Izzy's Week in Review

Smiles abound at the Barkoudah house. Either Izzy is less interested in the camera or she's finally ok with it's presence. Below are a few pictures we captured this past week.

We were wondering how long it would take Izzy to start pulling these pieces apart. Now she goes right for the edges and can get them off in seconds. This time, however, she got a big square to come with it & was more than tickled at her accomplishment.

Abe was able to get a close up shot of Izzy one day showing off her two new teeth. I guess he was a bit too close because she is cross-eyed!

Izzy has always loved bath time. We've been bathing her in the kitchen but lately she's figured out how to slam those legs into the water causing HUGE splashes. So we figured it was time to move to the tub. Too bad she didn't like it for several days and ended up crying the whole time. So we decided to bring back the whale tub. Now she's ok the the big tub. And we can fill up the whale tub with more water letting her do all the splashing she wants... which she loves.

Stuffed Animals

Izzy now likes her stuffed animals. She's gotten a couple extra ones along the way. Now they are accumulating in her crib.

Bedtime - Here's Izzy getting ready to sleep with her stuffed animals in their places.

Good Morning - Here's how we find her in the morning. I call this her "ET" picture. Sometimes she's buried in the stuffed animals but mostly she's got them scattered about.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Today's was Izzy's 1st Valentine's! We waited until daddy returned home from work to celebrate.

Finally... a picture where she is smiling! I guess she loved Oma & Opa's gift that much.

Here is Izzy's Valentine's daycare project for mom & dad. I just love her little handprints!

Mom has discovered a series of books that are bilingual (English & Arabic). They are Elmer, the patchwork elephant and come out of England making it somewhat hard to find. But mom found the first book (English only from 1968) and got an Elmer to go with it.

Yesterday was Izzy's last Caterpillar's class. The 6 weeks went by fast! She really enjoyed all the free space to move and play with new toys. This was also great for mom so she could see what Izzy liked and avoid those toys she doesn't.

The last class was all about movement & music. Izzy really had fun with the egg shakers. Here we are also working on getting her to lift that bum... just for you Opa!

Another musical instrument that she liked to play with. I'm now imagining what our house will sound like in several years!

Here is Izzy's Caterpillars class. Unfortunately, 2 families were not able to join so they are missing from the group photo.

Bring On the Snow!

As many of you know from watching the news, we are tucked away at home waiting to see what the snow storm will bring. So far there has only been a light sprinkling since noon. But all 3 of us are enjoying a impromptu day off. We'll just have to see what the night brings. I'm sure Abe will appreciate not having to scoop a ton of snow off of the car in the morning.

In any case, here are a few pictures that we snapped this past week.

Izzy seems to enjoy the activities at daycare so much that for the past several weeks she has forgone her AM nap. Therefore, by the time Thursday & Friday roll around we have an extremely tired girl. She will fall asleep in the car almost immediately upon picking her up and won't wake despite lugging her inside. We end up putting her down & wait till she wakes up. She then spends the weekend playing catch-up on her sleep with 2-3hr naps.

We just had to get a picture of one of the outfits Abe's parents gave us when they were here since she's now big enough to fit in it.

We thought the ruffles on her bum were too cute and tried hard to get a good picture. But Izzy had other plans so this is the best we could do.

Fun with Izzy

This past week has been a hoot with Izzy. The funniest story came from daycare. The set-up of her daycare is the infant room (her room) shares a "wall" with the toddler room. The "wall" is actually a picket fence so essentially its all one giant space. Izzy seems to like being with the toddlers so much they actually have her over there at least once a week, especially for song time. This past week, it appears that one of the little guys has a crush on her! His name is Hugo and he loves giving her kisses... not your run-of-the-mill quick child kisses. He will put both hands on her checks and plant a long one on her lips! She then squeals with laughter so he keeps doing it. Too cute!

Here is mommy's attempt at getting a picture of Izzy playing. Do you notice a gray fuzzy thing blocking my view?

Here is mommy's attempt #2 at getting that picture. Better... but the gray thing is still present!

Izzy just loves grabbing blankets and covers. She couldn't let this one go even during her rolling escaped & got all tangled up.

This winter, I signed Izzy up for a playgroup for infants 5m-9m. It is called Caterpillars which is a pretty accurate name for this stage of development. There are 5 others in the class. She has enjoyed all the activities.... songs, books, bubbles, etc... Every week is different with new topics to talk about.

Today we got to play with the Rody horses. Izzy seemed to be the only one who enjoyed bouncing on him and stayed there for the majority of the class. Of course, no smiles of glee when the camera came out.

Our last session today was the ball pit. Izzy is showing you all two important things... 1) I now like to sit but only if I'm really interested and 2) there is no way mom that I'm going to turn to the camera for this picture with all these fun toys to figure out!

Week In Review

Unfortunately we haven't been doing too much up here over the past week. This has mainly been due to Izzy being sick. She got a cold almost immediately upon returning to daycare from Christmas break. Then she was attacked by pink eye and finally had a mild case of diarrhea. Of course this means mommy was sick as well. She looked quite bad having stuff come out of almost every orifice, but is doing much better these past couple of days.

We do have some (albeit small) exciting news... Izzy has two tiny teeth coming in! I actually dreamt that she had two teeth and decided the next day to check it out. Call it mother's intuition :-) So we are excited and will get some pictures out when they are a bit more noticeable.

Izzy has a set of toys that are magnetic blocks, circles and cylinders that helps kids stack them without having to worry about balance. We found a new purpose for them today however.... we made Izzy into a mini-Madonna! I don't think daddy thought this was as funny as mommy but too hard to not pass on to you all.

All Good Things Must End

We finally said goodbye to Oma & Opa yesterday. I don't know who will miss them more... myself, Izzy for all the spoiling or Clay for all the turkey in the morning! The last couple of days saw snow. Oma stayed home once with Izzy while I took Opa to the Sam Adams Brewery located a short walk from where we live on New Year's Eve. We thought the place would be deserted... but we should have known better. Who wouldn't want free beer prior to celebrating the new year? We also brought some beer aged in oak barrels to try. Its a nice cross between a beer and wine and tasted oh so good.

The remainder of the time was spent enjoying everyone's company. Izzy got to try out her new highchair. We all think she loves being at the same level as everyone else. We all braved the weather to eat at a local breakfast place and played several games including Uno. We had such a good time that Izzy & I have already bought our tickets to come back to Nebraska this May. Hopefully we'll be able to see some of you soon!

Clay's present from Oma & Opa... he's still working on it.

Opa in front of the Sam Adams Brewery. Look at all that snow!

Opa & Liz on the brewery tour.

Izzy's 1st time in her highchair. She enjoys playing with all her toys & seems to have learned the drop & you pick up game well.

All of us enjoying dinner together.