Honing new skills

Josie loves her Grandma & DD!  Last weekend she stayed with them on Saturday so Louie & I could start getting organized for the big move and go see Phish 3D (which was awesome btw, but I digress).  Here are a couple of pictures of our little future rockstar 'tickling the ivories' in DD's music studio.

Equally as awesome in these pictures - DD's Chuck Taylor's on the floor & Josie's Polly Pocket purse on her arm (courtesy of Grandma - which Josie loves because it makes her "a big girl like Claire").

I also have to share the scene of Josie practicing her sweet baton moves.  The story goes something like this: Josie saw a certain cartoon bunny on TV with a baton & was very curious about it. I explained to her that her awesome Grandma is a baton master (and former majorette). She couldn't believe it.  Grandma produced said baton at Easter, showed off her skills & Josie has been practicing ever since. 

(Carissa's faces in the background are pretty priceless, too.)

And while I'm on the topic of Josie's dancing skills. I'd like to offer a special shout-out to one Kalie Roundtree who Josie is absolutely obsessed with. After attending Kalie's dance competition a few weekends ago (where her team became National Champs), Josie has also been busy working on her straddles and splits. We also had to download "Put your hands up in the air" from Itunes because she insisted on adding it to the Schneider Family Dance Party Playlist.

Her splits:

And straddles:

And kicks:

And a little fun with Mom:

Yep, I think our fate has been sealed. This girl was born to dance.

Sparkling little piggies

Miss Josephine had her first pedicure.  (It was actually out of necessity more than it was out of trying to perpetuate gender roles, considering that I had to use sparkly polish as the "carrot" to get her way-too-long toenails clipped.)

New 'do

Josie has had a few haircuts in her almost-three-years on this planet, but yesterday's was the first one by a professional.  Carissa & I talked it up for weeks as a "girl trip to the salon" and yesterday the three of us walked down to Paragon where Lou & I have been getting our hair cut for the last five years.  Josie has met who she calls "Hair-cutting Lauren" several times, but this was Josie's first time in her chair. Here are some photos from Josie's first "real" haircut - all the way from the shampoo in the fancy sink, through the cut, to "real" blowdry & final new 'do.  (Why does she look so grown up?!?!)

The hardest part was getting her to keep her head down. All she wanted to do was to admire herself in the mirror...

Viola! The big finish -

Butterflies flutter by...

Please indulge me in what I know to be another series of photos of a mini-Cincinnatian at the Krohn Conservatory's annual Butterfly Show.  We've all got 'em. The pics of our little ones not-so-patiently waiting for one of the butterflies to *please* land on their hand, or shoulder, or head, or anywhere long enough to capture it on film.  Silly Schneiders - we went on opening weekend. Maybe the butterflies weren't quite ready for the droves of families just yet, because none of them got too close. Even still, we managed to have a really special time watching them and begging for them to come closer - all the while enjoying some really beautiful flowers.

Props to the CFEC

So, I've been posting about the Cincinnati Family Enrichment Center for awhile now (remember the hypno-hottie reunion party when our babes all turned ONE all those moons ago) and we continue to still love it there. Sadly, we've now entered what is likely our fourth and final phase at the CFEC. It started with us taking the infant Musikgarten class with Miss Liz & Miss Megan when Josie was just barely sitting up. Then, when she outgrew that class, we signed up for the Art Class with Miss Marianne. There we created some fabulous masterpieces and Josie got in touch with her inner-Picasso.  Josie also started taking weekly Spanish classes with Carissa where they learned all kinds of fun (and funny) things. This session (and our last session at the CFEC since Josie is starting school in the fall) we decided to sign-up for the PeaWee Gardening Class. Truth told, it couldn't have been better timing since we're finally going to have that yard we've wanted so badly since Josie was born.  And, since my green thumb has started to brown, I'm going to count on Josie to keep the gardens thriving at the new house.  I just can't say enough for the value of these experiences. It's the little things like Josie singing "Itsy, Bitsy Arana" instead of "Itsy, Bitsy Spider" or pointing out to me today that our bamboo plants are getting new roots, and enjoying time together creating things without rules. Big thanks to the CFEC for being such a big part of shaping our sweet Josephine.
Here's a photo of Josie practicing some of her new gardening skills on one of our houseplants. The mess was worth it.

Quick Quotes

Josie to me yesterday as she was opening a new skirt that came in the mail: "We're going to have a fight...I do not like this skirt! It's not awful. It's just not pretty."

The other night we were in Josie's bed talking about paint colors for her new room. She said she wanted something beautiful like my (recently painted) belly cast. (More on that later.) 
Me: "The belly cast is beautiful, isn't it?"
Josie: "Yea, but not as beautiful as me."
Me: "You are beautiful. And so are the flowers and the trees and..."
Josie (cutting me off): "They are, but not as beautiful as THIS (pointing to her face)!"

Let's Go Fly A Kite...

A couple of weekends ago, we headed out to West Chester for the annual Kite Fest. We can't remember why we missed it last year, but we knew we regretted it. It was almost more family-fun that we could handle.  Here are some of our favorite photos from our afternoon flying kites with the masses.

First "the bounce house" where Josie seriously said "Look at me! Look at me! Look at me!" at least 100 times!

Proud daddy. She's really flying her own kite!

A sea of kites and people...

Because we couldn't resist, we spend the $3 to build our own homemade kite.

 And it works - beautifully!

Time to go explore the big kites -

(That's a scuba diver, octopus and lizard by the way.)

Our favorite kite of the day. I think we counted 60 altogether and it stretched for as high as you could see!

The runner-up is in the background - giant soccer ball & legs.

Hours later, little Josie had finally ran out of steam (and so had we!)

This Just In...

We have a closing/moving date set for our new house! 

Thursday, June 3rd

Can I get a collective woo-hoo?!

(In other news, we close on our condo this Thursday. 

Starting on Saturday, we will officially be renting this place from its new owner.)