I'm not sure who had more fun...

To be honest I had forgotten how fun legos are to play with. It's been years since Todd and I have played with Legos. For Christmas Hailee got her very own set of girly-pink legos. She has loved playing with them. We have been doing working on a chore chart/rewards system with Hailee. When she does her chores she get to put a certain amount of rocks in her jar. When the jar gets filled up she gets to pick out a special treat. The time came and she got to pick out a treat, she knew exactly what she wanted....a lego set. She had seen it just after Christmas and fell in love. It's a cute winter scene with village shops, horse and cart and an ice skating rink. As soon as we got home Todd and Hailee sat down together to put it together. Todd and Hailee had such a good time playing together.

 

 When we first decided to get Hailee some of the little legos I was a little worried about James. I was imagining him eating legos, sticking them up his nose, and scattering them from here to there. I have been quite surprised that he actually does really well with them and really enjoys playing with them as well. And so far he hasn't stuck any up his nose, as far as I know.

It was such a fun evening together.

Ready to Go

When it's cold outside we insist that James wear his coat and shoes when going out on the patio. One day James was hanging out in his diaper, like he normally is, and he brought me his shoes and coat. He insisted that he put them on. I was a little confused as to why he wanted them on, but as soon as he got them on he went straight to the door and I understood. Before he asked to go outside he made sure he had his shoes and jacket on. It was tough to convince him that he needed his clothes on as well. As far as he was concerned he had his bases covered and was ready to play.

Words by James

It seems every time we go on vacation James starts talking more. It happened over the summer and again at Christmas. He is talking so much now and it is so fun to see what he interested in. Some of our favorites...

• "Cars" and "Bots" - This little guy just loves cars and robots. One evening we were scanning channels when he was still awake and we came across Transformers. (No we didn't let him watch it.) He did watch a few minutes and the whole time he kept saying "cars!" "bots" with the best look on his face. He was in heaven, cars that actually turned into robots. No wonder boys love Transformers so much. Also when we are at the bus stop he has to point out all the 'cars' that pass by.
• "Nope, having fun." - This was one of his first sentences. We were at a furniture store when he found a 'tree house bed.' I let him play for a minute but then it was time to pick Hailee up, I told him it was time to go. He replied "Nope having fun!" and ran away. I was able to get him to go, but he was screaming, 'nope having fun' the whole way out.
• "Sammy" - aka, sandwich. James just loves sandwiches. While Todd was gone to Germany he got an ear infection, for a few days he didn't want to eat very much. One day his appetite came back in full force. He ate like crazy all day. That evening when I was going to bed I heard him stir and say "Sammy." At first I thought he was just talking in his sleep, but he let me know that he really did want a "sammy." He ate a sandwich and immediately went back to sleep. 
• "Cake" - Hailee never really like sweet things, but James sure makes up for it. He loves cake. However the funny thing I discovered after making some mini cupcakes is that he doesn't like the "stump" of the muffin. He just eats the top and leaves the bottom behind.
• "Shake, shake shake" -He also really loves shakes. When he really wants one he goes to the freezer, says "shake, shake, shake," and does a little shake dance. I have the hardest time saying no to such a sweet little dance. 
• "Oh Shoot" - This is one he's been saying for a while but it still makes me laugh. There is just something wrong about "oh shoot" coming out of a little one's mouth after something goes wrong.
• "Nooooo" and "Nope" - Christmas time was the time when he learned how to say "no." Before that he would just shake his head or growl at you. I love the way he says both of these words. It's always long drawn out in the most annoyed voice "nooooooope." Over Christmas he woke up a little grumpy and wanted Todd to hold him. Hailee came up to him and was trying to get his attention. "Are you ready to play with Sissy," she asked. To which he responded "Nooooooooope."
• "Dink" - He loves his sippy cup when he goes to bed at night.
• "So Fun" and "Funny" - When Todd was in Germany I pulled up the little videos we took at the zoo and he announced "so fun." He now will tell us what he thinks is "so fun" or "funny." When he and Hailee are laughing he will say "that's funny." It's pretty cute that he can tell us how he is feeling.  
• "Sorry" and "Excuse Me" - He is quite a polite little boy. He can say 'please' and 'thank you' at all the appropriate times, but now he has added 'sorry' and 'excuse me.' The funniest thing is that he is usually pushing me out of his way as he is say 'sorry' or 'excuse me.'
• "MOM" - Not to be confused with "mama" when he is calling for me."MOM" said in a really loud and annoyed voice, means I'm done with this (ie, drink, sandwich, etc...) and I don't want to hold it anymore. He usually just does it when I'm around, but I have seen him use "MOM" with Hailee and Todd.
• "Word Girl" "Huggy" "Toby" "Bots" - James has decided that the PBS kids show word girl is his absolute favorite. His favorite villain is definitely Toby since he controls his own army of 'bots.' He has quickly stolen all of Hailee's Word Girl books and loves it when we read them to him. They also enjoy watching the show together.
• "Super Why" "Alpha Pig" - His favorite game to play on the computer is Super Why. He loves working with his letters with Alpha Pig. He really loves the letters 'W',  'O'  and 'M.' I can't quite get him to like the letter 'J.' He is getting pretty good with his letters.

