Gymnastics

Here are a few pictures of Autumn at her gymnastics class. The past couple of weeks she has been very insistent that she do things herself "no no, Aunumn do" or we get "s(t)op, s(t)op" with her hand held out like a traffic cop. She loves to walk across the balance beam and swing from the bars. And anything that might involve climbing she is all over.

Crazy Weather

Last week Autumn and I were playing outside in our short sleeved shirts, stomping around in puddles. This week she's wearing snowpants and snow boots so she can slide across those same puddles and I'm scraping my car's windows! This is the most crazy weather, I always forget how insane spring is here in MN. You'd think, having lived here for more than 10 years now I'd remember this but nope, apparently my brain blocks it out every year. :)

Autumn is enthralled with the glow-in-the-dark stars on her ceiling. We sing to them every night.

Winka winka winka tars

howa howa howa are

upa upa upa kies

upa upa upa kies

winka winka winka tars

howa howa howa are

Spring Days

We made a race track in the living room during my vacation week. Autumn has fun driving the cars on it, but also running on it herself.

We moved the dragon humidifier into our room after we bought the elephant for Autumn. I was re-filling it one afternoon and when I came back into the bedroom this is what I found, the dragon was trying to eat Autumn!

After I finally found a pair of toddler sized rain boots Autumn couldn't wait to go out and "plash" in the "puwus" (puddles). She wanted to take her bear for a walk so we strapped it into the doll stroller nice and tight so it wouldn't fall out into the water. Autumn went back and forth and back and forth in the parking lot.

She's A Broadway Baby

We think that Autumn may do a stint on Broadway. She's got the moves and the lungs. She writes her own songs and choreographs her own dances. Maybe she'll write the plays too.

Take A Bow

Autumn got a new humidifier. At first it was this dragon, but now it is an elephant and the dragon is in our room. Kurt really liked the dragon so when we went to get a second one Autumn got to pick it out and she really liked the elephant. Here you can see that the dragon needed to blow it's nose. :) This dragon she really left alone but the elephant she is constantly trying to play with and the floor barely dries before she dumps it again. We need to figure out how to put it up higher but currently the only higher place we have is really close to the ceiling, I can't see that being very good, blowing mist right into the ceiling.

The video clip is of a "show" Autumn put on for us. It went on for at least 20 min. She would do a little bit of dancing/singing and then we clapped all of a sudden she bowed a couple of times saying "keekoo, keekoo". It was so funny!!! I have no idea where she learned to do that. She is such a kook.

A Rant

Why is it that it is next to impossible to find seasonal wear that coordinates with the season you are currently enjoying?!?!?! If you haven't figured out what size your child's feet will be by the end of the winter and have bought that size boot by Halloween then "sorry ma'am we aren't getting any more boots in this season". ??? What ??? It isn't even officially winter yet!! This is Minnesota!! And Heaven help you if you haven't anticipated (in JANUARY) that your toddler will want to stomp in every puddle located (in MARCH) and bought your rain boots. Because "I'm sorry ma'am, we got those in January and aren't expecting any more this spring" ?? Huh ??? If you really want these things you can of course spend extra to buy them from a store on line and hope and pray that you figured the size correctly! ARUGH! Oh, and by the way, the stores that do sell rainboots only sell them for older children, becuase there's no way a 2 year old will want to stomp in puddles or a parent who wants to keep the shoes in semi-good shape for at least a month or two. Oh yes, and don't forget to stock up on extra mittens and hats (for when they disappear) by the middle of November because you won't find any of those that fit either. Of all the...........

Spring!!!

(Yes yes I know, her hair is......well I just don't have the words)

It was fabulous out yesterday (monday march 16), almost hit 70 degrees!!! I took the week off from school since our district didn't do a spring break this year (lots of construction and moving around this year). Autumn and I walked to Ace Hardware, well she rode in her wagon, and then we played in the parking lot/yard with her wagon and car. Earlier yesterday morning we went to see the sharks and Ray (the manta rays) in the aquarium at the Mall of America. Then we went to Build-A-Bear and stuffed our very last pacifier into the bear. You can feel it in his foot. She spent a lot of time deciding which animal to pick and ended up with a bright pink bear with white hearts. To be honest it was a good choice, since it was a Valentine special and it's closer to Easter now, that one was on sale, and I still got to use my $5 coupon! She cried all the while stuffing the "fier" into the bear and the lady who was helping us was perfect, she talked about waht a big girl Autumn was being. After we did that we came home and had NO NAP!!!! But last night she slept fine and today she is napping. Tomorrow she goes back to daycare and I get down to some serious weaving!!! HURAHH I have no idea what I'm going to make but it'll be on my new rigid heddle loom that I can take anywhere with me. I'm so excited, I'll post pictures for those of you who have no idea what the heck I'm talking about. And now, without further ado, the reason all ya'll check this blog..........

