Spring Break and Daddy

For my first day of Spring Break James went to daycare and Jim was out of town. He had a business trip in Pittsburgh. I wanted to be productive (with the whole house to myself) and so the first thing that I did was deep clean my bathroom. Ahhhh a clean bathtub! It's all ready for a long, relaxing bath. If it was cold and wintery I think I would be all over that! But during the first part of spring break it was beautiful and sunny.



When James came home from daycare we spent a lot of time outside golfing. He loves golf again. It makes me happy for him.



We spotted a plane in the sky. James told me, "Mama, Dada is on a trip. He's way up in the sky." So he waved at the plane. It was very cute.



Even cuter was the moment he stopped, mid-swing, to grunt and very obviously poop! He stood very still and strained. I tried to get him to put down the club and finish inside, or at least go inside and change his pull-up but he cried. A minute later I insisted.




Later, Daddy called us on video chat! James didn't even blink at the concept. I told him it was a "computer phone" and we had a great couple of minutes filling in Daddy on the day's activities.

Bedtime routines

We still attempt to get James on the potty often but he's still only cooperating right before bedtime. I am trying to be patient and not force it but it's hard not to want it NOW. Imagine no more diaper or pull-ups?! We'd save a fortune :)

Cooking

It's nice to come home and find dinner in process of being cooked! Jim made Chicken Scallopine and pretended to swipe the cooking wine.

My Little Cupcake

Jim and James met Grandma Laura this morning for breakfast and a playground run. This left me with a little free time. I knew I wanted to bake something so I dug out a recipe that I had bookmarked for a loooooong time.

(Jim might need to guest blog on the morning. He took pictures with his iPhone. I guess James was really, really active at the playground. He made another friend! and loved the beach!)

I made my own Hostess cupcakes! I'm taking the majority of them to work to share with my peeps but I personalized a few of them for us at home. Grandma Laura came back for dinner- spring chicken pot pie- and we had these cupcakes for dessert. James even ate his! I wasn't sure if he would. You just never know!

I was pretty happy with the cupcakes but I think I can find a better cake recipe. The cake was a little dry and crumbly. I think the marshmallow creme and rich ganache deserve a better cake.

We love Saturdays!

Especially the Saturdays that we sleep in! James graced us with a 7am wake-up, which is pretty good considering other mornings it's been 3:30am or 4am. We are glad he stayed in his own bed until then. I woke up to take care of James while Jim slept in (his turn), and James and I played in his room. He was pretty obsessed with Star Wars that day.

He kept his Star Wars pajamas on all day. It was that kind of day. Here he is playing with his Barack Obama Air Force One. Seriously, it's a toy that we got at last year's Green Expo.

James' room can be dark enough that lightsaber play is quite fun. He uses this flashlight to make swooshing sounds and motions. He fought Battle Droids all day. In this picture, "a Battle Droid got me, Mama!"

James admires his picture of himself, Dora, and Grandma Rosie.

Battle droids attack again!!!!

Later, still in pajamas, James takes a turn on my iPhone to play a game. This is an app where he has to blow into the microphone to blow bubbles. He then uses his finger to pop them. It's not the most educational app on the phone, I much prefer the ones where he has to identify shapes, puzzles, matching, etc. But it's pretty darn funny seeing him concentrate like this.

He only gets a few minutes at a time and then he's okay to let it go. I tell him we need to charge the battery often.

Outside

I really only took one picture on this particular day. It was another cold play outside kind of day but James didn't mind. I was clearing my flowers of weeds when we found this caterpillar. We watched it crawl around on the ground and then STOMP! James tried to stomp on it but luckily he missed. The caterpillar crawled away to live another day.

It was kind of neat that we saw this caterpillar because the next day one of James' favorite shows, Little Einsteins, had a caterpillar that transformed into a butterfly. Metamorphosis (did I even spell that right??), you know. James likes to say that word. I love that that show includes vocabulary but also classical music, great art, and cute stories :)

Spring get here fast!

When I picked up James they were hogpiling Ms. Jamie. James greeted me with his usual, "Mommy!!!" and he threw himself into my arms. I feel so loved in those moments :)



We've been taking James outside a lot more because it's been warm. On this day we underestimated how cold it was. We had James in his winter coat but we didn't bring his gloves and hat. Dumb. Well, he wouldn't have worn them anyway but we could have insisted. It was pretty cold but James still played well and didn't want to leave.


