8/29/2014

Mia ate malt-o-meal cereal and raisins for breakfast.  For lunch she had a bite of ground beef, ate elbow noodles topped with shredded cheese, a taste of lettuce salad, and bites of mixed fruit.  She made sure I knew she had a "taste" of the salad!  At breakfast I was letting the cereal cool off for a couple of minutes and Mia said, "Maybe I can blow it off!!"  :)

Darcy, Mia played very well this morning and I never saw any carry over from her having a fever yesterday and last night.  However, right before nap she started getting a little testy so she was getting tired and maybe the advil (or whatever you gave her) was wearing off too.

Cooper and Mia saw Lauralea take off her shoes and they were taking turns playing with them.  Lauralea stayed until 10:30 this morning because it's Riley's last day here so Lauralea was getting some extra Riley time.  (Riley was Lauralea's baby before Lauralea moved on to the University job.) This has been a tough week with Nora and Riley moving to Pre-School at the same time!!

At art today we were making a "Good Bye Poster" for Riley.  Mia was slightly dismayed because she said she wanted to take her art home!!  :)  I took this picture of Mia doing art because I wanted you to see the "rainbow" she is working on.  She has been watching what Riley and Nora have been doing the last several art sessions and the "rainbow" theme has been popular!  :)

8/28/2014

Mia ate half of whole wheat english muffin and ate blueberries for breakfast.  For lunch she ate bite of chicken, ate crackers, sweet potatoes, and cherries.  Cooper is home recuperating today after vomiting yesterday evening.  So it's just Riley and Mia here today and they played together very well this morning.

Mia and Riley barricaded themselves in the igloo and they have on their "growling" faces.  Riley said, "Gary can't get us!!"  :)

We took a walk around the neighborhood (I put a notice on the door just in case any Parent came by wondering what happened to us!) and stopped at this swing for 25 minutes.  Riley basically never quit smiling the entire time and Mia never quit talking!  Mia was done first and did several laps around the swings while Riley continued swinging!  While she was swinging Mia said, "I'm not falling off Gary, I'm not falling off!!"  :)  Well good!  I guess we'll count this as a success!

Mia also went down this slide one time.  As you well know she's a fearless little thing and scampered up the steps to the top.  There was some moisture on the slide so one time down was all she wanted! We also saw a large dog in the park - and that started Mia talking steady about TyTy for a long time.

When Mia was jabbering I asked Riley if she knew what Mia was talking about.  Riley said, "no."  Mia said, "I don't know what I'm saying about!"  :)  Back in the play room, Mia's doll got scratched and Mia said, "I fix her in no time!!"  LOL  When she hears a catchy phrase like that, she's got it!!

8/27/2014

Mia ate most of biscuit and ate peaches for breakfast.  For lunch she had three servings of baked beans, ate dinner roll, large serving of peas, and ate pineapple.  I am transitioning Cooper to the table and I was telling him to keep his belly up there.  Mia said, "I'll show you how to do it!!"  (This is her area of expertise!!  And she is quite adept at it I might add!)  She said, "That's what my hands are for - to EAT!!"  LOL

I always like watching to see what they find enjoyable.  In this picture Riley was calling this her "bridge."  And for some reason it was really funny when Mia would crawl under the bridge.  :)  And Mia gets a big kick out of making someone laugh!  :)

Riley and Mia worked hard packing all the blocks over and arranging them this way.  Riley said, "We are working, right Mia!?!"  Then to Cooper she said, "You want to help?"  When I took this picture they were just a few seconds from having used all the blocks so this project was over.  They looked at it for a few seconds and started tearing it apart and doing something completely different.  So it was obviously the process, not the completed project, that was important!!  :)

I got out these little houses because this play set has the toys that go with them.  The kids had lots of fun filling them with the toys.

