The TODD Ride

This last weekend Dan, Izzy and I got together with some friends and rode a 27 mile trail in Des Moines, IA. Not only was it awesome to see quite a few of our old friends again, but the experience of the ride itself was great! Honestly, I wasn't sure how I would do over that distance. I admit that it was tiring, but it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be.

Izzy was a pretty good sport about the whole trip. It was a LONG trip to IA on Friday...about 8 hrs worth. By the time we arrived in Ankeny we were ALL ready to get out of the car. On the ride, she did pretty well too....sleeping quite a bit and taking in the sights the rest of the time. There were portions of whining, of course, but that is to be expected when someone her age is restrained over a period of time. She seems to be saying 'I've got no stinking time for this, let me out!'

Here Izzy is playing with Kylie. Kylie was kind enough to show us around the playground at the trail head. The girls had a great time exploring and giving me things they found. At one point we found a group of geese to harass a little too...

The park pretty much rocked!

Here we are at the starting point. Note we're all fresh and smiling....ha ha. Izzy already has her helmet donned....obviously awaiting a wild ride.

The Sponge Bob MagnaDoodle says it all...and yes, she had help writing this...Finish line was El Bait Shop in downtown Des Moines.

Group finish shot. Note we are all looking a bit more subdued here. We've just finished 27 miles on the hottest day of the summer....and now we're having a beer! (minors excluded)

Who Flipped the Toddler Switch?

At 15 months, to the day, it seems...Isabelle has reached another dimension. A dimension of sight and sound... That's right, she has seemingly entered *dum dum duuuum* The Toddler Zone.

Ok, that's cheesy, but the switch seems true enough. Izzy is now into things that I would think she wouldn't be yet. (Believe me, I am learning fast to not underestimate my little smarty...the knobs are now off the stove to nip that curiosity in the bud until she can understand what it means....) She is BIG still into mimicking...that isn't new. What's new is our realization that she sees a lot more than we think she does. For instance...our dishwasher has a control panel that works intermittently, much to my disgust. Well, the other day, Izzy was helping me take clean dishes out of the washer. When it was time to close the door, she helped me push it up, we latched it, and then she proceeded to smack the control panel....just like she's seen mommy do in moments of weakness. SO! Obviously she sees and hears everything. Guess it's time to pay more attention to what Dan and I say when we're talking about work frustrations or other things that get us riled up.

Izzy is in the middle of a language explosion. She's picking up many new words, even though it seems like me, Dan and the sitter are the only ones that understand most at this point. Also, now when she's babbling, EVERYTHING has inflection when she responds to you, and 9 times out of 10 they are what you would expect. If you tell her something that she doesn't want to hear or re-direct her to somthing she should have as opposed to something she shouldn't (which is quite often these days) she will whine something at you that sounds like 'noOOOooooooo' with the rise and fall in the tone. This, now also has become accompanied by the dreaded LIP. Yes, the lip that if it would stick out much farther, birds might perch on it. I have yet to catch the LIP on film...I hope to catch and preserve it at this early state....for embarrassment when she's 16, of course.

Here are some things that she says aside from the usual Mommy, Daddee, and Dodger...she will try just about anything if you catch her at the right time:

• Landon (the sitter's 2+ year old she loves to play with)
• Banana (sounds more like na na na....sometimes she gets the b in there...sometimes it comes in the middle...lol)
• More
• Emily (a 2+ year old girl also at the sitter she loves to play with...sounds like ma-lee)
• Baby
• Ball
  
• Magnum (work in progress)
• Grandpa (work in progress)
• Grandma (work in progress)
• No no no! (work in progress)
  
• If you sing or babble to her in a musical way, she will mimic your notes as well or at least something very close to

Here are some recent pictures:

Isabelle and Magnum are good buddies....until she pulls on his ears. Remember that toddler thing I was telling you about? Here they are playing with a stick together. Through it all though, Magnum is never far from either one his girls if he can help it.

Enjoying life and time outside. What does the gesture mean? It's anyone's guess.

Miss nosey pants very concerned with what Magnum is up to, but not quite enough to step off the deck and into the grass.

Izzy seems to be saying, "HEY! You're not supposed to be taking a picture of me in my swimsuit!!!"

My bathing beauty getting her squirt toys ready for the swim. LOOK at that cute butt!In this picture, I see the coy mischief of Grandma Mabel. Anyone else see it too? Notice that in ALL these pictures, MOM is the only one in the pool. We haven't had warm enough weather to naturally warm the water for too much swimming in our shady backyard.

