Des Moines GiGi's Playhouse opened on Saturday!!!! On the left is GiGi proudly posing in front of her picture and above she is working the new stage! Hundreds of people came to check out our newest location!!

That other picture is Bella standing in front of the coolest wall ever!! It is in the new Playhouse and is full of inspirational sayings!! How cool is that??

Talk about re-inspired!!

Peace, Love and Happiness!

Peace baby! Cynthia Judd from Metamorphosis Studios took that! Isn't that a great shot?

The little poser!! She is soooo about her accessories! We cannot leave for school without her grabbing a hat, scarf, Micheal Jackson glove.....

I was in New York last week working on the Manhattan location! I so wish she was with me! We were at a luncheon given by the NDSS. We were being honored with a grant from Stephen Riggio, the CEO of Barnes and Noble! (and his family) It was so cool and it all goes towards the NYC Playhouse!!

I cannot wait to bring the kids there for the opening. I told Franco last night (as we were watching Celebrity apprentice!) that we would stay at Trump Towers for a night! I know I am going to PAY for that one!

Call me..Text Me!!

Ok...So I have moved from this blog to facebook!! But I have received so much grief about not updating the blog (Lora Bak!) that I AM BACK!!! So blame her!!!!
GiGi is rockin' first grade!!!! She is in the Phun with Phonics program at the Playhouse and is doing awesome! I love that we just go to the library and she can read books off the shelf!! Too cool!! Her favorite saying is "Call me, text me!"

kissing the fish

GiGi had a major fishing day! They just kept biting! Once again she got so excited that she kissed the fish!~ She wasn't as grossed out this time and she was naming all of them as she caught them. I wonder why she named the large mouth Mommy???

lost her first tooth and the camp rock girls!

OK Seriously...when I say she lost her first tooth, I mean lost! She ate it with her Subway!!

I remember I was at a support group meeting when GiGi was an infant and they showed a video of an adult with some delays getting his teeth cleaned and he was strapped to the chair! Then they told how you needed to do whatever it took to clean their teeth. How about a tooth brush and regular dental visits?? I remember being freaked out and then talking to other parents who said that was a bit extreme. You think?

She had a cleaning and fluoride treatment and she is all good! She was a bit freaked by the bright light and laying straight back in the chair so they let her sit up a bit which made all the difference in the world. She is a bit of a control freak (no, I do not know where she gets that from) and I think laying there flat made her feel too vulnerable.

work out!!!

OMG!! I heard GiGi kind of breathing hard, grunting and counting. "Urgh 1, Urgh 2, Urgh 3 etc..." So I look over to see what she was doing and she was laying on the ground curling a dumb bell!! The only problem was that it wasn't a dumb bell at all, it was a 2 pound roll of Nestles toll house cookie dough! She is hilarious!!!!!!!!!!

School starts!!! Kindergarten!!!

OK... Seriously! She is constantly messing with me!!! I tell her to get dressed for her first day of school and she comes down in her t-ball uniform! It was complete with her crocs (on the wrong feet) and her purse! Obviously she changed to pose with Daddy!

We have had no structure at all this summer so the poor girl is being thrown to the wolves! I was a little afraid when they blew the whistle and told the kids that meant they needed to stop playing on the playground and line up. She was like "uh, don't think so! This stuff is cool!!" Reluctantly she got in line and started her first day in kindergarten!! She is at our public school with all the neighborhood kids! The next day I followed the bus to school again and watched from a far to see what she would do when the whistle blew. She was walking hand in hand with a friend from the other class(a boy!!) when it blew and they both looked at each other, let go of each others hands, hugged and went to their separate lines!!! Too cool!!!!!!!!

The Chicago Playhouse opens!!

Wow!! What an incredible day! Hundreds of people came to the opening and then 2 days later channel 7 was there!

It is amazing! They need murals on the walls, a gaming station and a flat screen for the teens and a few other items but the learning has already started! Their first literacy sessions began already and the kids did amazing! The tutors at this location are working on their masters at National Louis University and volunteer their time! The miracles never seem to end!! Everyone left the Playhouse with a picture of their families in this cut out. Isn't that cool??

They have done an amazing job and there is already talk about a Playhouse for the south side! Sioux City Iowa is next! I can't wait!!!

