Donald (Age 6):

Donald had a banner year both in school and in extracurricular activities. He continues to get outstanding grades in all of his subjects and is reading and doing basic math. Being a true Renaissance man, he is involved in the after school choir and French classes. Donald also took private art lessons this summer and painted a truly remarkable picture of a sailboat on the ocean. We’ll post pictures on the inter net. On the Karate front, Donald earned his Orange belt and is fast on his way to being a Yellow belt. He’s getting really good at it, and we’re really proud of him. Donald also continues to be a wonderful big brother to Emily and Katelyn. He is kind and gentle to both of them. He never raises his voice or gets angry no matter how “under foot” the girls get. Quite an achievement considering Emily is 3 and Katelyn is 1. Donald is also working with Daddy on the “Abbott and Costello” routine Who’s On First. Donald plays the “straight man” role of Bud Abbott while Daddy plays the Lou Costello role. It’s a lot of fun to hear us do the routine. The only problem is that we’ve done it so much over the past few months that now any time a person says “I DON’T KNOW” in front of Donald or Emily, they both yell “THIRD BASE”. It was funny the first 1000 times they did it. Now it’s starting to wear thin. I can’t believe that Donald would just beat a joke into the ground like that long after it stopped being funny. We don’t know where he learned to do that.

 

Emily (Age 3):

It appears that Emily is following in the footsteps of Donald both academically and artistically. At the tender age of 3, she can write her name, knows all her letters and numbers, and can spell simple words. Emily’s preschool teacher believes that at her current rate of development, Emily should be reading soon. Emily is also very artistic and is quite a little drama queen. She also has recently become fond of ballet, so we might sign her up for dance lessons. On a personal note, we are happy to report that after two and a half long years, it appears that Emily is finally exiting her “terrible two’s”. They started just after she turned 1 and have continued until today. However, recently we have noted some major improvements. For example, Emily sometimes goes entire days without a tantrum! Unfortunately, as Emily exits her old “tantrum” phase, she is entering a new once that may prove to be even more worrisome to Mom and Dad. It started in August when we were at the dinner table. Half way through dinner, Emily (age 3) reaches into her little pocket and pulls out her Mom’s credit card and drops it on the dinner table. Kathryn and I just sat there in shock. We said, “Emily, how did you get Mamma’s credit card”. Emily just looked at us and said, “I’m sneaky”. (That’s a true story!). About a month later, Emily started walking in the bathroom and shouting “butt, butt, butt, butt” at the top of her lungs. Kathryn and I told her that was impolite to say that. However, Emily responded, “I can say that because it’s bathroom talk and I’m in the bathroom”. Terrific. Our daughter is going to be a lawyer. Where did we go wrong? Even worse, shortly thereafter Emily started walking around the house saying “but, but, but … this isn’t bathroom talk because I’m saying B-U-T and not B-U-T-T”. Apparently, Emily has discovered the concept of the loophole. 

 

 

Katelyn (Age 1): 

As Emily exits the “terrible two’s”, Katelyn has started them. 

The newest member of the Wedding household initially appeared to be Trouble (that’s trouble with a capital T). She sent us to the hospital on a false alarm when she gave us all the signals that she was going to be born early. Then after lulling us into a false sense of security decided to be born when we least expected it: 6 hours before the doctor was going to induce. Don and Kathryn sped to the hospital literally running red lights and breaking every known traffic law. We got to the hospital with literally minutes to spare. Whew! That was close. Well, that was apparently the worst of it. Since then, Katelyn has been the world’s best baby. She only cries when she is hungry, tired, or needs to be changed. Otherwise, she is always happy and smiling. Also, Katelyn is truly a beautiful baby. Take a look at the web site and see for yourself! For fun, Katelyn helps Mamma with “lunch mom” duties. Katelyn rides “shotgun” (technically she’s in a baby pouch), but she keeps an ever-vigilant eye open for kids who take two milks or don’t eat the crusts on their sandwiches. Katelyn has turned into a real street-wise lunch monitor, sort of in the mold of Robert Blake’s “Beretta”.  Her motto? Don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time. Actually, in the kindergarten class the motto is: Clean your mess up, or your name goes in the yellow cup!