7Jan2009: Day 226: Sledge

Makenna slept quite late today - just after 8:30 am. Not sure if she's catching up with the time change or if she's going through a growth spurt. She seems to want to sleep all the time. Or at least, she's always saying, "nap, nap," even after she wakes up. Unfortunately, getting up this late meant she didn't see daddy before he went to work.

We went to swim class and the teacher said that the main objective was to make sure the child understands that when (not if,) she falls in, that she can get herself up and out. So that's "our"homework, to encourage her to pull herself out or to "monkey crawl" across the wall to the steps. Makenna was the only girl in the class and thoroughly enjoyed the class. She splashed when they did and even put her face in the water to blow bubbles - something I was trying to get her to do all the times we swam. There was a lot of toys in the water and I think that's what made her so excited. The instructor also told me not to hold her by her stomach and to hold her under her arms so that she realizes that she can float by her own body weight. They recommend that I get her swimmers, and had a couple for her to try out. It did work fairly well as she actually swam to me. They also said to make sure I tell her to keep her head up. She enjoyed the swim/sing time and was screaming elatedly. We stayed after class (as it's only 1/2 hour long,) and worked some more on things. The instructor doesn't mind and it seems she only has one baby in the class after ours (which is for parents and babies).

Makenna then was anxious about seeing Hannah. She kept mentioning it repeatedly and I told her we'd see Hannah at playgroup after lunch. Unfortunately, we got there and Hannah didn't show. Not sure what happened but Makenna was very disappointed and continued to ask me over and over for Hannah, even after we left. One thing that was interesting at playgroup was during the story time. They had a story about a tiger that was in the snow and found an ironing board that he used as a "sledge." I had to keep looking at the book to see if it was really spelled "sleigh" and she was just saying it as sledge. Sure enough, it was spelled "sledge." That's a new word to me.

Makenna was quite upset during dinner - not sure why - but part of it may have been not seeing Chris all day as she kept asking about him. He finally came home, and she wanted to make sure we read scriptures. She had watched the videos I posted yesterday about three times today.

One other thing I've noticed over here now that it's cold enough to freeze, is that putting down "salt" to break up the ice is not something that's done - except on the roads. When they put it own the roads, they call it "gritting." So it will say "Gritting in Progress." Now they need to translate that to the places where people walk. The past couple of days, walking from the parking lot of the gym to the gym itself has been an experience. The parking lot of the nursery from yesterday looked like a ragged ice field. Our front walk isn't much better so hopefully no one falls and gets hurt out there either.