Lyla's testimony

Olivia, Lyla and I were walking down the street and Lyla shared with us her sweet little testimony. She said:

"I love Heavenly Father and Heavenly Father loves me. I love Jesus and Jesus loves me. I love John the Baptist and John the Baptist loves me."

I am so glad that Lyla shared this sweet and simple testimony with us.

Lyla goes to primary

When Lyla first started going to nursery she loved it. Then at the beginning of the new year she went from being the youngest surrounded by older kids to the oldest surrounded by babies, including some poor babies who were always crying. Lyla decided that she no longer liked nursery, in fact she really didn't like it. The only way she would go is if Matt and I would sit in nursery. We did that for a while, but she still didn't love it. Matt and I thought that Lyla would probably do a lot better if she were in Primary. We talked to the Primary President and she agreed to allow Lyla into primary early. I was a little nervous the first Sunday she was to go and was really hopeful that things would go as well as I assumed they would. Her first Sunday she happily marched herself in and sat down with the Sunbeams and loved it from the very first second. I waited for a while and peeked on her, one of the Primary leaders came out and said that Lyla was doing a great job. She was sitting reverently with her arms folded and singing all the words to the the primary songs nice and loud (we had been practicing the primary songs so she would know them.) When I came to pick her up everyone came to tell me what a great job she had done in Primary. They said she even volunteered to say the closing prayer in front of all the primary in closing exercises. They knelt down to help her say the prayer, but she said she could say it herself (later Olivia informed me that Lyla had done a good job saying her prayer, she didn't say "thanks you for the ice cream" something that she likes to say and usually causes her to erupt in laughter.) The primary president said that during sharing time Lyla raised her hand to answer questions and the primary president said she thought "oh isn't that cute Lyla's raising her hand to try to be like the big kids...but was so surprised that when they called on her she actually gave the correct answer. Last week they asked if Lyla could give a talk in closing exercises. When I told her she was going to give a talk she became absolutely ecstatic, she was so excited.  When Lyla gave her talk and she did an awesome job.  When they called her name she marched right up to the podium with a huge smile. I went up to whisper the talk for her to repeat . Before she started I told her to speak loudly so that grandmother could hear her all the way in Japan, she said she would.  She spoke in such a nice loud clear voice, she did such a great job. The primary leader came up to me and said that not only did Lyla have such a great voice tone, but she was so expressive and had a big smile while she was speaking. I was so proud of Lyla, she is such and outgoing and friendly little girl.

City girl

The other day we were on our way to church and Olivia asked "Mom that's called a gas station, right?" I told her "yes, that is a gas station." She went on to say..."doesn't that just make you feel like we are out in the country?" I responded that gas stations don't really make me feel like i am out in the country. "Take a deep breath...can you smell that? Aahhh just like we are out in the country" she said. I asked her to explain to me how gas stations make her feel like she is out in the country. She explained that whenever we go out into the country there are gas stations everywhere. I asked when we have been out in the country, she responded, "you know like Utah and California." It seems to me my sweet Olivia considers any place outside NYC "out in the country."  She is right, compared to NYC (where we never really see gas stations) there really are gas stations everywhere when we are outside the city.

Lyla loves to read

Lyla has always loved reading books. It sometimes seems like she would be happy as could be if we sat on the couch and read book after book all day long. As a result we do spend a lot of time reading books. I always love when she says things that I know have come strait from her love of book reading. Some things I have recently heard from her...

- As we are approaching a large white building, "Mom are you taking me to the Taj Mahal?"
- Walking around the park  "I love pigeons! Pigeons are my favorite birds... and egrets too."
-"Mom do you want me to show you my veins? I love my veins!"
- After drawing a picture, I aked Lyla what she was drawing and she said, I'm drawing a picture of Claude Monet."

Kindergarten

Olivia just began 1st grade, but I can't move on to first grade without having mentioned Kindergarten. I have to say I was quite worried about Olivia going to Kindergarten. All of the kids in our neighborhood have been going to "school" together since they were 3 and this was going to be the first time Olivia would be away from me. She would be going from being with me 100% of the time to going to full day Kindergarten (NYC doesn't offer 1/2 day). I was certain that she would do a lot better with this transition if she were put in the same class with a lot of her friends from the neighborhood. There were 4 Kindergarten classes and I really wanted Olivia to be assigned to the same class as her closest friend Cate. I prayed that this would be the case and Olivia and Cate would be in the same class. The school mailed out the class assignments and as I asked around I noticed that alot of Olivia's friends including Cate had ended up in the same class...I really wanted Olivia to be in this class and prayed for this to happen. For some reason our letter took the longest to arrive and when it finally did I was so disappointed that Olivia was not in the class with her friends and as I asked around I couldn't really find anyone she knew that was going to be in class with her. 