He is talking constantly now. It's so fun that he can tell us the things that are going on his world. He can tell us when he is hot or cold, happy or sad, and whether he thinks things are funny or not. I only understand about half of it and whenever I guess what he is saying he raises his arms and says  "YEAH!!!" with the biggest smile on his face. It's really quite cute.

Driving Miss Hailee

What James is lacking in speech, his sister more than makes up for it. She is constantly talking, and if she happened to not be talking she is thinking about what she is going to say next. So as we go from here to there I always get some of the funnest conversations, for instance.

On the way to swimming lessons I was complaining that the sun was in my eyes and my eyes were itchy. She said. "You know the sun dries out your eyes and that is what makes them itchy." "Oh is that how that works." I responded. "Yes, you know like in the song 'The insy, winsy, spider.' The sun came out and dried up all the rain. And when your eyes dry out they get itchy." I also learned that tears block germs because germs don't like water. And that if you look directly into the sun it will cause "harm and damage."

She was also curious about why that store "eleven" had a seven behind it, it should have the number 11. Realizing we were passing 7-eleven I told her the name of the store was actually "Seven-eleven." To which she said, "oh that makes sense, I should have thought of that."

After the seven-eleven incident she started bothering her brother, who was a little cranky and didn't want to be bothered. I told her to stop bothering him to which she said, "I just can't help it he is just so cute, fun, cuddly, adorable.... " on and on she went describing her brother. After some time I told her that was fine, but she still needed to leave him alone. Then she said, "Mom those are all adjectives about my baby brother, really they are. Mrs Fletcher taught me." That may be true, but he was in no mood of being adored at the time.

Sometimes Hailee and James will get each other a little wound up and a little and a little crazy. Tonight I had to tell them several time to settle down. At one point Hailee had James laughing hysterically, but things were quickly getting to that "crazy" point where someone was going to get hurt. I told Hailee she needed to stop, to which she said, "but he's laughing his head off, you know mom, that is just an expression. He's not really laughing his head 'off.'"

The other day we were driving around and she asked me what kind of a baby our next one would be (we are not expecting). I told her that it could be either a girl or a boy. She told me that she would be happy if it was a girl, then quickly said that James would be happy if it was a boy. She was in quite a quandary about this new situation. She quickly decided that I just needed to have twins, one boy and one girl, then EVERYONE will be happy. I laughed and told her that she better start praying, because twins don't run in the family. She thought for a minute and then said "Mom what is it called where there are five babies born at one time."  Yikes! I hope she doesn't start praying for quintuplets.  

