Today's Project...A Drum

Now that Rebecca is a little older we are starting to do more projects. Thursday she helped Mommy make granola. And figured out that the empty oat container made a good drum. So Friday we turned it into a drum. Rebecca decorated it and we added a string so she can wear it. She loves to play the drum. Rebecca definitely has Daddy's rhythm :)

We went to "Frog Howow" again on Thursday. Rebecca absolutely loves that place. She always wants to go on the big kid equipment.Unfortunately we have all caught a cold. So we won't be doing much this weekend. And Mary and Rebecca will most likely be staying home from church again tomorrow. Hopefully they'll be over quickly. We were supposed to be in Grand Blanc today, but decided to stay home to rest and not get everyone else sick :) At least we get to enjoy some birthday cake...we don't get to bring it to GB, so somebody has to eat it ;)

Sneak Peek...and Sick?

Here is a peek at Rebecca's big girl room. It'll be a while before she actually uses it. And we still have some decorating to do. But it's definitely come a long way from the yellow wallpapered room it once was.

We had a good visit with Grandpa and Grandma Holleboom yesterday. As usual Rebecca got a lot of story time on Grandma's lap :)

Unfortunately Mary and Rebecca will be staying home from church again today. Rebecca was up most of the night due to teething and tummy problems. So she and Mary got about 3 hours of sleep. Hopefully she'll get in some good napping today.

We thought it was just teething and a tummy ache that kept Rebecca up. Turns out Rebecca has a very stuffy/runny nose too. We'll see if it's a full blown cold (could have picked it up at Kindermusik :( ). Or if it's just from the teething...I've heard of that. Either way, not fun. And we'll see if it limits what we end up doing this week. If it's a cold we don't want to get anyone else sick.

More Work

Rebecca just seems to get busier and busier...now she has to do laundry :p Our neighbors had a garage sale yesterday. We got to browse before they even opened :) Rebecca got a little washer/dryer. She loves anything that lets her pretend to do what Mommy does. So she's already loving it. It also has an iron and ironing board attached. Rebecca sure is busy now with all her coooking/baking and washing. But she still makes time to rock her babies and make them go "night night" :)Yesterday we went to our MOPS openhouse. It's becoming obvious that Rebecca is not a shy little girl anymore. She is quite independant. Someone even commented on it yesterday. Rebecca loves to be around other kids and be involved in everything that's going on. As soon as we got there she saw the little picnic tables and kids' crafts. She colored and made a cup w/ stickers. She didn't even notice that Mommy wasn't near by. We stayed for quite a while, but she still didn't want to go. We can't wait for MOPS to oficially start in a few weeks.Rebecca is definitely a good eater. She LOVES fruits and veggies. She's been chewing on beans straight from the garden (Mommy likes to do that too:) She asks for a bite if you are eating any kind of fruit (we've had fresh local peaches, pears, apples, nectarines and plums latley...she loves them all). And she always wants a taste when Mommy is chopping things. Last night we made another batch of pearsauce. It went a little slower than usual becuase Rebecca wanted a bite of pear every 30 seconds :) We're glad she's learning at such an early age what good food tastes like.
Rebecca is also becoming a little more interested in her appearance. She always has to look in the mirror after getting dressed or getting her hair done. And lately she's into headbands. She won't keep them on too long, but she likes to look at them. Her hair is getting quite long. When it's wet it is half way down her back. But with the curl it doesn't look that long. We can get just about all of it in a ponytail now.

17 Months Old & Kindermusik

Rebecca is 17 months old today! Hard to believe she's almost 1 1/2. Rebecca is learning so much every day. She is getting much faster at counting. She used to pause between each number. But last night she spouted off 1-6 like nothing. She is also getting better and better with her letters. She knows pretty much the whole alphabet. She just needs a little prompting here and there. We're working on one letter each week. So far her favorite is B. She thinks every word starts with the letter B :) She loves to sing the alphabet...ending with "wi me!." Rebecca is doing more independent play, like reading. She'll sit and read through books by herself for a while. We just realized the other day that she's been singing "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" for a while now. She actually sings almost the whole thing by herself. We sing every night before bed, and Rebecca requests whatever she's in the mood for. If you start singing something else she'll continually ask for another song until you start the new one :) Her favorite right now is "Climb, climb up sunshine mountain,..." She asks for "cimb." And then she chimes in with "turn." She likes the song about Zacchaeus. She calls it "tree." "He's Got the Whole World In His Hands" is "wowld." And she'll request specific verses...usually "He's got grandpa and grandma..." "Jesus Loves the Little Children" is "white." "Deep and Wide" is still a favorite. And so is "Rock-a-bye Baby"..."wock by baby...tee top...bwows...fall...baby...all" And "Jesus Loves Me"..."Jesus...for...bible...loves me."

She is still showing signs of lots of logical thinking. The other day she was trying to push her stroller. And figured out that it's much easier to just carry the stroller instead of bumping into things all the time :)

Rebecca is still teething like crazy. It's rare to see her without her hands or a toy in her mouth. But the teeth are getting through. And she's sleeping well now...some mornings sleeping until 8 instead of being up at 5:30 :P She has skipped her morning nap for about a week and a half now. Not sure if we're totally done with it yet, but she's definitely in the process of phasing it out and just taking one long afternoon nap (about 1:15-4pm most days).

