Daniel the Athlete

Daniel has been acheiving new athletic feats daily. He climbs in and out of the big bathtub, he can climb in and out of his highchair, and he can climb onto the stools in the kitchen, just to name a few. Yesterday he actually climbed up to and went down the big corkscrew slide at the park by himself. I always wonder whether or not to let him do these things. Normally, I just let him go unless he is in serious danger or is doing something totally inappropriate like getting on the kitchen table.

Daniel has a few favorite things. He loves the bathtub in our bathroom. He will throw all his 'toys' in and climb after them. You can see some of the items in the little video below. Thankfully he is not too adept at turning the faucet on yet. The bathtub gets really slippery when it's wet. Yesterday he decided that he wanted to crawl down the edge of the tub. You can see that in the video, too. For those of you wondering, he did eventually make it all the way down the side. Shorty after this, I decided that going to the park and playing on the balance beam might be a fun activity.

Another favorite thing of Daniel's is brushing his teeth. I'm pretty sure it's just for the toothpaste, but it seems to keep him busy for a few minutes in the morning. Daniel also enjoys Sesame Street. He will sit or stand and watch almost an entire episode. It is a savior on the days that he skips afternoon nap.

On the pregnancy front things are going well. I was feeling pretty worn out for a couple weeks, so I started taking iron supplements and have regained my energy. Next Wednesday we have the 20-week ultrasound, and we have decided to find out the sex of the baby. I'm looking forward to knowing whether it's a boy or girl.

Last thing, check out the Gagnon's blog, All Things Baby Gagnon, linked on the right to see a few pictures from the SFD weekend.

Sick

We have the flu. It has really taken the wind out of our sails. This is really not what I thought my next blog post would be like. We have had so many exciting things happen recently. We painted the exterior trim of our house. It used to be mint green, now it is cream and sage.

Also, we hosted my girlfriends from ND here last weekend. There were 23 people here for the weekend! The house worked out great for our huge group. We had 11 people sleeping in the basement, and I don't think they felt like sardines. At least that is what they told me. It was an amazing weekend. I have not received the pictures from our historian, Allison, so you will have to wait to see full footage. I have included a little video of Daniel and Grace on Sunday. We had a fun filled weekend. I think the highlight was the SFD (Sunday Family Dinner - our unofficial name) 5k. The neighbors did not know what was happening when 11 girls and their spouses took off running down our street in pink t-shirts. Being the pregnant gal in the group, opted for the 20-minute walk so that I could see the finishes.

It was really awesome for Daniel to spend time with his SFD cousins. There are three within six weeks of each other. It is really fun to see their personalities developing. Daniel is definitely the most active baby but has the smallest vocabulary. Over the weekend, I think he learned about 30 new words. Being with the other kids really inspired him to talk more. Thanks Will and Grace!

Ok, back to the flu. Daniel was a little off Sunday morning. I thought he just had stress induced vomiting since he was sick after we hosted people for Easter, too. Well, I'm guessing I was wrong since Matt and I both have fevers today and just generally feel yucky. I'm hoping that all of our guests didn't go home with the flu. That would be really bad. Parenting with two sick parents is kind of rough. Hopefully we will snap out of this sooner rather than later. We are going to run out of Sesame Street episodes if this lasts too long.