Owen Update

We have a walker!! Owen took his first steps a couple of weeks ago and has been perfecting his technique ever since. He prefers walking over crawling and will crawl to the nearest object to pull himself up. We love watching the pride on his face as he walks towards us. Of course, with his new found skill, we are entering the bumps and bruises phase of life with a baby. It doesn't help having older siblings who chase after him or come running around corners and take him out. Owen has also cut another tooth bringing his total up to 7 and is working on two molars. He is waving bye-bye and says ba ba for bye-bye and for baby. He signs "more" and "all done" and has mastered the art of shaking his head no!! Owen loves clapping and is realizing that he can make us laugh. Tonight he entertained us with a new dance and just kept going because of our reaction. He is still horribly attached to me but when I think of Alex finishing up his first year of school in just a couple of weeks, I relish it and know that it will all go by too quickly!

Jenna Update

Jenna participated in a gymnastics recital earlier this month. She had so much fun and loves her ribbons and medal that she received! Last week we learned that her coach would like to put her on the pre-team track at the gym. Today, we signed her up. Over the summer Jenna will spend two hours in the gym a week. She will begin working on the larger equipment more. During the next year, they will work with Jenna to move her up to a level four, which is the standing that is required to begin competing. Jenna will be able to begin competing when she is six years old. Right now Jenna is very excited about all of this. We will continue to follow this as long as she is having fun. Of course, all this happening today coincided with her first injury. I was awed at watching her hold a perfect hand stand today for a good amount of time, then watched as she crashed over and quickly grabbed her foot. I noticed her rubbing her little toe on her left foot. She sat for a bit, then jumped right up and went back to work. After class she told me she hurt her toe. I told her I saw it and asked if it still hurt. She said a little. We went to the park, where she jumped and ran and climbed all afternoon with her friends. After getting Alex from school, we finally came home and she took her shoes off. She said she hated her shoes because they hurt her toe. When I looked at her toe I could not believe what I saw...red, purple nasty bruise the entire length of her toe and wrapped around the backside. It isn't broke, not after everything she did that day, but it looks terrible and I sit back and sigh and think this may just be the beginning of many more injuries.

Alex Update

The first picture is on Mother's Day. Alex lost one of his front teeth. OK, he pulled it a bit prematurely as there was too much blood involved for my liking. Luckily he did do this because it was a great cover for one of our biggest parent blunders to date...the tooth fairy forgot! Here is the story - Mother's Day was great. I spent a quiet day with my family which is just what I wanted to do. We spent the afternoon outside enjoying the weather but I was silently being attacked by nasty allergens. During Owen's bath my hands broke out in a very painful allergic reaction. I took some benadryl knowing that it would knock me out for the rest of the night, but needing it because my hands hurt so bad. Before I passed out I reminded my back-up tooth fairy of his job. Well, he was side-lined by Jenna later that night due to nightmares, leg pain, something along those lines, so the tooth fairy never came. UGH! After much doubt in the tooth fairy's existence, Joe reassured Alex that the tooth fairy would come that night. That is was actually Alex who messed the tooth fairy up. See, she had Alex on the schedule for that night, but Alex threw her off by pulling the tooth out early and she could not possibly squeeze him in. Sold, story worked, tooth fairy came, all was good!! Three days later the other front tooth came out and the tooth fairy was on time!! We love his gappy grin!!