I tried to make the first day of Kindergarten as exciting as I could... starting with allowing Olivia to look through our favorite cookbook and pick out whatever she wanted for her breakfast. She selected breakfast cupcakes.

Olivia and Cate on the first day of school.

They let the parents stay for a little while and then it was time to leave. This was the part I was worried about...especially when most of the kids started crying and screaming when there parents where trying to leave. I looked over at Olivia and she was calm and happy and said goodbye see you at pick-up. I thought this was such a wonderful blessing. Olivia was confident and happy to be there.

 Now that Kindergarten is over, I can see how Heavenly Father didn't answer my prayer in the way that I was asking by putting Olivia in class with her friends, but He answered my prayer in the way that would be best for Olivia. Olivia ended up being in the class with the brand new teacher. She was young, enthusiastic and very caring...the perfect teach for Olivia. Although I am sure the other Kindergarten teachers were good, Olivia's teacher Ms. Recugglia, was exactly what Olivia needed as she transitioned into school. Also looking back I can see that if Olivia was in class with Cate she would have just stuck with Cate the whole year and probably wouldn't have tried to get to know any of the other kids in her class. Since Olivia didn't really know people many people in her class beforehand it pushed her to get to know everyone and by the end of the year she was great friends with everyone.

Olivia really loved Kindergarten and had a great year. We were all proud of Olivia for ending the school year with straight A's. 

 Unfortunately Olivia ended up catching a bad case of strep throat at the end of the year and missed that last few days of school. Luckily she was able to participate in the fun end of the year activities before she became sick.

One activity she was really looking forward to was Field Day. She did a great job. On the way to school that day she told me one thing that was certain...her class was going to win the tug-a-war contest since they had the strongest boy in all of Kindergarten. Well, she was right...I'm not sure they won any other of the races, but they beat every single class in tug-a-war. 

 She also made it to Graduation Day. They sung a number of songs, Olivia was constantly singing them at home and so Lyla was actually able to learn the graduation songs as well.

 She was also happy to be there for autograph day. She enjoyed visiting with her friends and signing books.

 One of her favorite people from her Kindergarten...Olivia and Hailey

 More friends...Olivia, Kiki and Kaliope

 I believe more than any other name I heard Olivia mention that she ate lunch with was Alyssa.

Olivia and the teacher she loved so much, Ms. Recugglia.

Spring Break

One of New York City's strengthens are the wonderful parks all around. We decided that we would spend Olivia's spring break exploring as many parks as we could. Unfortunately, winter weather returned and we weren't able to get to as many parks as we planned, but we were still able to get to some of our favorites!  

 

Central Park is definitely one of our favorite places and has no shortage of fun. One of our favorite Central Park activities are the row boats. The girls were so excited to take over rowing duties.

 

 

 

Somehow this was just Lyla's first time on the rowboats and she loved them. She wanted to be rowing duty at all times.

While walking through the park, Lyla, my pink-obsessed girl was absolutely ecstatic when she saw a tree covered in pink blossoms.

Our next park was Prospect Park in Brooklyn, this was actually our first trip to Prospect Park and it was a fun one!

 As we were standing by the water some swans came over to us. I was excited to point them out to my girls. Olivia liked the swans, but Lyla immediately told us that she didn't like swans and ducks were better.

 

Once my girls stepped foot into this structure, it immediately transformed into Elsa's ice palace and they both belted "Let it Go."

One things we were really excited about doing in Prospect Park was roller skating at their new outdoor rink. Our trip ice skating last winter wasn't as successful as I might have hoped, but for some reason I was convinced that roller skating would be way easier for the girls...that didn't prove entirely true for everyone.

Balancing on the slick rink proved to be quite difficult for Lyla, a local roller skating buff tried to give Lyla some pointers which did seem to bring about some improvement.

 

   Olivia was so excited to go roller skating. She didn't want any assistance she was ready to go out on her own. There were definitely some spills, but she got a little better and a little better as our time went on.

 

On our way back to the subway, we stopped by a Brooklyn pizzeria to grab some dinner. New Yorkers all eat their pizza by folding it in half. Matt and I do not follow that trend, but the second Olivia grabbed her slice of pizza she immediately folded it in half and started chowing down. Olivia is our true New York girl!

Since we have lived in NY, Bryant Park is our most frequently visited park...we love it so much!

 

 For the girls, the carousal is a big reason to love this park.

 

 We can't go to Bryant Park without stopping by the big NYC library. Once we go, we never want to leave.

 

We sure had a wonderful spring break together as a family, luckily we have the whole summer ahead of us to get to those parks we missed this time around.