Hip, Hip Hooray! It's a Gymboree Day!!!

A few months ago Caroline started "going to class" at Gymboree: Play & Music once a week. It has been wonderful for her and I highly recommend it! I was searching online for "M.ommy and Me" classes and Gymboree popped up in my browser. And wouldn't you know, it is just at the bottom of the hill of my neighborhood. We couldn't have a more convenient location, which Mommy loves!

Every week they learn 2 new developmentally appropriate words that relate to each other. Ex. Up & Down, In & Out, and this week our words were Stop & Go. They "work" the two words in to their activities and even the free play. We also love that they have songs to go with some of the words and do some of the same songs every week to transition to different activities, including parachute time pictured below. Caroline loves the music and I can always add to my children's song repertoire!;-)

The area in which Caroline has benefited the most would be Social Skills. Since Caroline is an only child and she spends most of her time with Mommy, Daddy, and other family(all adults) it was very important to me that she have some interaction with other children her age. Caroline is starting Mother's Day Out in the fall, but until recently I wasn't quite ready for that yet. I just knew that my child was going to struggle with communication and be a biter, hitter or something similar. She is actually doing great playing with the other children and seems to really be thriving in this stimulating environment. She is a GREAT sharer! She walks in and waves and says, "Hi, Hi, Hi" over and over to all of the friends and their parents... it is so sweet and she really enjoys seeing the same people each week!

This scary looking guy is Gymbo the Clown. At the end of Class Gymbo gives each of the kids individually kisses and Caroline always tries to get up there first! She loves him! In fact, when Caroline wakes up on the morning of her class I wake her up by singing some of the Gymboree songs and ask her if she wants to go see Gymbo... she always wakes up with a sleepy smile! I'm not sure what their opinion is on taking pictures during class, but if possible I will... when I get my new camera... which I'm still working on... because Chris might have been more anti-camera than I originally thought. Don't worry, I'm very persistent;-)