I was just going to post my Chicago pictures and GiGi came up to me so sweet and said "Mommy I tired" and gently picked up my hand and kissed as she told me she loved me!! SO the pictures will have to wait!! Then as I started typing this she got impatient and said "Mommy? Mommy? Mommy Gianni!!" So much for sweetness!!
(but it will be back!!) Gotta go!!

The next Idol or Top model!!

The Karaoke Queen is bustin a move! Apparently she has been watching too much Hannah Montana. Not only does she know the words to all of the songs but she has mastered her moves. As soon as the camera comes out she strikes a pose that changes with every snap of the camera!! Talk about attitude!!! (I wonder where she gets that from??)

She is all about accessories now. She will disappear and come back fully dressed head to toe with multiple head bands, purses, shirts etc.... First words out of her mouth "How do I look Mom? How do I look?" Then the Italian accent comes out "I like-a this one."

Just now she was trying to talk to me but I am typing so she said "Mommy?? Yoo-Who mommy!" and waved her hand in front of my face! She took money out of my wallet and wants to buy Bella a diet coke! She is hilarious!!

Water logged!

Always a part of the action! She must have climbed this ladder a hundred times and just kept jumping in the lake! She had arm floaties on (which she taught herself how to blow up by biting down and blowing them up while they were still on her arm!) so I just watched!!

I am always amazed at her willingness to learn. She took swimming lessons but the stuff she does outside the lessons is so much more than she ever did in the lessons. I think hanging out with the big kids really motivates her to do more.

Seriously!!!

GiGi has turned into a real fisherlady!!!

OK...I am a total loser!  My laptop broke, we had our 5k with over 2,000 people, my Dad got sick, we went on vacation, opened a new Playhouse in Chicago, swam, tubed, 4 wheeled, went wave runnin, fished, boated, worked on the Playhouse projects, bought a house, sold a house, did karaoke, partied and finally had Channel 7 at the new Chicago Playhouse today before I had a chance to blog!!  Not to mention sports and the normal day to day!!!

I wish I had pictures from this weekend.  I had the three girls at the pool and GiGi decided she wanted to go off the diving board (after going off the big curvy slide 50 times!)  I told her no because I was by myself with the three of them and we should do it with Daddy there.  But do you think she would listen to me???  Before I knew it she was standing in line.  I thought for sure she would get up there and bail.  But when I saw the look of determination on her face I knew I better jump in because she was going to do it!  Sure enough she stood up there, looked right at me, put her hands up in the air and clapped them together (diving position) leaned here head forward as if to dive and then just jumped in!   I grabbed her only to be met with the usual "I do it myself!"   

She is still reading a new book every week.  Her soon to be kindergarten teacher came to her literacy session at the Playhouse and was blown away!  It was so cool!  OK, enough about academics back to the important stuff...SUMMER!!!   

Too funny!

Bella was making popsicles in a mini muffin tray and she was filling it too high and it was going all over.  So GiGi says "Bella, you gonna spill it."  Then she got really excited and said "OHHH Look!... Father (pronounced Fahder), son, Holy spill it!!!"  She was so proud of herself!  

Then yesterday she said to her babysitter Joanna (pronounced Jo-ah-na)  "Knock, Knock" then of course came "who's there?" GiGi said "Jo-ah-na" then of course "Joahna who" and she says "joahna glass of water?"

So psyched for the Gigi's Playhouse 5k this weekend!  My team was #1 but we got knocked down to third this week!!  Which makes me so happy because that means we have these incredible teams out there fighting for our kids!!  Love it!!  I would love to tell you their stories but I have to get the kids off to there last day of school!!  But then somehow a small baseball game at my house has turned into the class party for my 5th grader!!!

T-ball moves to coaches pitch!

First and foremost... Look! I finally got the pink helmet to match her mitt and bat!!  

This month we were able to start having the coaches pitch to our t-ballers if we wanted to.  Well, we never did this with our team (I am one of the coaches) but the team we were playing was doing all coach pitch so we thought we would try it too.   Some of the kids did OK, others not so good.  When GiGi came up I told the pitching coach not to worry about her just let her hit it off the tee.  (This was not a Down syndrome thing it was a coach thing.  I knew she never had tried it and I would have said the same for my other kids (mostly to save time!!) Anyway, he wanted to pitch to her so he did and what does she do???  She hits it!!!!!  Loser Mommy!!!

marshmallows

What is a memorial weekend without a bonfire???   Here she is roasting a marshmallow for her smores (and eating the extras)  I think she enjoyed it a little too much.  In the bathtub tonight she asked for a bon fire with marshmallow again (and then showed me how she would get 2 crackers and smoosh it all together)  When I told her we couldn't do it tonight I of course got the "Please mom, please, please, please"??  Where do they learn how to beg like that?

boating and tubing

"Look Mom, no hands"!!!  What a weekend!!  I couldn't believe that GiGi was on the first tube ride of the year!  She couldn't get to the back of the boat fast enough to get on that tube!  It was so cool!  We wiped out last year so I wasn't sure how she was going to react.   Obviously, it didn't bother her!!

