Crawling and Swimming Lessons

It's a day as a parent that you look forward to, but also dread - crawling. Crawling = the ability to get into things and is one step closer to walking. While this is an exciting time watching your child learn new things, grow, and develop, it also marks the end of a very cherished thing - FREEDOM for mommies and daddies. Freedom to place your child in a spot and know that she is not going to stray far from that spot. Freedom to organize your drawers however you want knowing that no one is going to pull everything out. Freedom to leave things on the floor in each room of the house. That freedom is now gone from the Petroelje house. Brooke started crawling this past week. The video below is one of her very first attempts, and she has improved quite a bit since then, being able to get around a little more quickly now. She's not a speed demon by any means yet, but that will come soon enough. (Sigh), my baby is growing way too fast.

For the past two weeks our big guy has been taking swimming lessons. What a riot. He has had such a great time, and has learned a lot. There were 4 kids in his class - his buddy Trent, and Trent's cousins Grace and Lucy. Thanks to Kim and Mitch for having the patience to put up with our active 3 year old :).

Grant and Trent - good buddies and the two rambunctious ones of the group

...and, the two that seemed to have to pee ALL the time (yes, they are both peeing in the rocks here - Trent just does it the more politically correct way; Grant bares all :)); I haven't figured it out yet if they really did have to go or if they just liked peeing in the rocks (Modest? I think not.)
Grace, Grant, Lucy, and Trent on the giant inflatable
G and Lucy

Clip of the kids "monkey crawling" along the side of the pool. Can you hear the little monkeys??

G loved jumping off the diving board!

Kathi and Chad are home again for a little bit, so we spent the past few night at my parents' house hanging out with them.

Grant has enjoyed riding his "big boy" bike around our house that he got for his birthday, and my parents have a similar bike that my grandma picked up from Ditto. The only difference - the one my parents have is a girls bike, and G picked up on it the first time he saw it last week. My mom asked him if he wanted to ride bike, and when they went out to do so, he said 1) "I don't have my helmet." (good boy!), 2) "This bike is purple. That's a girl's bike.", and 3) "You don't have any sidewalks to ride on!" (my son has been in the city too long!). Last night, my mom hauled the bike out again, and he gave it a try, AND...
Kathi decided to take the other bike they have for a spin - with my dad's snowmobile helmet on - to show Grant that she is being a safe bike rider. What a hoot. She looked hilarious on the thing.
Mom and Brielle - she's grown so much in a month! What a sweetheart.