Yikes, 2 weeks went by?

Crazy how fast time goes! We've had a nice couple weeks. Lots of rain, which has been much needed. There's nothing like hearing the rain at night :o). We've had a lot of inside play time and the kids have gotten a little creative in their play. Here's a picture of what they were doing today:

We also implemented a gold star reward program a few weeks ago and it has been such a success. Reggie has been very good about getting dressed in the morning, helping me with the laundry/dishes and cleaning up his room! I got up one morning and he was already dressed, had picked up his room and the living room and had put the dishes away (too bad they were dirty!!!). When he gets 10 stars, he gets a surprise toy. Ainsley participates, but isn't as into it. She doesn't seem to mind helping just for the sake of doing it.

Last week we had teacher conferences at Reggie's pre-school. It was great to get some feedback on how he is at school. He is definitely ready for Kindergarten, but we need to work a bit more on sounds and reading retention. It was interesting to see his self portrait at the beginning of the year (looked similar to a snowman with eyes) vs. now (he had arms/legs/hands/hair). He has grown leaps and bounds in his art ability :o).
We had some extra time since he didn't have school, so we hit the bike trail and went for a ride. I thought it would be fun to throw rocks in the overflow drainage area that has only had water in it twice since we've been here. Reggie wanted so bad to get to the other side and there was a big branch in the water and he thought he would try to walk out on it. I turned my head for one second and he fell off it. Thankfully, it was only calf deep, but his pants and shoe got soaked. Last year that would have sent him into a crying fit, but he laughed about it. And then, he took his socks and shoes off and waded to the other side. He got full of mud and didn't even care. I was smiling the whole time, wondering who this little boy was! Ainsley wanted to follow Reggie, but she put her feet in the water and decided it wasn't for her. She managed to get plenty dirty, just throwing rocks and sitting in the dirt. We had a nice fast ride home (last year I couldn't pedal slow enough and I was constantly waiting for him), even venturing off the trail to ride up and down a hill :o).
We had Ainsley's gymnastics class this morning. She has been doing so great and I'm amazed at all of the things she'll try and that she can actually do. It is really fun to watch her!

Reggie's baseball has been quite the committment. His team practices twice a week and this Sat. they had a practice baseball game. It was during Ainsley's nap, so Ryan took Reggie and he did great. Doesn't he look good in his uniform, cup and all?!

Ainsley loves it when I tell her stories about babies and a couple days ago, I was telling her about how she was born and then Reggie came over and wanted to hear about how he was born. Of course Ainsley was asking about Grandma baby and Daddy baby and I had to explain to her that I couldn't tell those stories because I wasn't there! Anyway, Reggie somehow remembered that we had video of him and he wanted to watch some of it. I put it on and Ainsley was in heaven!!! After about 10 minutes, she wanted to watch herself. Yikes! We haven't transferred her videos to DVD's and I didn't even remember taking much. So, last night, Ryan and I got out the movie camera and were watching fun family videos. We found some of her, but I think our next project will be sorting that out (we made the mistake of using 2 different cameras, partly because we couldn't find the power cord to one of them. Ryan found it a month ago in my car glove box....hmmm). We have not done as good of a job capturing video of her and we need to be better about that. Movie night this week was watching baby Reggie and baby Ainsley.

Happy Valentine's Day!!!

We had a few Valentine parties this week and I'm happy to say they are over. Reggie painstakingly addressed all of his to his classmates. It took 45 minutes to do 5 (and that is no exaggeration!) and I have to say Ryan and I lost our patience a few times. We've had a very nice day today. We went for a drive and visited a huge Bass store in Manteca. The kids had a great time looking at all the animals/fish, climbing on the party boats and finding anything that looked like a toy.

We've had a crazy couple weeks, between Ryan working long hours, Reggie's baseball practice, gymnastics, Ainsley's class and all of us being sick! I had a nasty cold all week and am just starting to feel better (I even lost my voice one day, which I'm sure the kids enjoyed). Ryan has the same cold, but seems to be handling it better. Yesterday, I woke up with my eye crusted shut! So, I had to load up the kids and go to my Dr. to get a prescription. It looks like I gave it back to Ainsley, so we're starting her drops again, grrr!!!

