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School has officially begun! Isaac is glad to get back into the routine of going to Dana's everyday. He loves the other kids. I picked him up one day this week and I could hear a stampede as she opened the door (it's really only 4 kids). Isaac was trying to run with the other 3. He got knocked down by them and had a funny irritated look on his face when I saw him. He's keeping up; helping with clean up and now answering our questions, which is really cute. I'll ask him, "How was your Dana today?" and he'll answer, "Nana," which means Dana. (Not to be confused with "Na-na," with slightly different intonation which means banana, his favorite fruit!) He's starting to attempt to answer by saying something jibberish to almost everything we ask.
With teaching, I've almost completed all of my fall testing and I've selected the 7 students I will be working with. Tomorrow is a paperwork day. Slowly, I will start lessons with kids this week. I'm excited. There will, as always, be a few challenges, but that keeps me on my toes.
Small group begins again on the 12th. We are happily re-joining the group we "birthed" from several years ago. We are studying "The Power of a Praying Parent." We went with the group to pizza on Friday without children, and I'm truly looking forward to reconnecting with some young parents and families.
Life is good!

Jen's page
We counted Isaac's words and, even though my brother doesn't believe me, he says between 35 and 40 words. When we were on vacation, Isaac was jabbering gobbledy-gook. Tim said,
"Jen, did you hear that? Isaac just said, 'Mom, I want a cheese pizza for dinner'."
I laughed and so did he.

Jen's page
Howdy! Today is the last day of July and I never posted in June! Yikes! I'll do better!
We have had a super summer. It has been very relaxing just hanging out with the boy. He's fun. We gave up the bottle before b-day 1 (yes!), and he started walking during his birthday week. I tried to give up one of the naps, but after talking to someone about it, I decided to keep both and it's been going really well. Isaac loves to sleep and this is good! He now knows the routine and even asks for the door to be closed once he has his pj's on at night ("door"). My goal has been to get the routine down so that I only have to lay him down and he goes nite-nite on his own. GOAL ACHIEVED! He does have a small security blanket that he needs to have when he goes to sleep. I'm sure as I head back to work-school, it will take a few days for him to get back into the routine.

I'm looking forward to going back to work and having my own space this year. I'm sure it will be a good change. I can hardly wait to set up my little space.

I wanted to enjoy these last few days and do some cooking. Today I made a recipe and I'm planning one for tomorrow, too. I have a few errands to run tomorrow, also. I hope to get an early walk in, too, before it's 80 degrees.

Have a happy day.

Hi, everyone! It's great to have such super weather for this long weekend! One more 1/2 day of school, yeah! I can't wait for the lazy days of summer! Today my brother, Tim, is working for the first time. He is working the front desk and concessions at a pool in town,"Fairview". He called because he wanted my mom to bring him something to eat. It was funny, he was thinking Subway or some other fast food, she made him a plate of what we were having for lunch at the cookout (pork chops, broccoli, rice, etc). My dad caved and went and got him the fast food. Tim would have cracked up if she brought him the plate (I would have liked it:).
Isaac doesn't stop asking questions! He was saying "what's dat?" on the entire walk we just went on every step of the way. It's almost humorous!
We released the turtles yesterday. They were loving freedom, as they swam very quickly to the middle of a very large pond. We gave them one last meal, thinking that they might have trouble at first, but I don't think they will have any trouble! Actually, they might miss the safety of a rather small aquarium and dependable food. Well... maybe not!
Here are the plans for the summer not working: 1. Take Isaac to the pool at the YMCA at least 3 times per week. They have parent and child swim from 11:30-12:30 everyday. This should be just enough swimming to get Isaac really tired, so he'll nap in the afternoon (right now he's taking 2 naps and I've got to get him to take 1 long nap this summer). One day per week, I'd like to take him to BabyTalk. It's a fun playgroup. They meet every day during the week at different locations. I'm not sure which one we'll go to, probably a few of them to find the right one. This only lasts 45 minutes, but a teacher does fingerplays and reads books and the kids play with toys. Everyone discusses parenting issues. It's really fun! We're going to do the summer reading program at the library. They have weekly programming that's neat, and a kick-off June 1 or 2nd (I'll have to check). There is also a weekly lapsit at the library in Warrensburg that we'll go to and see some friends with babies from work. That's all so far :) I'll keep you updated.
New funny Isaac-isms:
Isaac tries to do "Where is Thumbkin?" He claps and tries to do his fingers.
Isaac is standing, but not walking. I'm quite sure he could do it if he wanted to.
Isaac gives everyone the sweetest kisses. They're funny; he doesn't quite get it, but we love it!
He is a really fast crawler! Too fast!
He definitely throws things down all the time to see you pick them up again.

By the way, we love the disposable sippy cups called take-and-toss. They're really great. He can hold them on his own. My goal this week is to stop laying him down with a bottle. I do this 3 times a day, for naps and nite-nite. This is bad!
That's all my news!
Jen

Spring is here! Yea! Isaac is getting bigger every day! He is such a silly boy-- he has a fun personality! Whenever he sees Brian or me the first thing he does is start asking questions. "What dat?" We say, "It's a fan. You pull it, and it goes woo, woo, woo!" Isaac gets a big grin on his face. Then he asks again. It's a little game :) The Wiggles sing a funny song: Do the Monkey. Isaac loves that, too. If you can imagine Mom as a monkey going "Ooo, ooo, ahhh, ahhh...ooo, ooo, ahhh, ahhh..." That's the scene. It's very funny. Mom and Dad do little dances to all the songs. Our favorite is Dorothy the Dinosaur. "She's a really friendly dinosaour, she works so hard in the garden...she's mowing, she's mowing, she's mowing!"
For Mother's Day I'm making dinner for my mom on Saturday. Only 10 more days of school... Yes!
Have a happy day!
Isaac says:
birdie
da da
mom
done
what dat?
bye-bye
tree

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It's Easter day! Horray! Back to work tomorrow. The spring break has been great! I loved the time. Hope all had a super day!

Jen's page
It's Saturday morning, and even though it's sunny, it's pretty cold out there. We decided to go to the park for a nice little walk. Well, the sun was really whipping. I took Isaac yesterday and it was much warmer. We walked all around the new duck pond and the Civila War memorial stuff. Isaac liked it but his little nose was red when we left. Driving by Fairview Plaza, we noticed two new places-- an ice cream shop and sandwich place. We'll have to check that out. Brian's doing some shopping at Target and Isaac is sawing logs now. We think he needs a little tool bench or something. He loves that kind of thing, and his baby toys are definitely getting old. See what we get. Have a great day!

Jen's page
Hi, Shawna! You should get a blog page.
Tomorrow is dress up like your favorite book character. I am the wicked witch of the West-- we're doing the Wizard of Oz in 1st grade. Our spring break is next week. I'm looking forward to the downtime. Isaac has new words and discoveries everyday. Today, he knew If You're Happy and you Know it. He clapped right on cue. I'm reading My Sister's Keeper and its good so far. Have a great day, all!

My mom and dad are moving soon. I'm a little sad because it's my childhood home, however, I'm glad their happy. They will be closer to us in their new home. Have a good day.
Jen

Getting this set up is tricky!