Kid President's 20 Things We Should Say More Often

We watched this video at a staff meeting.  It is too cute not to share.  Enjoy.

Harper can READ

At just 4 years old, Harper is learning to read!  For the past few months Harper has been really interested in the beginning sounds/letters of words.  She has been practicing sounding words out by writing them on paper.  (Ex: garlic toast = grlk tost)  I decided that I would buy her some books for beginning readers just to see how she'd do.  She did AWESOME!  She read the first 10 books with hardly any help.  (Side note: teaching your child to read takes A LOT of patience as it may take 30+ seconds just to read one sentence.)   

After doing a little research, I decided to start with  BOB Books for Beginning Readers.  (I actually ordered them from Amazon though)  There are 10 books in each series.  Each book focuses on a different sound, vowel, or sight word.  Every series contains the same familiar characters.  The illustrations are simple, with black, white and red being the only colors.  I definitely recommend BOB books for anyone with kids that are learning how to read.  We will be purchasing more books as Harper's reading skills advance.  And we will be buying the 'pre-reader' series for Elliet. 

Check out the videos of Harper reading!

I hope Harper's love of books and reading continues as she grows up!

Mall of America Videos

Here are a few videos of Harper on the rides at the Mall of America.....she had no fear and can't wait to go back!

February

Is tomorrow the first day of March already? As you can probably guess from my lack of blogging, February was a complete blur! My last semester or nursing school is keeping me very busy! On a positive note, today marked my halfway point for clinicals and we're only 1 1/2 weeks away from spring break! I want and NEED a break....school is stressing me out; June 19th can't get here fast enough. These just may be the longest 3.5 months of my life.

Anyways, I finally uploaded a few pics and videos. I will hopefully have a handful of blogs posted in the next week.

Here is the first video, taken January 13th, 2012. Don't mind Harper's hair - it's much cuter now that she got it cut {future blog :)}

My little pianist ~ learning how to play the only thing her mommy knows - Twinkle Twinkle

Nursery Rhymes

Harper LOVES to sing. Some of her favorites are: Happy Birthday (which we end up singing to EVERY.PERSON.IN.OUR.FAMILY), Twinkle Twinkle, Itsy Bitsy Spider, ABC's, Baa Baa Black Sheep, Wheels on the Bus, This Old Man, and If You're Happy and You Know It. We are currently trying to spice up our mix with a few Christmas carols :)

We usually sing for a good half hour - let's just say that my voice is sore by the end. No joke!

Here is a video of Harper singing a few of her favorites.

NERLIEN!!!

Harper now knows her last name....

Best Friends

Here is a sweet video of Harper and Ali showing their love for one another :)

These two have really taken a liking to each other this summer. I love watching them 'play' together.

I am afraid of dogs, so I am amazed at Harper's courage while around Ali. Harper has never shown any fear around Ali.

I love that I trust Ali 100%. I know that Ali would never do anything to hurt Harper. Now Harper on the other hand....I think she gets a little rough with Ali by wanting to point out her eyes and ears while she gouges her little fingers in Ali's face. None the less, Ali takes it; after giving Adam a "help me!" look.

Harper also likes to boss Ali around ;)

I never thought I'd say it, but I am happy that Adam has brought Ali into our 'family.' (But don't get your hopes up, we will NEVER have an indoor pet.....EVER!)

Blank Park Zoo 2011

Aug 8, 2011

A few weeks ago we headed to Des Moines for our 2nd annual trip to the zoo. The three of had a lot of fun spending the day together. We love watching Harper learn new things and seeing her get excited. Here are a few pics from our special day.

Adam and Harper on the train. This was Harper's FAVORITE part of the zoo - who needs animals when you can ride on a choo-choo train?! She talked about the train for days!

Look at those cheeks!

Sad face! No more choo-choo! I told her to smile for a picture, but she decided to show me her sad face instead. Little stinker!

We watched the monkeys play for a very long time!

Front row seat for watching the giraffe eat!

Feeding the goats. She didn't like this very much because it was stinky! She did not like the smell and she repeatedly said 'Poop" and made her gag face!

Making a little music at the playground

Harper loved the fishes!

As we did last year, we met up with the soon to be Mr. & Mrs. for supper again!

Future Career???

Harper just may have found her calling in life :P

We got the McDonald's cash register along with a box of toy food at a consignment shop. Harper quickly fell in love with the cash register. I think she does a better job than half the people that I've seen working at McDonald's!

