Lily Starts Kindergarten!

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IMG_8361IMG_8363Lily had a great first month of Kindergarten at her new school in Diamond at Quail Summit Elementary School!  She is in Ms Edward’s class and she is also in the morning and after school Fun Club since my work schedule doesn’t allow me to drop her off and pick her up during normal school hours.  Lily is doing some extracurricular activities that’s offered by her school (Robotics, Programming, and Mad Science), and she’s doing some activities that I signed her up for through the community center (Jazz Dance, Pom Pom/Baton Twirlin, and Tennis).  I wasn’t sure if all those activities would be too much for her, but at LePort, she did about 3 activities after school each week and so I figured if any of this is too much, or if she doesn’t like any of it, then I won’t sign her up for it in the next session.  So far, she loves all of the classes!!!  Her favorite is tennis!  When she first came to the tennis court for her first lesson, she was super excited because I got her a new tennis racket and balls, but then once the class started, she froze and started to cry and didn’t want to do it.  I think she was probably intimidated by the tennis court and everything looking so unfamiliar to her.  I decided to do the warm ups with her and held her hand and jogged with her around the tennis court.  Then she stood in line and once she swung the racket for the very first time, she had the biggest smile on her face and she instantly loved it!  She had so much fun and was running to get the balls and even asked me if she can play till night time!  Haha!  I’m so proud of Lily for trying new things and giving tennis and chance and now fulling embracing the sport!

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IMG_8482 IMG_8620Lily is doing so well in class too!  On the first day of school, Lily received two stones to put in the classroom jar, and you get the stones by doing something good or behaving in class, etc.  Once the jar gets filled up, then the class gets a popsicle party!  She also received a Quail Coin on campus for helping another student and listening to the rules.  The Quail Coins go into a big jar at the school office and once that fills up, the whole school gets a party!  Lily was so excited to get homework too, that she even made up her own homework assignment at school on the first day haha.  I told her that I put all her color pencils, markers, pens, erasers, etc in a box in her backpack so that she can work on her homework in after care if she has any.  She was so excited that during recess, she just asked the teacher for a piece of paper, wrote her name on it and drew pictures and put stickers on it and said that’s her homework.  She’s so cute!  She didn’t have any homework the first week of school, but once she did start getting homework, she’ll do it right away when we get home and she’ll finish the whole week’s assignment in one day!  So the other days we just practice reading because she insists that we do homework!  That’s my girl! haha.

IMG_9157Lily also got selected to be the first Star Student in her class!  She kept telling me that she needed pictures for her poster, like the one her teacher has in class, so I gave her some photos but all week she said they didn’t have time to work on their posters.  That Friday when I picked her up, I saw the poster in her cubby and saw she was chosen to be Star Student!  Her teacher told me that Lily’s a joy to have in class and that she chose Lily to be the first Star Student because she felt that Lily would be a good example to the class for being Star Student.  So all of that week, she gets to be line leader, help serve lunch, pick the book to read aloud in class, and get first choice for other activities!  Lily also got chosen to be the first Student of the Month in her class as well!  She will be presented with an award this coming Monday, and it’s a surprise at the first school assembly too, so I can’t wait to go see Lily get her first award!  I’m so proud of Lily, she is transitioning so well to kindergarten and all the new activities!  She’s making lots of friends, and knows all the teachers names that she interacts with.  She even wanted to make a birthday card for one of the after school care teachers because she heard it was her birthday soon!  She’s such a sweetheart!  Lily even told me not to pick her up so early because she was about to do her homework and that she was going to play soon too haha.  I love her spirit and her desire to learn!IMG_8556Right now Lily loves to help me cook dinner and she can almost do everything herself!  She can chop and crack eggs, she can even turn on the stove and everything!  She’s very enthusiastic about serving the food when we’re all done too!  I also took the kids to the Museum of Ice Cream and she had a blast exploring the exhibits and trying all the different ice cream and candy samples!  She’s very happy spirited and has a very kind heart.  She’s always looking out for Leo and always telling everyone how much she loves her baby brother!  Everytime I bring Leo to drop her off or pick her up from school, or even bring Leo to her after school classes, she always point Leo out to her friends and teachers haha.  She’ll take a break in her tennis class to come over and give Leo a kiss!  I fills my heart seeing how much she loves him!  I love you so much Lily, I’m so proud of you!

