Madeline the Gymnast Part 2

Here are the better pictures, as promised.
Madeline getting ready to go in and showing off her outfit.
All the little gymnasts stretching out.
Madeline finishing one forward roll and getting ready to do another.
Madeline doing a cartwheel.
Madeline on the balance beam.

Madeline the Gymnast!

We have been trying to keep Maddie busy this summer with fun activities. One of them was gymnastics. Our local gym had 2 one week sessions in June and July. Maddie loves it! We went to watch today and were very impressed with what she could do. I think she's a natural! We weren't' sure if we were going to sign her up for just tap and ballet or also do gymnastics but have decided that she can do both as she enjoys gymnastics so much.
Sorry the pictures are a little fuzzy. The lighting was a little weird and she was in motion but you can get the general idea.
Here she is doing a straddle roll.

I kept trying to catch her in mid roll but my camera has a slight delay so, here she is again starting a straddle roll. Nana took more pictures with Paw-paw's super nice camera, so I will post better pictures later when I can get to their computer.
I've talked about Will's milestones a lot and realized that I don't mention Maddie's as much. She is growing up quickly! She can dress herself most of the time except for shirt buttons, she can finally reach the sink with her stool and washes her hands by herself, she likes to fill her water cup too, she recognizes all of her letters and knows most of the sounds they make, she is working on writing her name but has a little trouble remembering the order of the letters. She is her mother's daughter and loves books. We go to the library every week and check out 8 books. Just like me, she can't wait and has to have them all read to her that day! She will be taking swimming lessons next week, so I will let everyone know how that goes.
Madeline also like to play beauty shop. We all take turns doing each other's hair. This was mine and Nathan's most recent creation.

More Summer Fun!

We are a little sad that our summer off is more than half over! Nathan is now done teaching summer school so we are having even more fun, doing lots together as a family.
Madeline spends a lot of her time pretending to be a princess. Her Nana got her the movie, Enchanted, and she loves being Giselle. For those with little girls in the princess phase, I would recommend this movie. She has watched it several times, and I have not gotten tired of it. It is really cute!
Here is a shot of her singing "A Happy Little Working Song."

She has missed her preschool friends, so we've been trying to arrange time to play with friends. Here she is at our church picnic with her best friend, Haley.
She and her friend Jackson had a play date at our house a couple of weeks ago. Don't they make a cute couple? Madeline taking care of the babies, and Jack doing all the cooking!
Jack had his birthday party at the Arkadelphia Aquatic Center. For those with younger kids, it is great. There are lots of very shallow areas (I think it's called zero-entry) and a few small slides. It was so much fun. Thanks Cole family for having us!
Madeline liked going down the frog slide.
Will and Nathan had a good time hanging out in the water and watching all of the other kids.

Big News!

For those of you who may not know, Will is an extremely laid-back baby. With this personality comes some great things. He is pretty patient, doesn't let much get to him, he entertains himself well, is easy to take on errands, and the list goes on. But, there is a slight downfall too. He is now 2 weeks away from turning 1 and just started crawling a month ago. But, this is big news for us. We were starting to get worried that he may need physical therapy. Instead, he just needed time to make up his mind to do it. He now speeds around the house and is getting into everything. He is starting to pull up some, but, again is not in any hurry to walk. He does walk holding onto furniture and our hands, but we have no expectations of him walking by his first birthday.
To those of you who don't have kids yet, this may not seem like much to worry about, but those moms out there know that, even though you say everyone develops at their own pace, you are secretly worried when your child falls behind your friend's children. Oh what we moms put ourselves through!!!
Here are a couple of pictures of Will in action.
The expression on his face here just makes me smile. He looks so cute when he raises up those little eyebrows!
When he was 10 months old, we started transitioning him to a cup. I'm a big believer in doing this earlier, as the older they get, the more attached they get to the bottle (this is just my opinion, no judgement for those who do this differently:). 2 days ago, we also started the transition from soy formula to real soy milk (he is VERY allergic to cow's milk!) and after spitting out much of the first cup with a confused look that I did not have a chance to catch on camera, he is starting to like it!

"I guess I'll try this stuff one more time."
"Hey, not too bad. I could get used to this stuff!"
Oh, and here is an example of the stuff that Will and Daddy like to do for laughs.

More vacation pictures continued!

We did a lot of shopping on vacation, especially at IKEA! We almost filled the Yukon with people and were not sure what we were going to do for space. I ended up finding this Roof Bag. It is completely water-proof (which was really tested on the trip down to TX) and fits quite a bit of stuff. Still, it was a chore to get everything we had bought crammed inside and Nathan and Grandpa Taylor worked up a sweat getting it ready the night before. I would recommend this to anyone!

It was so great to see my kids bond with my grandparents, who I have always been so close to. Maddie and her Grandma Taylor went to the library where she volunteers and checked out some books. They really enjoyed reading together everyday!
Will gave Grandpa Taylor lots of cuddles and made him smile with all of his funny expressions and "words." They were so impressed with what a laid-back baby he is.
He figured out how to open the drawer with pots and pans and had a great time creating "music" on the ceramic tile.
This was Will's first long trip away from home and he was not too keen on sleeping in the Pack n' Play. The only way we could get him to fall asleep in it was to have someone lay on the floor beside it where Will could see them until he fell asleep. Sometimes, Nathan got a little extra rest in the process. I was afraid he would be really spoiled and expect the same treatment when he got home but, luckily, he fell right back into his great sleeping habits when we got back.

More vacation pictures!

It may seem that 8 hours in the car with a 3 year old and 10 month old would be a nightmare, but both kids handled the trip very well.
Thank goodness for the drop down DVD player with wireless headphones so that the rest of us could enjoy the ride without the background noise of various Disney Princess movies! Madeline had a good time watching movies, reading books, and playing with her Barbies.

Will just hung out, napped, ate, and played with toys. His favorite past-time was throwing toys on the door side of his seat where Nathan could not reach them. It was not a big deal until one of us had to get him out and had an avalanche of toys when the door was opened!
Georgetown had a great park not far from my grandparent's house. It had the cutest playground equipment and the kids loved playing there in the evenings when it had cooled off a little. This little firetruck was Will's favorite!
Madeline loved the twisty slide with the swinging bar.

Vacation!

We took our first vacation as a family of 4 last week! Us Henrys and Nana Pesek loaded up Paw-paw's Yukon and headed to Georgetown, TX to visit Grandma and Grandpa Taylor. Georgetown is a little outside of Austin and a good place for a trip with 2 such small kids. We are still having trouble with our card reader so, here are a few pictures to tide you over until I can download the rest.

We went swimming at Uncle Greg's house. Look at the Texas landscape behind us. They had a great pool and Nathan and I got everyone ready to jump in. Can you see the anticipation on Will's face?

Maddie was a little tired from not taking a nap that day and was a little hesitant to swim, but eventually got going with some help from her floaties and her Daddy.
Will went all over the pool in his cool float. He loves the water and does not mind getting splashed or even dunked!
Grandma and Grandpa Taylor had a good time watching everyone.

Again, more picture to come when we figure out whether or not we are going to have to break down and get a new card reader.