Saturday, April 30, 2011

Recent Birthday Party

Eliana got to go to her friend Jocelyn's birthday party recently and was so excited to be there! Here she is with the birthday girl:

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It was a Rapunzel party and Eliana got Jocelyn a ballerina Barbie. It was a hit!

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Look at the BEAUTIFUL cake her mom, Jessica, made!! It's amazing!

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The girls had a great time playing with it! ;)

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And they were mesmerized once the candles were lit - can you blame them??

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Make a wish, Jocelyn! Happy Birthday!!

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Thursday, April 28, 2011

My Favorite Picture Yet

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I asked Eliana what this picture was and she told me there was the grass, clouds, sun, sky, and Josie. I pointed to the not so obvious parts of the picture and asked about those:

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"That's Josie; she's a carrot. And that's me; I'm a cherry. We're Veggie Tales characters!"

This is my favorite picture yet!

Sunday, April 17, 2011

Better Bike Rider

Last time I posted about Eliana learning to riding her bike, I mentioned that she was unable to get started unassisted. Well, she's pretty much gotten that figured out now. We've also been riding longer distances together. Yesterday we rode to Weebee's to buy sorbet. It's about a 2 mile trip which involves crossing a major street and riding in bike lanes. She's doing a really good job staying in the bike lane and following directions. It was a fun trip that I hope we'll be able to repeat often this summer when we don't need to wear parkas when going for ice cream.

Thursday, April 14, 2011

Wii Bowling

I am sitting here watching Leif and Eliana play wii bowling. It's funny to watch Leif's competitive side come out against his own daughter. It's also funny to watch Eliana skunk Leif by getting 6 strikes in a row. It's the first time Leif has played with Ellie. Apparently she has been learning to wii bowl at Josie's house. She's either crazy good, or crazy lucky. Either way she's crazy. :)

Saturday, April 09, 2011

Bike Riding Fun!

Tonight for the first time I actually got to witness Eliana's new-found bike riding skill. I was impressed! I'm pretty sure she can ride a bike better than I can now. I had fun watching her ride to and fro in front of our house and snagged some pictures.

Learning to ride a bike

Learning to ride a bike

Learning to ride a bike

Learning to ride a bike

Learning to ride a bike

Tuesday, April 05, 2011

Playing the classics

A while back Shirt.Woot had an awesomely nerdy shirt I couldn't resist.


It came in the mail yesterday and I proudly wore it today. Eliana was quite interested in the shirt and kept asking questions about the details of it. It was hard to explain why the turtles were doing those things and how they were painting a cloud on the sky.

I figured the easiest way to explain it was to show her. So we fired up the Wii, downloaded Super Mario Brothers, and set to playing. I played a few levels to show her the ropes and then turned over the controller. She laughed gleefully at being able to make Mario jump and run and so forth.

She definitely lacks the motor skills to play well, but it doesn't matter. It was still a fantastic moment. I've been looking forward to playing the classic video games with my kid for a long time. It's right up there with teaching my kid to ski and bike.

On the topic of biking, we went out riding again tonight. Given a sufficient slope, Eliana can now get started on her own. The best slopes around are found in the park across from our house, pointing straight down into the pond. She's better than I expected at translating that momentum
into forward motion around the pond when she rolls down to the trail.

As last night, she was quite resistant to heading home when I told her it was time, despite obviously tired legs, cold hands, banged up shins, and flushed cheeks. I love the spark of drivenness that I see in her.

In another sign of her growing up, when we got home, I told her she needed to take a bath or a shower. She picked a shower. She even managed to get out of the shower in a timely fashion when I told her to keep it short. I was proud of her.

Monday, April 04, 2011

Bike Rider

Today Eliana learned to ride a bike. She went around our neighborhood pond three times. She still can't get started by herself, but with a little something to stabilize her to get started, she's off.

This newfound competency was met with such humble expressions as
  • I'm doing it. I'm doing it.
  • Whoohoo!
  • I am the greatest bike rider ever!
  • I'm a five year old!
  • I need to tell Josie about this.
  • I am an excellent rider!

It appears she got my sense of humility. (The preceding sentence caused Elizabeth to cackle.)

To think I considered staying in to watch some silly basketball game tonight instead of taking the monster out.