++Hold onto your hats++

Ladies and gentlemen, you may not believe your eyes but I was there, it actually happened, these photos have not been altered (I didn't even edit them because I am feeling super lazy).  My son PERFORMED on a STAGE in front of an audience!  It only took about three years but it happened. 

They were singing along to some song about what Jesus would be like if he walked with us on earth.

 This was the rock star part.

 Not sure what this was all about.

 The real point of this was his gymnastics show and tell.  It's so fun to get to see Wyatt in his school element.  He loves it.  And, he appears to be a pretty good kid at school (he saves the riff raff for home, I guess).

 This was a proud moment as well.  We went to Little Gym for over a year and he never touched the parachute.

 Way to come around little guy!

++Heartbreaker++

Wyatt's "girlfriend" at school, Malia, moved at the end of last week.  He picked her out early in the year and was quite smitten.  She is pretty cute if you ask me.  I'm not quite ready to share him yet.  Wyatt made her a goodbye card.  It melted my heart.

Don't you love that they are holding hands?  And the belly buttons?  I love that kid.

++Go Daddy Go!++

Dad and Uncle Brett ran the Mercer Island half marathon this past weekend.  If you ask me, they had the best cheering section ever (Claire was there too...just sitting in the comfort of her stroller snacking).  What you can't hear is the boys chanting "go daddy go" over and over again.  They made quite a few weary runners smile.  They also got their fair share of high-fives.  

 Finally the Daddys emerged from around the bend..right on pace! The best part is that they said they heard us before the saw us (we were kind of the only group cheering at that stretch of road). 

Cora cried when her Daddy kept running.  Poor thing.  They did great!  Way to go guys!

++Sports Star?++

Our community center offers some great sports classes for the kids.  Wyatt took one this spring that was all about basketball and t-ball.  It's serious stuff, let me tell you.
They start out with stretching.  Clearly essential for a four-year-old who hasn't moved much all day (ha ha).

 I think we may have some work to do on the tricep stretch (notice the kid who is two feet taller than everyone else?  His mom was about two feet taller than me.)

 Water breaks are essential.  Easily three or four during the 45-minute class.  More water than he drinks during the rest of the week combined.

 After they are all warmed up they get down to the SERIOUS business of playing the game.

 Finally, all that hard work should not go without recognition so certificates must be handed out (he took the class with buddies Ryan and Owen from his preschool class last year--who sadly are in the other 4-year-old class this year.)

Watch out sports world...here they come (untied shoes and all!)

++Why I love having a boy++

There was never any doubt in my mind that I would like having a girl.  Having a little buddy just like me to shop and do girly things with.  The clothes, the crafts, the dolls.  Yes, it's fun.  On the flip side, I wasn't quite sure what it would be like to have a boy.  I was just excited to have a baby.  I knew I would love him...I just never knew how much fun it would be to have a boy. 

++Hugs and cuddles from boys (especially 4 1/2 year-olds) are less expected so they mean so much more. 
++I love when he gets all into my daily routine.  He knows the order in which I put my make-up on and likes to hand me my "supplies".  It was exciting for him that I finally replaced my old and crumbling blush.  This morning he was trying to fix his hair with a round brush just like me. 
++My eyes have been opened to so many things I've never thought about before.  Trucks, rescue vehicles, tools, dirt.  The list goes on and on.  I've learned to love and celebrate them too. 
++Whenever I put on something the slightest bit dressy, he tells me I look pretty.  I ask him what kind of car he wants when he turns sixteen in return (it's a pickup truck for the record).
++I love watching how he adores his father.  Adores may be an understatement.  I know how important it is for boys to have a strong male role model and he sure is lucky he got his dad.  He'll have to look elsewhere to learn stuff about cars and tools, but other than that, he's got it made. 
++I love sports.  Boys love sports. This could work!
++If I were four, I would have a crush on him.  Ok, I have a crush on him anyway.
++Boys, especially my boy, are good for me.  I'm learning how to let go and focus on what really matters.  Let him get dirty.  Let him pick out some less than lovely shoes.  Maybe even be ok with the mess boys leave in the bathroom (ok, that may be pushing it). 