Mia was frantically getting my attention and wanted an immediate response.  She said, "Gary Gary! I need you to talk!"  (to her!)  Then outside we were playing in the sand table and the one basic rule I have is to keep (or at least make an attempt to keep) the sand in the sand table.  Mia was waving her arms around and I said, "Mia, you're just wild!"  She dismissively said, "Oh Gary!  It just fine!!"  :)

Here's a conversation from yesterday afternoon I thought you might enjoy:  Mia said, "I have sandals!"  And I acknowledged her by saying, "Yes you do!"  Riley set us straight!  "No!  You have flip-flops!  Cooper has sandals!  I have Crocs!"  Ok, thank you for that enlightening shoe moment Miss Riley Details Teacher Cline!  :)

8/26/2014

Mia ate two servings of breakfast: waffle and hash browns.  For lunch she ate most of beef & cheese quesadilla, most of carrots, and ate oranges.

Riley and Mia played with the blocks a lot and Riley asked for help; "make me a S."  Then she and Mia were making an "R" for Riley and a "M" for Mia.  Then after breakfast they were making a "river."  Which basically consisted of piling all the blocks on top of the block shelf.  It looked more like an ice jam than a river!  :)

The kids were having so much fun running back-n-forth across the room and it was their "race."  I love the Toddler's version of a race; Everyone and anyone can say "ready set go" and they GO whenever they feel like it!  They were all saying it and also saying, "race race race!"

All the time Riley was playing with the food toys Mia was on the floor being Riley's "puppy."  It was quite hilarious.  Riley would only occasionally pay attention to her puppy, but Mia continued the game for a long time.  Riley said to Lauralea, "That's my Bad Dog!"  LOL  Actually Mia was being a pretty good puppy except for occasionally being quite demanding!  Later Riley was saying, "Slow down puppy, slow down!"  She looked to Cooper for some help; "Let's slow that puppy down!!"  :)   Good luck with that!!

The kids spotted a bee on the patio and they were all yelling and running around in a frantic fashion.  Then Nora started saying, "He's a nice bee, guys!!  He's gone, he's gone!"  LOL  That was so funny. And of course it wasn't gone; it was right above her head!!  Yikes!  That changed the tune of her encouraging little speech!

There was more "puppy play" outside and Mia and Cooper were both being puppies.  Nora was not thrilled with her puppy (Mia) so Riley generously handed her puppy (Cooper) to Nora!  "Here, you can have this puppy!"  :)  They were trying to get 'Mia puppy' to stay in the wagon.  Mia said, "I'm not going to stay in the wagon!  I jump out!!  I'm a puppy!!"  :)

8/25/2014

Mia had bites of cheerios and ate banana serving for breakfast.  For lunch she ate cheese sandwich, drank tomato soup, and had two servings of apple pieces.  After she was done with breakfast she said, "I'm not going to eat, Gary!"  Oh ok.  :)

This picture was taken Friday afternoon and the kids were having so much fun playing in the boxes.  I'd cut "windows" in the sides of the boxes and they were sticking their heads out.  Then Riley was sticking her hand out the hole in the top and they all had to do it.  I think this is such a cute picture of Mia smiling so natural and pretty!!

We did a toy, book, and puzzle exchange and Mia had explored LOTS of stuff before anyone else arrived!  She was filling the purses full of all kinds of goodies.  She and Nora were also wearing the Tutus and dancing to the music while watching themselves in the mirrors.

Riley was not feeling well (running a temperature) this morning so we played indoors.  But that worked fine with the toy exchange as no one got too bored!  Here's a picture of Mia drawing and coloring on the dry-erase boards.  We have several different colored dry-erase markers that the kids use.

Nora was waving at her Daddy this morning and Mia informed Nora that she also has a Daddy!  "His name is Matt; he's my Dad!!"  :)

8/22/2014

Mia ate oatmeal and dried cranberries for breakfast.  For lunch she ate ground beef and large servings of everything else; elbow noodles topped with shredded cheese, peas, and applesauce.

Here's a lunch table conversation:

Mia - "Thank you for dinner Gary!"

Nora - "It's NOT dinner; it's lunch!"

Mia - "I'm not talking to you; I'm talking to Gary!"

And that's a prime sampling of their relationship!  :)

I took this picture of Mia's hair after Lauralea braided it.  Look at the thickness of the braid - and you can see it's only from the circle of hair on the top of her head.  Pretty impressive!

