Since it's almost Father's Day...

Here are the lovelies that Helaina made at school for Mother's Day.  She was so excited to give them to me - almost as excited as I was to get them.  She asked "Do you love them?"

Funny, the right handprint shows 3 of the large callouses she has on her palms from doing monkeybars.

I'm special because I take her to "gmnssix".  Hee hee - gymnastics.  She drew some of the equipment but it's in yellow so you can't make it out too well.  The 3 "girls" in the picture are me, Helaina and her instructor.  Is my head really that big?

Every mother needs a popsicle stick flower for Mother's Day.

Daddy came through with a gift card to PF Chang's.  I've only been once so we'll either take a road trip to Rochester some day or wait for the new Chang's to open in the mall in a few months.  Jim also got me the most comfortable things I've ever put on my feet - Clark's sandles.  OMG, they are like having cushy clouds on my feet.  We also went out to dinner.

One recent afternoon it was raining out so we were stuck in the house.  We had played games, read all our library books, watched some TV, tortured Zoey, and Helaina was still bouncing off the walls.  "Do you want to make cupcakes?"  Her excited response:  "For real?"  Yup.  We went all out and got out the fancy cupcake stand, every sprinkle jar we had in the house, purple frosting spray, fancy flower cupcake cups.  We even piped the frosting through a star tip (some directly into Helaina's mouth).  Helaina's piping skills were a little squirmy but she got the hang of it after a while.  She's watched Cupcake Wars with us on the Food Network and thinks that cupcakes are just divine.

Beautiful sweetness.  In a weak moment at the grocery store I grabbed the new summer flavor of pink lemonade frosting and cake mix, not knowing how it would be, but also knowing that Helaina would love it.  Not too bad.  The batter smelled very lemony and the cakes weren't too sweet.  The frosting, however, was very sweet but had a tartness to it.  Wouldn't buy it again, but it was nice to try something different.

Funny Helaina:
Helaina's dentist gave her an electric toothbrush when she had the palate expander put in her mouth.  She prefers the manual toothbrush but we usually use the electric one at least once daily because it effectively cleans the expander.  Recently after lunch she went into the bathroom to brush her teeth and said "I'm going to use my electrocute toothbrush now."  Electrocute, ha!

Our little clown fish...

Finally some pics from last month's children's theater production of the Little Mermaid.  Helaina made the cutest little clownfish.  She had a blast on stage and her family had a blast watching her perform.  She brought Mommy to tears many times during the show.  I keep thinking back to when we brought her home from China and she didn't say a word for 3 months, now you can't shut her up and she's singing on stage in a packed theater in front of an audience.  Amazing little clown fish, she is.

Our little actress posing at home before we left for the play.  It was wonderful not to have to make the costume.  Making the bluebird costume from Snow White aged me 10 years.  White t-shirt and white pants - works for me.

The first time I saw the clownfish head on Helaina I burst into laughter.

How funny is this?  When the kids were on stage if they turned sideways or turned around they would hit each other in the face with the giant tails.  Too funny.

Curtain's up. The audience is chuckling at how adorable the school of clown fish is and the opening number gets underway.  Helaina's initial stage fright  (or shock!) kicks in.

She soon finds us in the audience because we scored 2nd row seats for the performance and she knew exactly where to look for us.  Her stage fright disappears and she begins to "swim", sing all the songs and dance the routines that she practiced for so many months.

After the show the school of clown fish take their bow.  Helaina's on the end and I have no idea why she bowed while bending down!

My absolute favorite picture.  After taking their bows the rest of the cast was introduced and took their bows.  Helaina stood on stage and smiled, clapped and fist pumped her little arms in the air for quite a while.  After the show people came up to her and told her that she had the entire audience laughing during that time.  Pure joy on that little clownfish face.  Love it.

We went out to brunch after the performance.  It was a great way to spend a Sunday.  At home after the show with her bouquet of flowers.

Helaina loves roses so that's what she got this time.  She was so happy with her flowers.

After brunch it was home for chocolate cake decorated with Little Mermaid squinkies, of course.

One of these days I'll have to post the video from this show and also from The Rockin Tale of Snow White last December.  Not enough time in the day to accomplish all I want to.  Helaina's taking the summer off from acting(!) and wants to sign up for the Fall show - an adapted version of Rapunzel.  She loves it so much - how can we say no?  Yah, and we enjoy seeing her perform on stage too - just a bit!

