This week Lisa took some pictures of the kids playing in the driveway. If you remember, Mara got her jeep some time ago and wasn’t very adept at using it. Here is a chance to get a real look at Mara driving around. When we first put her in this thing she didn’t even know what to do. We had to push the button and walk along side her to let her have some fun with it. Now it is not problem and she goes all over. Even off roadin’.
I love my jeep.
Let’s see what this baby can do…
So the topic of this post is a little old, but I was searching for something to post about since it had been a while since the last time we put something up here. These pics were actually taken by Lisa in April and are a little dated.
Mara has had a tricycle now for while, but it has been until this year where she has made the turn to being able to ride it with no problems. It used to be that one of us had to push her around, but now she is out in the cul-de-sac doing donuts when we are not looking.
On this particular day the crew took a trip up to the playground. Not knowing how far it is if you have never been there, and most of you have not, it has to be about a 10-15 minute walk. Mara proceeded to ride her trike all the way there with ease. One might think, riding is better than walking, but after looking at the size of this vehicle, I would think twice.
Look at the intensity!
Sweet success is best experienced in a swing.
This past weekend was part of the pool season here in the neighborhood, like most pools around the country. We left off a good season last year, with Mara jumping in the pool all on her own. She was highly anticipating our Saturday walk to the pool, and started talking up all the swimming she planned to do beginning early in the week. It turns out she talks a good game, but it’s going to take a little longer for her to really get into the swing of things. It probably didn’t help that the water was freezing, but reality is she has probably forgotten a little bit about what she had accomplished last year and a little fear has set in. It should only be a matter of time though.
Contemplating a strategy…
Stylin’
Mara was getting crafty again last week. Grandma had gotten her a purse for her birthday and had put a Michaels giftcard inside for her to go spend. Lisa took Mara over to the store the other week for her to get whatever she wanted to put on her purse.
Now, Mara liked the purse as it was, with it plain. But after they were done with it, it was quite a sight to see. And she likes it even more.
Doesn’t it look fancy?
Her favorite thing to do with it is to carry some of her smaller buddies around in it. You can see who is hiding in the purse in the second video below. (WARNING, the videos are large)
241 MB / Time 2:12
147 MB / Time 1:18
Grandma came to town last Friday to do a little babysitting as Lisa had to leave early for the day. Any time that she can get with the kids she tries to take advantage of. At the end of the day Mom and Grandma took the kids to the playground for a little fun outside. Dad arrived at the playground to meet them directly from work, so it was all of us there together.
Mom has been taking a digital photography class, and got a new camera for her birthday. Needless to say there has been a lot of practicing going on and Friday was no exception. There are fifty pictures that I have uploaded, and I even eliminated a few before doing so. Here are just a few of them below. If you want to see the rest then click on one of the pictures to get to the album.
Kicking it on the swing.
Swinging makes me smile!
Little brother and big sister having fun on the slide.
Grandma is fun to play with.
Well, little Mara’s birthday just seems to live on and on. Of course her party was two weekends ago. But on Friday, her real birthday, she got to go for a trip to the movies to see The Chipmunks. She was decked out in her birthday gear for that event. Alvin is her favorite, or “the one with the red shirt,” as she likes to call him.
Baby, I can accessorize.
Later that night she went with Mom and Dad to her favorite eatery, Red Robin. She wore her crown again, but we didn’t get any pictures. When the serving crew came by to sing to Mara and deliver her chocolate sundae, she had a great big smile on her face.
Then came Monday, and Lisa was just too kind. She got Mara a dance outfit, a ballerina dress. Mara loves it! She didn’t want to take it off for dinner that night, but we were afraid she would get it dirty. On Tuesday she put it right back on, and wore it to her dance class at the little gym.
Watch this!
And I sing too.
Here is some video of what she learned in class.
52.4 MB / Time 0:29
Mara’s real birthday has yet to come, but yesterday we celebrated with a little party at the house. It was a Prince and Princess party for our little one. The kids had quite a bit of fun making crowns and tiaras at a craft station that mom put together. We also played pin the crown on the princess too. There were some other games that we had planned, but really the kids just wanted to play with toys and it would have been like herding cats to get them to do much else. As it was, we passed two hours along in no time. This party was pretty special because there were quite a few children that came that Mara has not seen in a long time. Since leaving Primrose for daycare, she hasn’t seen her former classmates and they were nice enough to come see her. Thanks!
We took quite a few pictures and tried to catch one of all the kids that came. Sorry if we missed you! It was chaos.
Birthday princess surveys her kingdom.
Presents are better with buddies.
Cousin Grace is turning one and her birthday is really close to Mara’s, only two days before. So she was in town to celebrate as well with the family, and she got a cake of her own.
We also got some video of her. Here is the smaller of the two files. Auntie Jen, we will have to send you a link to get the other one and download it.
11.0 MB / Time 0:06
All partygoers got to leave with a CD of songs that we played at the party. If you didn’t get one let us know.
Mara’s first album cover.
Over the holiday week, The Little Gym had some open sessions where anyone that was enrolled could come in for scheduled open sessions. This gave Mom and Dad an opportunity to see Mara at the gym since she had been in classes this winter session and Lisa had been the one taking her during the week. Needless to say she was a little wild, and it was hard to tell if she was learning particular skills or just horsing around. To be fair, since it was an open session there wasn’t really any controlled play. We got her to show us a couple moves. This is the first time I’ve seen her in the gym since her birthday. There are more pictures as you click through to the album.
What is this?
Jumping that gets the curls bouncing.
OK. This looks like she has been practicing.
As mentioned on her brother’s site, we have some video from Christmas this year. Although a majority of the pictures over there were taken on Christmas Eve, this video was shot on Christmas day. It isn’t indicated in the video, but the first portion has all the kids at the beginning of the morning and them opening some gifts. The next portion of the video is just Mara opening some of the rest of her gifts while the younger ones take a nap. It just took so long to get through all the gifts that the kids got this year, we spent almost the whole morning opening things. Needless to say it was difficult getting them through the morning. With every gift for Mara she wanted to open it up and play with it right away. It took some finagling to get her to move on to the next gift each time. You might even catch a sourpuss face on her every once in a while as if she doesn’t want to open the gift, because she is still thinking about the last one we wouldn’t let her play with.
This is a VERY big file. Start to download it, then walk away for a little while.
139 MB / Time 27:53
Some pictures leading up to the big day. Taken on Saturday.
Naughty?
Or nice…
Naughty?
Or nice…
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