Weekend Recap

Last weekend we traveled back home for a wedding of a childhood friend. We had a great time catching up with old friends. Harper came with us and enjoyed dancing at the reception. Adam's parents went to the wedding/reception as well and offered to take Harper home with them when she got tired. It was great having a night 'away.' Here are a few of my favorite pictures of the weekend:

Here are a few videos of Harper dancing:

Slow Dancing with Duckie :)

Random:

Happy 22nd Birthday to my brother, Michael! I hope you enjoyed the 90 degree weather we had today!

We will be heading home again this weekend for our niece's high school graduation.

Tomorrow I start my summer class...and I'm nervous!

New Words

Harper is a jabber-box these days, at home anyways. Our daycare told us that Harper is very quiet and only will say 'mommy,' 'daddy,' and 'duckie' when she's there. Which is surprising because she says around 50 words now. I'm not surprised that she is quiet at daycare; Harper is very shy and it takes a while for her to warm up and be herself around new people and/or large groups. Daycare said that she is very good and smiles all the time. They also said that she is very good with the babies and gives them toys all of the time :) Harper will be a great big sister someday!

I initially took this video to capture Harper saying 'Maggie,' who is one of Harper's babysitters. I am going to show them this video to show them that she DOES talk....all of the time!

Here are some of Harper's newest words!

(my favorite is 'basketball')

Explanation on 'Dora': The theme song for "Dora the Explorer" sings d-d-d-d-d-Dora. Which is why Harper says 'di-di' for Dora. A funny story about Dora: Dora is Hispanic and when we were at the park last weekend, Harper saw a Hispanic lady and her daughter and started saying 'di-di-di!' She said the same thing a few weeks ago when we went to a Hispanic friend's wedding....I think I need to teach Harper that not every Hispanics name is Dora!

Catch Up

I realized that I've forgotten been to lazy to blog about some important events in our lives. This blog may be random and lengthy; I apologize now.

Celebrations:

Today is my father-in-laws birthday! Happy Birthday Grandpa Gary! We all love you very much! We're happy we got to celebrate with you last night.

This one is WAY over due - Happy BELATED ( x 1000) to Adam! He celebrated his birthday back at the end of January (whoops!) Adam had to work and I traveled to Des Moines for a girls night out with some college friends. Thank you June, for watching Harper!

On Tuesday Adam and I 'celebrated' our 3 year anniversary of renewing our vows. We don't really consider this a celebration - we celebrate the day we were legally married by the Justice of the Peace - which is coming up in June - FIVE years baby! However, March 15th was still a special day for us - it was a great way to celebrate and honor our vows since we weren't able to have a traditional wedding before Adam deployed to Iraq.

Harper

Well, Harper is sick again :( We took her to the doctor today for exhibiting symptoms of a low-grade fever, rapid and heavy breathing, harsh cough, and a rattling/wheezing sound in her chest. The doctor informed us that she has an ear infection in her right ear and probably has RSV or bronchitis. (A child in the nursery at Harper's daycare got diagnosed with RSV last week) The doctor didn't draw her blood or anything to do an official test to differentiate because he would treat both infections the same anyways. So why put her through torture?

Anyways, she is now on an antibiotic for her ear infection. And she is also to complete four nebulizer treatments every day until her lungs clear up. She is not a fan of the neb treatments - it's too hard for her to sit still for 5 minutes. I'm not sure how effective the nebulizer is at this point, but it sure is better than nothing. We're also giving her ibuprofen to help with her pain and fever, and we have a humidifier in her bedroom.

Please keep Harper in your thoughts and prayers and pray for a speedy and healthy recovery.

I was supposed to go to Iowa City tomorrow night for a bachelorette party. My MIL was going to watch Harper b/c Adam has to work. However, I don't want to leave her. I know she'd be fine - but I guess it's just be being a first-time mom that has me worried.

My spring break FLEW by - I am not looking forward to going back to school on Monday. I think we only have 6 weeks of class left! Yipee!

Hope you're all having a fabulous weekend!

PS - tomorrow is the first day of SPRING! Yay!!!!!

Another Video :)

Here is another cute video that I promised. It is so much easier to post a video of Harper than trying to explain her awesomeness! She has really been working on her vocabulary this past week. Proof at the end of the video! Sorry about the blurriness - someone (AKA - Harper!) got ahold of my junky camera and smudged up the lens.

Isn't that one of the cutest things you've seen?!?!?! She is such a good mommy to her babies! And she knows how to say her name!!!!! Yay!

Growing Up!

Here is a little video of Harper. She is getting so big SO FAST! It's hard to believe that she's almost closer to being two than being one. Very exciting! I have another video or two to post soon. It seems like she's learned so much just last week alone. It is so much fun in this house!

