Wednesday, May 29, 2013

Dandelions

After dinner we decided to walk over to the store in this (finally) beautiful weather.






Some updates:

Inara: We had a meeting with her preschool teachers a few weeks ago where they just gave us an update on her progress, what she needs to work on etc. Apparently she is very determined and knows what she wants (we had no idea!). She'll explain what she wants and if you don't understand the first time, she'll explain again. If someone takes something from her she will let the whole school know what happened by demanding it back (even the older kids back off), but she rarely takes things from others. She's very kind, polite and helpful, but still struggles with waiting her turn and table manners (although the last part has gotten a lot better). She has advanced motor skills and has had a chance to spend some time in the older classes to prepare to transfer there. She has a positive outlook and is usually excited by the suggestion of a new activity or event. Needless to say, she's great! They didn't say that, but I'm sure they thought it. 

She's also using the potty about once a day, but it's totally up to her. We're not pushing it, just praising her when she goes. Her speech is advancing everyday and she's using more English words. The other day, she translated what Andrew was telling to Swedish for me. She talks a lot in her sleep, saying things like: "I want those blueberries", "my turn now!" and "Inara will fit there."

Baby:  I went in for a check up the other day and the baby's heartbeats are nice and strong and my belly is measuring right on the line. This baby is a lot more active than Inara was, it's pretty much a party in there 24/7, so we'll see what comes of that. 

Andrew: Andrew went to a wind conference on the mainland for a few days two weeks ago. He got to dine in a castle and ride a crane, so it seems like he had a good time. He got his Swedish driver's license on Monday, so we're pretty excited to be able to drive (legally) here now. He's done with his Swedish classes tomorrow and has to work for another month before he gets to go on a six week "vacation", but don't worry, I'm already lining things up for him to do on his time off. 

Maria: Apparently I was a bit anemic last time I had my blood checked, so now I'm taking some more iron and it seems to help with the jet lag-like fatigue I've been experiencing. Work is going well, although it's a bit depressing to be cooped up in an office when the sun is shining outside. I just have to make until middle of august though when I get to go on vacation.

That's all for now!


Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Thursday, May 23, 2013

Time

Just finished the invitations for Inara's birthday party. I can't believe she's almost two.


Wednesday, May 22, 2013

Holding Hands

Our friend Reagan and her son watched Inara for us for a little while last weekend. It was sort of a test to see how she would do. Judging by these pictures, she seems to have been doing more than well: 


Holding hands









Monday, May 20, 2013

Shades

Inara looking wicked cool.
Even cool enough to wear them inside.

Thursday, May 16, 2013

Assorted pictures of Inara doing things

It's me again folks.

You may have noticed a drop in the number of posts going up here. This is largely because Maria is tired and too busy. She has repeatedly ignored my suggestions to improve her efficiency, to the point where she now just threatens me. Her lose and yours I guess.

I have only a very mild interest in keeping the blog updated. This is compared to my complete lack of interest in Facebook. Anyhow I digress.

So today I present you with random stuff I took off my Ipod.

Went to daycare. Dog suit taken. Lion suit taken. Daddy was hirsute. Cow suit... available.

Going to a birthday party.

Angry that we were just sitting outside taking stupid pictures. PARTY! Stupid parents.

 The next set of pictures is from this last weekend where we went to a farm with her daycare. Basically a swarm of small children molesting innocent farm animals. Sounds like fun!

This farm had six horses, a few hundred sheep, two dogs and two rabbits. Below are Inara's interactions with all except the dogs.

These rabbits seemed a bit on the sluggish side. They were probably drugged to tolerate the 10+ children screaming at them and ramming various objects in their direction to eat. If they weren't drugged they should have been.

Inara was very pleased to be able to touch the near catatonic rabbit. She later tried to force feed it a dandelion with middling success.
Inara moved on to larger game. These were more lively and ate all the dandelions I could pick and then give to Inara to give to them. Children are bureaucrats at heart.

Yup. Sheep.

Inara sat on this and just kicked her legs. Great fun.
 This next set of pictures is from yesterday. Inara and I got some time together after I got out of class. This is how we chose to spend it.
Inara saw one snail and decided to collect every one she could see. Turns out she has pretty good vision. This is her haul. Daddy is so proud.

This particular snail is probably going to bear the psychological wounds of this encounter for a long time. Lets just say there was some probing right after the picture was taken.

These two were determined to be "small" and were placed where they could most easily be stepped on.

Uploaded the wrong picture. Too lazy to take this one down and load the other one.

And thus began the great snail rolling contest. There were no winners.
I've gotta couple movies too that I'll probably upload tomorrow.

Enjoy folks.

Friday, May 3, 2013

The tricycle

So it's been a while since the last post, but I'm sure you loyal readers don't mind and won't complain. Seriously this is a free service folks so you can all be a part of our awesomeness. To reinforce this I give you the below.

Inara has recently received her mother's old tricycle. It is in mint condition, thanks in large part to grandma Anita's impeccable storage and house keeping and Maria's lack of ability to ride it as a child. It is not commonly known, but Maria didn't learn to walk until she was 12. So cycling of any sort was out of the question.

Inara had been eyeing a neighbor's tricycle so we figured it was time to give her one of her own. It is red, which is one of Inara's eight favorite colors. The tricycle was unfortunately too big for her and her legs couldn't quite reach the pedals. I show her how to cycle, being an expert.  In the second video she decides to attempt to effect repairs to the tricycle.

I've attached two videos of her second and third attempts to ride. The first attempt would have been filmed but the Ipod picture froze and consists of me muttering and pressing the buttons while I filmed my feet, the sky and, best of all, half a minute of what my pants pocket looks like inside! I don't want to spoil it for you but apparently it's pretty dark in there with poor acoustics.

Behold:


Behold futher:


After the tricycle lost its allure I was forced to entertain her the old fashioned way, throwing her as high in the sky as I could. Turns out I can throw her high enough to make her mother sick just by watching. I'd say that was an accomplishment but worms/slugs have the same effect on Maria and they just mostly lay there. Here is a video of the sickening feat. I feel that the effect was greater for Inara not being able to see and almost being dropped once.