It was a cold, sunny day.

I guess we don't have to worry about James being too shy. There was another little boy at the playground with his Dad and older brother. James was playing on the same equipment, noticed him, and soon enough they were chasing each other around the playground. They ended up climbing up on this car together. James insisted it was a "spaceship" and they were going "high in the sky!"

I hope that we find many, many new friends this summer to play with.

Food

I keep thinking that I should start a separate food blog but what I do isn't that incredible. I steal from other people's blogs :) There are a few websites that I completely trust for recipes and I know that they will be for sure great meals.

Martha sent me an email right before St. Patrick's Day for some Irish handpies. They were good. I didn't think I could go wrong with some of my favorite foods in pie crust :) Cabbage, red potatoes, beef, thyme, tomatoes.



I didn't get a picture of them after I baked them. I ended up shaping the pies and flash freezing them for later meals. They were wrapped, frozen, and then baked frozen for 30 minutes.

School Carnival

On Tuesday James' daycare had a school carnival at night. We wanted to be there early so we could get home and feed this normally-hungry-at-5pm boy so Jim met us there when I picked up James that day.

We definitely beat the rush and the daycare workers were still setting up the games. James' first stop was this balloon pop. Each balloon had a "prize" inside. James couldn't get the balloon popped so we ended up taking the balloon home.

I don't know why his crack is always showing!



I like this picture because he kind of looks geeky (hehe) and the little kids in the room next door are jealously looking at James with the balloons!


Lollipop tree behind James.



Cake walk. I was suprised that James participated in this one so well. He kept expecting a win and would follow the teacher to the prize basket. It took three times but finally he won! He won a cookie so really isn't it a cookie walk?

James' first cotton candy! He did like it. He liked to lick it.

It ended up being a fun 35 minutes :) We didn't stay long but we did hit all of the games and said hi to all of the teachers. The next day the director told me that they ended up having 60-70 families show up. She was glad James came early because he's quieter and she was glad he didn't get overwhelmed by the people. Me too!

Bouncing Balls

James can make a lightsaber out of anything. He has been using his electronic drumsticks as lightsabers. The bonus is that they make cool noises when we "fight".


Jim registered James for a class at the Science Museum before he knew he would be gone on his business trip. I gladly stepped in and took James to the class. I was so curious how he would do at the class. It was a class for 3-4 year olds but I just didn't know if James would participate or be interested.

I was pleasantly surprised to find James very attentive and well behaved! He sat quietly while the teacher reviewed the properties of balls.

He even raised his hand to answer "What makes a ball a ball?" (The teacher first explained that the kids should raise their hands. James was whispering answers to me and so I told him, Raise your hand!) The teacher called on him and he very sweetly said, "Balls are round!!" I was such a proud Mommy! :) :) :)

The class had several stations set up for the kids to explore the different sizes of balls, what the insides look like, etc.

James is measuring the circumference of the ball here, using pieces of string to measure it.

Dropping the balls in a pan of flour was great fun!

Jim made it home soon after our afternoon class. We met him for lunch at Key's cafe in Spring Lake Park and then went home to open the "surprise" from San Diego.

Wow! A treasure chest! It is a sort of snow globe but with fish, shells, and bubbles. He loves it :) Thanks Daddy!

A boy!

A boy joined my Step group at school. Brave kid! He amazed the girls by learning all of their steps in less than an hour. He's doing so well.

Playground

Jim/Daddy is out of town. He has a business trip. I thought a trip to the playground would be fun. James did too! He wanted so badly to walk to the playground but the wagon's wheels need to be blown up and the stroller is for babies! And actually I need to look into whether it is recalled- a friend of mine told me that Graco strollers from 2004 on are being recalled because of finger amputations! Ugh!

So we drove to the park. It was fine. James excitedly held his soccer ball on the way there and told me he wanted to go down the slide.

Yup, that's the first thing he did.







He figured out that the rock wall was too high for him. He is much too little to climb up there.




James called this the spaceship. I'm sure he was thinking of Star Wars.


He didn't really enjoy the swings but I did make him smile and laugh as I swooped in for kisses.








The playground was a hit. I did need to carry him away because he didn't want to go. He didn't throw a fit but he did try and run away. We needed to go home because it was getting late and it looked like it might rain. We made it home in time for one episode of Dora. He was very happy that it was the ABC animal episode.

Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com