Random Recent Pictures

I don't have time to write a proper update this evening, but thought I would share some pictures from a couple of weeks ago to catch up:

Playing with some sparkly Chuckies that she was very fortunate to get from cousin Erin....straight from Disney! They're too big, but....we don't care so much about that because they're SHOES, they're PINK, and they're SPARKLY! (She shows a preference for mom's red leather boots as well as her red dress shoes... a girl after my own heart.)

More of the same...for some reason, this picture reminds me of Flashdance...something with her arm position, the silhouette thing that's sort of going on, and she looks like she's lost in her steps. I don't know...some days I think I'm a little too easily entertained.

Singing herself to sleep in the truck. Sometimes she will sing and sing and sing and then not more than 2 seconds later she's fast asleep. If only I could fall asleep that fast!
What's that, momma?Always with the camera! Then again...it IS red. Am I sensing a pattern here?

Play-doh and the Little Helper

We decided to revisit the Play-doh this week. Once Izzy got over the fact that I wouldn't let her eat it, she decided the playing with it just might be kind of fun! Mostly she would tear the big pieces into smaller and smaller pieces and then try to slip them in her mouth if she didn't think I was watching too closely. If she happened to pop a piece in, I would receive the innocent 'What? I'm just sitting her minding my own business and looking like an angel' face. Long name....one expression. I see it more and more these days. ;)

Other than that, Izzy insists on being involved in whatever she can. Her helping isn't usually much of a help, but we include her on everything we can. It's how we learn, right? She still loves "helping" with the laundry and putting Dad's socks down the laundry shoot...

Here are some pictures of my little helper:

Mmmmmm, home-made play-doh!

Isabelle and her grilled cheese. No longer happy to have pieces, she now takes both whole halves at once and slowly, deliberately dismantles them...sometimes while enjoying nature through the skylight. Who says kids can't multi-task?

Isabelle helping with the *ahem* laundry...

Isabelle helping Mom fill the pool.

Izzy pretending to drive a Ferrari. So young for such good taste...

Isabelle's First Trip to the Zoo

At the end of June my sister-in-law and her family came up for a visit over the weekend. We decided to take the kids to the zoo. What a great trip that was! Being Izzy's first trip I was curious to see how she would respond. She seemed to love it! Her favorites were the monkeys and the fish. I swear if we'd spent much more time near the monkey exhibit, my sis-in-law and I would've had Izzy saying "monkey." By the end of the day there, it was a long day for her, but still SO worth the trip.

Izzy ready to start checking out the zoo.

Daddee and Isabelle checking out the giraffe exhibit.

Isabelle cashed out after a long day of seeing the animals....dreaming of monkeys and fish, no doubt!

Playing Around

Isabelle continues to talk and talk and talk all the time. I'm starting to think that she's actually now SAYING more than I understand, but can't quite get them out yet. I've been trying to interpret as best I can, especially with syllables that she says often, over and over. When I finally get one right, she beams at me....now that mom has figured it out, that's one less word to cause frustration. The trouble is....many of them sound VERY similar at this point (Milk vs. More vs Mom....although she seems to have settled on Mom-mie for my name). No one told me that becoming a mom would be easier if I'd have gotten a degree in linguistics!

On the physical side of things, Izzy has been starting to be able to run. Well...maybe that's not quite the right word....trot might be a better one. She really seems to enjoy it...especially when you're chasing her!

Her other new game....when you begin a sentence with "Where" like Where's your nose, or Where's Daddy, she only hears the "where" part and immediately (most times) covers her eyes with both her hands until you exclaim "WHERE's Izzy? I can't find her??" She'll then unveil herself as if you couldn't see her the whole time, and thinks she's incredibly clever. She cracks me up!

Other than that, she continues to mimic. Anything that Dan and I are doing, she wants to be a part of or do a version of herself. She has now learned how to throw laundry down the laundry shoot (so Dan now has help now with those pesky socks...) and she's helped me throw laundry in the washer every so often. Sometimes after her bath, she will take her bath basket back to her room and set it on her shelf....but it doesn't always stay there.

On Father's Day, we took Dan out to lunch in our wanderings of the day. Not thinking about it, I just plopped Izzy down in the booth beside me while we looked at the menu to order. After ordering, I got up to get Iz a high chair, and Dan and I spied booster seats next to the tower of the chairs we usually use. We decided to try it, and we had pretty good luck with it! Honestly, with how much Izzy was messing around, I'm surprised she didn't fall and give herself a good jolt to the chin, but we all came out of it unscathed. When did she get old enough to use a booster instead of a high chair???

