Emilyisms

Pinocchio Theater:

The Nokia Theater in LA where we're going to see Sesame Street Live.

June-nastics:

Gymnastics.

Cal Elite

Cal Elite is the name of the kid's sports center that Emily goes to for gymnastics (and formerly swim lessons).  It's such a cool place!  They teach things like dance, gymnastics, swimming, and cheer.  I love the teachers, they're all really nice and they're great with the kids, and I love that they have extra activities your kids can take part in outside of their lessons.  They have "open gym" several times a week; you can just walk in, pay I think $5, and your kid gets to run like crazy and use anything they want in the main gym.  There are trampolines, uneven bars, a huge foam square pit to jump into, etc.  They also have this fantastic thing called Parent's Night Out.  You can register your kid for $16 and you just drop them off to basically be babysat from 5:30 to 9:30 so you can go out and have a date.  You can't even get a babysitter for anything near that!

Anyway, Emily is having a great time in gymnastics; I love how happy she is when she's learning things there!  This past Saturday they had what they called a "Cheer and Tumbling Clinic".  We signed Emily up for it, dropped her off for 2 hours that morning while they taught them a cheer and a little routine to do after the cheer, then we came back and watched them all perform it.  She had a good time learning it, then when the parents all walked in to watch them perform it she just broke down in tears and cried through the whole thing instead of performing.  Poor thing!  She was probably partly burnt out from 2 hours straight of practicing (that's a long time for a 4 year old!) and partly scared to death of all those people watching her.

I did, however, manage to get her to do the cheer that she learned on camera for me tonight.  :)  So now, for your viewing pleasure, here's Emily - The Cheerleader in a Hoodie!

Bruises Hurt

So...I wish I had a better story for my ailment, but turns out I get hurt in lame ways!  :)  I was running through the grass with Emily and Bella before dinner yesterday having a fun time when my heel found the perfect spot on the edge of a grass-covered hole to slam down on.  Apparently you can bruise your bones, that's just silly!  So for now I have a bruised heel bone and I'm feeling pretty lame walking on crutches.  Yay for no fracture though!  Feel free to laugh at me, I've been doing it all day!

Colorado

I thought I'd give a little recap of mine and Emily's trip to CO last weekend.  We had such a great time!

The first day it started snowing about half an hour after we got to Jen's house, and Emily was sooo excited!  She played in the snow a little, and mostly Jen and I sat around and talked a lot and laughed like crazy, what a perfect day!

The next day was Dakota's birthday party with his little friends (he turned 3) and I made the pirate cake for it.  The house was done up really cool in pirate decorations and each of the kids got pirate hats (which just happened to fit my pea-head) and swords; they went on a treasure hunt, ate pizza, and sang happy birthday.  Unfortunately the snow was worse that day and a few of his friends couldn't make it, but little did he know how lucky he was to be surrounded by adorable little girls!  :)  We also went sledding for a little bit, but it started raining and the wind was blowing it right in our faces, so we decided it was time to go back and warm up.

Sunday was Dakota's family birthday dinner, and I helped Jen learn how to make homemade lasagna which turned out very yummy.  There was a lot of Wii and good conversation that day.

Monday morning it was time to fly home, and we were ready to be with Alex again.  Emily is always a big hit in airports; she flies well and people think she's cute.  Well, most people.  We had just gotten through security when there was a man next to us that had a rather large stomach, and here's how the conversation went:

Emily: "Mommy, that man has a BABY in his tummy!"

Me:  "Oh my...no Emily, he doesn't."

Emily: "Then why is his tummy SO big??"

The man had a less than amused look on his face, but luckily didn't say anything!

Then we're standing in line somewhere else and there's a lady with short, boy-length hair.  Luckily she was on her phone and didn't hear when Emily said, "Mommy, that's a MAN, why does he have a purse??"

Silly little girl.  That about sums it up though, we got home and gave Alex hugs and just about melted in the almost 100 degree weather! Here are a few of my favorite pictures from the trip...

Gymnastics

Ok, I know I'm a week late on this post!  The last week was crazy busy for us, but now that we're home from our trip and rested I can update the blog.

Emily had her second gymnastics class today, and I'm lovin' it!  I can just see how much fun she's having on her face, and she's doing really well and trying to learn everything her teacher shows her.  I'm really glad we made the decision to try it out!  They're even learning a little routine-type-thing to do in a show they're having in May; it's so cute because they're all just giggling while they do it and out of sync.  Here's a slideshow of a few pictures from her first day last week.  Sorry about the quality, but most of them were taken through the window of the little room they start out in.

Emilyism

"Bella is my favorite doggy in the world.  And you're my favorite girl, Mommy.  And Daddy is my favorite boy...and I'm my favorite self!"

Happy Easter!

We had a great Easter, relaxing with Family over at Nick and Suzanne's. The weather couldn't have been more perfect, and we had a fabulous brunch! When we first got there the kids got to go on a candy hunt in the house, and an egg hunt outside. My camera's battery died after the first few pictures (of course!) but I still have a few to share.

I made sure to keep Emily's Easter basket pretty bare since the Easter Bunny was going to Grandma and Grandpa's house as well. Of course my strange child got the most excited about the new toothbrush the Easter Bunny gave her at home; gotta love her!

Here's my little Easter girl in her new cookie-cutter pose she has decided to use for pictures the last month or so.

And the egg hunt, of course.  What a beautiful day!

I love how old Emily is because...

...she's young enough to not know how unfair it is for Alex or myself to come home with Cold Stone for ourselves right before her bed time, and nothing for her.

Muahahahaha!  (Evil mom laugh)

No More Swimming

Well, the time has come.  I'm taking Emily out of swimming lessons because she's just to scared to get her face wet.  It's so strange because about a month ago she seemed like she really wanted to try and her teacher was even able to push her down to get a ring at the bottom of the pool.  After that it all went downhill!  She just keeps getting worse about it ever week, and I've even tried to practice with her just in the bathtub here but all she does is cry.  I'm going to try and practice with just her and me in a pool over the next couple of weeks so hopefully I can gain her trust and ease her into it while having fun to distract her.

She still needs a fun class to take on a weekly basis though, so here comes gymnastics!  She'll start in her new gymnastics class next Tuesday morning, and I bet she'll love it!  The only trick with that one will be her listening well to her teachers; stubborn little girl.  And really, who doesn't love little girls in leotards?!  Adorable!  :)

Emilyism

Looking at a picture in a magazine she says, "Dr. Pepper?!  That drink can't be a doctor!"

*Grumble, Grumble, Grumble*

I am NOT happy with my 4 year old today.  That is all, just needed to vent.