Ho Ho Ho

Here is Harper doing her best impression of Santa.

And saying 'Bump-a' ~ we call one of my grandpa's 'Bump'. Weird - I know! When I was younger I couldn't say Grandpa so instead I called him Bumpa - the name has stuck now for almost 27 years! Now Harper can say it too!

Bedtime Routine

We've added a few new items to our bedtime routine: brushing our teeth and refilling the humidifier. That's about how exciting it gets in our household! Harper LOVES to brush her teeth before bed. When she signs to us that she wants to go ni-night, she also points to her teeth, letting us know that she wants to brush her teeth. We've been doing this for a few weeks now, so her skills have improved from when we took the video. I think she mostly likes sucking the water off the toothbrush and messing around with all of our 'stuff' on the counter. While we have her sitting still, we also have a solution that we put on her head because she has and EXTREMELY dry scalp at times.

She also has dry skin, hence why we have to refill the humidifier. As soon as she's done brushing her teeth, Harper runs to the humidifier and pounds on it. She is so stinkin' smart! Then she plays in the water that pools at the bottom of it while I'm refilling the tank. Even though I tell her 'NO!' She usually peeks to see if I'm watching her before she sticks her little hands in the water. Or she points at the water and says 'Nah!' (her version of 'no')

Another change in our bedtime routine is that she takes a bath in the big bathtub now. She loves it! Her favorite thing is to sit in the tub with the water running. She USED to be TERRIFIED of the running water. Funny how things change. Because she now loves the vacuum, which she used to cry every time we turned it on, or even had it sitting out. My little girl is growing up!

Playing in the leaves

We took advantage of the gorgeous fall weather today and played in the leaves! A new first for Harper. She loved it! Enjoy the pictures.

"Can I really jump into all of these leaves?!"

This is fun!

Mommy played in the leaves too

Time to bury mommy!

Daddy's turn to play with me!

..JUMP!....

Harper is turning into a silly and VERY active girl these days! Walking is a thing of the past - she usually RUNS everywhere. I often wonder why she feels the need to run from room to room or toy to toy. Good exercise I guess. She also knows how to climb on furniture, go up AND down the stairs, and get down from the chair/couch/bed. Her newest skill is JUMPING! Or so she thinks that she is jumping. I'm not really sure how she learned the concept of jumping. I think I was acting like a bunny one night to entertain her and the rest is history. Yes, I was hopping around like a bunny. If only you could be a fly on our wall!!!!! Enjoy the video :)

PS - It took 24 hour for the video to load - I promise I was trying to keep on on my blog.

Self Feeding

Harper has been practicing her self-feeding skills using a spoon. We've only experimented a few times because it just gets so messy, and a lot of the foods she eats are finger foods. But we realize that practice makes perfect so we have to keep trying. The biggest issue is with Harper picking up the bowl and dumping it out. We bought a bowl that suctions to her tray - but it doesn't hold up the best with a determined and strong little girl!

Look at me trying to be a big girl!

Well, maybe it's easier to use my fingers instead...

or even easier just to drink my yogurt!


I'm trying so hard!

Blank Park Zoo

Today we enjoyed one of the last weekends of summer by taking a trip to the Blank Park Zoo in Des Moines. It sure was hot - but we had lots of fun! We're already planning a trip to the zoo for next summer!

To start the trip out right - ADAM decided to turn Harper's car seat so it was facing forward! The guidelines suggest that the child be 20 lbs AND at least one year old. Well, Harper is 20 lbs and almost one. Two weeks shy - what's the big deal - it's not like she little-little. I wasn't going to argue with 'the law' - aka - Adam :) She is getting to be such a big girl!!! How cute is she?!?!

Harper's favorite part of the zoo was Kiddie Kingdom - a large petting zoo and playground. You could feed the animals through the little boxes. Harper was not afraid to walk right up to the boxes and stick her head and hands in there! The animals didn't stay long once they realized that she didn't have food.

Harper and Daddy checking out the animals

Mommy and Harper eating some ice cream - it was hot!



Looking at the Tiger...

The Giraffe's were my favorite!

We took a ride on the little train that drives around the zoo grounds. Harper loved it! She sat like a very good girl between Adam and I. Took everything in! What a big girl!

We ended our day with a quick trip to Old Navy - and then ate supper at On The Border with Abby and Aaron!

This is just a short video of Harper walking around - I love watching her walk - This was at Kiddie Kingdom.

Here is a video of Harper at the petting zoo - she was laughing and screaming at the goats :)