Isabella, the swimmer

Isabella had her first swimming lessons in Oct. She went twice a week for 3 weeks. It is always hard to determine if she will enjoy doing something like that, but she ended up having an absolute blast. My biggest worry was that she wouldn't want to get into the water without Jeff or me. The first night, as they were walking into the water, she said "Mommy, mommy", but one of the lifeguards gave her a diving ring and asked her to take it into the water and from then on she was totally fine.

We began to realize how much she has changed recently. She was so talkative to her instructors, she was the first one to shout out answers to any questions. When they were making pretend soup she was always calling out ingredients to add. "Corn!" "Crackers!" "M&Ms". She also was looking for a lot of attention always telling the teachers to "Look at me!".

I could tell she didn't really understand the difference between blowing bubbles and putting your head under water. She was constantly dunking her head under water. When they'd get out the noodles to swim with she'd start swimming away and have to tell her to come back closer to the rest of the group. When they played with the diving rings and it was her turn, she always just stuck her foot out under water to catch the ring and get it that way - which wasn't the point, but it was so funny!

We are so happy she loved swimming lessons. The next level they said she was ready for was Level 1 which she has to be 5 years old to be in, so I don't know if we will enroll her in the same swim lessons until then, or maybe I'll just make more of an effort to take her swimming at the indoor pool every once in a while.

Butternut Squash Retraction - we have a taker!

The butternut squash has become an interesting food item over the years. Bella has never cared for it, although she states that she likes it with lots of ketchup (although she gagged last time she had it that way). I also find the butternut squash to be a vile food while Robin enjoys it. Evelyn has never tried it, at least until Oct 7th. Robin was eating the squash when Evie motioned that she wanted it. Being the wonderful father I am I had to grab the camera before she could take a bite which did not please her very much. Here is the video of Evie's first bite and subsequent bites of butternut squash.



It appears we have a divided house on the butternut squash, it pleases Robin to have someone else that enjoys the squash. I would imagine our supplier is probably also pleased.

Evelyn's 18 month appointment

Evelyn had her 18 month appointment last Tuesday. She had to get 4 shots which she was not particularly happy about, but was able to get to be her usual happy self by the time we got to checkout. Here are her stats:
Height: 33.5 inches tall (93%)
Weight: 23.5 lbs. (35%)
Head: 18" (45%)

To sum it up she is tall and thin with a roughly average sized head.

Butternut Squash 2011

Each year Grandpa Groves brings us butternut squash from his garden and the girls are less than impressed.

This year Isabella eventually agreed to try it, if it was dipped in ketchup first. Jeff took a teeny tiny bit and here is the result



I don't think Evelyn has ever actually tried it, she just shakes her head 'no'.



Another video on a different day, trying with Evelyn



Another day, Isabella refusing



And of course, a post about butternut squash could not be complete with the videos from previous years

Who do your kids look like?

I remember getting a lot of questions about whether Bella and Evie look more like me or Robin when they were babies. We have always said that they do look more like me than Robin. Months ago a picture was unearthed that proves that Bella definitely looks more like a Kellbach than a Groves. The weird thing is that Bella is a dead ringer of Grandma Linda when she was young. If you don't believe me just see the pictures below. When we first showed the picture below to Bella we asked her who that was a picture of and she replied "It's a picture of me."

Below is a picture of Grandma Linda


Below is a picture of Bella (for comparison purposes only)



We have a board book called "A Picnic With Monet" that we read with Bella. We read it a few days after convincing her the original rocking horse picture was Grandma and not herself. She saw the picture below in the book and exclaimed "Look there's Grandma."

Adventureland

A few weeks ago we decided to go to Adventureland for the day. Bella got to ride on several rides but is a couple inches short of being able to do a couple of the roller coasters. Next year she will be able to ride most of the rides. We did all do the log ride together which I believe Bella enjoyed and Evie was not sure about (check out her face and her arm grabbing onto my leg in the photo).



Below is a video of Bella riding on one of the kids rides called the frog hopper.




We got both girls to nap at the same time which was awesome!



















Robin is actually really nervous here that Evelyn is going to jump out of her arms!

Isabella, the soccer player!

Isabella has been playing soccer on Thursday nights. She is getting better each week. The first night she basically wouldn't leave my side. The second night, she wasn't much better. The 3rd time, we told her we'd go out for ice cream afterwards if she just ran on the field by herself. That really motivated her and now she's doing much better and actually seems to enjoy it. She rarely kicks the ball during the game, she just kind of runs around after everyone else. When she actually does kick the ball you can just tell how excited she is. She has really improved and we have really enjoyed our soccer nights.

Can't believe it was actually cold the first night


Next photo shows how Isabella likes to stand behind the crowd

This is a later week where she has actually warmed up a bit to being on the field. She's not usually that far behind the others...

