Colin’s last day of preschool was last Friday and they had a little graduation ceremony.  Of course Colin got to go first, somehow he is always going first.  Holden thought he was part of the show so he walked right up and stood with Colin.  Holden pretty much thinks Colin’s school is also his school.  Here is the video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xv7ybbsoAo in case you can’t see it below):

Holden took Colin’s graduation cap, however he didn’t put it on exactly right:

Afterwards they had a little party and cupcakes:

And a picture of the whole class:

Then the next day, his actual last day of school, they had a big picnic in a park near here called Carkeek Park.  It was a beautiful day (we have had a week of perfect days, sunny 70s).  There was entertainment, face painting, magician, parachutes, butterfly release, pinatas – not to mention it was also on the beach.  We were there for 5 hours, Holden missed his nap and everything, but it was so much fun.

Colin did graduate, however he still has one more year of preschool before Kindergarten. He is starting Jumpstart in the fall and he is looking forward to that!

We are really the worst about going out on the weekends.  We keep saying we are going to only go out once to save money and eat better but inevitably come Friday we are ready for a treat.  Then Saturday just feels like a night you should go out, so we succumb and it is fun.  The boys are always so great when we go out to dinner it is hard not to want to go.

We have been good about working out though so hopefully that will offset it a bit.  I joined LA Fitness, yes I am a sell out to the big chain, because they have great childcare.  I can drop them off any time for one monthly fee.  Plus they love it.  I have been working out about 5 times a week, bring the boys about 3 times a week.  I feel much better since I started about a month ago.  Chuck has also been getting up early in the morning to go to the gym or go running.

Boys update:  Colin was really into playing baseball over the weekend.  He has a great swing.  We were in the backyard yesterday using 4 real softballs and a wiffle ball.  He would connect with the softballs but they wouldn’t go far, however when I pitched him a wiffle ball and he hit it, it would fly.  He almost knocked me over and did knock my glasses off one time.  Holden also has a great stance but has a little more trouble hitting the ball, but he sure is cute when he tries.

Holden has been trying to speak a lot more now and is getting better I think.  He uses tone and inflection all the time.  He is starting to get really mad at me when I don’t understand him.  He is so cute when you aren’t watching because he plays with his little animals and makes them talk to each other.  I found him in his room the other day with his puppy who was tucked in with a blanket and pillow and Holden was reading him a story.  Adorable.

Both Colin and Holden love to tell jokes at dinner.  Virtually all of them knock-knock jokes and none of them make any sense.  Especially Holdens – but he laughs so hard afterwords it his hilarious.  I took a video of it:

Telling Jokes

BTW..Holden tried to crawl out of his crib for the first time and also decided (for the first time) he wasn’t going to take a nap today.  It figures because just yesterday we said how easy he was to put down for his nap…always happens that way.

Recently Colin has been very into games. It started with a couple of Thomas card games, then I bought Candy Land for him. A mistake on my part. It could be the most boring game ever made. You don’t really even need to be there to play – you don’t have to make a single decision. Candy Land progressed to Sorry, which is only slightly better. Then when we got sick of Sorry and moved him on to Uno which is fun.

Over the weekend we made a huge leap to Monopoly. We played on Saturday and Sunday, both times for over an hour and a half. Colin made big strides in understanding and counting. In the beginning he would count the dots on each die, but by Sunday if a 5 and a 4 came up he would just say “nine” without counting. He also got much better at understanding money and properties. Granted he has no idea about strategy at all – but he did just turn 4. It was really quite fun to play with him and I am just amazed that he can sit for that long to play a game.

Now the latest is chess. He found this tiny chess set we got in Russia on our honeymoon and has been begging to play. It isn’t the nicest set and one pawn is missing but he managed. Chuck sat him down right after the monopoly game and explained it all to him. I gather Colin did alright with it because I overheard him say “Oh you move the push-up (bishop) in a diagonal, like the letter “A” and the knight like a letter “L”.

Yesterday, during Holden’s nap, he wanted me to play chess with him. I told him I would if he set it up. He remembered where all the pieces went and then I asked him to explain how to play – here are the videos:

Setting up the Game

Playing Chess

He really has no concept of understanding moves. When we were playing yesterday he attempted the “I am going to get your king with my king” strategy – not easy Again chess is way beyond his level, but he tries. I am just excited he likes board games because I love them!

Colin and Holden have been getting along great lately, even with Holden into all Colin’s stuff. Yesterday we went to the zoo and Colin said “Holden sits right next to me mom” and last night Colin said “Holden is my best friend.” It was very sweet although I have to admit that Colin has a different “best friend” every day.

