Conversations With A 2 Year Old

My little boy has a lot to say.  Here are two separate conversations just from our ride home last night.

Des - Do you get it, Mom?

Mom - No, I don't get it, Des.

Des - Mom, I want you to understand me.  Do you understand what I am saying?

Mom - Yes, I understand you.

Des - So,  you get it, Mom?

Mom - Yes, I get it, Des.

Mom - Grandma & Papa are coming to Lydia's meet tomorrow.

Des - They are?  I like to see them.

Mom - Kim is coming with Grandma, too.

Des - Kim!  I hate her!

Mom - Why do you hate her?

Des - Because she doesn't hug and kiss me and she has no toenails!  And she has toes, but she doesn't have feet!

Poor Kim.  (Please don't wear sandals!)

You can imagine the uproar from his sisters!

Rowan's Tennis Lesson

Rowan started taking tennis lessons with her best friend, Ciara (who is practically pro already:).  This is video from her 3rd lesson.  She seems to be getting the hang of it!

Captain Pirate!

Captain Pirate has found his treasure!

Aaarrrr, Matey!

Captain Pirate wears his treasure map  on his head.  He defends his treasure with his fearsome hook! 

Level 3 Testing Day

Last Saturday (Feb. 4th), Rowan was tested on her level 3 gymnastics skills.  Testing takes about 3 hours.  Each girl has to complete her bar, beam, floor & vault routines along with conditioning & flexibility tests.  Level 3 is when the standing back handspring is tested, as well.

Daddy made a good breakfast.

Mommy did her hair.

Ready!

Of course, our little superstar passed!  Next step is Level 4 testing.  If she passes, she will begin competing in August!  

She passed!

Surveys & Such

I've been doing surveys & product testing for a while now.  These were two separate product tests I received on the same day.  Wave was pretty amused that both items were labeled H & toilet paper H said, "USE SECOND"! : D

Kiwi Crate

I love, love, love the gift subscription Matt & Janet gave my kids to Kiwi Crate.  It's been great fun and great learning all at once.

So far, we've received the space themed crate & the ocean themed crate. Each crate comes with EVERY supply needed to finish the projects in it.  They even sent scissors & tape!

We spent 2 days painting and putting together a solar system mobile.
It's an artistic rendering of the solar system that now hangs proudly in the kitchen next to our realistic model.


The kids made rockets.

Blast off!

Misfire!

Lydia's Fancy Rocket

Rowan's Pink Rocket

Rocket Jalopy

I'll post pictures from the ocean crate soon!  

Click here for $10 off  your order!

How We Homeschool

Rowan using my Kindle Fire for math.

Lydia doing her math on the floor.

We've settled into a pretty laid back routine lately.  Our only classes are gymnastics (4 days a week) and dance (once a week).  We do schoolwork for a couple of hours each morning.  It's a nice life...

Christmas Eve

The Watsons bowled on Christmas Eve.  

 

Catching Up...

A whole month gone of 2012, sigh...  Time to play catch up.  Let me back up a bit.

 

Did anyone ever post the giant cake I made with my friend Nancy for Thanksgiving?

More soon...

So This Was Christmas...

Bothered

This is what it would look like if I, an Ewok or Chewbacca wore a strappy, high heeled boot.
I don't think that's the look most ladies are going for.
So why do I see the ad for these boots on every web site?
They are hideous.
I hate them and they are stalking me.

Season's End

Grump.

Today was the 2011 NorCal Level 4 State Championships.  As you can see from the photo, Lydia was not happy with her performance.

Happy Little Lumberjack

Luckily, her Lumberjack's Breakfast cheered her up pretty quickly!

 She really didn't do so badly, my Lydia is just hard on herself.  She got medals for every event.  You can see the scores in the chart I made up below. (I had to make my own.  I wasn't happy with the score tracker sites out there.)

Medal Wall!

I think Lydia had a great first season.  She placed in 35 out of 40 possible events.

Two of those medals were 1st place, one was 2nd and seven were 3rd place.

Lydia also holds the title of "Zone 4 Vault Champion".

We are super proud of her and can't wait for her Level 5 season!

Silly Kid

Goofball!

Date	Meet	Level	Vault	Bars	Beam	Floor	A.A.
08/13/11	Meet At Mavericks	4	8.525 (13)	8.325 (7)	8.875 (3)	8.425 (6T)	35.150 (7)
08/20/11	2011 NAWGJ Judges Cup	4	8.900 (3)	8.025 (7T)	8.225 (8)	8.550 (8)	33.700 (7)
09/10/11	2011 River City Classic	4	9.175 (9T)	8.675 (4)	8.600 (4)	8.275 (12)	34.725 (4T)
09/17/11	Candyland Classic	4	9.275 (2)	8.725 (3)	8.625 (3)	8.625 (6)	35.300 (3T)
10/08/11	Tumble in the Jungle	4	8.700 (11T)	8.675 (6)	9.150 (3)	8.750 (11)	35.275 (6)
10/15/11	2011 Circus Parade	4	9.500 (1)	8.975 (3)	8.875 (4)	8.825 (6T)	36.175 (4)
10/30/11	Zone 4 Championships	4	9.525 (1)	8.300 (12)	8.750 (8)	9.275 (4)	35.850 (7)
11/20/11	NorCal State Championships	4	9.000 (8T)	8.925 (7)	8.975 (8T)	8.900 (8T)	35.800 (9)
~*Personal Bests*~		4	9.525 (1)	8.975 (3)	9.150 (3)	9.275 (4)	36.175 (3T*)
							*Highest place does not coincide with highest score.