Mia, Riley, and Cooper were having a blast with the masks this morning; Mia was wearing the wolf mask and growling and chasing Cooper and Riley.  They were laughing, running, and playing this game for at least 20 minutes.

Mia was in the chair and was whining because Cooper was bugging her.  (So I moved him away from her.)  Nora was trying to fix it and walked over to Mia and said, "I'm a nice girl; do you want me?"  (Do you want me to sit by you?)  Mia ignores the gesture and leaves.  Nora said, "You don't want anybody?"  (Apparently not!)

8/21/2014

Mia ate whole wheat english muffin and three servings of blueberries for breakfast.  For lunch she ate two servings of turkey sandwich, ate green beans, and two servings of strawberries.

Mia was here for 45 minutes before anyone else arrived and finally she asked, "Where's Riley, Cooper, Jamie, and Nora!?!"  Notice she included Jamie in the list - which made Lauralea and I laugh.  :)  Hey, she's part of the Day Care Family too!

Here's a picture of Cooper and Mia being very sanitary!  Actually Riley is the one who started this; every time it rains Riley has been running to all the climbers yelling, "lick lick lick!"  I know this isn't very sanitary, but it's dang cute!!  Cooper and Mia were saying, "lick lick lick!"  So after the picture we moved on to something different!!  :)

The kids were at the play house on the patio and Riley was serving them all "ice cream."  Cooper came running to me and was upset because Mia ate all the chocolate ice cream!!  :)  He was whining, "chocolate, chocolate, chocolate!"  Riley, please give brother Cooper some chocolate ice cream - and life was good once again!  :)

At first Riley was calling it "brown" ice cream.  So I asked Mia what flavor was brown ice cream.  She answered, "Chocolate!"  I was impressed so I asked her what flavor is "white" ice cream.  (even though it's not really white!)  She answered, "Chocolate!"  :)

At lunch time I was warming up my coffee in the microwave and the microwave is really loud.  The kids can hear it running and also hear it beep when we're in the lunch room.  (I can't!)  So Riley always alerts me when she hears it beep!  I said something about the microwave "running" and Mia said, "It running fast!!"  LOL  (The daughter of a Track Coach!)

8/20/2014

Mia arrived at lunch time today so her blog will continue tomorrow.

8/18/2014

Mia is with Family in Helena; Blog will return when Mia returns!  Maybe Wednesday or Thursday.

8/15/2014

Mia ate brown rice and raisins for breakfast.  We ate breakfast a little earlier than usual because Mia and Nora were both about to faint from lack of food.  Nora said, "I JUSSSST want to eat!"  And Mia whined, "I'm STILL hungry Gary!!"  :)  For lunch she ate meatloaf, whole wheat pita bread, bites of carrots, and ate apricots.  It was an interesting morning with only Nora and Mia here and it was fun listening to them visit at the breakfast table.  Nora told Mia, "You make me laugh Mia; you make me laugh all the time!"  (And I was thinking....if only that were true!!)  :)

These two girls played together quite well at times and at other times they played well while they were apart!  They really do like each other, but like I've mentioned many many times, they could NOT be more different in temperament and personality.  Pretty much polar opposites!  Here's the real story on the picture below: Mia arranged the blocks like you see and invited Nora to join her.  Nora was in there a few seconds (long enough for me to take this picture) and said, "Don't push me!....I'm gonna get out of here!  I'll see you in a little bit, ok!?!"  (Look closely at Nora's body language - her right shoulder and arm.  She's trying hard to get some distance between her and Mia!)  Love these girls!!

Nora included Mia in one of her elaborate pretend scenarios.  She informed me that "We're going to Boston; we won't see you anymore!  And we're going to the beach!"  :)  (That's where Nora went on vacation with her family this summer.)  She kept telling Mia "Let's go, let's go!"  Mia said, "I get my purse and phone!"  LOL  (The two essentials!)  Nora was not being very patient!  "I'm going to leave you! You need to come!"  Mia started talking about "You gonna buckle up - I'm gonna buckle up!"  They almost immediately started fighting over the big bear and that was before the trip even started!!

