Sunday, July 10, 2011

Happy 5th birthday!

Today is Gwen's 5th birthday! My oldest starts Kindergarten this year, summer is halfway over! I don't know really what to say about her. Most of the time she is a sweet, fun and great help around here. She does have times when I wonder what has happened to my sweet girl, but her brother is requiring more and more attention and I think the sweet one occasionally gets jealous and when I speak to her about it and give her some attention life gets much better. She adores Nate though and usually plays so well with him.
She is very affectionate, she especially loves babies and animals. She is planning on moving to a farm, she'd like goats and other assorted animals, which I think she has already named. Every time we see a baby she calls it a "cutie pie" and tries to help it in some way. I almost dread when the neighbors with dogs are outside because I know she will run down there to play with them and then I feel kind of awkward, because I don't really know those neighbors and then I have to make random chit-chat.
She is very timid. She needs lots of coaxing to try something new. And often times she can't be coaxed into something new. I am usually unable to coax her into stuff, which can be very frustrating. But, since going to preK she has become more confident and I am excited to see how much confidence learning to read next year will help her overcome her timidity. She is slated to spend the night at a friend's house this week. And although I am pretty sure that she can completely do it and I have the up most confidence in my friend, I will be interested to see if I get the call. I had a neighbor growing up that was often invited to spend the night and fortunately we were neighbors because it was a long time before he could make it through the whole night. I don't think I had a problem, but then again, why would I remember that? Sometimes I think if we make a big deal about something she gets more nervous. So, I've just casually mention it and telling her that she can come home if she wants or she can stay. I did mention to her today that her friend sleeps in the same room as her baby brother and her eyes just lit up with excitement, so I am thinking that might be incentive for her to stay.
I took some pictures and video of her today, opening presents and riding her bike. I have to mention she was real cautious about her bike today, which is kind of funny, since whenever we were in the store and she tried it she was all over the place with confidence. We tried to take her to the Tobacco trail today so she could get more confidence on the trail, smooth surface, no hills. But sadly, the easiest way to get there is by hooking the bikes into the bike trailer and towing the kids and the bikes behind Eric. On the way there, Gwen's bike tire was rubbing on the trailer tire and rubbed a hole into the tire and tube. Fortunately we found a new tube and Eric replaced it and as you can see from the video she was back riding the bike and racing on the street.
Here is the slideshow with pictures of her cake-which Eric made and I frosted...he made a light and fluffy cake, quite yummy, but the kids seemed to prefer my roses, which were so rich not as much cake was eaten (or maybe they were full from dinner!)

Here are 2 videos of Gwen opening presents, which I thought were quite funny-I am sad I missed the very beginning, because she received a "pop-out" card from her Godfather and she was so excited, when people asked her what she got for her birthday they mentioned the pop-out card. She has since popped out all the characters and played with them.

Untitled from Melanie Ubil on Vimeo.


Untitled from Melanie Ubil on Vimeo.


These next videos are of Gwen "racing" Eric. He's not wearing shoes or a helmet and he is using my bike, I'd say it was a fair race. She used to ride down the driveway on her old bike, but she apparently needs more confidence before she can start doing that with the new bike.

Untitled from Melanie Ubil on Vimeo.


Another ride...

Untitled from Melanie Ubil on Vimeo.

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