Holden turned 11 months yesterday. I can’t believe he is almost a year, it went so fast. He is still cruising, not walking yet. Babbling, mostly saying “dada”. He loves to brush his hair, mostly with the brush but also with a spatula yesterday. He is a pretty good climber, up on to top of the train table and a couple weeks ago I found him up on top of the toilet. He is a good eater, although he doesn’t really like us to feed him with a spoon much anymore. He also does this super cute thing when you ask if he is cozy he will lay his head down on something soft and go “awwwwwwh”. He got pretty sick over the weekend, had a fever of 104.3 and we basically held him for 72 hours straight. I felt so bad for him, he was moaning and everything. When the fever would come down he would get down and play but over all it was rough.

Colin is doing well. Very much into preschool now and loves to go. He has made lots of friends and is always asking to have people over – everyday he tries to arrange something. He goes up to his friends parents and tells them he is going to come over to their house. He is also such a funny guy at home. The things he says and does just make us laugh. He sings all the time. A couple of days ago he wasn’t listening to me so I said no TV all day. He kept begging, but I said no, so at lunch he started singing to himself all sad “I wanna watch TV….but mom said no….daddy would say yes….” I said are you singing blues?

As far as Chuck and I go, Chuck has been hard at work, although I have to admit, I don’t know at what Seems like he gets home, we eat, play with the kids, get them to bed, clean up and then we go to sleep. I never get a chance to talk to him about work – so here I publicly apologize. We have a babysitter this weekend so hopefully we can catch up then – having kids is a bit time consuming.

I have been working on a built in shelf in our living room. I have the bottom base cabinet in and hopefully will get started on the bookshelves/TV unit this weekend. It takes a long time when Colin is “helping” me. Chuck and I have agreed that we feel like a lot of the home organization hinges on getting this thing done. We have no bookshelves or good storage places right now so we can’t wait to get this settled.

Alright before I go I will just leave a few tidbits over the past month or so since we haven’t blogged in so long:

• On the plane to NY I said to Colin “are you going to give Grandma a big hug when you see her?” Colin replied “No, I only give hugs to Tracy. Tracy likes hugs.” – How do you like that TSinclair?
• Also for TSinclair another poop story – The other day I had to change a diaper and Colin’s poop was bright, I mean bright, green. I thought he was sick for a minute and then I remember he had eaten a cupcake with a huge frosting Christmas tree on top.
• Here is a video of Colin and his cousin Curt dancing: Dancing video
• And a video of Colin and Curt looking through a toy train brochure and getting excited about trains: Toys Video

Other than that we haven’t done all the much this weekend – it has been raining the whole time (and pretty cold, in the low 50s.) Yesterday we had to be out of our house for awhile so our landlords could show it to new renters. We went to a new coffee shop that had lots of toys which Colin loved, then to the toy store where Colin found a cool little red fire truck. Today we had a very unsuccessful trip to the mall – just couldn’t find what we wanted. Chuck’s feet are too big and they didn’t have any shoes in his size. My feet are average size and all the shoes I wanted were sold out. The boys have been very agreeable and well behaved all weekend – it’s been great!

I always have these random things Colin said or Holden did and they just don’t seem to fit anywhere in the story of what we have been up to so I am starting a “Tidbit” section at the end of posts so I can remember all these cute and funny things.

Tidbits:

• Colin’s pronunciation of some words:
  • “Com-pee-ter” = Computer
  • “mech-che-ches” = Messages, as in “why do you need to use the computer?” Colin “I need to check my mech-che-ches”
  • “steep-e” = steep, as in “wow Mommy, this is a steep-e hill” any time we drive around here
• Holden’s mysterious spit-ups – we will hear and see Holden spit up but then we can’t find it anywhere. The other day he spit up while I was holding him. Both Chuck and I heard it hit the floor and I swear I looked and wiped up for 2 or 3 minutes and I just could not find it.
• Holden’s had little rug burnt knees from army crawling on the carpet
• Colin was rocking in a little rocking chair at the coffee shop and he said “Look mommy I am rocking”, to which I replied “yep, you are just rocking away.” He looked at me with confusion and said “No I’m not I’m staying right here.”
• Here is a little video of our backyard tennis lessons:
• Here is another video of Colin naming the first 11 or so presidents (I had to put this one up especially for Lighthouse Grandma, who will really love the end). I should note that during this video I have Colin’s presidential place mat and Colin keeps looking up at the computer screen watching himself because we were recording with the webcam.