Walter's Present

Yes, those are skulls. This is Walter's birthday present to Hannah.  He requested a picture.  Knowing Walter, I'm just glad he didn't send a dead squirrel or something.

Hannah's 2nd Birthday

For Hannah's birthday weekend her grandparents and Uncle Casey and Aunt Marissa came to our house to celebrate.  We had a ladybug birthday, and I made my first attempt at decorating cupcakes.  Some of the of dots came out more like spikes, but Hannah didn't mind. :)

Hannah was mesmerized by her new train set.  Grandpa is trying to show her how it works.

Marissa and Casey got her art supplies (that only show up on special paper!), so she tested them out.

Reading "Ladybug Girl" with Grandma and Grandpa.

We also went to Little Monkey Bizness with Granny and Papa.  Hannah had a great time with Granny doing all of the equipment with her.

This time her favorite thing was bouncing on the swings.

Putting together her new train puzzle with Granny.

Hannah was very excited to touch the letters and wouldn't put her hand down.

Science City

For Hannah's birthday we took her to Science City.  It was our first time and we were impressed.  There are three floors of stuff to do!  I was worried that it was mainly for older kids, but we found plenty of things to interest a toddler.

Getting her morning started right with nutella on toast

Albert and Hannah

She always likes building with blocks, espcially when they are huge!

She climbed this all by herself, with us nervously on either side of her just in case.

One of her favorites: putting scarves into a wind chamber.

Another favorite: mini golf.  She couldn't really play, but that didn't stop her from carrying around a club.

And probably her #1 favorite: the water table!  This was also Steve's favorite.

Other exhibits that Hannah enjoyed: digging for dinosaur bones, seeing live animals (especially the rabbit), walking on the floor piano, and the model trains (of course).

Hannah Stats- 2 years

Hannah is now 28 pounds (75th percentile) and 37 inches tall (over 99th percentile).  Since her first birthday she gained over 5 pounds and grew 6 inches.  She also learned how to feed herself, walk, run, jump (sort of), and talk.  She only had a few words when she turned one, but now she has a big vocabulary and talks in phrases or sentences.  Most of the time we can understand her, but we sometimes have to be translators for other people. ;) She has also started using some pronouns.  Hannah is still very interested in books and has memorized some of her favorites.  She is very motivated to learn things.  If she sees us doing something new she will watch us for awhile and then keep trying it on her own until she can do it.  She learned her letters by constantly pointing to them and asking us "What dat?" until she eventually memorized them.  Now she knows all of the capital letters, numbers 1-10, shapes, and colors.  She's very serious when she is working on something, but very silly when she is playing.  We are so proud to the be the parents of such a smart, opinionated, polite, and funny little girl!

Hannah's Favorites as a Two-year-old:
foods: fruits, mac and cheese with peas, but she'll eat just about anything
songs: If You're Happy and You Know It, Waltzing Matilda
books: Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, The Foot Book, Llama Llama Red Pajama, First Picture 123
tv shows: Super Why, Team Umizoomi
toys: legos, trains, blocks, balls, puzzles
activities: reading, drawing, playing at parks, helping Mama and Dada with projects, playing Ring Around the Rosy, giving hugs and kisses
saying: "Here ya go, Mama!" and "Hannah do it!"
*least favorite things: getting her face wiped off, washing her hands

St. Pat's at Mahaffie

Instead of trying to brave the traffic and intoxicated people to watch the St. Pat's parade, we went south to Mahaffie Stagecoach Stop and Farm. I'd never been before and wanted to check it out. I was a little disappointed in the place (not much to see) and the weather (very windy), but Hannah still had a good time.  She loved trying out hoop rolling and riding the stagecoach.

Baby Shower

I think second baby showers are a little silly, especially when you have two of the same sex....and especially in our case when both girls will even be born in the same season. All we really need is some diapers and we're good to go. But although we don't need a lot of stuff, we still wanted to take some time to celebrate baby #2.  So when Wendy offered to throw us a co-ed baby shower we were excited.  It was more of a game night with friends and less of a traditional shower. It was perfect. We got some new books and toys for baby, but most of all we got to hang out with friends and have fun. I forgot to take many pictures of the night, but I did get this family photo with my cousins:

Hannah refused to put her hands down, so we all put our hands up.