The water was cold but that didn't stop her from going on the wave runner either!  We must have sang every song we knew when we were wave runnin'!  It was awesome.  Then she hung out in the hot tub for a little while and did some four wheeling with the kids.  It still is so funny to me that I thought all this was over for us when she was born.  She is the one that makes it the most fun!  If I only knew....

  

New pink bike

Yeah, yeah, yeah, she should have shoes on but.....  My Mom doesn't go on-line so it's all good! 

Because GiGi loves our tag along bike (with me) so much she hasn't been riding hers as much as she should.  In fact, I caught her a few times looking down watching her feet instead of the road!!  So that is something we will be working on this summer.  Her endurance is really building up.  Yesterday she had to do 2 home-run runs (all bases) at t-ball and did great!!  Actually, when she finished she said "I'm dizzy!"  That is so her!   

St. Annes last day of school performance!

Wow!!  They started with the Pledge of Allegiance and went on to sing at least 12 songs!!  Talk about cool!  She was amazing!  This was the same class that had some parents questioning if GiGi "belonged" in their school.  So it was great to see her do so much better than some of the other kids!  When that happened I was hurt beyond words.  In fact, the very next day is when I committed myself to the national "i have a voice" traveling gallery project.  Though I knew I couldn't (shouldn't) take on such a huge project these parents left me no choice.  I can only hope and pray for their "perfect" children.

Some of GiGi's facial expressions and dancing had me cracking up!  My favorite part was during the Pledge of Allegiance when she said "and to the repubic, for which I stand, one-ation, under dog, individible, wit liberty and just for all."  "under dog"???  Is that show still on???  

It was a proud and weird day.  Knowing people teach their kids to judge others just freaks me out!  OK, I am over it.  (I am sooooo not!)   

  

I can read!!

I am so behind!!!  Between school, baseball, the 5k run/walk, the after party prep, finalizing the new 2009 "Inspire" calendar (which is amazing!!), tutoring, board meetings, birthday parties and my own partying I am buried!!  I usually don't complain but what the?????   OK better now!

GiGi started back in the free literacy program at the Playhouse and she is learning to read a book  a week!!  She is even getting the phonics component!!   Here are a couple of pictures of her and her tutorer Beth.  She is amazing and a VOLUNTEER!!!!!   The Playhouses are so blessed to have people like this teach our kids.  A book a week!!  Sorry, did I say that again??  We were reading earlier today and I am just so blown away by her progress.   

I love summer!!!

You can tell summer is here when the Hannah Montana CD is blaring at 7:30 am and the kids are outside playing in their pajamas before 8!!   I love it!  

I remember reading recently in a magazine that one of the best things you can do for your child is to allow them time to play alone outside.   You guys know me... I am still stalking from the window, but it still gives them a since of independence and they begin to explore a world they might not see with us constantly around guiding them!   

I have to share something I read on one of the 5k registration pages.   It was a quote from a proud Mom.  I wish I had a picture of her son to share but here is the quote.   

"When Vincie came into our lives we had no idea what a blessing he would be and how he would bring our family together in the truest sense you can imagine. When you're pregnant thinking of having a baby with Down Syndrome is the scariest and most taboo thing and when it happened to us we were shocked and a bit scared of the unknown. My sister, who has been Nancy's friend for years and a part of Gigi's Playhouse from the beginning was actually excited and happy for us. Her reaction was confusing to us at first but we didn't know what she knew - how absolutely amazing these little angels are. I feel like God gave us Vince as a gift. Down Syndrome awareness is so important for the quality of life for families, friends and children with Down Syndrome. We are excited to give Vince a good life and let him shower us with happiness as he's already done in his 8 months of life."

That sister is Auntie Ang who we all love so much!!  Vincie is a lucky boy!

Gotta go!  GiGi just came in and wants to do yoga!