On the Run

Walking is totally easy now, so I'm experimenting with what else I can do. Running? Check. Spinning in circles? Check. Climbing on furniture? Check. Pushing my toys around? Check and double check -- including sliding furniture on the tile and rolling my empty stroller across the living room. I certainly keep Dad busy, and Mom too when she gets home and Dad collapses from a full day of chasing me.

It doesn't help that my gym closed. Can you believe it? Mom said the owners couldn't concentrate on running the place and their family at the same time, but they couldn't find a buyer to keep it going either. So on Saturday I had my last class with Miss Staci at the Little Gym. There's another place close to our house, but since Dad can't come to class until his drum corps is over we're going to wait until September to start a new membership. Unless Miss Staci starts working there before that -- she said she'd call if she did, and I could see Mom signing me up a little earlier than we've planned so I could start new classes with her.

After class we went to the beach. That made two weekends in a row for me, actually. Mom and I went with Mallory and her parents after class two weeks ago, and we had tons of fun. This time, it was just our family, but I still loved running in the sand (and eating a little), smashing Dad's sand castle, eating jelly sandwiches, and splashing in the waves. I did have a little accident, though. Not long after we got there, I was leaning on the umbrella, and it came out of the sand and bopped me in the eyelid. Man, it hurt, and it even bled a little. I had a scab and a pretty good bruise for the better part of four days, but it fell off this morning.

The other big thing from these last two weeks is that I'm not sleeping in my crib anymore. Nope -- now I have a toddler bed. OK, so technically my crib is what's called "convertible," so all Dad had to do was take off the front rail and put a little brace/roll guard on. It's not like I got a whole new piece of furniture. (The rail goes back on and turns into a footboard when I'm ready for a full-size big-kid bed.) We decided to give it a shot, and turns out I really like sleeping in it. I've slept through the night in it for two nights now -- Tuesday I woke up at 6:30, but last night I slept nine hours straight. I didn't realize how nice it was not having to fight Dad for bed space. The only problem is I still don't know how to get down by myself. I have to yell for the 'rents.

That's all for this time, I guess. Next time I post will be after Dad's birthday. I can't believe he's so old.

Take It Outside

I've gotten a lot of new stuff to play with outside recently, which is good because I love it out there. I posted about my pool before, and I might have put up pictures of the sand and water table (which Dad just filled up with sand today). But then Mom found a cool slide on Craigslist for totally cheap. My stuff is so awesome out there that a couple days ago I went out the dog door out of sheer determination to get outside. Just the one time so far, though -- I'm not totally positive that will work every time, or that I won't get in trouble for doing it. But it's been great to hang out in the yard. Of course, Mom and Dad won't let me play out there when it's raining, which I don't get because they let me splash in the pool and that's water too. Whatever. Parents.

This week I've also been fascinated by books. Not all of them, mind you. A select handful. Mom said she's so tired of reading me Biscuit's Snowy Day that it might get lost. I don't really know how that works, but I haven't been able to find my Dog pop-up book for a week or so either. Dad said he had to fix it after I tore off some of the moving parts, but now it's just gone. I don't know. I can still get Ten Little Ladybugs for some fun reading time.

Dad's going away for the weekend for his drum corps. It's lame and I'll miss him, but I know he's going to have fun and do great. Mom and I have fun plans for the holiday, too -- playing in the yard, of course, but also going to gym class, going bowling with some friends and hitting a party on Friday night. So we'll have fun even though he's not here.