Jumping into July

Momma Post: Ruby's been taking swim lessons at the Matt Dishman Community Center the past several weeks. Each week another skill is introduced, such as, blowing bubbles, jumping off the side of the pool into a parents arms, and floating with support. It's great seeing her so excited about being in the water. Ruby is constantly retrieving her swimsuit and urging us to take her swimming. She says "swimming, hair wet, kick my legs...".

"Owies" are a major topic of interest with Ruby. It seems that Ruby is eager to show off her latest "boo-boo" and share the story behind it, "fall down" or "Bryan pushed me". Matt and I are taking this opportunity to discuss injuries, how they happen and how they get better. Ruby has gone through several band-aides for real and imaginary injuries, although sometimes a simple kiss to the hurt area will do the trick. We are trying our best to let Ruby know that we all get "owies" and, with time, they heal and go away.

Willa's got rhythm! At first, what she did was shake everything with a whole arm motion. Apparently, as an experiment to see what would happen. Now we're seeing just hands moving back and forth--and then just with toys that are meant for shaking. So from a simple "let's see what happens," Willa's moving toward intentional use of different kinds of objects.

Willa is also becoming more assertive, which is a necessity in the Stockton household. She gets MAD when objects are taken away from her. She expresses this by either flapping her arms and wailing or, in a sitting position, lowering her head and more angry screeching. Thankfully she has a pretty quick recovery.