Boys, gotta love them!

++A Party for the Little One++

This year I decided to make Claire's party all about Claire's favorite things: music, the color purple, and lollipops.  It became a bit of a challenge to pull it all together but I managed.  I didn't intend to make the invitations (I found in a lot of cases it ends up costing more and being so much more work) but there really aren't a lot of purple lollipop invites to be had out there.  So here's a little recap of the partay. 


The spread.  Very simple on purpose.  Two-year-olds don't eat.  Especially if there is cake.

The lollipop cake.  For the record, Claire only ate the frosting.



Sprinkles are great.  Kids love them and they cover a multitude of sins.

Cora and Claire decorating their musical instruments.

Kerri and Sarah (Moms Club friends).

Amy and Lily (MOPs friends)

Here's Claire in her element.  Her music teacher came to her house for her party and she got to do all her favorite songs--and even got the purple ribbon wand!

James.  Our neighbor and Claire's future husband.

At least Mark and I got the memo to look at the camera for a photo.

We practiced blowing out the candles for a few weeks leading up to the party.  She took a HUGE breath in but just couldn't get the job done.  Even with Owen's help (busted!!)

She even tried going at it from another angle.

The big brothers were a little more interested in the gifts than the two-year-olds.

I tried to get a shot of the guests but just ended up with all the big brothers. 

Here's our pretty two-year-old!

And her brother who couldn't be left out of the fun.

And her cousin who we would happily adopt into our family (she spent the rest of the day with us while Susan went to see Larson ski--that's also why he's absent from the photos.) 

And just like that we have a two-year-old.  Crazy.

++Fun with Grandma and Grandpa++

We were lucky to have a quick visit from Gandma and Grandpa just in time for the birthday.  The weather wasn't the greatest (remember the snow in the previous post?  Well, Seattle doesn't do snow so well).  We managed to find plenty of things to keep ourselves busy though.

Grandma remembered Wyatt's fascination with his state quarters that he discovered while counting the money from his piggy bank (remember THIS?) so she brought him a book and they organized them all.  For the record he's missing Ohio and Guam so if you come across one of them--send it this way!

 We decided to tackle the garden show since we know how much Grandma loves gardening.  They actually had a lot of fun things for the kids to do as well.  Wyatt can't ever get enough pretend tractor riding (we've learned this from our trips to Home Depot).

 They had this great kids garden with all these little wheel barrows and bins.  The vegetables were real! 

 Moments like these are a great reminder that we're not dealing with Wyatt junior here.  She couldn't get enough of these and wanted me to take her picture. 

 This little lamb could follow me to school any day!

 They had these big bins of dirt and flats and flats of plants that the kids could plant.  Wyatt was being schooled by a master gardener a.k.a. Grandma.

 We spent the rest of the weekend building Claire's birthday present.  Being able to build it was a treat for Wyatt.  Not so sure Dad and Grandpa would say the same. 

As always, their visit went by too fast and the kids were sad to see them go.  They sure are blessed to have such wonderful grandparents!  

++Turning Two++

We've made it a tradition in our family that the kids get to open one present at breakfast on their birthdays.  Usually it's the present that they give each other.  Claire really got the hang of unwrapping this year, but Wyatt was poised and ready to help.

Gotta love this face.  It's almost as if what was in the package was something that she had been hoping for forever.  The reality is that she had never seen it before...it was just something her mother thought was too cute for her not to have.  A little play cottage with three cute "babies" and three pets.

 If you look in the background you can see that mother nature gave Claire quite the present for her birthday.  It's a good thing it was winter break here or the kids would have had no school for a week.  The play house was a hit.  She now calls it her "Happy Birthday House" and the dolls inside are the "Happy Birthday babies".

We weren't planning to celebrate her day until the following night as dad was supposed to be out of town.  His plans were cancelled (bummer) so we trekked to the grocery store to get some cupcakes and dad trekked to the airport to claim some very special visitors from the Midwest.

After cake we opened the rest of her family presents.  I was hoping for a face like the second photo above when she opened her sparkly shoes.  She actually had been begging for these for quite a while.  Instead we got nothing.  Perhaps she was a little overwhelmed by birthday by this point?

