Is it wrong to laugh?

I was an aunt for 9 years before having Nina.  Being an aunt means you get to laugh at all the things the parents cannot laugh at. For example - blowing bubbles in your milk, taking more candy when your parents say no and jumping on the bed like a bunch of monkeys until someone falls and gets hurt. Before having Bean it was okay for me to egg on the kids and laugh at them, but now I am the parent.  Bean is really starting to test the waters and a lot of the time I just want to laugh at her.  When we are in public I try to teach her what she can and cannot do, but I find it much harder to do that in private.  When we are sitting at dinner and I constantly tell her to put her feet down at the table she mocks me. She'll pull her knees up then say "down".  All I want to do is laugh, but I cannot b/c then I'm just teaching her it is a game. Or that I think it is hilarious that she uses her bed as a trampoline. I have to remind myself that the things I laugh at could cause her to get in trouble at school!  The one thing I never laughed at was biting and that was the one thing that she did at school. This parenting thing is a lot harder than I thought, but it sure is a lot of fun.  No one ever tells you how much fun it is to teach someone so many things. They are just a sponge and soak up everything.

I guess we have to find the balance b/n fun and parenthood! 

I was going to post a video but nothing wants to work for me today. So, instead here are a few cute pics of the Bean:

I couldn't resist the backpack. Especially when she said "Pease" and signed for please!  I'm such a sucker!

Taking her bear Bobo to school. When I was 5 years old I was in the hospital for a month and my dad got me a bear that I named Bobo.  That bear is now in Bean's room. For some reason Bean thinks all bears are named Bobo.

After looking at these pictures, it makes me not like the nuk even more. Hopefully, we can get rid of "Nu Nu" soon. I'm sure that will be a future post!

Summer Fun

We have been up to a lot since my last post.  We have gone to the zoo numerous times, started swimming lessons and have just had a lot of fun hanging out with family and friends.

Bean has also grown a lot since then. She is starting to lose her baby face and look more like a toddler.  It is crazy when I look at her pictures from this time last year and compare them to pictures taken this summer.  She is talking so much and every day she is starting to speak more English and less baby talk.  Some of her words are "Pease" (Please), "Tutle" (turtle), "Nigh Nigh" (good night), "Boo" (blue - every time you ask her a color it is blue), "Boci" (broccoli - loves her broccoli), "Petty" (Pretty), "Hat", "Moe" (More), "Ice Ceam" (Ice cream) and the list goes on. She is still signing for please but says the word please when she signs, and she always does the sign for milk. That little girl sure loves her milk and ice cream.

For someone who used to eat everything she has started to get pickier with food.  We are lucky that she loves her fruits and veggies and she eats anything that daycare gives her. I think she sees what the kids at school are eating so she figures she should eat it to so she can be like them.

It is so much fun to watch Bean explore. She loves going for walks on the path by our house and she really liked going to the beach and playing in the sand. The lake itself was not a hit, but she does great in the pool.  In June we started swim lessons at the YMCA (thanks to Grandma Gassner who paid for Bean to take the classes). Bean has learned a lot at swim class and really likes to blow bubbles in the pool and now the bath tub. 

I was really looking forward to having 4 day work weeks this summer so I could spend and extra day with Bean, but due to Mike's lack of work since February I have not been able to do that. One nice thing is Mike has had a lot of days with just him and Bean.  Mike is a wonderful father and is so good at giving her his undivided attention. I can tell she really loves her daddy.  They don't do anything exciting, but going to the park and playing at home is enough to make the Bean happy!

Over the last week we have had to deal with having a biter.  Bean used to just bite me but that habit has moved to daycare. She has bitten someone at daycare 4 out of the last 8 days at daycare, so we have been trying to nip that in the bud. We went to the library and checked out "Teeth are Not for Biting".  Bean's daycare cannot tell us who she is biting, but whenever we get to the page in the book with a little girl crying b/c she got bit Bean yells out "Abby" so I'm guessing that is who she is biting. If so, I feel bad for Abby.  Bean has been getting better at not biting at home and she only bit someone once this week so I'm hope full things will get better. Plus we have started giving Bean "Time Outs." I got some great advice from my friend Mandy that seems to be working. Hopefully, we are coming to the end of this phase. It is hard to discipline Bean b/c after working all day I just want our time together to be happy, but I've come to the realization that she is a toddler and that just isn't going to happen.

It has also been fun watching Bean play. Last month we made a trip to Toys R Us to get birthday presents for her two cousins and I picked up a doll for Bean.  She loves her doll and watching her act like a little mommy is just priceless. She brings her baby to me so I can swaddle it and she tries to give her "Nu Nu" (nuk) to her baby.  She puts her baby in her little stroller grabs her purse and says "bye bye" and walks around the house.  It truly is one of the cutest things I have ever seen.

Overall it has been a great summer and I look forward to all the fun things we will do before it gets cold outside.

This picture was taken last year at State Fair. It is one of my favorite pictures. It made me laugh so hard I

had to make it our 2009 Christmas card.

This was taken last Saturday at State Fair. You can see just how much Bean has changed in the last year.

Trip to the zoo!

Two weeks ago we took Bean to the zoo. We were really excited to take her since it has been six months since our last trip. We really hoped she would be totally into it since she was so much more active this time around BUT...she sat in her stroller. Anytime we took her out of her stroller to look around she walked right back and whined to be put back in. The weather was nice and Bean did get excited about some animals. I think she liked the train the best. It must be all the episodes of Chuggington she watches. We will be making plenty more trips to the zoo over the summer so hopefully she'll want to get out of the stroller and explore some more!

Here is one of my favorite pictures! My big girl eating her PB&J.

It has been a long time

I didn't realize it has been six months since I've posted anything. I'm not to good at blogging!!

Bean has grown and changed a lot in the last six months. She has learned to crawl, walk, and climb! She has gone from a baby carrier to a big girl car seat . She has learned to say "Da Da", "Uh Oh", "O's (when she wants Cheerios)"Ma Ma" (says it very rarely but I've heard it!!). She is so much fun! Everyday she is surprising us with something new.

For the last two weeks Bean has been enrolled in daddy daycare and we have seen her learn so much. Mike is a wonderful teacher and he is so good at giving her his undivided attention. This past week she has tried to say "blue" and "turtle", which comes out sounding like "tutle". We are working on animal noises and Cow and monkey seem to be here favorite. Thanks to daycare she has learned to sign "more" when she wants more food and for the past two weeks we have been working on getting her to sign for "milk", "juice" and "please". I can tell she gets frustrated b/c she cannot tell us what she wants so we are hoping that learning to sign will help.

Taking Bean outside now is so different from the fall because she can walk and explore everything. We even got a bubble maker which was a huge hit. Mike took her to the park a lot when he was home with her and she loved it. She climbed right up the four stairs to the slide and had no fear! I cannot wait for summer and we can try lots of new things, especially the zoo! We were there a lot last year, but now she is at an age where I think she will really enjoy it.

I should probably go spend some quality time with my Mike. Here are some pictures of Bean the climber and playing outside.

We turn our head for a second and look who climbed the step ladder.

Our neighbor B.J. has a little dog and Bean loves to go to her front door and look for the dog!