We filled the bird feeder and walked on the sidewalk around the yard to reach the back yard.  I was thinking about continuing on a walk, but Mia was wanting to run ahead and Nora was puttering along  behind so it was obvious that wouldn't work!  :)  Mia's motor was running fast outside and she was sprinting in circles around the yard.  Nora stood and watched her and said, "She's trying to catch me, but it's too late!"  LOL  And all the time Mia was yelling, "Can't catch me Nora, can't catch me!"  I told Mia; "You are a runner!"  Nora said, "And I'm a walker!"  LOL  I was clapping for Mia and cheering her on - trying to keep her running!  I call it preparation for Nap Time!  (Get them as tired as possible!)  As long I kept clapping and cheering she kept running.  Mia said, "Clap for me Gary; clap for me!"  :)

8/14/2014

Mia ate cinnamon toast and grapes for breakfast.  For lunch she ate bites of chicken, dinner roll, hash browns, and ate cherries.

Yesterday afternoon before it started raining the wind was whipping up the leaves and we were watching them blow across the yard.  Riley said, "Now I have to pick them up!!"  All the kids were quite concerned about the bird feeder too as it was flapping from side-to-side.  Nora and Mia were saying, "Oh no! The bird feeder!!"

During Story Time we were reading "Toddlerobics" and Mia and Nora were having a blast with certain parts and doing what the book said;  Especially the "bump bottoms" (they were back-to-back and bumping their bottoms together) and "rub noses."  They were laughing hard!

Mia's hair was bugging her shortly after she arrived and said, "My hair's in my way!!"  I put in a couple of ponytails and then I had to take this picture when one of the ponytails flopped down in front of the other one.

This is a picture of the daily ritual before lunch while I am getting it ready to set on the table.  Riley and Nora usually share a chair in the living room and look at catalogs.  Mia and Cooper will sometimes look together (like in the picture) or they will look individually.  After I took this picture Mia started messing around and rolling up the magazine and Cooper apparently thought it was pretty funny; he was laughing really hard!  These catalogs are full of kid's toys, art supplies, etc.

8/13/2014

Mia ate half of her breakfast: toast and peaches.  For lunch she ate most of her ham, a large serving of mac-n-cheese, a bite of salad, and a large serving of corn.  Mia kept telling us she tried a bite of lettuce salad and Nora and Riley both told her, "Good job Mia!"

We went out to the bird feeder and refilled it again.  The kids are studying the sack of bird feed and the bird feeder is leaning against the pole.  We refill it every other day.

Mia and Cooper played together several times this morning and in this picture they were having fun with the food toys.

This picture is pretty self-explanatory!  They were both pretending to sleep, but I never did catch them sleeping at the same time!!  :)  (Except I think Nora may have her eyes closed in the picture.)

At art time I gave each of the kids a choice for painting; hands or paint brush.  They all chose "brush" and that lasted for 75% of the project and they all finished up using their hands.  Riley was the first one to ask me, "Can I use my hands?"  Nora had been experimenting with pushing down hard with the brush and making different designs with it.  (And Mia was experimenting with how it all tasted!!)

Yesterday Riley, Cooper, and Mia (Nora had just left) spotted a bug on the climber and Mia had her nose about three inches from it.  Cooper and Riley were laughing and squealing so hard.  (With quite a bit of nervousness mixed in.)  When Mia realized how much they liked what she was doing she cranked it up a notch or two.  One of the times Mia touched the bug with her nose.  The other two were roaring with laughter.  As soon as I mentioned how BRAVE Mia was being that totally changed Riley's approach - she started getting brave too and then she'd jump back and giggle and squeal some more.  It was sooo cute!  And she did it over and over.

