Sniffly noses & strawberry thieves

I know, the last 3 posts have all been about dancing. And yes, I know this is a Harmon Family blog, not a dancing blog. (No need to call me and file an official complaint, Grandma Joni.)

So, what's new around here? Hmmm...


We've had a lovely round of colds here lately. First was Emma, sounding like a frog for several days but still smiling like a princess. Then down went Dad, who one evening laid down in bed after putting Emma down around 8:30 - and slept until morning. !!!! (If you don't recognize how strange that is, you clearly don't even know who Colby is.) Now it's Adam's turn; poor little guy can barely breathe through all his nasty nose-gunk - yes, that is the medical term - and it's plenty clear that this kid just doesn't feel good. Let's hope Mommy stays clear of the germs & everyone gets healthy again soon!


We moved the furniture around in the basement, and I love it so much. I've always loved moving things around, have ever since I was 10 years old and I'd rearrange my bedroom furniture every few months. Anyone else out there the same way? Probably not. :)


We are running a neighborhood "Feed the Birds" program in our backyard. How nice of us, right? Wrong. The stupid birds are eating all the little budding strawberries out of our garden! And then crapping them out all over our front sidewalk & my car!! * steam coming out of my ears *

On a completely unrelated note - Colby, don't you own a BB gun that's stored somewhere at your parent's house? No? How about a regular gun? Any kind of semi-lethal weaponry? How accurately can you throw that machete you find so useful? 'Cause I've got use #562 in mind for ya...


Adam graduated to full-force crawling a few weeks ago. That satisfied him for about... 3 days. So then it was him standing up on e-HEH-verying - most of the time, grabbing onto my pants wherever I might be standing. (Try vacuuming without moving your feet. Gets pretty interesting.) But standing around gets boring pretty quick, apparently - because one day while at my sister's house, outta the clear baby-blue, I head toward the playroom to check on him, only to find him at the top of the stairs. No, not getting ready to go down - having just come up. YAY. "Amy, can I borrow your gate?"

But, he is also growing in cuteness exponentially. See?

And he is a talker. His main word so far is "Buh-Gee", but he tries his hand at all kinds of sounds. I keep trying to get him to say Mama, but he just sits there grinning while I say it. Oh well, that works too. :)


Emma has been busy with swimming and gymnastics classes, and she loves both. Honestly, I think she really does love learning things, just not coming from us. :) So, I anticipate good things down the road when it's time for school. And lately, I can't get over how beautiful this girl is becoming!


Emma is totally our little actress. She loves to watch shows "like a movie theatre", down in the basement with all the lights off (hmm, wonder where she got that from...), and then she wants to "play" whatever she just watched, assigning everyone a part and running us through the lines. It's honestly what we do all day long; we play The Incredibles, Finding Nemo, Clifford, Aladdin, Emperor's New Groove, Bambi, Tom & Jerry, etc. etc. etc. It's never-ending! I suppose it's better than a child wanting to play Play-doh all day long, eh?

I'm trying to get better at being Emma's mom; not being A mom, but Emma's mom specifically. I've starting feeling like I spend most of the day just yelling at her, and have to constantly remind myself that that's not the way to get through to her. She's a highly unique girl & therefore requires a unique approach, in all areas. Emma needs clear motivation and frequent positive reinforcement in order to focus on accomplishing something; so we've started implementing a lot of charts and rewards programs when trying to teach her things:

• We've got the fuzzy-ball jar for when she doesn't argue with us after we've said no (that earns her a "special Emma date" which she's actually earned & is cashing in next Tuesday to go see Toy Story 3 with Mom & Dad);
  
• the prayer chart for saying her own bedtime prayers every night this week (that'll earn her a cookie at Smart Cookie after the movie on Tues.);
  
• the sticker chart for learning to show me she's listening by a: looking at me, and b: holding still (that earns her a little Polly Pocket-size Snow White doll - been working on that one for a while...)
• pretty much every meal comes with a treat at the end, but only if she eats a good meal to earn it;
• at bedtime she can earn up to 3 books if she is good getting ready for bed, but she can lose them too - which she does, a lot;

Excessive? Don't answer that. :) It's all working pretty good so far, and that's all I'm gonna worry about for now.