Rowan Lost A Tooth!

Rowan is very happy to have lost her first tooth today!  She's been dying to lose one for years.  

I remember her as a tiny, little 3 year old saying, "Look, Mom, my tooth is wiggly!"  as she shook her entire jaw at me.  

This tooth started wiggling for real on the morning of Halloween.  She played with it so much that day I was sure it would be out by nightfall.  It hung on for 10 more days despite the constant attention from it's owner.  This morning, Rowan decided she'd had enough and pulled it all on her own!

Although she tells me she doesn't believe in the tooth fairy, Rowan will still be putting her first tooth in the lovely box she got from her friends Eva and Irenie for her birthday.

Update!  Rowan's best friend, Ciara, pulled her loose tooth on the same morning as Rowan did.   They really do do everything together!

Rowan's Tutorial

Rowan teaches you how to make a toy. Daddy says she's our future Martha Stewart.

Tumble in the Jungle 2011

Lydia had her first late meet on Saturday.  It started at 5pm in Larkspur.

Until now, all her meets have started early in the morning.  It was quite a change for all of us!

Lydia was not happy with her performance.  She expects to earn medals for every event.  This time, she placed in 3 out of 5.

I think she did a fine job. Although she didn't place on floor, she did earn her highest score to date!  She also received her highest score on beam (9.15), which earned 3rd place.

In addition to 3rd on beam, she placed 6th on bars & 6th all-around.  That puts her up to 21 medals for 5 meets!

All the gymnasts received a cool leo as their gift.  Lydia is modeling it in the picture Daddy took with a Droid app.

As always, you can check out the full scores by following the link.  ---->

Updated Scores!

Lydia had her 4th meet today.  Check out her scores!                                                                      

Pre-meet photo by Rowan. :)

         














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Desmond's Bath

While the girls & I were cleaning, Desmond decided he wanted a bath.  Instead of asking for help, my self-sufficient little boy just helped himself!

Dinnertime

Judges Cup Meet Results

Lydia's 2nd meet was today.  This one was local, but it was still an early day.  Wave took this picture of  Des sleeping during awards.  It was really loud, so you know he was a tired boy!

Lydia had another successful meet!  This meet was much bigger than last weekend, so awards were given up to 8th place.

Lydia earned a trip to the podium for every event!


Here's the summary...

3rd place on VAULT (A great improvement from last week when she got last place.)
7th place on BARS
8th place on  BEAM & FLOOR
7th place ALL-AROUND

Once again, her team took first place!  Yay, Byers!

If you'd like to support Lydia at her next meet, it's September 10th at 8am at Byers Elk Grove.

Meet At Mavericks - August 14, 2011

As most of you have heard, Lydia's first gymnastics meet was this past weekend. It turned out to be a great first experience for her (and me!).  Use the link  to view the pictures and videos we all took throughout the trip.  2011 Meet at Mavericks

On Saturday, Grandma Susie came to Sacramento and we all piled into her car for the trip to our hotel in South San Francisco.  After a long trip due to the heavy traffic, the kids played in the pool & hot tub with their Daddy. We followed that up with snacks and drinks at the hotel happy hour.  Wave and I picked up some fast food for Grandma & the kids then went out for sushi by ourselves.

Sunday morning, we were up at 6am.  Lydia's hair still takes me a while to put up properly.  We were out of the hotel at 7am.  The trip to Moss Beach took about 1/2 an hour.  Breakfast muffins & orange juice were a pretty good on-the-go meal.

It was chilly in Moss Beach.  My favorite, foggy-type weather.

The meet started at 8am.  Byers competed on beam first.  Amazingly,  Byers girls earned the 1st, 2nd & 3rd best scores in Lydia's division and they held for the rest of the meet!

We are so proud of Lydia for her 3rd place score on beam!  Beam is the event that she has shed the most tears over in practice.  Parts of the routine were really hard for her to master and a fall caused her a lot of anxiety over the dismount.  3rd place at her first meet is a great accomplishment!

Along with 3rd place on beam, Lydia tied for 6th on floor.  She ended up with 7th place all around.  Her all around score qualifies her to compete in the Level 4 State Championship on November 19th or 20th!  Byers took home 1st place as a team. Here are  the  full results for her division.