8/12/2014

Mia ate waffle and had a bite of pears for breakfast.  For lunch she ate bites of tuna, ate crackers, sweet potatoes, and oranges.  At lunch time I was having some coffee so everyone was calling their milk "my coffee!"  :)

Mia was not here yesterday so this was her first day with the toy, book, and puzzle exchange we did this past weekend.  The kids were wearing the masks, although Riley (in the foreground) had just taken off the Grandmother (from Red Riding Hood story) mask.  Mia is wearing the Big Bad Wolf mask and she was getting into character with way too much enthusiasm for Nora's taste!  :)

Here's another picture of Mia playing with some different toys from this set.  (Although she still has the mask on - it's more of a visor now!)  She has food toys in her hands, boots on, and some more food toys stuffed in her pockets!  Actually, in her right hand she has a fork and spoon wrapped in a linen napkin.  Nora told her it was a "napkin" and whenever Mia was explaining what she had she'd look to Nora with the expression; "What'd you say that was again?!?"  And Nora would tell her.  It was really cute.

Outside, the kids were following Riley's lead and took their dump trucks around the edge of the yard finding leaves and long stems of grass and other goodies.  However, Mia and Cooper quickly grew tired of that game and found it much easier and more fun just to grab things out of Riley's dump truck.  Ok kids, find your own goodies!  :)

8/8/2014

Mia ate a large serving of oatmeal and ate plums for breakfast.  For lunch she ate hash brown casserole, bite of biscuit, and ate mandarin oranges.

Lauralea did some french braiding on Riley and Mia's hair before she left.  (Nora arrived a little too late to get her's done.)  It takes extra time, but they both sat very well while Lauralea worked on it.

And I thought you might like to see what it looks like from the front view!  It's still intact (right now during nap time), but no guarantees by the time she leaves.  :)

For some reason (unknown to me) Riley and Nora were calling Mia "Pocahontas."  I have a Pocahontas book, but it's not in this toy set and it has not been out for awhile.  So it was pretty random and Mia was not real appreciative!  She said, "I'm NOT Pocahontas! I'm a girl!!"  So I steered them on to other activities that did not involve naming someone.  :)  Riley was saying it so cute: "poke-n-honna!"  I asked them why they started calling her that and of course they didn't have a clue.  (Just great big grins!)

The kids were playing on the climber and Mia was saying, "Hi Riley, hi Riley!"  (Like she'd just arrived!)  Riley was not responding and Nora said, "My daughter is saying hi to you!"  :)  (Her tone was slightly laced with motherly indignation!)

The Templeton Family (except for Daddy) stopped by while we were outside playing.  For those who do not know them, we had all three of their boys in our program, except Reed (same age as Cooper) had to leave early when Lauralea got the University job.  Bode was pulling Mia and Cooper across the yard in the wagon (pretty fast I might add!) and they were laughing so hard.  Everyone was having a great time - we even invited them to eat lunch with us, but they'd had a late breakfast!

I posted the following in Nora's journal, but I thought you all might like to read it too! -  I thought of something Tate Templeton said when he was in our program and about Nora's age.  Nora is going to be a Flower Girl this weekend and Tate was going to be the Ring Bearer at his Uncle's Wedding.  He asked this question; "How long do I get to wear the Bear Suit?"  (That's the logic of a "literal thinking" Toddler!)

8/7/2014

Mia ate bites of whole wheat thins and ate cantaloupe for breakfast.  For lunch she ate turkey, two servings of crescent roll, ate green beans, and two servings of mangoes.

Mia wanted to join Riley and Nora in their dancing, but her idea of dancing and Nora's idea of dancing are several galaxies apart!  Here's a picture of how dancing frequently ends when Mia is involved!  (Kind of a grappling/martial arts type of thing!)  Riley is flexible enough that she'll just go with it until she wants to do something else and then she has no problem telling Mia to "stop!"  Outside, Mia and Nora were both asking Riley to follow them with the dump trucks.  Finally Riley yells, "Just ONE second!"  And then proceeded to basically ignore both of them!  :)  It's not easy being a Toddler and learning social skills!

Riley and Mia were asking for the horses so I put the horses on the patio and the kids had lots of fun with them.  Mia was saying, "Yee Haw, Yee Haw!  Come on Cooper!" So Cooper started saying, "Yee Haw!"  A couple of times I thought Mia was going to go right over on her head when she had the horse on it's tiptoes!  :)

Then Riley started saying, "My horsey's gonna puke up!"  So of course everyone else had to say that too.  Even Cooper came over to me and said, "Horsey puke!"  Mia was saying it and then told her horse, "I get medicine and I coming horsey!"  :)

Cooper was at the window with Mia when Matt stopped and waved bye this morning.  Cooper saw Matt in his pickup and said, "Pickup!"  :)

8/6/2014

No Blog for Mia today - she'll be back tomorrow!

