All Aboard!

So, I moved all of the chairs out of the dining room so I could mop. Little did I know I created a train...

Bella put on her conductor's hat and sat in front. Charlie sat in the caboose and all of Bella's "friends" at in the other train cars. I don't have a lot to say about this, I just wanted to show these pictures because they were so cute. If you ever need something for your kids to do, this is so much fun! They played with the train for about 30-45min.

And yes, I do know that it is cold in New Zealand and Bella is wearing a tank top and panties but I choose my battles with her. I prefer that she wears clothes outside so I have given up on making her wear them inside!

Charlie's Glasses...

Charlie is wearing Bella's glasses in this picture, upside down!
Charlie is being a superhero!

We bought Bella a pair of sunglasses when we first got to New Zealand and never thought to buy a pair for Charlie. We thought he would never keep them on. Well, lately, Charlie has wanted to wear Bella's glasses often so we thought we'd better get a pair for him as well. I bought him a pair that are black with blue spider webs on them. He loves them soooo much and wants to wear them all the time, even in the dark! Bill thinks that they are too girly and wants me to get him a different pair but I think they are fine. After all, they have spiders on them, right?

Bella's Best Friend

Bella has made a new friend. His name is Jesse. They met at playcentre. Jesse is a few months younger than Bella and he has a little brother, Finlay, who is about the same age as Charlie.

Bella and Jesse are so cute when they play together. They pretty much chase each other around and call out each others names. They also hold hands and hug a lot! So funny! One of their favorite things to do at playcentre is dress up in animal costumes and chase each other around. Bella is usually a lion and Jesse is a monkey.

One day Bella ran up to Jesse and said "you are my best friend" The look on his face was so cute and he quickly ran to his mother to tell her. When we were about to leave that day and were literally stepping out the door, Bella said "I didn't say bye to Jesse". She ran through the centre and out the door into the yard to find Jesse to say goodbye!

We recently started going to the same church as Jesse and Finlay and Bella could not be more happy.(Jesse's dad is the minister and his mom teaches Sunday school). Bella calls it Jesse's church. I am so happy she has made a friend. It has been hard on her not having friends around.

Well, we are off to Jesse's church!

The results are in....

I finished my boot camp challenge last week. It was great fun! For eight weeks I worked out five days a week, twice with the group and three times on my own. The group consisted of six ladies and two trainers. Each week we had a different theme. One day we focused on cardio and one day we focused on strength training. Some of the themes were "Siamese twins" where we did a lot of partner centered exercises,including carrying each other piggyback! Another theme was "pirates" and we exercised on the beach. We had to run sand dunes and do relays, hard. Another was "army" and we had to work out while carrying backpacks with weights in them. It was quite challenging but super fun. The trainers and ladies were so nice, it made it so much easier to workout.

We also did fitness testing to help us monitor how we were progressing. We had to see how many times we could run around a rugby field in five minutes(a rugby field is about the size of a soccer field). We also had to see how many squats, lunges, push ups, tricep dips and sit ups we could do in thirty seconds. The last test was how long we could hold the plank position.

The first week I ran around the field 2 1/4 times.

Week 8 I ran around 2 3/4 times!! It was much easier.

I also improved on each of the other tests, too. I don't have my tally sheet with me. I will fill it in when I have it.

I do know that the first week I was able to hold the plank position for 40secs. Week eight I was able to hold it for one min and 15 seconds!! Big improvement.

I had big hopes of losing a lot of weight and inches but, unfortunately, that didn't happen. I didn't lose any weight and lost only 2 1/2 inches. I was super disappointed about this for a while and thought it wasn't worth it. Now I realize that a lot changed and I am in much better health and fitness now than probably ever before. When I started this challenge, I didn't run at all and now I am running 20 min on the treadmill. Today I went on my first ever run with Bill! That is something I have wanted to do for a while and never thought I would be able to do it.

One other good thing that has come from this is that I no longer have persistent back pain! Now that is worth every early morning session!

Bella's First Snow!

This morning we woke up to snow in the backyard! The kids were soooo excited, since this was their very first experience with snow. There wasn't much snow but enough to make the grass and deck semi white. Bella wanted to go outside right away. I have never seen her get dressed that quickly! It was good practice for us for the upcoming months, getting her all outfitted in her snow gear. We are still missing mittens and snow boots but we have most of her covered.

Charlie doesn't have snow clothes yet so he had to stay inside. Good thing he is so agreeable. He said "go outside snow?" I said "we don't have clothes for you, let's just watch Bella" He said" OK mama". What a sweetie!

Bill took Bella outside and she had so much fun. They weren't out for very long but long enough for her to run around in it for a little while. It was pretty much frozen on the ground so not too much fun but I think the whole experience was exciting. Just before she came in she took off her glove so she could touch it...so cute!

The white sweater she is wearing is Bill's sweater from when he was four years old!

Dress up fun!

Bella is sooooo into dress up and pretending these days. This particular day she wanted to be a bird. She fashioned the headdress herself out of pajama pants and I helped her with the feathers. I think the tie dye shirt just adds to the ensemble!

Charlie has been really into shoes lately. He was really proud of himself this day because he put these boots on by himself! The first picture he is wearing Bella's rain boots and the second picture he is wearing one of my boots!!

Bill, Bella and Charlie were pretending to be superheros flying with their capes on!

Here comes trouble!

Charlie is a pretty laid back, easy going guy. He is so sweet and loving and usually does whatever you ask him to do and doesn't get into much trouble....

Today was not a typical day. We were all not feeling well so had a pretty quiet day. After nap and quiet time the kids were getting ready to go out in the backyard because it was unusually warm today and we wanted to take advantage of that.

I asked Charlie to put a step stool away in the bathroom. He did but then was very quiet. I asked him what he was doing and he said "playing in the bath" I walked in and there he was splashing pee that was in his little potty! Apparently Bella had gone pee in his potty instead of the toilet, Charlie found it and decided to have a little fun!! ARGGGHH!!!

We got cleaned up and went outside. the kids were having a great time. It had rained recently so there was a lot of mud which always makes the backyard more fun. They were running around and playing hide and seek...so cute! I went in the house to check on some laundry. Bella came running in saying that Charlie was playing with dirty water. I ran outside and found him underneath the deck, his face, shirt and hands covered in mud and he was holding a beer bottle that he found under there!!!(not ours, of course) I quickly picked him up, brought him in the house to wash him off. When I was cleaning him off, I smelled something funny. I leaned in to smell the "mud" on his face and it smelled a lot like poop!! I was so disgusted! I scrubbed his face and hands and rinsed out his mouth! There is a cat that likes to poop in our yard so....I just don't even want to think about it....

My sweet little well behaved baby is turning into a two year old boy!!!!!! YIKES!!!!