First Day

Today was Claire's first day of school. Kindergarten. She bounced into her class happy and eager. I have cried all day.

I'm pretty sure it's dead now, right?

Claire is getting so big and so funny! Can you believe she starts Kindergarten next week!?!

This past weekend, Claire and Ben enjoyed throwing the crab pot and cast net to catch blue crabs and shrimp off our dock. They had a ball and Claire wasn't grossed out in the least by the beheading of the shrimp or the steaming of the crabs. But as she and Ben were enjoying the fruits of their labors on the back porch, Claire paused with crab meat on her fork and asked her Daddy "I'm pretty sure it's dead now, right?"

Other funny tidbits she has said recently

In the car - "Please turn the music down, Mommy. I am trying to do a daydream."

When exasperated trying to help JT - "Don't just point and scream 'that'! Be more pacific."

Mom and Tot Olympics

To celebrate the 2008 Summer Olympic Games in Beijing, Stroller Strides and My Gym hosted a Mom and Tot Olympics on 8/8/08! It was so much fun. We started with a flag march with all the kids and moms marching around the room and waving their ribbons. There were mom games - like a wall sit competition - and kid games. Everything from a baby crawl to a mom/child 3-legged race. Moms and kids both had a ball playing in the gym and competing for ribbons and prizes together.

Childhood obesity is a huge problem facing our children's generation. Exercising IN FRONT of your children like we do in Stroller Strides helps them learn by seeing what you do! No matter how much you "talk" health at home, kids actually seeing you be healthy makes much more of an impact. And exercise WITH your kids - like at the Mom and Tot Olympics - help them learn exercise doens't always have to be a "work"-out. Sometimes it is a "fun"-out!

Easy at-home activities to help you and your children get moving together:

• Indoor volleyball game with balloons. Non-helium, of course. Add in a math challenge by counting how many times you can bounce it back and forth before it hits the ground.


• Obstacle course. Use anything in your house you can find. Ex/ crawl over 3 sofa pillows, tiptoe around the coffee table, climb over an ottoman, walk across a balance beam (masking tape on the floor) etc!


• Dance party. Turn your favorite kid music on and dance. Take turns with your child hitting the pause button and "freezing" your dance position in a funny pose!


• Hula Hoop contest.


• Nature/Treasure Walk. Walk around the block with your child and let her search for nature and treasure finds. One of the little joys of parenthood is letting your children show you the beauty in little things, like a white feather on the ground, that as adults we often miss.


• Play games - Hulabaloo and Hyper Dash (both sold at Target) are two quick moving favorites with a preschool educational twist as well!


• Follow the Leader. Walk like an elephant, hop like a frog, slither like a snake, gallop like a horse, march, walk like a robot, etc. all around your house. Let your child be the leader some too!


• Penny Pick-up. Dump a bunch of pennies on the floor. Set 2 cups up far across the room. You and your child race to get the most pennies in your own cup within a set timelimit. To make it harder you can make a rule that you may only collect 1 penny each trip. Count the pennies when you are done. Kids love to time themselves too. My daughter, Claire, will do this multiple times just to try to get faster and beat her previous result! So get a stopwatch. And let your child time your performance too.

Laugh and have fun! If you smile and enjoy yourself, your children will too!

Metro Man

I have a 5 1/2 year old daughter who developed her own fashion sense early. At first it had to be purple. Now pink is the color. I can buy adorable outfits but she will mix and match tops and bottoms to make her own. She is a girl. This is expected. I have learned not to shop without her for approval (or it will just sit collecting dust in the closet) and I just let her dress herself in the mornings.

But JT.....he is a boy. He is not even 2 yet. He is supposed to be easygoing and just allow me to put whatever I want on him. Well, he is turning into a little opinionated fashionista. His favorite shirt is his monkey shirt. It is really just a light blue t-shirt with a screen print monkey on it that his Cat bought him in St. John, but he has grown so tall this summer that now his belly hangs out. So now it is just a pajama shirt. But he loves that thing. Getting it off of him in the morning is torture. I will toss it in the dirty clothes and he will fish it out "monkey, peeeeze. Peeeeze mama. Peeeeze!" With the pleases escalating in urgency with each ask. Then he doesn't want just a plain red or blue shirt. Heaven forbid the seersucker shorts. It has to have something on it. A dog. A fish. A car. An alligator. A whale. A bear. He likes animals and cars. Even his diapers have cars on them (or fish for the pool) and he would rather pull his shorts off so he can see the diaper image than wear shorts!

JT also loves to watch me put on make-up and copy me. His favorites to use are the powder brush and the eyelash curler. And last week when Claire and I were having our "cure" day, he wanted his toes painted too. I managed to distract him with building blocks, but the painted toes are coming for sure.

He also loves to use the blow dryer. As soon as I mention shower he starts attempting to take his clothes off and runs screaming toward the shower saying "shou, shou!". Well, he used to love long showers playing with his car stick-on toys and rubber ducks, but now as soon as we are in the shower, he points to the water and demands "off". He pounds on the shower door " bow dry, bow dry, peeeeze." So, yes, all he really wants to do is blow dry his own hair. I think we need Ben to hang around the house more.

Splash Island

I taught a Stroller Strides class out at Palmetto Islands County Park on Friday and then we all stayed at Splash Island for a playdate. It was the perfect day for splashing and swimming. JT is a wild little man and will approach any new challenge with gusto. No fear. Claire has grabbed this swimming bull by the horns and is getting braver and more confident in the water everyday. JT went down the baby slide about a million times. Claire got so brave that she went down the super slide - all by herself! She even is a confident enough swimmer to conquer the lazy river without a life jacket on. She was so proud! We had so much fun that we stayed for 4 hours!