A Warrior!

I am a warrior:

www.warriordash.com/register2011_minnesota.php

Wish me luck. A gruelling 3 mile course with 11 obstacles (including fire, sandhills, warrior climbing walls, and muddy mayhem) that a group of friends and I will be doing in July. Sounds like fun, right? I hope so! If interested in signing up - send me a note and I will get you our wave time.

This week has been good. It is nice to be back in our schedule after the holidays. The kids are still enjoying and playing with their toys, which is nice. But, they are still wild and crazy :-) That won't be changing anytime soon. They now have a new hideout that they constantly play in together. It is between the couches, right next to the side table and no, not a lot of room for two boisterous children to play. At least once an hour, one of them starts crying because one accidentally kicked the other, one hit the table, one lost a toy, or something. This prompts the lecture from me or Tim, "guys, we told you that is not a good place to play. We don't like you playing there, you tend to end up crying." But, every night on the way home from daycare they look at each other and giggle and Emma says, "Should play in our secret hideout?" and Evan always replies "Shore Emma. Dat Fun Emma!" Too cute, but I always know the outcome.

Emma is continuing to learn and do her homework. She enjoys learning letters and sounding out words as we try and prepare her for kindergarten. Her favorite things now are playing with her "Flairies" which are the fairy dolls in the most recent Barbie Movie, "A Fashion Fairy Tale". She can play with those three dolls for a very long time and most often brings them to daycare with her as well. We are still trying to work with her on listening and respect however. She struggles at times to pick up her toys and to not come back with a whiny statement, but we are trying. I had to have the conversation with her tonight about why her Daddy and I are trying to teach her to be nice, why it is important before she gets to school and why she needs to listen and respect others. Wish me luck. Overall, she is doing good and learning a lot, but I still think we have a few behaviors to work on before kindergarten comes.

Evan... well, is Evan. He is trying to assert his independence as of late also and has been receiving time outs for not listening as well. Of course Emma loves it when Evan is in time out and vice-versa, so it just fuels the fire of sorts when they are naughty. It is cute when Evan is being punished too, as he looks all defiant when we are saying no and he is pushing back. However, the minute we say "time out" his face crumples and falls and he starts crying. Plus, in the time out chair, he looks totally in despair that he has to sit out for 2 minutes. It is hard to discipline him at times as I can easily laugh at his reactions. He is talking in sentences more and trying to understand a bit more of the world around him, so that is cool. He still loves his Cars and has to wear Cars clothes, jammies, cover up in his Cars blanket, etc. Most of the time though, he can be found following around Emma and trying to do what she does.

Work is good for me. Continually busy. Same for Tim. He is now receiving more responsibility and working for a new boss, so he is happy with the change.

Our puppy Sage is back after being gone for 5 weeks at hunting/obedience training and we are happy to have her here! She is really enjoying the snow and I am enjoying the winter walks we take her on! She is a whopping 65# (at least) and still growing, but still a puppy at heart. Tim laughs at our "lap dog" as many times when we are petting her, she will circle around and try to lay on my lap; just like she did when we picked her out of the litter! There is something soothing about having her around and petting her at night so I can destress and relax, so it is a nice thing to have her home.

I leave you all with a "GO PACKERS!!!"