School Pictures: Round 3

Miles just turned 17 months old and he has already experienced three "school photo" sessions. Ooofdah. They don't hand out little black combs to infants and toddlers, though. Thank goodness....we'd have a drawer full.

Picture day hits us twice per year at Kids Korner - once in April and once in October. The April session is usually done by LifeTouch or some other big name photo company, while the October photo shoots are done by a local photographer. I think it's nice to feature a local business and wish they'd do it for both sessions, but then I suppose they'd have to have quarterly picture days to keep up with all of the photographers in town. Believe it or not, it's a hot business here in Otown.

Anyway, Miles wasn't too thrilled about having his picture taken this time around. It just so happened that picture day landed during his first full week in the toddler room. He was already out of sorts with the Big Move to Toddlerville, so we'll cut him some slack. You can't tell in the pictures below, but Miles was actually sitting on the back of his main teacher. That's right...Ms. Starr was on all fours like a dog with Miles perched on her back. I really wish the camera would've slipped and gotten a shot of that scene, but no such luck.

Without further ado, I present to you Miles Jay Grimmius:

Take I:

Take II:

Sigh. He's a keeper. We'll buy some prints and frame 'em for the grandparents and cousins (yes -- that's plural!!! The twins will be here soon!)

Lil' sizzler

On warm days, this is the crazy animal that I pick up at daycare --

If I'm lucky, he has cheese chunks in his hair.

Teaching babies how to swim

Miles is in the midst of his first round of swimming lessons. Yes, we know he's only 17 months old. Yes, we know he's too young to learn the crawl stroke. Heck, I'm 28 and I still don't know how to do that one (perhaps I'm also too young?!).

Community Ed offers toddler swimming lessons, and so far the first two sessions have been a blast! Miles LOVES the water. As soon as we arrive, he points to the pool and yells "B! B! B!" ("bath" in Miles' world). He also goes running for the water...which is exactly why we're teaching him how to swim.

His buddies Claire, Kennedi, Reid, and Alec are also in the class. That makes it all the more fun!

I splashed around with Miles during the first session, and Tanner got in the water with him this past week. We might be fighting over who gets to participate next week -- Miles is lucky that he's an automatic in!

Big babes and lil' babes (week 1)

Dudes and dudettes (week 2)

Getting acclimated to the water...

Jump! Jump! Jump!

Bubbles with mommy

Hokey Pokey with daddy

Pool rats

In just a couple of short months we'll be able to take this party outside. Yahooooo!

26.2 miles of fun

It's official - Charlie and I are running the Twin Cities marathon in October.

We talked about it last fall and decided to give it a try if we could get in...well, we got in. Easily. Now I know that I need to wait at least 30 days (not 24 hours) after registration opens to register, because then my chances of not getting in are much better. :)

We're already 5 weeks into the training plan. Charlie did a 10 miler on Friday morning and I managed to whip out 11 miles. I'm not some kind of overachiever and I'm not trying to compete for mileage here, trust me. There's a half marathon in Otown on May 2nd and I'm planning to run it, so that's why I have to tack on an extra mile or two with some of my runs lately. I don't do it for kicks and giggles.

The From the Heart half marathon is for a great cause; all of the proceeds are going to the family of a woman who recently died from cancer. It sounds like a lot of people are going to participate, so it will no doubt be a great run. The more non-competitive runners, the better.

Charlie was going to join me but those twins are getting awfully close to their birth day...so it's better that he stays home to rub Angie's feet and fetch her various snacks!

Anyway, I just added a TC Marathon widget to my blog. Not so sure I want the detailed reminder of just how quickly The Day is approaching, but it's fun.

Here's what Miles thinks of the whole thing:

grandmas and grandpas and eggs...oh my!

Easter weekend is winding down. We were lucky to have nice weather and good company on both Saturday and Sunday. Or was it nice company and good weather? Anyway, there were grandmas and grandpas everywhere and the sun was shining. Perfect!

We made the 30-mile-south-on-I35-and-110-mile-east-on-I90-trip to Worthington on Saturday to visit Great Grandma Grimmius and her sister, Leatha. Grandma and Grandpa Grimmius, Uncle Will, and (probably some day Auntie) Anne also participated in the fun. Everyone enjoyed a delicious meal at Perkins.

Great Aunt Leatha and Great Grandma Helen sat still so we could take their picture with Miles...

When we got home that afternoon, Miles could hardly wait to bust out of the car and run around outside. He realized his bike needed a tune-up,

and the sidewalk needed some cleaning.

It was such a busy day that Miles couldn't sleep straight on Saturday night.

He woke up early on Easter Sunday to help clean before our guests arrived. He looks a little annoyed here, but he really was quite content holding the cord for the vacuum in between rounds of golf. Easy entertainment....I'm going to have to get the vacuum out more often :)

Great Grandpa Charlie was the guest of honor. Oh, and Grandma Jill and Grandpa Larry came over too.

After a yummy dinner featuring grilled ham, we ended the Easter festivities by dying some stinky eggs. They look pretty but peeeewwwww!

Happy Easter!
Peep peep.

The Big Hunt

Miles participated in his first Easter egg hunt last night. We heard that the Owatonna Country Club planted 350 eggs around the club house and only 7 kids were planning to attend...obviously they needed help, so we offered up Miles. He's a darn good egg hunter!

You're probably wondering why the other 7 kids didn't appear in the photos. They were all inside eating mini corn dogs and smiley fries. MMMMM! We did some coloring activities with them....
....until the food was brought out, and then we decided it was safer to be outside. Miles had already eaten supper and...well...we just didn't need to have supper again. Yes, yes, I know. We are mean parents.

The good news was that Miles had no idea that we were keeping him from such deliciousness. As soon as he heard the word "outside", he was ready to go. That meant we had no competition during The Big Hunt! Awesome.