The Wakeman Family: February 2015

Friday, February 27, 2015

Wednesday, February 18, 2015

Outside Fun

Now that the weather is nice, the kids wanted to go play at school. They were little monkeys!

Tuesday, February 17, 2015

New Scooters

It looks like spring has arrived. The kids woke up Valentine's morning to find new scooters! They wanted to go outside right away and start scooting. It was a bit chilly.

Nathan's new scooter.

Elizabeth scooting around.

She biked a bit too.

By the afternoon, they were still scooting. They proclaimed they were too hot and that it was shorts weather. For me, 62 isn't shorts weather, but I guess for little kids it was.

Nathan quit scooting for a while to rotate our neighbor's tires.

Sunday, February 15, 2015

Nathan's school uses a color system to identify their busses. His teacher loves My Little Pony. He decided to make a chart that changed the bus names to the names of the characters in My Little Pony. His teacher loved it!

At Elizabeth's preschool, the kids all learn the Pledge of Allegiance. Once they have it mastered and can say it in front of the class, they get a flag! She's got it down!

Saturday, February 14, 2015

Preschool Celebration

Elizabeth's preschool had a birthday celebration for her!

The birthday flag was up when we pulled in!

She had a sign!

She got to sit up front with the teacher and wear a crown! The kids sung to her and she got a card and candy AND a book!

The Valentine's Party was actually celebrated on the same day so it was an extra fun day!

Friday, February 13, 2015

Field Trip!

Elizabeth's preschool class went on a field trip to the gym that her tumblebus coach owns. She had a great time!

Working on the obstacle course!

Learning how to use the rope swing. Once she figured it out, she didn't stop doing the rope swing for the entire 1 1/2 hours we were there.

Coach Brett made her show off her amazing headstand.

Waiting for the rope!

I didn't mean to upload this video, but here she is learning to rope swing.

Elizabeth and Ali. Elizabeth says Ali is her BFF.

Coach Brett giving Elizabeth the rope.

Crawling out of the foam blocks!

Thursday, February 12, 2015

Elizabeth at 5

Elizabeth is 5 year old! Here is a picture of her waiting for preschool to start on her 5th birthday. It was also the day of the Valentine's party.

Here are a few things about Elizabeth at age 5.

She's about 36 pounds. Not quite big enough to sit in a booster seat in the car yet. She gains weight pretty slowly.

She usually sleeps about 10 1/2 or so hours at night. I put her to bed around 8-8:30 and she "reads" in bed until around 9. She enjoys listening to audio books. She's still not keeping a dry pullup at night. We're not quite sure what to do about that!

She wakes up between 7:30 and 8. We get Nathan off on the bus at 8:15. She then eats her breakfast and watches a little TV while I get ready for the day. The rest of the morning we run errands together or play games. The last week or so we've been able to go outside. Finally! It seems right around her birthday is when "spring" starts.

Her favorite toys to play with are princess and castle sets and My Little Pony. She does very well playing by herself. I can hear her humming and singing and her toys like to talk. She talks a lot! I can always hear her using her little imagination.

She's also a big fan of stuffed animals. She loves stuffed kitties! She sleeps every night with a stuffed animal stuffed into the front of her pajamas.

She loves to play with Nathan. She says he is her BBBFF. (Big Brother Best Friend Forever). She learned this acronym from My Little Pony. They still fight but are much better at playing imaginative games together. They can have fun playing games inside or outside or just running around in the living room in their underwear listening to Disney songs on Pandora.

She loves to play dress up games. She likes wearing princess dresses and cat costumes. She loves to have her nails painted.

She's very curious about how things work. She will "explain" how things work. For example, she will tell me how the wheels on her bike move with all the chains. Or she likes to take apart her toys and put them back together.

She loves preschool! She goes 4 days a week from 12-2:30. It's just the right amount of time. She's always happy when she comes home, but then likes to kind of decompress and will just play her own game until Nathan gets home. Then, she's ready to play again!

In the evening, the kids play while I make dinner( Jeremy is usually at work). After dinner, they like to run around and play. I can't wait until it's light out so they can run around outside!

She's getting very good at writing her name and most of her letters. She knows all her numbers and colors. Her preschool teachers say she is doing great both socially and academically! She'll come home every day from preschool and tell me about the little girls she played with that day. She says she is friends with most of the girls but never plays with the boys because they sometimes push her. She mentions the girls Ali, Hannah, DeAnna, and Raini a lot.

We register her for kindergarten next month! I can't believe my baby will be going to school next year. Our school district has decided to go to all day kindergarten next year so she will really be leaving and I'm sad about that. We were expecting half day kindergarten so I'm giving her up sooner than we planned.

Elizabeth goes to her gymnastics class once a week on the "Tumblebus." She LOVES the Tumblebus. Her coach says she does an incredible headstand for someone her age! We believe it!

Her allergies and eczema remain a challenge. The eczema is really, really hard to deal with. We have tried every ointment, lotion and steroid cream in the world over the last 5 years. She still just scratches her hands until they bleed. It is very frustrating. We try gloves but the minute they come off, she's scratching. Everyone notices her hands and I feel like a horrible mother, but am not sure what to do.

We had a full blood test done this year to test for allergies. Her food allergies are peanuts, sunflower seeds, and hazelnuts. She's getting good about carrying her little pack with her epi-pens!

Her environmental allergies are extensive. My guess is they are fueling the eczema since we've tested for the foods and can't seem to find another that is causing the problem. She's allergic to grass, cottonwood, birch, ragweed, russian thistle, sagebrush, dust, cats, and dogs. I'm sure they could test for more too, and would likely find more!

Elizabeth is such a good girl. She's just a joy to be around and I have so much fun with her! She's also just darn cute! She's such a good friend at preschool. She's so good at sharing and taking turns and making other people feel better. She's very loving to her family.

Sunday, February 8, 2015

Elizabeth's 5th Birthday Party

We had a great family turnout for Elizabeth's birthday! She also invited 2 little girls. Elizabeth's little friend Ali got sick and couldn't come so she was sad about that.