Here are some pictures of Izzy and I playing around this week. She definitely keeps us entertained!

What 'choo doin'? (Unfortunately, I can see this same picture.....fast forwarded about 16 years as she peers coolly over here sunglasses at some boy somewhere. *sigh* Can she just stay little and innocent? To adopt one of my sister's rules for her daughter....Izzy's heart should belong to Daddy...at least until she's 30! ok....25!)

I see this expression a lot these days. She's in the midst of telling me somthing.

Izzy has her very own set of bracelets to play dress up with. Here she is experimenting with them as anklets...

Isabelle and Getting Dressed Up!

This weekend, Dan was an usher in a friend's wedding. This meant that Izzy and I had a reason to dress up and head out! We didn't want to look like slobs next to Dad-dee in his new black suit! Now that I'm thinking of it, we should have had the photographer take our family picture while we were dressed up, but now is a heck of a time to think of it! :P~

Anyway, Izzy and I got ready and headed to the gardens to meet Dan at the wedding. It was very hot that Saturday and I was glad that the wedding was the one at 11 am instead of the one at 3pm, as the church at the gardens has no A/C. As the ceremony started, Izzy occupied herself with this and that, mostly tearing the program apart. After that got old, she thought that she just HAD to get in the aisle and try to pick up the flower petals that the flower girls had distributed. As I tried to curb her enthusiasm and kept her in the pew, you could tell by her sour expression that she didn't think my limits were fair. It seemed like a LONG ceremony even though it was of normal length. I was terrified that somehow my little exuberant goofball would create a scene....but this day the toddler gods were on my side, or so it seemed. My struggles with her remained quiet, thankfully.

I think that Isabelle really enjoyed getting dressed up, but I believe her favorite part of the day was roaming free at the dance...and dancing herself! I plan on posting that as soon as I can heist it off Dan's phone.. ;)

Here are some pictures of the dressed up princess:

Izzy ready to go (the bib was for transit only, as the molars are still causing a minor tidal wave). These pictures of her dressed up are precious to me, and a little eerie. I say eerie because I see a little glimpse into the future with these. Her face seems older in these to me....maybe it's the dress, maybe the piggies....I can't quite place it.

Here's the comb, Mom-mie. Are you sure you're done with me?The princess ready for the ball....it doesn't seem to matter that it isn't HER ball. She's helping out Mom by carrying the camera to the car just like I am carrying the diaper bag.After the wedding, we hung out on the deck for awhile...

...enjoying the breeze.

This is my favorite recent picture of Izzy. I am VERY disappointed that the camera chose the grass over her face to focus on. Grrrr. I will have to re-adjust the settings and try to fix this with some post-processing.

Isabelle and Craft Time

We've been trying to introduce some creative outlets to Izzy recently. I know that it's pretty early for some of this stuff, but what the heck! We've been trying our hand at sidewalk chalk and coloring for a little while now, with more success every time (and fewer attempts at eating the medium). More recently we've been trying finger painting and playing with play-doh. The play-doh is home made because I had a feeling that it's pretty early for playing with this stuff....and I was right. Upon meeting the stuff, she promptly pinched a bit off of the lumps and ate it....then made a move for a second pinch. That stuff is SALTY...I know...I tasted it too when she went in for a second lick. What a goof! I rolled both lumps into a ball and finally talked her into patting them a little and then stored the doh in plastic bags. So far the doh is still good, so we'll try again at some point.

Now onto fingerpainting! I thought she would really enjoy this! The bright colors, the crinkly paper, etc. However....right now instead of really getting up to her elbows in it, she is more worried about slimy fingers. Given her other daredevil personality traits and love of smashing food everywhere I find this, and her aversion to grass on her bare feet puzzling.

Here are a few pictures from the play-doh and fingerpainting introductions. The pictures are a bit older....I didn't realize how much she's changed in a month until I looked at these pictures again.

Mom. Come on. I JUST woke up. Put the camera DOWN.

EWWWW! Finger painting is squishy...and it doesn't taste very good!

What is THIS stuff? (Note the stylish laundry basket table...)

Maybe I'd better taste it....just one lick?

