Busy Busy

We have been incredibly busy lately and I am finally looking forward to a weekend with NOTHING on the calendar! Because of all of our busyness, Hannah has been a bit cranky lately, but hopefully that will work itself out now that we are calming our schedule down a bit.

The gymnastics show a few weeks ago was a big success. Hannah had a great time and Kyle and Grandpa got some awesome photos. I used photoshop and made composite images for every kid in the show. It was a lot of work, but I had fun doing it and those parents that I got to talk to really liked their pics. Last weekend Tiffany's twins had their 5th birthday so Hannah got to see them and she had a blast at the party. She especially loved playing on Kayla and Chase's swing set. The same weekend Hannah had her gymnastics meet we also did the March of Dimes March for Babies (formerly known as Walk America). This year Hannah was one of Lilly's poster kids because the antiviral that cured Hannah's herpes and saved her from serious neurological damage was developed using a grant from the March of Dimes. Hannah had fun on the walk and loved seeing all the dogs the people had with them.

Hannah's language skills continue to grow by leaps and bounds. She is now praying on her own and will often incorporate the day's events into her prayers and not just recite a standard memorized prayer. We had no idea she could pray like that until one night when we bowed our heads to say our bedtime prayers she just started praying! Here is what she said, "Dear Jesus, Thank you for the day. Fun with Grandpa, fun with Daddy, fun with Mommy. Amen" This was the night of her gymnastics show and she had had a very fun day and seen Grandpa. Kyle and I were both shocked. The other day we were sitting at a stop sign and a bus pulled up beside us and Hannah said. "I see a bus. I see an octagon." The bus started to pull forward and she said, "I see another octagon. Two octagons." She was pointing at the stop signs on the arms of the school bus! Then, tonight she got in trouble for chewing on one of the letters on her play mat and Kyle put her in time out. She started to cry and then called out, "I'm sorry Daddy for chewing the M." On Monday she had a doctor's appointment and when the doctor came in she looked at him and said, "Leave the door open please Dr. Hendrick." I thought the doctor was going to keel over. He turned to me and said, "What 2 year old talks like that!?!" I replied, "but she's not even 2!"

She now knows all of her alphabet except for X, V, and N. She often calls X K, V Y and N Z. She can identify several lower case letters now and knows basically all of her letter sounds. She's still pretty much stuck at 13 in the counting department, but if you get her past 13 and break the 13, 7-13, 7-13 cycle she can sometimes get to 20.

Potty training is still pretty much holding steady. We've had no major breakthroughs lately. She definitely gets great joy out of picking out her big girl underwear each day and gets very excited each time we check them and they are dry.

Obedience is currently a hot topic in the Spontak household. As Hannah grows more and more independent she becomes ever more willful. She will push the limits on the same issue dozens of times a day even if it means getting multiple time outs in a row! There are days when I feel like she spends ALL day in time out. Hitting is another unruly behavior that has reared it's ugly head and I am none too pleased with it. It seems like whenever she gets frustrated, bored, or the whim just strikes her she will haul off and hit us. She gets time outs for this so often that many times when asked why she got a time out she will default answer for hitting even if that's not why she was in time out! Time outs or a stern "NO!" don't seem to be making much difference. I am hoping that this is a phase that she will soon grow out of because it is really trying my patience.

Physically she can now jump and get both feet off the ground all the time, but she still hasn't grasped the concept of jumping off of things yet which is actually good in my opinion! She climbs like a crazy woman. She goes up ladders, steps, cargo netting, rock walls, etc. She can sit by herself in big kid swings and go down pretty much any slide by herself. She's working on walking on the balance beam by herself and is very motivated to learn how to do it. She can really run now (not just a fast walk) and loves to do it any chance she gets. She can usually walk up and down steps alone as long as she has a railing or something else to hold onto and she is starting to want to go up and down without holding onto anything which makes me nervous.

Some people have asked me what Hannah wants for her birthday. She doesn't NEED anything really except for some clothes for the next season, but when I said last year that she didn't need gifts I had people asking me anyway for ideas. So, here are some ideas if you feel like you really want to get her a gift. She's currently wearing size 3T and 4T dresses and shirts. For pants she needs size 3T, preferably elastic waist without zippers or buttons that she can pull up and down herself for easy potty training! For shorts she needs 2T or 3T. If you want to get ahead for the fall, she could really use some 3T (or to be safer 4T) long sleeve shirts, light weight jackets and sweaters or sweatshirts. She's currently wearing size 8 shoes. She doesn't have any sandals or dress shoes that fit. She could also use size 4T/5T ( I think they only come in two size increments and the size she is wearing now is 2T/3T) big girl underwear because some of the pairs she has now are already getting tight. Socks for shoe size 8 or bigger would be great because she has very few pairs that still fit (thank heavens it's almost summer and hopefully I can get her into some sandals soon!). I'm always looking for cute hair bows and clips to tame her wild hair. I love the curly ones from Gymboree(she wearing ones from there in almost every picture in this post!). They work great in her hair because they seem to be just the right size/stretchiness.

Besides clothes she LOVES books. She can read books with regular paper pages just fine now and rarely (if ever) tears pages anymore, but board books are still fine too. New alphabet and counting books are always big hits. Those seem to be her favorites from the library these days. Also, any books about adoption would be good. Some of the best ones I've found from the library are Megan's Birthday Tree by Laurie Lears, The Red Thread, An Adoption Fairytale by Grace Lin, Over the Moon by Karen Katz, and A Mother for Choco by Keiko Kasza. She likes all of these books and I feel they portray adoption in a realistic or favorable light. I would say her favorite of all of these (and the only one I've ever seen in a bookstore, I kicked myself for not buying it then, but I didn't know she would like it so much!) is A Mother for Choco. Other favorite books that we have checked out from the library recently that we don't have are DW Flips, I Love You Stinky Face, Hop on Pop, and DK My First Phonics Board Book.
As far as other interests go, she loves animals, puzzles (she could stand to have some new ones since she's completely mastered the 3 she has), Diego, anything Sesame Street,-especially Grover, The Backyardigans, Fisher Price Little People toys (she has the barn, ark, and A-Z Learning Zoo) the computer (we've thought about getting her the Leap Frog Click Start My First Computer, but it's kinda expensive), swing sets, toy kitchens/food, art supplies (stickers, stamps, scissors, etc) and anything that teaches numbers or letters. She is NOT very into stuffed animals or dolls.
I think that is all the updates I have for now. I'll try to get some more videos uploaded as soon as I can.