I missed blogging a huge milestone a couple weeks ago....Ainsley moved into a big girl bed. She used to have major issues falling asleep and some nights are still a challenge, but it has been so much better since she moved into her bed. Very strange, but we'll take it! When we were setting it up, we talked about having a sleepover in Ainsley's room because her bed has a trundle. I told Reggie maybe after movie night. He, of course, reminded me after the movie last week, so they had a sleepover and it went really well. So, we now have movie and sleepover night :o)!

Reggie had 2 evenings of t-ball practice this week and Ryan spent an hour or so working with him today. They were pitching to the kids on Thursday and Reggie didn't hit a single ball. He did great when Ryan worked with him:

We tried a couple gymnastics classes this week and Reggie decided that he doesn't like anything about gymnastics except the pit, so we won't be signing him up (which is great because they cost $15/kid per class!). Ainsley, on the other hand, loved it. She doesn't do any activities, so this will be good for her.

First t-ball practice and movie night

Reggie's first t-ball practice was last week and it started out like every new activity. Him sitting (actually, he was laying in the grass) and watching, refusing to participate. The coach was quick to try to get him involved and paired him up with a fellow teammate. He and Christain played catch and they both had a ball! I think he forgot I was even there. They did a circuit where he hit, caught fly balls and fielded grounders. He did amazingly well for not ever practicing. He had so much fun, he didn't notice until we got to the car that Ainsley had been picked up by Ryan! When we got in the car, he said, "I love baseball! I didn't think I was going to like it, but I do. I want to play everyday." He was very excited to tell Ryan all about it. I was commenting on how good he did at catching and hitting and he said, "yeah, I think I'm a professional!" I was cracking up :o). We are both really excited he liked it, but since then, he hasn't wanted to play with us. I think he just likes to play with other kids?

We started a new thing last weekend, movie night. We usually watch about 1/2 show per day, but I thought it would be fun to actually watch an entire movie and pop some popcorn. No surprise, it has been a huge hit. Ainsley was chanting tonight, "movie night, movie night." They alternate picking the movie, but Reggie seems to influence Ainsley a bit.

We are still sick. Both of them got pink eye, so we've been dropping their eyes 3 times a day....oh, what fun that is. We had a bit of a mix up a couple days ago because Ryan couldn't find the eye drops. He grabbed what he thought was eye drops, but was actually ear drops! They totally freaked out, but I was at a Kindergarten meeting, so Ryan didn't figure it out. The next morning, he did it again and I quickly figured out something was very wrong. Thankfully, the natural ear drops are very mild, but the pharmacist said it would probably feel like putting orange juice in your eye. Ryan felt terrible, but it was a good reminder to always check the label before using anything. Ainsley has another ear infection (that's 2 in one month) and we're trying to let her work it out on her own. She's been doing great, but we're tired of high night fevers. We'll give it a couple more days and see what happens. I just got the cold last night, so I've been laying low today-I'm glad Ryan is here!

Big man Reggie!

Yesterday we adjusted the training wheels on Reggie's bike. They are so high that they really only catch him if he is going to fall. He rode on the bike trail and to the park and was very proud that he didn't hear his training wheels. He did so good and it seemed effortless. I guess he was ready! He's been a bit obsessed with it since. We're going to go again this afternoon and I'm going to run (this might be a really good thing-I could push Ainsley in the jogger and he could ride his bike!).

Ryan took the kids to the zoo in the morning, while I ran some errands. They had a great time and got to see a big elephant unload...Ainsley thought this was very funny! There's also a small park with rides next to the zoo that they enjoyed. Ryan had to fib a bit on Ainsley's height.

We've had a bit of an unhealthy run lately. We had two weeks of the stomach bug, rotating from person to person. Ryan had it the longest, but Reggie had it the worst (we were changing sheets like crazy in the middle of the night). Ainsley only threw up once and I never got it. Must have been a man bug! We capped it off with some brutal food poisoning. Ryan got most of it out in 1/2 hour, but I was sick for about 3-4 hours :o(. It has been a long time since I've thrown up and I don't care to do it anytime soon! We're now back to colds. Reggie is complaining of an ear ache and he's never had one, so I think I'll see if I can get him some drops. It seems strange that he would get an ear infection at 5 years old when he's never had one.

My friend Sarah had her baby (Cooper!), so I had Sam and Michael one day last week. It was very busy, but they all had tons of fun. They were a bit disappointed they weren't able to do a sleepover, but I think they were all worn out from playing so hard all day. Ainsley is very excited about the baby and spent a good 1/2 hour holding him when he was 3 days old. She has a new excitement for playing at their house :o).