The ZOO

When James found out we were going to zoo he just had one request.  The only thing he wanted to see was the monkey. Since we didn't have a lot of time we made sure to go there first. He was in heaven. The really nice thing about the zoo is that it's small enough and close enough we can just pop in when we have an hour or two, see our favorite things and still get lots of errands done. It was quite lovely way to send a couple of hours and enjoy a little bit of sunshine.

 

 Making some good African drum music.

 The lions are fairly new to the zoo and always really fun to see. They have a new baby cougar that we were excited to see, but sadly it was off exhibit. I guess that will just get us back in another Saturday or two.

We need to come up with a better plan for when we go into the Lorikeet exhibit. Todd holds the nectar and feeds the birds and I'm trying to take pictures of all the fun, but it leaves James a little unsupervised. Here is Todd trying to do double duty of keeping the lorikeets safe and away from James. It's really no easy task.

Over all the weather was perfect, the animals were fun to see, and it was a great way to spend 2 hours as a family, doing something everyone enjoys.

My Girl

She is quite the girl.

This morning she was looking at our Aspen Grove book and she exclaimed..."Oh look, I look really old in this picture."
"Oh really," I responded
"Yeah look," she said, "I look like I'm 16...., or at least 9 or 10."

Later in the afternoon she asked if she could play dress-up. She ran off happily with an affirmative reply and got down her blue dress from Halloween. She wanted to be Cinderella. After helping her with her dress she said, "Now I just need a crown." I told her that there was one in my room because I had stepped on it and it almost made me say a bad word. To which she responded "REALLY!!!" It made me laugh so hard. She was so shocked, but I tell you, unless you've stepped on a tiara in the dark, you have no idea what bad words were running around in my head.

On days when  string cheese or yogurt isn't quite enough for an afternoon snack, Hailee decides to take matters into her own hands. Usually she makes the normal, chicken, roast beef, etc... sandwiches. But sometimes necessity (we were out of the normal ingredients) and creativity combine in such a way to make a perfectly delicious sandwich. One one such day she came up with this great idea...

A peanut butter and apple sandwich. Before I knew it she had made not only one for herself, but for her brother and I as well. I have to admit while the texture was a little weird, it tasted quite good.

I also discovered that she doesn't like crust anymore.

This is what I found on the kitchen counter after breakfast.

We also started her in swimming lessons. Summer's get so crazy and we really needed to get her swimming. She isn't afraid of the water, but she won't go anywhere without her noodle. Temperature what they are here, we don't do a lot of swimming, but she is enjoying her swim lessons. James on the other hand is not enjoying HER swim lessons. He really thinks they should be HIS swim lessons. One day he tried undressing himself so he could get in the pool with Sissy. It's really not fair she gets to have all the fun.

Free and Clear

At least that is what the doctor told me after she took of the little guys cast. She then also said "try and go easy on his arm for the next week or so." James on the other hand, had very different ideas. I mean really....you expect him be boring for a week or so at the same time he just got complete mobility of his arm. Since the doctor obviously didn't know what she was talking about, James decided to just do whatever he wanted. Thankfully he hasn't re injured himself (not for lack of trying) and we are all still in one piece. 

 He turned out to be quite good with his left hand while in his cast. A week later he is still using his left hand quite a bit. It will be interesting to see if he continues to be a lefty or not.

 Hailee was insistent that we keep James' cast, at least to show dad. I told her she had to carry it to the car. When she was buckling up she said "Oh mom, this cast is stinky." Then later when we were home, James picked it up and said "stinky." Todd appreciated the gesture, but I'm not sure how excited he was to smell it.

He didn't really know what to think when they were taking off the cast. Once it was off he was quite excited. He did so good during the x-ray, he put his arm right where it needed to go. It's his 4th x-ray since this adventure started, so he knows just what to do. Let's hope he doesn't have to use that skill again any time soon.

 

He was very thrilled to come home and get a shower. In the picture he is actually 'kissing' the shower because he missed it so much. I was thrilled to give him a good scrub. I finally feel like he is 'clean.'