 We didn't do a great job of capturing Grandma and Grandpa in these photos but they brought Claire this pink princess tent and a bag full of music instruments.  Both were a hit. 

Happy Birthday baby Claire.  It's hard to believe it was only two years ago that you looked like this:

++What we learned++

NOTE: After I posted all these photos and I'm looking at them again I noticed they are super grainy.  The originals are not like that...not sure what happened when I saved them for the web.  If I suddenly come across another free hour or two I will re-do them.  Otherwise, just imagine these shots as sharp (and don't feel sorry for me that I got bad vacation photos because I really do have better versions of these photos---and about three hundred more).

We're all about learning in this family.  Every day is a new educational adventure and you never know where it will come from.  So, here's a recap of what we learned on our trip to San Diego.  A few weeks late...

1. The key to good behavior on an airplane ride: lollipops.  The longer lasting the better.  We had Jolly Rancher lollipops.  They lasted at least twenty minutes.  I have an unlimited candy policy on airplanes.  Trust me, it works.  As we were getting off our flight down the man across the aisle told us our kids were the best he's ever seen on an airplane and he travels a lot.  Believe it or not the eastern European man who sat next to me on the return flight that took off at Claire's bedtime didn't quite express the same sentiment.

2. It is possible to take my kids to an amusement park by myself.  Legoland has an offer for a second day ticket for $10 so while Mark worked the first day, we went to Legoland!

3. It's totally ok to roll your kid's crib into the bathroom if necessary.  Whatever it takes. 

4. Condos provide a whole new level of fascination for kids.  The sliding door closets and carpet sweeper made for hours of fun.  My favorite comment by Wyatt about the non-flat screen 27" tv "I just love these cute little TVs".  Oh dear.  What have we done.

5. We learned Claire is a daredevil. They rode this one about five times.

6. Despite the fact that Wyatt now holds 5 driver's licenses from Legoland, he has a little work to do on his boat driving.

7. The best way to get a great smile out of your son is to put him in a lego shark.

8. Claire+favorite baby+music+jumping=pure bliss.  (It was a musical fountain operated only when you jumped on those circles...fun for the adults too!)

9. Claire may not be afraid of the rides, but she was not a fan of being measured.  She was about three hairs taller than the 34" minimum for a lot of rides and she pitched a fit at all of them because she wanted to go on them, but she didn't want to stand under their stick.  She finally relented and agreed to be measured off to the side because she wanted to drive these cars so bad.

 

10. Lots and lots of seals on the beach aren't necessarily easy on the nose.  (Taken at the Children's Pool in La Jolla--a swimming beach turned seal haven).

11. If you follow them around with a camera enough, they may just strike a pose for you after all.  We're still working on them posing TOGETHER though. (Wyatt is climbing the famed Torrey Pines).

12. Boy in flip flops+running+ hands in pockets+trip=a pretty nasty looking nose.

13.My children have no fear of touching slimy ocean creatures.  Not so true of their mother.  

14. Claire's fascination with pink and purple even extends to amusement park rides.  She insisted on the pink elmo fish.  

15. 51 cents makes for a super happy kid.  It's the simple things.

16. Wyatt doesn't seem to care WHAT the temperature is, while on vacation shorts and t-shirts are the wardrobe and that's that.  We saw kids with hats and mittens while Wyatt was in his shorts. 

17. Nothing makes kids happier than a day at the beach (which we always had to ourselves because it was cold to Californians.)  Claire was fascinated by the waves "Here it comes...there it goes..."

18. Leave a luggage cart unattended in your room and within seconds your kids will have moved in.

19. Hotel checkout at 10a, flight leaves from airport 80 miles away at 6p.  Dad sees: adventure.  Mom sees: nightmare.  The truth lies somewhere in between.  We won't go there...

20. Kids can survive on a diet that includes french fries at almost every meal.  The same might not be so true about their parents!

There you have it. Hopefully you learned something too!  Traveling is getting a little easier as the kids get older.  We're so excited as we have so many big dreams for our family in the years to come.