Moving Up

Janna moves up to the two/three year old room on Monday. I am hoping for an easy transition. She loves her teacher Crystal. She calls for her in the car on the way there and I can hand her over to Crystal who hold her until she is settled and ready to eat or play. I have enjoyed getting to know Crystal and seeing the great care Janna gets from her. I leave Janna in the mornings she is happy and loved.
I am assured the the new teacher Danessa is great and Janna already likes her. She currently is teaching numbers/math to all the class rooms. Having never met Danessa I am a bit nervous about Monday. I am looking forward to more potty training in this room and the weaning of the burp rag and pacifier. With this room she will learn to line up and will eat in the cafeteria. She will get more outside time. She is moving with three of her good friends, Ben, Nate, and Jayden. Also her friend Madelyn in already in the room.
I will keep you all updated on my progress and Janna's during this time. My little girl keeps growing up. It is such an amazing time seeing her discover new things and become independent. If only she could stay little....but then I would never sleep:)

Colors

This morning Janna was having fruit loops cereal for breakfast. After a long night she was surprisingly happy. We didn't have much time before I had to be at work and her at school, instead of her usually big bits of food(that we keep trying to stop), she was eating her cereal one fruit loop at a time telling me the color before she put it in her mouth. After she would take a bit she would say "Janna eat green" or whatever color it was. It was so cute how can you rush them when they are learning.

Baby Names

The following is a post that my friend Bethany recently wrote. She is also having trouble coming up with a name. I really enjoyed reading it since we are having some similiar issues. So enjoy:

This brings us to choosing a name for a
baby, which is officially one of the most difficult, time-consuming things I
have ever done. Why? Because there are too many factors to consider when
thinking about baby names. For the benefit of those of you who are parents, will
become parents, have parents, or hate your name, I will list them.

1. Do you like the name? You're going to be using it a lot over the next
fifty years - it's important to choose something you really like and that sounds
good even if you're happy, angry, sad, laughing, scared, etc. Practice yelling
it - does it have a strong, authoritative ring to it? Imagine it appearing on a
wedding announcement - does it sound ridiculous that Apple is getting
married?

2. Do you both like the name? Yes, this is the
most difficult part. Little girls have been naming things since they could
talk...most of us have had favorite baby names since our mid-teens. Then the
husbands show up and blow our names out of the water with the newfound power of
fatherhood - names they have come up with in the past ten minutes, rather than
cherishing for the past ten years. Thinking about baby names also reveals a lot
about your personal level of comfort with individuality...Tim likes names like
Kate, Anna, and Megan, while my top ten list includes Madeleine, Eleanor,
Isabel, and Jocelyn. I won't even discuss the boys' names, because the camps are
set up on different planets.

3. Can it be easily
changed into nicknames? This can be a pro or a con. Tim's family all has
one-syllable names, and we know they will nickname the baby. Therefore, we not
only have to choose a name we like, we have to precede them in choosing a
nickname so that we're guaranteed to like the nickname, too. I love the name
Madeleine, but with the current popularity of the name Madison, I wouldn't want
to have just another "Maddy." In addition, how long do you use a nickname before
it becomes ridiculous? Until they start walking? Until they start kindergarten?
I know a 31 year-old man who still goes by "Boomer." Poor guy.

4.
Will it be difficult to spell or pronounce? It's hard enough learning to read
and write - giving a baby a name that's difficult for them (and their teachers,
coworkers, dentists, etc.) to either spell or pronounce will cause unnecessary
aggravation. Even if they are personally successful in learning to spell it
themselves, they will be constantly spelling their name for every camp form,
doctor appointment, pizza order, etc. Unusual names seem to be especially
prevalent in the south...some of fun names we've heard of have included I'auna
(iguana without the g), Candy Mann (he has brothers named Jupiter Mann and Moon
Mann), and Amazing Grace.

5. Are you naming the baby
after a relative? This is dangerous ground. You cannot include every traditional
family name in your first child's name, so does that mean you dutifully choose
from the list for each successive child? Are you favoring one side of the family
over the other, based on who is "named after" first? Our conclusion: safer to
avoid it altogether.

6. How important is the
name's meaning? Bethany means "House of God," and I have always treasured the
significance of that meaning. However, when we were discussing meanings, Tim had
no idea what his name meant - we had to look it up. However, do you choose Elise
over Scarlett just because one means "My God is a vow" and the other means "A
deep red"? Personal preference - see comment #1.

7.
Do you want it to be popular or not? This is a tough one - Tim likes more
popular names, but I refuse to choose anything from the Top Ten list. The Social
Security Administration posts yearly reports about the popularity of baby names
in the United States. You can track the popularity of names over time or view
the order of popular names in any given year (even by State). For example, the
name Emma went out of fashion in the 1950s and then suddenly peaked again in the
early 90s. For those of you who want to see how popular your name is, the
website is: http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/babynames/

8. What do the initials spell? Even if you have
overcome all of these other barriers, you still need to make sure the initials
don't spell anything offensive - I had a friend in grade school named Angel Star
Stokes.

So for our family and friends who check this blog what is your opinion? Our top five boy names are: Daniel, Nathaniel(Nathan), Simon, Ethan, Noah. Please leave a comment and let us know your favorite.

