Outside Fun

The weather man said rain all weekend but today was actually pretty nice. A little cool but warm in the sun. We went to the playground at the local elementary school and the girls had tons of fun going down the slides and just running around in the school yard. Then we came home and had an impromptu photo shoot in the front yard. This is my favorite new photo of the girls; although they are not looking at the camera (they are looking at a guy who was driving by and stopped to ask us a question) it's so hard to get a photo of both of them together anymore so this one makes me happy:

Tiny Tumblers Part II

The girls loved their second gym class this Saturday. They were busy little bees the entire time we were there.

Stats

Natalie and Amanda had their 14 month check up this week so we have some new stats to report. There is big news here....the little wee one (Amanda, who was 2 lbs smaller at birth) has surpassed Natalie in weight. We suspected this to be true for awhile but were unable to officially confirm it until the weigh in. Here is the overview:

Natalie is 30 and 1/4 inches tall (50th percentile) and she weighs 19 lbs 2.4 oz. (7th percentile).

Amanda is 29 and 3/4 inches tall (40th percentile) and she weighs 19 lbs 13 oz. (12.5th percentile).

They are definitely growing like weeds! I have not reported lately on their development but it really is amazing. They are really good walkers now. Natalie can make it a bit farther than Amanda on the whole but they both have it mastered. They say a lot of words now too, like "cat," "woof", "duck" (although they have their own version of this that you might not recognize if you heard it); dada, mama, the "boo" part of peek a boo; moo, and others that seem to come out of nowhere. They understand a lot of words and phrases now. For example, they are able to point out their noses, tongues, hair, hands and feet and are quickly grasping ears, eyes and mouth. They know and can point out numerous items, such as flowers, dogs and cats in books. They also have a much better grasp of what we're doing when. For example, at night when we ask them if they are ready to go upstairs to get a bath, they both say "ba?" about 30 times and then they take off for the stairs. They also recognize songs that go with certain activities. Like when we sit in the rocking chair and rock, Amanda sings "Rock A Bye Baby" with me. She has the "ra" part down! They also know the Bonanza tune because I sing it to them whenever they are riding a "horse" or their little rocking giraffe. So, now if one of sings the tune they both run over to the giraffe to get on.

In sum, it's a very fun age!

Tiny Tumblers

We enrolled the girls in a Tiny Tumbler class at a local gym. We had our first class today and they had a ball. Here are a few photos and then a funny video of the girls running back and forth on a trampoline -- warning, there is a collision in the middle of the video -- Amanda was dazed for a moment after getting wiped out by Natalie but everyone was fine.

Fairytale Town

The mall play area was such a hit yesterday that today we decided the girls were probably old enough to enjoy Fairytale Town. They did! They loved seeing the animals (goats, pigs, a cow, a donkey and some chickens). But their favorite part was going down the slides! Here are a few pics and a video.

Fun At The Mall

The local mall has an outdoor play area for kids and we decided to take our first trip there today. The girls were in awe for a bit but quickly let loose, ran around and had a ton of fun.

Thief!

We have a thief in our house! Amanda literally took the pants right off Natalie!!

Weekend Update

Grandma Jean gave the girls a box of Baby Einstein alphabet books for Christmas and they just LOVE them. Every day we work our way through the box multiple times. The girls will actually sit still in their chairs and listen to the entire alphabet. Here they are this morning reading with Daddy.




Here are the girls playing, something they do very well!

And here is Amanda double fisted with two of our old cell phones. The girls love any kind of electronic item and they far prefer the "real thing" to their mock toys. Last weekend, Amanda walked around with both cell phones in her hands for quite awhile. It was very amusing.