Still catching up...

Still catching up on some cute photos from a while back.

We have a set of face paints at home and when Helaina needs a face painting fix, we're ready to go.  I duplicated (sort of) the butterfly she had done on her face at the circus.

One of Helaina's favorite summer dresses has Rapunzel on it and a twirly lacey bottom.  She'll wear it until it's ready to crawl off of her and begs to be washed.

A recent trip to the zoo with her pal T.  Two cutie pies on an elephant.

Helaina has lost 2 teeth now - both front teeth on the bottom.  This one she yanked out herself and got it on the 2nd pull - she was so proud of herself.  We'll have to post video some time.  It's very funny.

This was what the tooth fairy left under Helaina's pillow for the 2nd tooth.  She was absolutely thrilled to wake up the next morning and find a note from the mysterious fairy.

No toothless gaps in the front for Helaina (boo hoo).  Her permanent teeth were already almost all the way up behind the baby teeth, shark style.

Joshua at the same age as Helaina - 6 years old, after losing his 2 bottom teeth.  He had the toothless grin while waiting for his permanent teeth to come in.

Lucky Bob the Prop Comic

We were at a private party at the zoo Saturday night and Helaina had a blast.  It was a beautiful evening weather wise, Helaina was happy to be wearing her new "halter top" dress and have french braids in her hair.  She was ready to party.  There was face painting, cotton candy, animal  demos, a trio of band members performing children's songs and the highlight of the evening - Lucky Bob the Prop Comic.  We were lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time and Helaina wriggled her way through the kids to get a spot right in front of Lucky Bob.  The guy was funny, no - he was hysterical.  Helaina thought so too.  She laughed loudly at everything he did, which is probably why he picked her as one of his assistants.  When he said "Now I need another volunteer, a girl this time", her hand shot up like a rocket (so did everyone else's hands), and then I saw him point in her direction and say "You, in the pink, come on up here."  I nearly had a heart attack.  This is how it went.

He asked her what her name was then handed her a plate.  He told her not to let go of the plate no matter what and always hold it with both hands.  Then he started asking her questions.  "What's your name?"  Helaina.  "How old are you?"  6.  "What's your favorite color?"  Pink and purple.  "High 5" and he put his hand out.  Helaina let go of the plate with one hand and gave him a high 5.  "I told you to hold the plate with both hands and not let go.  Now let's try again."

He asked the same questions again ending with "high 5" and Helaina again took one hand off the plate and gave him a high 5.  He put his hand on his hip and looked at her saying "I told you not to take your hands off the plate."  She was laughing so hard, almost uncontrollably, I don't know who was having more fun - Helaina or Jim, Josh and myself watching.  This went on a few more times then finally he asked the questions, said "high 5" and Helaina screamed out "No way!" laughing even more than before.  Oh my gosh, it was the best.

He sent her back to sit down with the plate.  She held on to it like it was gold, waiting to see what she had to do next.

He called a little girl up to give him his juggling baton then Helaina was called up for the plate.

Oh my gosh, Lucky Bob the Prop Comic is ok in my book.  So funny and such a hit with the kids.  Part magician, part comedian, part stunt man and 100% hysterical.  He made our night.

It had been such a long time since Helaina had seen Siri up close.  She was thrilled to be able to pet her trunk.  Every time I'm that close to Siri I'm just in awe of this amazing animal and how beautiful and gentle she is - and absolutely huge!

We were fortunate enough to catch a peacock with his feathers displayed strutting his stuff.

There was a 3-piece band playing kids songs and doing some Laurie Birkner songs (which Helaina loves).  On our way to get cotton candy she heard the music, saw the instruments on the ground to play and ran in that direction screaming "I want to be in the band!"  Helaina always seems to have a great time and be happy no matter what she's doing.  I hope she keeps that beautiful smile and is filled with that fun-loving spirit through her whole life.

56 degrees of hypothermia

We opened the pool today one week earlier than planned.  Jim took the day off to get it done so we wouldn't have to listen to Helaina keep asking "When are we going to open the pool?"  Saturday and Sunday have temperatures in the 80's predicted and Helaina had no school Friday so it was a good day to do it.  Things were going smoothly until late in the afternoon when everything was connected and the pump was turned on.  "What's that screeching noise?  Is that the pump?"  Not good, nope, not a good outcome.  Kaching goes the credit card, ready to do battle with the pump manufacturer ... but here are a few pics of Helaina practicing to become a card carrying member of the Polar Bear Club - really, she's insane.  I think she has no nerve endings in her skin, seriously.