Getting a little more into the action, but notice she's not really paying much attention to the ball


Seeing a lot more of these proud smiles now!

And a video of her at practice the last week

Evelyn eating with a spoon

After she kept trying to grab my spoon, I figured maybe it was time to let her try by herself. She loved eating her applesauce with a spoon herself, but really, not too much actually made it into her mouth.

Happy Father's Day!

The girls and I worked on Father's Day cards for Jeff on Sunday morning. At Isabella's recent daycare conference I learned she was able to draw people now, so I asked her to draw a picture of her daddy. I thought the result was pretty cute.

This is actually Daddy and Mommy


The girls making their cards

I took a video of Bella making hers. Sorry about the bad camera skills, I'm focusing so much on what Bella is drawing you hardly see her face and then I never even pan over to Evie who is so cute sitting next to her at the table.

Next, the girls and I went to Hardee's to pick up some breakfast for Jeff. I know, it sounds ridiculous, but Jeff is way better at making homemade breakfast food than I am and I know he likes Hardees breakfast (thought about Brueggers, but Hardees has a drive-thru, so that kind of made my decision). Bella, true to form, decided to help Daddy eat a large majority of his breakfast.

We did some normal Sunday stuff like running errands and then after lunch and nap we got out the slip and slide (picked one up at a garage sale) and our kiddie pool. The neighbor girls came over and everyone had a good time.

So, I kind of forgot that slip and slides are a little dangerous

Evie was a great spectator

On to the pool

Hey Bella, I think you have a little something on your face...

For the rest of the day we cleaned up and took Jeff out to Olive Garden for dinner. The girls were very well-behaved and we had a nice dinner. Next, we stopped in at Coldstone for some icecream to go. Cake batter and only all cookie dough for the mix-in. Even the worker at Coldstone said that was going to turn out very good and it was!

Baseball Game

Bella and I went to a Cedar Rapids Kernels game with my friend Jeff and his son Aiden last Saturday night while Robin and Evie stayed home. It was P&G night at the ballpark so Jeff got free tickets and invited Bella and I out with them. I hadn't been out to a game for a couple of years so it was fun to attend and see some live baseball (sort of). We had some great seats, we were in the second row right behind the visitors dugout. Bella and Aiden sat in their seats and ate some popcorn but were not very interested in the game. We got up with them a few times as food was the only thing that kept them occupied while sitting in our seats. Bella said she wanted a sandwich and we ended up getting a kids hot dog which appears to be a normal size hot dog (just cheaper). Below are a couple of pictures of us in our seats and Bella eating her hot dog.



After about 4 innings of trying to sit at our seats with intermittent breaks we decided to take the kids over to the inflatable bounce house, slide, and obstacle course. The kids did not care much for the bounce house and spent virtually all of their time going through the obstacle course together. Aiden was much better at climbing in the course but would always wait to see if he could help Bella. Here are a few pictures of Bella and Aiden having fun.






We did go back to our seats after missing about 3 innings with the promise we would go back and play which we did less than an inning later. We were then able to go back to our seats and see the last half inning of the ball game where the Kernels lost 8-7. There were fireworks after the game and I thought that it was a good fireworks show but Bella wasn't as impressed. Bella thought they were too loud and didn't seem to care about the way they looked. We took this picture below after the fireworks and after changing into pajamas in the men's room.

We got home around 11:30PM and Bella fell asleep on the way home. It ended up being quite the late evening as Bella vomited all over her bed shortly after midnight. It was a lot of vomit and was quite disgusting (I got to see small pieces of hot dog). As I was taking off her sheets I was trying not to throw up as the stench was so horrible that I could smell it well after being away from her room and her sheets. Bella sat on Robin's lap watching me as I changed the sheets and she vomited again on Robin, this was even more disgusting and if it would have been me that she had puked on it would have almost certainly started a puke-o-rama between me and her. Robin stayed in bed with her where she threw up two more times. I am not sure if we had a bug go through the house as Evie threw up overnight the Tuesday before and I threw up this last Wednesday overnight. Thus far Robin has avoided the plague but if the schedule holds up tonight is her night.

Evelyn's Ear Tube Surgery

I started this post on April 10th and realized I never added pictures and posted it.

Evelyn had her ear tube surgery the Wednesday (April 6th) after her Birthday. Her surgery was scheduled at 8:10am and we had to get there at 7am. Jeff and I both took the day off and we brought Bella with us. Evie was a trooper, she wasn't allowed to eat anything before the surgery and they were running behind, so it wasn't until about 9:10 that she went in for surgery. The surgery went well and we got out of there and ate what ended up to be lunch at IHOP. Bella went into daycare while we stayed home with Evie for the afternoon.
Prior to surgery
Prior to surgery
Bella and Mom watching Sesame Street while Evie is in surgery