New School Year and a Broken Arm!

New school year pictures! James is now a big-boy and is going to two preschools! He left our wonderful little infant/toddler school, Little Tree, where he's been since he was three months old. It was pretty hard on me, but he was ready to move on. Now he spends Mondays and Fridays at Willson Preschool, right next to our house. This is where Maggie is the director and teacher (but not James teacher this year). The big change is that he is now at a regular Montessori preschool called Learning Circle. It is right next to the MSU campus, which is great to have him so close. He is loving it. His best buddy Oscar goes to school there two and they are like two little peas in a pod. James came home on Thursday SUPER dirty from the two of them playing in the sandbox together. Sand and dirt was everywhere. It was great. He goes there Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. It is a great schedule for him. Learning Circle is great - he is in a new challenging environment where they stress independence, individuality, and a love of learning. Perfect fit for our family.

However; the independence thing has been a little bit of a challenge since we are experiencing our first broken bone! James broke his arm (humerous - a fracture/chip right at the elbow). He is healing great and didn't even have to get a hard cast. Just a hard splint for two weeks, and an extra week in a sling. He's taking it like a champ, as is his personality. It has gotten him down a couple of times, but he is really great about the whole thing and once it is explained to him, he really understands the process of healing and what it is going to take. What more could we expect from our little rule-follower. We have started calling him out little hall monitor - he loves observing safety rules and telling others how to follow them!

Birthday Month!

Here are some pictures from April- Birthday month!

Finally

OK, so I know it has been way too long since I posted something. So here are a few new photos. Including James first day skiing! We are so proud that he LOVED his first skiing experience. Sean and I are totally excited that he got on skis before he turned two, and totally loved it. He did great. We let him play with his skis before he got on them, and he was really excited to try them out. When we put them on him, he was actually really into it, which we were pretty excited about, because he can be tentative in these types of situations. He LOVED riding the little "magic carpet" (basically a conveyor belt for taking kids up slope) and at first this was the highlight of his experience. Then he realized what fun it was to ski (slide) down the hill. He was giggling and laughing and kept saying "do it again"! Too cool. I am going to take him again this weekend. We have a skier!!! Woohoo! I see years of fun ahead of us. He was a natural.

James is WAY verbal, and is speaking in full, six or seven word sentences, can count to ten, and can sing the whole Ba Ba black sheep song. His favorite song is "Baby Beluga", by Raffi, which he sings regularly, and he loves to read stories about cowboys, horses, and trains. He is also super into airplanes at the moment. Nothing beats a garbage truck (semi's are also garbage trucks), or a school bus. When he sees a school bus, he always waves and says "hello children" with great enthusiasm. Cracks us up. He also has amazing manners and says please and thanks or thank you, and whenever you sneeze or cough, you receive a "bless you, mommy". We are so pleased with how good he is. How did we get such a great little boy. He is also much more snugly and affectionate now, and loves to give kisses. He has a little baby doll that Grandma U got him, that he carries with him everywhere and sleeps with him. He says "baby sad", then gives it a hug and kiss and says "baby is happy, now". Kills us.

He loves his tricycle, wooden puzzles, and playing outside when the weather is good. He is really into his stroller. He loves meat bones (see below). Tonight we were at dinner with Bill and Maggie (he is obsessed with Bill) and started into this pile of fatty rib bones that Bill discarded. He was doing it with purpose. We were all cracking up. He pumps his fist in the air saying "steak bone"!

His favorite toys are these little Swiss postal cars (2 of them) that Bill and Maggie brought back from Switzerland, and tractors (2) and these two (what do you know) little trucks that he calls busses. He has a thing for twos. They have to travel with us in matched sets, and he has to have at least two of the sets with us at all times while away from home, along with all four of his little blankie, animals which we call friends.

We sure do love our little Sweet Pea, and don't know how we got so lucky. He sure is a good one.

Christmas Morning!

Christmas!

Peepee in the Potty!!!!!

Yeah! Tonight James made his first pee pee in the potty!!! I scared him I got so excited. We were getting ready for bath time, and were in the bathroom. He was naked, waiting to get into the tub, and he said "pee pee" and opened his little potty, sat down, and peed! It was awesome! Even more exciting is that Oma got to be here to see it too! What a great day.

Oma and I also took James to the Museum of the Rockies for the first time today. He liked it ok, and kept calling the dinosaurs "horns". He did get a little bit tentative about some of the sounds that the animated dinos made, but overall he was diggin' it.

So excited about the pee. I have never been so excited about urine.