Yard Work

Hannah loves the warmer weather because it means she gets to be outside more. We've been out working on the deck project, cleaning up debris from a tree removal, and raking up leaves and spiky balls. Hannah helps us some, but prefers to work on her own projects.

Her favorite thing to do is work in what she calls "the sand box" (really just some left-over sand on a tarp). She likes digging and raking in the sand, but more than that she likes giving orders to Mama or Dada to dig or rake.  If we try to sneak off to do some of our work she says, "Come back here, Mama!  Sand box, Mama!"

She also decided one day that all of the dirt from the planters needed to be OUTSIDE the planters.

And she carries tools around the yard just in case she sees another project...like picking up individual pieces of gravel with pliers.

Great-Grandmas

We took our last trip to Chillicothe before the baby comes. Hannah spent time with her grandparents and great-grandparents. Here she is playing with exercise equipment with her great-grandma Velma

and sitting with her great-grandma Alice.

Crash Training

Brew to Brew is 2.5 weeks away and I haven't run at all.  The race isn't serious, but I'd like to at least not be the worst person on the team.  The plan is to run every morning and night from here until the Friday before the race.  I enjoy tracking stuff like this so I'm going to post the progress here on the blog.

3/15 PM: 3mi @ 8:00pace.  HR: 89%. Note 1.
3/16 AM: 3mi @ 8:44pace.  HR: 85%.
3/16 PM: 3mi @ 8:24pace.  HR: 84%.
3/17 AM: 3mi @ 8:39pace. HR: 87%.
3/17 PM: 3mi @ 8:31pace. HR: 86%. Note 2.
3/18 AM: 3mi @ 8:35pace. HR: 85%.
3/18 PM: 3mi @ 8:19pace. HR: 84%. Note 3.
3/19 AM: 1mi @ 8:49pace. HR: 83%. Note 4.
3/20 PM: 1hr Bike.  HR: 75%. Note 5.

Notes:
1.  The HR is exceptionally high because I threw a 1 mile tempo in there for the third mile just to see where I was.  If brew to brew were tomorrow I'd be looking at 7:45 pace at best.
2. It was hot today.  Also, I'm hoping the soreness is on the downhill side now and I can walk again  tomorrow.
3. Left achilles is sore.  Perfect temps today and tomorrow for running.
4. Last night's grade 2 moved to grade 3.  Achilles tendinosis.  Time to get on the bike.  More stretching, some calf raises and lots of localized massage.  It's nice to have this book around to tell me what to do.
5. Grade 4.  Probably even done with biking for awhile.  Good lesson here to not push so hard when you're
extremely sore.

Playdate with Ollie

Favorite Shows

We aren't big TV people.  We don't even have cable (gasp!).  But if we're at home for the weekend Hannah watches cartoons on Saturday morning or DVDs every now and then.  She also watches some TV at daycare.  She doesn't have much interest in sitting through a show that tells a story, but she does enjoy interactive shows that ask a question and then give the kids time to figure out the answer.

Ollie introduced us to Super Why months ago and now that is Hannah's favorite show.  It teaches beginning reading skills like letter recognition, rhymes, spelling, and filling in the missing word in a sentence.  Hannah gets super excited at the introduction of the characters....

In case you couldn't make out what she was screaming:  Rescue!  ALPHA PIG!  WONDER RED!  PRINCESS PRESTO!  SUPER WHY!  SUPER WHY!!!  Mama.  Super Readers.

Her other favorite TV show is Team Umizoomi which is kind of the math equivalent of Super Why.  It teaches counting, shapes, and patterns.  She watches it at daycare with the 2 1/2 year old boy and they see which one can say the answer first.

She also really likes the Classical Baby DVD series.  We have Baby Art, Baby Music, and Baby Dance.  They are short animated lullabies.  We used to watch one or two before bed each night, but now we read books.  Her favorite is Baby Art, specifically "The Museum" clip that shows lots of famous paintings.  Her grandma the art teacher should be very proud. :)