Rebecca is starting to show some early signs of potty training readinesss (although it will probably be a while yet). Lately if her diaper is really wet she starts pulling on her pants. And sometimes she'll say "all wet" or "potty."

She is really thinning out lately. Her Halloween costume from last year still fits. And it's 6-12m! The pants were snug last Oct. But she can still get into them now.

Rebecca got her first dose of the flu shot yesterday. As with any shot she was not too happy about it. But she settled down right away and hasn't seemed to notice it since then. She'll get the other dose at her 18m check up next month.

Yesterday was our first time at Kindermusik. Rebecca loved it!! She is in the Our Time class for 1 1/2-3 year olds. So she's kind of young...the youngest there. But she still did well. It was obvious to everyone from the moment we started that she loves music :) We thought she might be kind of shy at first, but not at all! As soon as we got in the room Rebecca wanted the whole bucket of wood blocks. And she wanted to collect them from the other kids too (she's in a gathering phase). Then when class started all of the kids sat with their mom or dad to sing and do motions and play instruments. But not Rebecca. She wanted nothing to do with sitting on Mommy's lap. She wanted to dance! Most of the class she was up dancing around the circle, pausing once in a while in front of someone, then on with the dancing again. Periodically Mary could get her to sit down and attempt to do the activity. But after a few moments Rebecca wanted to be up again. She just loved the music so much...and being the center of attention :P When it was time for a story and Miss Lynette set out the blanket all of the kids sat down on it. Rebecca...she laid down and said "night night." And then she got back up and went over to the teacher and stood right by her, expecting to get to sit in her lap like she does when we read at home :) The teacher is great. She actually has similar mannerisms and looks quite a bit like Grandma Voogt! So Rebecca seemed to be very comfortable with her right from the start. As expected Rebecca didn't really interact with the other kids. But she was in her glory with all the music and clapping and dancing. She was definitely tired out by the end. It'll be fun to do this every week and to get to know the other moms (and dad:) and kids. There wasn't really a way to take pictures during class. But we got a couple just outside of class afterwards and a few at home with our goodies. We got a pack of stuff to take home...instrument, book, CDs and activity book (for parents). Rebecca has already devoured the new book...she's read it at least 30-40 times already. And she talks about P. J. (the book is called Pete and P. J.) all the time. We've been listening to the CDs already. She'll know all the music by next week :) And hopefully Mommy can study and learn the words to the songs too ;)

Tomorrow we're going to a MOPS openhouse to register and meet some people. We're looking forward to that and to the start of regular MOPS meetings in Oct.

Lemery Park

We couldn't pass up the beautiful late summer weather yesterday and decided to bike to another local park. It was about a 20 min. bike ride. As usual Rebecca had fun climbing. And she's getting better and better with the slides. She did all but one of them by herself. She was fascinated by the little boy at the park. He was a bit younger so to her he's a baby :) Rebecca also did a little swinging in the big kid swing...with Mommy's help of course. It was a fun afternoon!

Kindermusik starts this Wed. We are very excited. Hopefully we'll have some pictures to share later in the week :)

Frog Hollow

Yesterday Mary and Rebecca tried a new park. It's called Frog Hollow. It's a boundless playground. They have different areas for different ages and special equipment so even kids with disabilities can play. The best part is that the ground under the play equipment is kind of rubbery. So it's a lot safer. Rebecca loved it! They had one area for toddlers. She did it all by herself...climbed stairs, went through the tunnel, went down the slides. She even did the little climbing wall (with Mommy's help:) She loved playing peek-a-boo in the tunnel (it has holes in the sides). The rest of the evening she was saying "peek-a-boo in tunnel." Rebecca also loved being able to run. She just went non-stop. After 45 min. there she was sweaty and her cheeks were bright red. She was having so much fun. We headed home then to cool down and have dinner. Mary and Rebecca are trying to do fun stuff on Thursday afternoons since Justin has class. We have a girls' day then :)

Rebecca is still majorly teething. But she has been sleeping better for the most part. The last few days she has slept until 8! Although she was up for an hour in the night again last night. But we'll take what we can get :) Our dentist gave us some extra toddler toothbrushes so Rebecca is enjoying chewing on those. She can actually reach back far enough with them.

Rebecca is getting very good with her letters. She can now do A-N on her own And adds in a few other letters as well, Q, R, U, V, Y. Mommy repeats the letter after Rebecca says each one, but Rebecca says it first. And yesterday while we were eating dinner Rebecca wanted to sing the ABCs. Since Mary was eating she couldn't sing the whole thing through. She said "A, B, C, D, E, F, G" and paused to chew. And Rebecca immediately chimed in with "H, I." Mary said "J, K, L, M, N, O, P." Rebecca followed with "Q, R." Mary said "Q, R, S." Rebecca said "T, U, V." Mary said "W, X." Rebecca said "Y and Z." Then later in the evening Rebecca also added the "W, X" part. And at bedtime she did "H, I, J, K." I guess she's been listening when we sing the ABCs!

