Busy summer and 20 Months!

I cannot believe how the time has flown. Hannah has just returned from a visit to MN to stay with Grandma & Grandpa H. She was able to take swimming lessons with all of her cousins and she loved every minute but admits that she was homesick. To surprise her, we made-over her room with a fairy/Tinkerbell theme. It now has giant leaves coming out of the walls and a green canopy over her bed complete with floral accents. Her favorite part is the reading corner with a giant green butterfly chair. She loves to sit there and just hang out.
Amidst the craziness of getting everything prepared for back to school, the little girls turned 20 months! There are so many things that they are doing now:

• They walk every where, this took a little longer but they both nailed it by the beginning of June. Emma was walking about 2 weeks before Sara. I attribute this to Emma's easy-going nature, whereas Sara is a little more cautious and meticulous.
• They both climb just about anything you put in front of them. They climb the stairs, the furniture, and us!
• They are both working on the coming-down-the-stairs. This is taking longer because most kids get to practice every time they go down whereas I hold one on my lap, while I help the other one down. Let's just say I tried letting them both go at once and it wasn't pretty!
• They are in full swing of Twin-speak. They have a little language of their own, sprinkled with some of our words.
• They go to nursery class at church. This started at 18 months. They get to go have a little lesson, sing, and play with the other kids that are 18 months-3 years all while the rest of us go to Sunday school classes. They love it!
• They are eating with a spoon and a fork. Successfully most of the time. One of their favorite foods is yogurt, and that is quite messy to clean up, but with practice I am sure that they will have this down soon.

On Wednesday, we will start school for Hannah. This year she is attending the UT Virtual Academy. It is an online public school. I will be posting more about that in subsequent posts. A few weeks ago, a computer, and boxes of textbooks, workbooks, and cool supplies for art and science showed up on our door step. Last night we made the final touches to the organization system that we will be using. It looks like an amazing system, I am really excited for Hannah because she will finally be able to challenged in language and reading and get the individual attention in math that she needs. She has already told me that she plans to finish 5th grade early so she can start in 6th. I keep telling her, "we'll see", thinking "mmm, am I ready for a middle-school child?"