Jim HAD to get in the pool to anchor the ladder with a sandbag that rests on a platform underneath it.  The water temperature was 56 degrees - that's FRIGID - and he's not a fan of cold water.  He screamed like a little girl and lingered on the ladder until I finally told him to get in quickly and get it over with instead of torturing himself.  Helaina and I were hysterically laughing while all the time she was trying to push him in.  I was laughing so hard at the noises he was making that I couldn't catch my breath.  Helaina, on the other hand, was all too willing to take the plunge.

She inched her way in with a few shrill shreaks then submerged her body.

We couldn't believe that she went in up to her neck.  When it hit her armpits it must have been unbearable.

She got used to it very quickly and swam around and played with her mermaid dolls (another obsession since the Little Mermaid play).  Jim and I kept looking at her saying she was crazy.  We let her stay in too long though and after about 45 minutes Jim told her to get out.  Then I realized "Geez, what are we thinking.  Hypothermia?"  We got her out and her skin was freezing.  Got her in the house, dried off her hair, put dry clothes on her and then she began to shiver - and then I got panicky thinking her core body temp had dropped.  I sat her on the couch and wrapped her up in a blanket and watched her for a while.  I kept putting my hands under the blanket and feeling her skin, which finally began to warm up.  While she was sitting under the blanket shivering she asked for a snack.  Guess what she asked for?  A popsicle.  Earlier we bought the kind that you freeze in their plastic tube and she's was asking all afternoon if they were frozen yet.  No, you can't have a popsicle, you popsicle.

I'm so behind in posting cute pictures.

Helaina and I visited her cousins a few weeks ago and had a blast.  Sophia's getting so big.  10 months old now.  How time flies.

Storytime, but all Sophia wanted to do was eat the book.

We took our annual trip to Chuck E Cheese's recently.  Helaina mustered up the courage to stand next to the critter for a picture.  Given her aversion to people dressed up as characters, this was an accomplishment.


Swimming lessons are going well.  Helaina loves them.  There are 2 instructors and one of them is a young gal who kids around with the group.  Helaina looks forward to Tuesday evenings.

Practicing swimming with a noodle under her belly.

 

"We live down deep under the sea ...

... where there are many wonders to see."  That's the first line in the opening song in The Little Mermaid.  Helaina was in her second play today with our local children's theater and it was an amazing success.  Great singing, teriffic costumes, adorable dance routines and some funny moments all witnessed by her aunts, uncles, big brother and of course proud Daddy and tearful Mommy.  She was so excited before the play, happier than ever on stage and pumped up after the show.  Just a quick pick then I'm finally off to bed.  Here's our little clown fish right after they got on stage.  Just like in Snow White, it took her a few moments to get used to it all and then she hammed it up and had the time of her little life.

We're all exhausted.  It's been a hectic week.  In the last 7 days Helaina had a busy schedule:  her first swimming lesson, gymnastics, soccer practice, dress rehearsal, first soccer game and the play.  I'm so behind in everything but it's been a fun, fast-paced week.

Breakfast with the Easter bunny

Finishing up March's pictures, here's our own little bunny with the zoo's Easter bunny.  Helaina looks forward to these special zoo events because she loves the food, facepainting, crafts, the Easter bunny (or Santa at Christmas time) and of course, the zoo animals.  Cute pics of our gal with E.B.

Delighted.

Getting her bunny lollipopl

Taking time from her bacon and eggs for a bunny hug.

One of the volunteers brought out a snake and Helaina was very happy.  She listened, asked questions and told the volunteer what she knew about snakes.  She wanted to touch this snake so bad but it's not allowed.  Guess we'll take her to Fort Rickey this summer and she'll be able to touch one of their snakes at a reptile demonstration.  Wonder if when the time comes she'll change her mind about petting a snake.

Helaina loves these creepy mole rats at the zoo.  I can't even look at them.  They are albino-type critters with wrinkly skin, no hair at all, and large yellow teeth.  Sort of like a hairless hamster.  Eeeewwwweeeee.

The tigers were enjoying the weather.

Cute pic of the fox.