Thursday, January 26, 2006
Catching Up
Wow, its really been 14 days since I posted an entry. Shame on me.
Anna News:
Anna’s making huge gains on two fronts: She’s pretty much got the potty training nailed. She’s in underwear everyday and pull-ups at night and we’ve had very few accidents. She’s more frequently communicating when she needs to go to the bathroom and we have almost no “false positives”. She’s extremely proud of herself, its pretty cute.
She's also, finally, going to bed with a minimum fuss. After we're done telling stories she rolls over on her side, pulls the covers up to her chin, and says goodnight. And that's it! No more playing, talking, roaming the house, waking Pierce... I'm so proud.
She’s making an attempt at dressing herself –with varying rates of success. The other morning she put both feet through the same leg hole of her underwear and managed to put them over her hips to her waist. I didn’t even think that was possible. She looked like she was wearing a Winnie the Pooh belt.
Anna’s hair is getting very long and full. It’s still very wavy but not as curly as it used to be, the hair weighs too much. Needless to say, she’s gorgeous. Her interest in all things Cinderella has continued to intensify. One of her holiday gifts was a DVD with songs and dancing from the movie. It comes with a “dance mat” and wand and has been running on our TV almost daily.
Anna is extremely articulate and her shyness around strangers has pretty much evaporated. This has led to some pretty funny situations in public places. No stranger sitting in a booth next to us at a restaurant escapes without some type of conversation with her.
Pierce News:
We’ve started to read chapter books to Pierce at bedtime (far fewer pictures, with text separated into chapters every 3-4 pages). They’re a big hit and we’re all enjoying the process. One of my favorite things is to wake up in the morning to find Pierce in Anna’s room/bed reading to her.
School continues to go well for Pierce. He’s a very proficient reader and his lessons now revolve around non-phonetic words. He’s also started on basic math and can count to 100. Of course, cars and trains continue to dominate his interests. About a month ago he declared he wants to be a car designer when he grows up, and he hasn’t veered from that statement yet. It will be interesting to see how this develops… I wonder if I can get a kid’s version of CAD (Computer Aided Design engineering software) so he can start working on cars now. We have an appointment with the local elementary school’s principal in a couple of weeks to determine what course Pierce will take when he starts kindergarten next year (we want to make sure he is able to build on the skills he’s learned at preschool).
Nora:
The wife is doing great. She still till loves her job and the extra time she’s able to spend with Pierce and Anna by working part time. I think she’s still recovering from the holiday season, so she hasn’t embarked on any major projects lately –I’m sure that will change soon. She’s become quite the wonder cook, so dinners are varied and interesting –course only she and I eat them, Pierce and Anna’s tastes are more focused on dinosaur chicken and hot dogs.
Josie (the dog):
Pant, pant, wag, wag.
Me:
Work continues to have me pretty absorbed. I’ve been back to Springfield, IL several times since my last entry and just got back Tuesday evening from my latest round. We should have the work we’re doing for them buttoned by the end of February. I’ve continued to work on the arcade machine since I got it up and running again. In a “test” environment I now have all the laser disk arcade games from the 80s running (think Dragon’s Lair and Space Ace). Man, I love those games. Pierce and Anna saw them for the first time last night and they were instant fans. I think the jury’s still out on Nora’s interest. Of course I’m staying up too late playing these things (hee hee).
I think my next project will be a hand-built DVD shelf. Our current storage/shelves are filled to overflowing. I saw some great ideas on the web that I want to try. Hopefully it will just be an afternoon project, nothing to the scope of the arcade machine.
Last thought:
Nora had a girls' night out last night, so I got concentrated Pierce and Anna time. Have you ever played Pictionary with a 3 and 5 year old? It’s a hoot. Everything Pierce drew was either a car, truck, or bus. I have no idea what my daughter was drawing ;)
-Eric (Dad)
Anna News:
Anna’s making huge gains on two fronts: She’s pretty much got the potty training nailed. She’s in underwear everyday and pull-ups at night and we’ve had very few accidents. She’s more frequently communicating when she needs to go to the bathroom and we have almost no “false positives”. She’s extremely proud of herself, its pretty cute.
She's also, finally, going to bed with a minimum fuss. After we're done telling stories she rolls over on her side, pulls the covers up to her chin, and says goodnight. And that's it! No more playing, talking, roaming the house, waking Pierce... I'm so proud.
She’s making an attempt at dressing herself –with varying rates of success. The other morning she put both feet through the same leg hole of her underwear and managed to put them over her hips to her waist. I didn’t even think that was possible. She looked like she was wearing a Winnie the Pooh belt.
Anna’s hair is getting very long and full. It’s still very wavy but not as curly as it used to be, the hair weighs too much. Needless to say, she’s gorgeous. Her interest in all things Cinderella has continued to intensify. One of her holiday gifts was a DVD with songs and dancing from the movie. It comes with a “dance mat” and wand and has been running on our TV almost daily.
Anna is extremely articulate and her shyness around strangers has pretty much evaporated. This has led to some pretty funny situations in public places. No stranger sitting in a booth next to us at a restaurant escapes without some type of conversation with her.
Pierce News:
We’ve started to read chapter books to Pierce at bedtime (far fewer pictures, with text separated into chapters every 3-4 pages). They’re a big hit and we’re all enjoying the process. One of my favorite things is to wake up in the morning to find Pierce in Anna’s room/bed reading to her.
School continues to go well for Pierce. He’s a very proficient reader and his lessons now revolve around non-phonetic words. He’s also started on basic math and can count to 100. Of course, cars and trains continue to dominate his interests. About a month ago he declared he wants to be a car designer when he grows up, and he hasn’t veered from that statement yet. It will be interesting to see how this develops… I wonder if I can get a kid’s version of CAD (Computer Aided Design engineering software) so he can start working on cars now. We have an appointment with the local elementary school’s principal in a couple of weeks to determine what course Pierce will take when he starts kindergarten next year (we want to make sure he is able to build on the skills he’s learned at preschool).
Nora:
The wife is doing great. She still till loves her job and the extra time she’s able to spend with Pierce and Anna by working part time. I think she’s still recovering from the holiday season, so she hasn’t embarked on any major projects lately –I’m sure that will change soon. She’s become quite the wonder cook, so dinners are varied and interesting –course only she and I eat them, Pierce and Anna’s tastes are more focused on dinosaur chicken and hot dogs.
Josie (the dog):
Pant, pant, wag, wag.
Me:
Work continues to have me pretty absorbed. I’ve been back to Springfield, IL several times since my last entry and just got back Tuesday evening from my latest round. We should have the work we’re doing for them buttoned by the end of February. I’ve continued to work on the arcade machine since I got it up and running again. In a “test” environment I now have all the laser disk arcade games from the 80s running (think Dragon’s Lair and Space Ace). Man, I love those games. Pierce and Anna saw them for the first time last night and they were instant fans. I think the jury’s still out on Nora’s interest. Of course I’m staying up too late playing these things (hee hee).
I think my next project will be a hand-built DVD shelf. Our current storage/shelves are filled to overflowing. I saw some great ideas on the web that I want to try. Hopefully it will just be an afternoon project, nothing to the scope of the arcade machine.
Last thought:
Nora had a girls' night out last night, so I got concentrated Pierce and Anna time. Have you ever played Pictionary with a 3 and 5 year old? It’s a hoot. Everything Pierce drew was either a car, truck, or bus. I have no idea what my daughter was drawing ;)
-Eric (Dad)
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