2 1/2 Years Old

Today Sophie is officially another half-year older. She loves to hold up two fingers and tell people that she is two, but I'm not quite sure she understands when I tell her that she is two-and-a-half now. So you might be wondering what new things our big girl is doing. There's so much that I could say, but I'll keep it brief and just cover the highlights. Some new skills include using scissors, identifying many letters and saying words that start with those letters, one-to-one correspondence up to seven and sometimes higher, identifying opposites, spelling her name, identifying a handful of words, undressing herself and dressing her bottom half by herself. Some favorites are singing, asking lots of questions about what people like or don't like, painting and other arts & crafts, bossing her sister around, and playing with friends. She is currently in a non-eating but lots of sleeping phase, and she has recently developed a lot of fears including the fear of dogs, going down big hills or slides, and the dark. Sophie has a great imagination and remembers everything that people say. It's fun to watch her carry on entire scenarios with her dolls and with Zoe, which are mostly just reenactments of her own day. She is still very loving, and lately has been interested in pretending to be a baby. She wants to be wrapped in a blanket, held, and pretend fed a bottle. However, she is quick to remind everyone that she is not really a baby, she is a big big toddler now, and when she is four and a big big girl, then she will get to chew gum. Now that is what's important to a 2-year-old!

Thankful Hands

This afternoon Sophie and I finished her "what I'm thankful for" project. We traced her hand and then cut out the pattern in fall colors. On each hand we wrote something that she is thankful for. She came up with all of the ideas herself. Some of them really point to her interests right now: scissors, paper, the playground, and others I hope will be true for a lifetime: her family, friends, food... This was a fun craft to do, and hopefully we'll get Zoe's finished tomorrow.

The Cutting Edge

While we were working on our craft today, I casually asked Sophie if she ever got to use scissors at school. To my surprise she said yes, so I gave her a chance to show off her skill. It was so neat to watch her concentrate and work so carefully (with her tongue sticking out of the side of her mouth - just like her daddy) on cutting lots and lots of 2 inch slices all the way around a piece of paper. This activity (along with coloring and gluing) kept her busy for 45 minutes. That is one of the benefits of a 2-year-old...a longer attention span!

Getting Crafty

Today our play group met at Melissa and Zachary's house. She had the cutest Thanksgiving craft for the kids to do. First we painted the kids' palms and thumbs with brown paint, then each finger a different color. We pressed their hands on a paper that was preprinted with a Thanksgiving poem, added a googly eye and used markers to add feet, beaks and waddles, and voila...an adorable easy craft. We love to do arts and crafts, and now that the holidays are approaching, I'm hoping to squeeze in lots of fun projects involving turkeys and glitter and candles oh my!

Saturday Night at the Movies

I decided to make it a special night for the girls. After an early bath, we spread a big blanket on the floor, popped popcorn, and settled in for a classic: Barney!

Running of the Gieseke girls

Sometimes if the girls have a lot of energy before bath time, I make them run laps. Seriously.

Happy Halloween

Last night we headed to nearby Gladden Farms for a Halloween get-together with some friends from our play group. Before the sun went down, the kids had fun in the jumping castle and ate lots of pizza. Then we changed into costumes and attempted a group picture, which proved almost impossible with four 2-year-olds, two 1-year-olds and a newborn. We did get some cute shots during the trick-or-treating portion of the night. The girls did a great job knocking on the doors and using their best manners. We only encountered one very scary mask, which I managed to convince Sophie was one of the characters from Pablo's monster party (from the Backyardigans). Safe! The other kids were reluctant to knock on the doors after Mr. Scary Mask, so we headed back to Rochelle's house, set up camp in the driveway and passed out candy to the big kids. Our favorite costume was a dad dressed up like Jack Sparrow. He was accompanied by a man on stilts, which of course was a huge hit with the little ones. All in all it was a very fun night, and we were especially glad that both dadddy and grandma were there with us.