Morning Serenades

"Oh, What a Beautiful Morning" is one of Misha's current favorites. :)

On a different morning while eating strawberries, he burst into a verse of "Whole World in His Hands." Today he came into our bedroom singing us "Puff the Magic Dragon."

Photo Fun

Misha's new trick!





Misha is still really enjoying gymnastics. Here you can see him swinging on the bars with a bean bag between his knees. In the second picture the kids all line up like little ducklings to listen to the obstacle course directions.



He practices handstands on the couch!



More block creations ... He figured out how to make a pyramid all by himself.







We dug Mousetrap out of my parents' basement! Perfect. After building the trap and watching it sometimes work and sometimes fail, Misha decided to put the pieces together his own way.





My handsome hubby.




Misha and Mommy and baby-to-be.



Get to work!



Misha can actually take some pretty good pictures. :)

Voila some of Misha's chalk writing. He's quite good at his name, and he can write other things if I spell them for him.











His new favorite game.


The shirt reads, "My grandparents don't spoil me; they're just very accommodating."




I brought home a tub of little counting bears and when we walked into the living room, we saw Misha's cool design on the floor.






It's starting to warm up now. Once in awhile it's warm enough to be barefoot! Of course, yesterday there were snowflakes in the air again ...

Bowling Night

Since Misha had only been bowling once in his life, we decided to take him Friday night. He loves it. He waits impatiently for the ball to pop out of the tunnel, then lugs it over to the kid-friendly bowling-ball ramp, pushes it down, and watches with anxious anticipation until it crashes into the pins at the end. Since he had the bumpers up on the side, he usually got some pins. ;) Josh and I decided to play a non-bumper game on the neighboring lane, which meant Misha was free to bowl and bowl and bowl - we soon became alarmed at the rate he was eating up frames and had to go home before he made us go broke! He had a good time though. Here's a little slideshow of Misha enjoying himself.

Our Mighty Tumbler

Just as ice skating lessons came to an end, an opening came up for Misha in the Mighty Tumblers gymnastics class for three- to six-year-olds! (We've been on the waiting list for months.) It's wonderful for kids. It gets them moving, paying attention, focusing, laughing, following directions, everything - it's better than school!

They start out with the whole group, maybe 20 or so kids, doing, for example, bean bag activities with Teacher Dave. Put the bean bag on your head! Put the bean bag on your knee and balance! Put it on the floor! Jump over it! And so on, up to sitting down with the bean bag between your feet, then leaning back to catapult the bean bag backwards. They throw and catch, then they toss their bean bags into the center basket by color. Then they split into three smaller groups of about 8 each and go off to different obstacle courses. The teacher runs through what they do quickly at each station, then off the kids would go.

The first time Misha went, he was not nearly as confident as the other kids. A few times he got lost in what to do, got discouraged, and came running tearfully to us on the sidelines. But each time he decided to give it another go, and he had a lot of fun. Tonight was his second time, and he was far more confident in what to do and he really enjoyed himself. The obstacle courses were neat - for example, climbing a little ladder to hang on a bar, swinging, and dropping to the ground; bouncing on a trampoline; walking on a beam with help; doing a handstand (for a milisecond); doing a sommersault; doing a backward roll on a wedge; doing a half cartwheel over a stuffed block; putting hands down while walking feet vertically up a wall mat; jumping over a series of "noodles;" hula hooping. Every 10 minutes or so, they switch to a new obstacle course.

At the end, the group comes together again for some practice throwing and catching light scarves or a game of Simon Says. Tonight I was laughing out loud as the kids tried most unsuccessfully to figure out when to follow the order and when not to!

Here are a few videos of him. Some handstands ...




And following the obstacle course ...

Yes, here's a tummy shot for my sister Tanya.

Misha's sporty new haircut by Daddy.

Daddy and Misha carved our snow pile!

We enjoyed ice skating this weekend and even got Grandma on the ice!

Making music with Daddy. :)

The three of us for Mommy's nonexistent 29th birthday.