Friends

Autumn has a couple of good friends that she greets so enthusiastically that many people ask "has it been a while since they've seen each other?" To which I reply "I believe it was yesterday..." She's such a social butterfly and does her best to share (as well as a 2 year old can share) and take turns. Though her turn is significantly longer than anyone elses, rather typical I belive. She even shares her daddy on occasion. One of her friends you can see here, they are playing ball and looking at pictures they each took with Autumn's camera and cooking some kind of amazing feast for Kurt and me to eat. No idea why but they both took turns standing in the bin of food in their bare feet. Autumn loves to share her kitchen with friends, it's more fun to cook with other people.

Language Explosion

Holy conversation Batman! I don't know when it happened but Autumn is a conversational guru. She can hold an actual conversation for 6-8 turns (here my developmental background comes through) and it all makes sense! And she really gets things too, maybe the kids I work with are just that delayed but I am amazed at the things I'm watching her do and learn and understand. It is fun to watch all the things I've studied actually happen in front of my eyes.

We were walking around the zoo yesterday and many of the animals in the Tropics Trail were off exhibit due to lots and lots and lots of noise from the creation of a new exhibit of crocodiles and some remodeling of the gibbons island. Autumn noticed that many of her favorites were not there. "ummmmmmmmm no bear" "monkey go?" "birds all gone" We got to the fish tanks and she started hunting for "memo" (we've watched Finding Nemo for probably a zillion times). She also tried to speak whale to the dolphins with not much luck, the glass is rather think you know. We were going from the Tropics Trail to the Minnesota Trail and she tapped her temple saying "tink tink tink" (we've also watched Pooh about a zillion times) and then she wanted to know "where amals?". So I said they were scared of the noise and were hiding in their houses. She promptly looked around for said houses. Better start watching myself here.

Later I asked her what she wanted for lunch "ummmmmm.....iono" (i don't know). This has become her new favorite phrase and she is perfecting the intonations and shoulder shrugging to go with it. What a kook! After lunch and while she was resisting a nap she was playing on the couch with her babies while I was doing the dishes. I heard her say "all done shirt" and then saw a shirt flying across the room. I looked around the corner and she was dancing shirtless on the couch. I laughed and told her she was silly which prompted a song to go with the dance all about "siwy Aunum". I went back to the dishes and heard "all done pants" and saw the pants fly across the room too. And more "siwy Aunum" singing. When I heard "all done diter" (diaper) I decided that we needed to end this strip show. I asked if we should put her clothes back on or take a bath and she decided on the bath. So off we went.

Later that night she found a roll of Christmas paper that I was going to put away and decided the roll would make good "gwasses" (I had recently made a pair of binoculars for her from a similar roll). So the paper was unrolled all down the hallway. It was ruined and when Kurt came up he asked if she was a present. She laid down on the paper and wrapped herself up. He said we should mail her to her grandparents and then she could yell surprise. So of course she did that for about an hour jumping up and yelling "prise!"

I'm glad our sick days are over and we are back to a normal schedule, though I could really get used to these kinds of days, it was lots of fun.

This is Autumn's new pet monkey (oh and her shoe). She loves to put him around her neck and carry him everywhere. The other one is of her being a present "prise!"

Phone Priveleges

Like any girl Autumn loves to talk on the phone, we may need to set some ground rules when she gets a bit older. :) Her favorite person to call is Papa (either one, she's not picky) but anyone who is home will do. If you aren't home and I can get her to wait long enough she'll leave a message on your machine. Recently she discovered that you can make yourself really comfortable while talking on the phone. And if you are going to spend a long time talking about the animals you saw at the zoo and your baby dolls and anything else you can think of words for, comfort is important.

Cool Dude!

Autumn loves to wear her "sasses" and is very adament that she put them on all by herself "no Aunum do!" (believe it or not they actually stay on her vace better when they are upside down, go figure) Actually she is very into doing just about EVERYTHING by herself. Welcome to the world of indepenence!