What Eden has been up to lately

working hard!

I did it!

"Eden-money"

Since my last real post was all about Andrew's recent accomplishments (still a work in progress, by the way), I thought I'd share some of what Eden's been up to lately. The first couple pictures are from her latest swim lesson. She's been going for a while, first at the YMCA and now at the city swim center, and she's made some real progress. She really doesn't like to get water in her face, but she's starting to put her face in the water and she's getting confident enough to float (assisted by the instructor), which means she finally has been passed on from the Preschool I level to the Preschool II level! At this swim lesson, she even did two really great jumps from the edge of the pool without the instructor holding her hands. For the longest time, she wouldn't really jump, she would crouch down until her bottom was just about touching the edge, then she would sort of scoot/flop into the pool, and she would usually have to be hanging on to the instructor during this whole time. But these jumps were great- water splashed up in her face and everything (she didn't like getting the water in her face, but she was so proud of herself)! Of course as my luck would have it, the battery died right before I could get pictures of her jumping. But, I'll try to catch it again in the future.

The last picture is of "Eden-money" that she made. I had moved my things to a different wallet, so Eden wanted my old one. It just wasn't complete without some paper money in addition to the few coins I gave her. Since I wouldn't give here any real money, she decided to make her own. I cut out the paper, and she studied the money and this is what she had when I came to check on her a little while later. She was getting frustrated with the letters at the top (notice they start getting bigger), so I told her I would finish the writing. She didn't include a face, and the building (I feel silly not knowing what building it is, I guess I'm probably not smarter than a fifth grader) came from the back of a smashed penny she was also looking at. But, I thought it was pretty impressive the way she paid attention to details like the serial number and all the other letters on the bill. She made a couple more, but on those, she only drew the pictures, and I did all the writing. This was her first one, and she did most of it all by herself!