Graduation

Isaac graduated this past Saturday. It was a busy weekend filled with lots of family and friends. I am so proud of Isaac and all his hard work. He did well in all his classes. There were rough semesters and or weeks where the work never ended but he made it.

CONGRATULATIONS ISAAC!

As for the future we are waiting....we are waiting for London School of Theology to offer an official acceptance, we are waiting for the job deadlines to close so we have an answer, we are waiting on our baby boy coming in August. Isaac is working on his "honey do" list and applying for more jobs to get us by until we have more answers. It is always a bit scary during this waiting period but God has always provided and he will take care of us.

Counting

Here is how Janna counts....

two, three, six, seven, eight, (ocationally says Nine)

I am working on the missing numbers:)

Growing Up

Last night Janna slept in her Toddler bed all night long. Yeah! For those who don’t know she has been on the futon except for a brief two weeks in January when she first got the bed. This time she did not roll a lot and hit her head on the side bars. She only woke up once and was easy to put back to sleep. She lost her pacifier. I don’t know if it will happen again, but I am proud of my little girl.

Also this morning as I was finishing getting dress she told Isaac she needed to poop and actually wanted to sit on the potty. Isaac took her diaper off and she sat down. Then she wanted up. Isaac could tell she did need to go, but we let her up. As he was trying to put on the clean diaper she started pooping. She did not want to go back to the potty so she finished in her diaper. But as Elmo puts it Janna understood the “got to go feeling”. I love that red little monster that convinces Janna to eat bananas and sit on the potty. This morning Janna made Isaac and I very proud. My little girl is growing up.

On a side note on the way to school we went over letter sounds and she got them all right. She even knew the letter “v” today. Yeah Janna!

Fun new phrases

This past weekend Janna had some fun new phrases. She has really started talking and putting things together.

"PaPa gave Janna bubbles."

"Marcy gave balloon-nice. " Marcy gave me balloon at church. She is nice.

" Janna fun eat" Janna had fun eating. Right after leaving Logan Steak House.

" Oh man"

"sure" use to be yea then yes...I wish you could hear it, it sounds so cute

"white balloon pop" "all gone"....then a sad face and whimpering.... after the balloon popped.

When looking at a picture of a fire in a fire place say "loud" and points to ear. (in the GoodNight Moon book)

She still calls the car "home", haven't been able to explain that one to her yet.

"two three" she always skips number one.

I don't understand...

I don't understand......

How yesterday Janna was in car riding to school yelling " no dirt" over and over and getting very upset, and when I was finally able to look and help her she had a leaf stuck on her shoe and once I removed it she was happy as can be.


But this morning she took her bowl of cereal with milk and put her hands up to elbows in it and flung it all over the table and the dog and the floor. She was laughing until I told her no and made her clean it up. I didn't put her in time out because part of it was fault for leaving the room while she was eating to do something else. After three napkins and two baby wipes she was less sticky and mostly clean. Lucky she was still in her pj's so it wasn't a big deal.

How can she be so finicky about having dirt on her or near her to playing in her food? I just don't understand. I probably never will.

At Two...

Janna is learning so much everyday and I just wanted to share what she loves and what she can do now...

She can point to the letter and say the sound it makes when you tell her a letter.
She is right most of the time.

She can tell you the color of something. Some colors she knows better than others.

She can count "two, three", somehow she always misses "one".

She talks in three and four word phrases all the time.

She sings often...her newest one "Row Row your boat"

She does the motions to "patty cake" . The roll it motion is so cute.

She loves " this little piggy"

She colors and draws. She makes a great attempt at drawing a circle and tracing your hand.

She is a great helper. She feeds Molly, dusts the coffee table, sweeps the kitchen floor.
of course this is only when she wants to help

She is great with her baby dolls. She takes great care of them. She also takes good care of her kitten. She takes it out to potty even, leash and all.

She is good at telling want she wants (unless she is really upset).

She good at turning games, lights, toys on and off.

She loves her "voom voom cars" as she calls them.

She runs, no longer just a fast walk.

She can take her jacket, shoes, and socks off with no help.

She doesn't like to wear shoes....as she puts it "feet, feet mommy, no shoe"

She loves the Care Bear videos, and Elmo potty video

She loves sweets:)

She is continuing to try and jump, her feet just don't leave the ground.

She can drive her cozy coop car backward and keeps trying forward.

She pushes her baby in it's stroller all over.

She loves being outside.

She is learning about playgrounds and swings.

She is such a blessing to us and we are so grateful to have her in our lives. I look forward to all the new things she will learn.

Two =

Two = I want....

when I want it

to do it All By Myself

it now

to do my own thing

want it my way only

I didn't think the two's would be this bad but we are working on our tantrums and choosing our battles. I hear it does get better. Janna is good for the most part about stay in the time out corner and then saying "sorry".

There are lots of good things about two as well...I will blog about those later:)

Swimming Class

Last nights swim lesson went well. She was excited as usual to go. She participated for a little bit with only a little fussing but no tantrums. Then part of the time I let her sit on the wall instead of participating to avoid a tantrum. She discovered she like to fly out of the water. My arms are tired but she got big laughs about flying in and out of the water. This also allowed us to participate a little more with the class. Then at one point she said "home". I asked if she was all done and said "all done". I tried one more activity and she was getting upset so we left class 15 minutes early, but at least this avoided a large tantrum. Overall the class went really well and Janna was happy.