Rebecca is getting better with putting words together too. She is saying 3 and 4 word sentences. And she is starting to add in vowels and conjuctions....so it actually sounds like a full sentence. This morning during breakfast she noticed the balloons on the side of her color book. And Mary said, "right, there are balloons on the side." And Rebecca said "balloons on side." She continues to impress everyone she meets as she repeats everything they say :) Her new favorite word is video. She wants to watch videos of herself on the computer all day long.

She has learned a lot of her shapes. She knows square, circle, triangle, diamond, star and x.

Rebecca loves to color. She wants to do it the moment she wakes up from her nap every day. We continue to have fun and learn new things all the time.

There are new pictures in the September album.

Labor Day and Visitors

On Monday Uncle Ryan and Aunt Shannon visited. They have been in Romania for a couple months, so we were excited to see them again. We played outside for a bit. Then we had dinner and visited inside. We also celebrated Aunt Shannon's birthday. Rebecca had fun showing them her books and toys. They'll be traveling again soon, but hopefully it won't be too long before we get to see them again.

Yesterday we had some neighbors over for dinner (Richard, Gretchen, Sam and Claire). We had a great time visiting with them. And Rebecca thought their babies (3 month old twins) were pretty neat. She is all about babies right now. She wanted to touch them and rock them. She doesn't quite have the idea of gentle down yet :P Sam and Claire slept almost the entire time they were here. I think Rebecca wanted them to be a little more active :) They'll be moving in a few weeks, so hopefully we can stop over to see them again sometime before they go.

Matt and Pennie's Wedding Reception

Saturday we went to the wedding reception of Matt and Pennie Burris in Greenville. Pennie is a long time family friend. It was great to see her on this special day. Our whole family was there, so it was great to get to see them as well. Rebecca was a little shy when we first got there, as usual. But once she warmed up she had a blast! She wanted to dance non-stop. We had to take her out crying because she wanted to stay longer. But it was already way past her bedtime. She definitely won over the crowd with her smiles and dancing. Lots of laughs and pictures :) It was great to go out as a family and to share this joyous occassion with Pennie and Matt. There are photos in the album and a dancing video.

Our Little Chef

Rebecca loves to help Mommy cook. She helped make rice on Monday...she poured the water, poured the rice and stirred it together. Just about anything can be a spoon and bowl so she can stir :) So we bought her a little cooking set. We've only taken out a few pieces since some of it is on the small side. But she absolutely loves it! Especially her rolling pin. She's been cooking up a storm ever since.

Rebecca is getting better at her alphabet. She can now do A-J on her own. At this rate it won't be long before she can do the whole thing by herself. She is also getting quite good with her colors and shapes. And her sentences are getting longer and longer. While I'm sitting here she just said "bye bye garbage truck." (she likes to watch the garbage trucks go by and say hi and bye :)

Today is shopping day. Rebecca hardly has any fall clothes and no pajamas. So she and Mommy are going to do some shopping.

Another Visit from Grandpa and Grandma Voogt

Over the weekend Grandpa and Grandma Voogt came to visit. Rebecca had been anxious for them to come all week. She wanted to show them all of her toys and all the things she's learning. Rebecca colored and had a tea party with Grandma. We also celebrated Grandma's birthday. Rebecca enjoyed helping her open gifts. It was a fun weekend. And they brought us some yummy produce. Rebecca thoroughly enjoyed her pearsauce this morning that Mommy made with their pears.

We also took a trip to John Ball Zoo on Sunday afternoon. We didn't want to miss out on the beautiful weather. Rebecca loved seeing all the animals. She especially liked petting the goats..."pet goat."

Rebecca is still going strong with the teething. Sleeping is unpredictable every day. Mommy is keeping busy rocking Rebecca to sleep quite often as it's the only way she can get comfortable sometimes. We hope they come all the way through soon.

Rebecca is learning so much right now. She is really starting to put more and more words together, saying short sentences. She is also learning her alphabet. She can go through the entire alphabet if we say the letter first. She'll then say a word that starts with that letter. A is for...apple, B is for...bath, etc. She even did it for Grandpa and Grandma. They were pretty impressed :) We're working on the actual alphabet. Yesterday she did "B, D, E, F, G." And she knows some others if you start saying the alphabet. She'll chime in with H, I, J, Q and V sometimes. We're trying to focus on one letter each week right now. Yesterday we started doing B. Mommy was saying B is for bath, baby, bubbles, ball, etc. And Rebecca said "band aid." She's catching on quickly! Rebecca is still doing well with counting. She counts all kinds of things...toys, pictures in books, etc. Rebecca is really getting into coloring now. And she still loves her babies and dolls, feeding them, rocking them, etc.

We're looking forward to a fun and busy holiday weekend. Friday we're going to a local orchard. Saturday we're going to a wedding reception for a family friend. Monday Ryan and Shannon are visiting. We can't wait to hear about their trip to Romania! And Tuesday we're having some neighbors over for dinner.

We finally bought a video camera. It was our joint anniversary gift. So you may see more videos in the future. We just need to learn how to do some editing :) There are new pictures in the August album.