8/5/2014

Mia ate two servings of breakfast: Whole wheat bagel and apricots.  For lunch she ate chicken, elbow noodles, two servings of peas, and two servings of applesauce.

Lauralea had announced that the Cline Family had arrived this morning and Mia was excitedly running around yelling, "The Clines are coming!  The Clines are coming!!"  :)

Riley was working on Nora's hair and then Nora wanted to switch and work on Riley's hair, but Riley said, "No, I have to go."  So she got on her "motorcycle" and left.  :)  Outside, Riley was letting Mia work on her hair and personally, I'd prefer Nora to work on my hair!  Mia is a bit more rough and wild with it!!  Riley was tolerating it all pretty well and I'm thinking;  She says "OW!" sometimes when I'm working on it, yet Mia is pushing, tugging, and wallowing it around!  :)

For Art Time today we were doing stickers and duct tape on a large piece of Art Paper.  It was too big to fit on the table so we just worked on the floor.  Mia is in the background of this picture.  (Riley is sitting in the middle helping her brother Cooper with some stickers.)

Here's a picture of the poster on the wall after we were done.  Mia is pointing at an area where she'd been working.  I found some more duct tape with Hello Kitty, Penguins, and Batman; so everyone was excited about that.  :)

I've mentioned before about our outside routine when someone has to go potty.  We say, "Potty Run!" and everyone automatically heads for the door.  (I can't leave anyone outside unsupervised.)  Yesterday, Mia yelled, "Potty Run!"  Then she stopped and changed it; "Poopy Run!"  And she did go poop.  (We'd never called it that before.)  :)

8/4/2014

Mia ate bran cereal and dried cranberries for breakfast.  For lunch she ate cheese pizza, corn, and two servings of tropical fruit.

The City had a crew of workers across the street this morning during outside time so the kids were busy watching at the fence.  (Mia is at the fence on the left.)

Mia and Cooper were playing a wild game of spinning in circles and then chasing each other around and around the igloo.  I love listening to them giggling when they are having fun like that.  :)  Outside they were doing their running up and down the sidewalk again, pushing the dump trucks wildly.  Mia fell twice, but not bad enough to make her knees bleed.  (Thankfully!)  Cooper came running over and one of the times said, "bandaid, bandaid."  The next time he also came running and was saying, "blood blood."  :)

We have a song on our iPod (I think the name of the song is "Nora Nora") and the kids always yell, "Nora's Song!" when it comes on.  This morning Mia was singing along with it, "Nora Nora open the door, open the door Nora blue..."

8/1/2014

Mia ate malt-o-meal cereal and raisins for breakfast.  For lunch she ate ground beef, elbow noodles topped with shredded cheese, maybe a bite of lettuce salad, and a bite of mixed fruit.

All the kids were watching the birds outside.  There have been lots of them - basically a feeding frenzy in the morning! We've also been hearing and seeing a pair of 'morning doves' for the past month and they were at the feeder today too.

Speaking of birds, Lauralea has a bird sound on her phone whenever my daughter texts her and this morning Mia said, "I heard a bird Gary, I heard a bird!"  Then later it was the same thing; "I heard bird again!"  :)

While I was setting up lunch Riley and Nora were looking at catalogs and Cooper and Mia were being crazy.  So I got a picture of them going head-first off the chair.  Earlier, they'd been playing with the dump trucks again and flying up and down the sidewalk.  Mia was saying, "Coop! We better go!!  Come on Cooper!!"  Cooper was running around chanting, "Mia Mia Mia."  :)

During the past 15 years of doing Child Care full-time I've had several kids (as they get older) ask me where I work.  "Where do you work Gary?"  This morning Cooper asked, "Where'd Lauralea go?"  I told him she went to work and then I asked the group where I work.  And Nora said, "At home!"  And Mia actually verbalized, "Daycare!"  I was impressed!