Isabelle's First Sleep-Over

Dan and I traveled to Iowa the first weekend in June for a friend's annual birthday camp out. It was a chance for Dan and I to see some of our college friends that we'd not seen in a long time. Plus there are quite a few of that group that have kids that are a few months older than Izzy, so we have a lot in common in that way as well. In a few years, I can see that camp out possibly having a great group of kids running around! This year, however, just the adults were getting together to mingle.

Isabelle stayed with Aunt Traci while mom and dad went camping. This was the first time Izzy stayed in a different place without the security of mom and dad. All reports say that she had an excellent time! Among other things, Izzy got to swing, climb the play house, jump (well, sort-of) on a huge trampoline, play dress up with some pretty pink shoes, help Traci sweep the floor, and on and on. Grandpa and Aunt Trudi also came to see Izzy while she was visiting Aunt Traci. Izzy was even able to have a little ice cream with grandpa! Truthfully, I think that Izzy had just as much fun as mom and dad did....and maybe more! We send Traci and Mike a huge thank you for allowing Dan and I to get away for a bit and showing Isabelle such a good time! Words can't express how much we appreciate it!

Here are some pictures that my sister was kind enough to send my way so I could see pieces of Izzy's sleep-over!

Who knew a Tupperware container could double as a top hat for a singing number?

FISH LIPS!

Enjoying the outdoors!

All reports say that Izzy turned into a goofball at meal times. Noooooo, really? This NEVER happens at home....lolNope. Definitely NOT a goofball.Mom has since bought some little post-its JUST for playing the sticker game...this was a GREAT idea. Thanks, Traci!

Dress up in a pair of Anna's shoes...Izzy looks so proud! She put them on herself!

Grandpa getting Izzy's toes...I don't think Isabelle had ANY fun....do you??

An Attempt at an Update

Well, it's certainly been awhile since I have updated the good ol' blog! What is it about summer that makes life seem so much more busy?

Throughout everything that's been going on, Izzy has not stopped learning and growing! On the contrary, she seems to take new events and situations in stride and take something away from each one.

Here are a few of the things that she's been up to these days (I'm sure I won't be able to catch everything):

• Making 'fish lips' is all the rage
• Shoes are still a big favorite
• So is putting lots of things on her head
• Along with shoes, she's starting to like to 'dress up' a little...I'm sure this will be a favorite for quite awhile if any of the other little girls I know are any indication
• She loves to rumble and wrestle around...if you can hang her upside down somewhere in the middle, it's a BIG plus....(am I going to finally get a buddy for riding those carnival rides???)
• Isabelle will try to help you with whatever you're doing, whether you want her to or not....she's convinced you NEED her help!
• She's become quite the mimic. Not in speech just yet, but in action, expression, and tone. Thaaaat's right, it's time to start watching what we say NOW and get into the habit early!
  
• She's still a climber
• She LOVES to be outside
• She LOVES to 'play' with Magnum...he puts up with it graciously. (He has the patience of a saint...especially when she's using him as a step stool...)
• Isabelle loves to eat with a fork and drink through a straw. If she can hold whatever container the straw is in...all the better.
• The newest thing is taking a walk. This doesn't sound like much until you know one little thing....Izzy is walking along the sidewalk too! Yesterday we made it half way up the block before she decided it was time to turn around. Sure, the pace was much slower than Mags or I are used to on a walk, but that's not the point. We had to instruct her on the rules of the sidewalk, like to not go into the street or start climbing in other people's yards....but for the most part, it was a good little trek! By the time we got back in front of our neighbor's house, it was time for her to beg for a 'taxi ride.' At least we were just next door!
  

Here are some recent pictures.

Peek with the basket was one of her favorite games a couple of weeks ago. This has since subsided.

Izzy loves to climb on the mower if she's allowed. Even better is if Dad is mowing the lawn, she loves to ride with him. In fact, if she sees him on it without her, she will rather loudly complain and look at me as if to say "Why didn't he take ME???" Dan, however, is only too happy to oblige when he can...he loves to have a little buddy helper too....especially now that she's a bit older and easier to understand. Seeing them having fun on the mower together melts my heart. Silly? Maybe, but I love to see them bond.

Two words....Diaper Ninja.

Boxes are SO much fun! They can be used for so many things!

Isabelle enjoyed her first museum experience...we went to the Harley museum the last weekend in May just for the heck of it. It wasn't crowded that morning and we let her roam a little. Among her favorites were the arena racers and a manual crank display illustrating the 4 parts of the combustion cycle with LED's....a possible engine or bike lover? Time will tell.This bike was almost juuuuust right