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IMG_8901IMG_9023Leo is growing up so much!  He’s definitely getting taller and he’s moving really fast too.  Leo is getting much better at eating purees from the spoon.  Sometimes he’ll fight it and not want the spoon in his mouth, but he’s improving and he’ll stick his tongue out to lick the puree when it’s on the high chair tray too.  He’s getting better at closing his mouth around the spoon too, it’s not completely sealed when he closes his mouth but it’s definitely an improvement!  Leo enjoys watching his big sister Lily play tennis and is fascinated with her baton twirlin class too haha.  He likes being outside and getting pushed in his trike.  He also loves the water!  He will see the bathtub and instantly try to climb inside.  Leo is also doing really well with speech therapy.  He still isn’t purposefully talking yet, and the only audible word he really says is “ball”, but he says “ball” for everything…  He is trying to make more sounds though, and he’s trying to use his hands to sign and communicate with us!  He’s sometime signs “more” and “dog” and “all done”!  He will tap his head when you ask where his head is too!  We are still working on the rest of his body parts but this is huge progress!  I’m so proud of Leo and I really feel like sign language will be super helpful for him.  I’ve been watching youtube tutorials on signing as well so I can really use it as a primitive language for Leo.

IMG_9141 Leo loves playing with toys that makes sounds, especially drums, the xylophone, and banging toy pots and pans together.  He really likes playing with the door jam and making it going “boing” all the time.  He still loves the mirror and would just sit in front of the mirror laughing and squealing at himself.  He is his own entertainment haha.  He also likes to chew on nerf gun bullets and keep it in his mouth and crawl around the house with it.  He is still drooling but it’s improved a lot!  He also is getting pretty good at listening, when I tell him no and not to do something, he will stop and go do something else.  He’s clever though and will sometimes try to hide and figured that if he can’t see me, then I can’t see him haha.  He doesn’t know any other directions for the most part but he’s learning and slowly understanding!  He had a recent OT evaluation and they said that he mostly ranks at a 10-11 month old in terms of physical and mental development.  He scored at normal age range for some skills, but the lack of certain skills pulls him down a bit.  It’s sad to hear, but I just see how much he’s growing and improving and I cannot be more proud of my little man!  IMG_8670 IMG_8675 Leo will soon be starting Hippotherapy where he’ll get physical therapy through horse back riding lessons!  It’s a great way to increase core strength and gain balance and coordination!  I really hope Leo will enjoy it and hope that this can eventually be a great hobby for him!  Leo is always so happy and easy going.  He is very chill and super fun to hug and squeeze and kiss!  When it’s time to brush his teeth, he opens his mouth now and is really good and not biting the toothbrush too much, and doesn’t resist me brushing his teeth anymore.  He also loves books and music.  His favorite song is still Twinkle Twinkle Little Star!  He really likes stuff animals, mostly so he can chew on their tail or their nose haha.  He likes to sleep with a blanket and hold onto it while sucking his thumb and then falling asleep that way.  He also is getting really good at cruising now.  He can climb up the stairs and couch very easily now and he knows how to safely climb off the couch now too.  No more diving head first into the ground from the couch haha!  It’s really cute when Leo crawls really fast, he would tuck his head down and then dart off!  That’s when you know he’s determined to get somewhere fast.  Whenever the baby gate at the stairs is open, he’ll see it and climb up the step and sit one step behind the gate and sit there and chill and see the room from a higher view point haha.  He’s so funny!  He’s getting better at taking steps and walking with assistance.  Sometimes he can just hold only one of my hand and take a few steps too.  He’s definitely getting close to walking on his own, maybe he will be able to by Christmas!  Leo is so sweet and happy-go-lucky boy.  I love you so much Leo!!IMG_8588IMG_8945IMG_8952

 

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