The Little Man

Alex is still very much into imaginative play and loves dressing up, his cape or his hiccup costume are among the favorites. He loves to play out back and pretend that we are knights or vikings or whatever the character of the day is. He has become very creative with his play, but still always wants me to play with him, which I don't mind (but I do get kind of tired of being the sick dragon or Jessie from Toy Story riding on the back of his horse).

He loves playing with his neighbor friend Cooper. They really play very well together despite the 2 year age difference. He has been upset this week because Cooper started school and is rarely available to play anymore. He loves legos or anything that he can build with or fix. Recently Jay showed him how to use his big power drill and to Alex this is the coolest thing EVER and is always asking to drill holes in anything.

We have been trying to put his fourth birthday party together and I asked him who he wanted to invite and the rattled off a list of about 25 kids!! AAAHHH!

Austin Children's Museum

Seems recently we have been doing a tour of Children's Museums all over the country. Austin's one is very fun and unique to Austin of course. We spent a great day downtown first with lunch at Magnolia (that is Alex hanging with the restaurant kitty) and then on to the museum. Now that it is official that we are leaving we are trying to soak up as much Austin as we can.

Arr Matey!

Alex the pirate!! Arrrrr!! This is Alex having a blast at his buddy's pirate party yesterday in Leander at Robin Bledsoe Park. They got to participate in a treasure hunt, each treasure they found contained one piece of their costume. Way too much fun!!

The Kilt

My not so little brother is getting married on September 25th. He is going full Scottish kilt, seal skin sporran, socks etc. so Liam and Alex are also going to wear their kilts. Alex's kilt just arrived yesterday in the mail after great anticipation more from me than anyone. I didn't spend a lot on them but definitely don't want it wasted if he chooses not to wear it. Ever since ordering them online I have been busy thinking of the bribe of the century to make sure he wears it for the wedding. All the chocolate he can eat, brand new dragon toy, new playmobil stuff, new cape...the list was endless. However when it came and we opened it he immediately wanted to put it on and show it off to his friend Sigi across the street. Well she gave him the right compliments and so I think he is sold on his new man skirt. Hopefully it lasts till September 25th. I do have my secret weapons in place though just in case we have some dissension.:) Doesn't get cuter than that!

Go Faster Mum, Go Faster!

Since Jay has been put onto the back end of the week at Samsung I now find myself with Alex every Saturday without Daddy. Saturday is my 5 K day, so Alex is now my race partner and he absolutely loves it. He asks me all the time when our next race is and "should we win this time". Well if it were only that easy to win!!. He usually sits in the jogger yelling at me to "Go faster Mum, go faster". That's all the motivation I need to go as fast as I can which pushing a 30 pounder is usually not very fast. We managed to take second place twice and several PR's-he's my lucky charm for sure. I was very happy today to break 30 doing Vern's No Frills at Berry Springs Park, which was not easy on a loop trail run with over 200 people. I have recently starting getting the t-shirt they give you for entering to Alex (if they have extra small) and he is so proud of his little t-shirts. Our Saturday morning races together have been so meaningful and memorable for me in so many ways-I hope that when he is older he will look back fondly on these times as well.

These are some pictures of the donkeys at the park today. He loves to feed them and is becoming more brave about actually letting the donkeys eat from his hand. When we first started coming out to this park he wouldn't even go near them. The first picture is kind of neat because the camera captures the carrot being thrown through the air to the donkey by Alex.

Starting School

I am so excited for Alex to start at Community Montessori School this year. Before I had Alex it was always my dream that he would attend a Montessori school (as Jay and I both did) and that I would also be able to work at the same school. This would be any mother's dream, to be with or near your child all day. Well maybe it wouldn't be all mother's dream but it is mine. We are very lucky to live 4 minutes away from what I consider to be one of the best and true to the Montessori philosophy schools that I have ever seen. When I taught we would attend the annual Montessori conference and some years it included a tour of an exemplary school in that city and never in all my years have seen a school as beautiful and well laid out as CMS. Even the school that I worked at for 10 years doesn't really compare. Hopefully it does meet my expectations which I sometimes set way too high.

This past week we had meet the teacher night and pot luck dinner to meet the other children and parents. All of us were on the playground chatting and doing introductions and Alex comes up to me and points to a lady and asks if that is Ms. Jinny (the teacher). I was very shocked because it was the teacher whom he had never met or seen before. I am still puzzled by this intution of his. (I am sure that he heard someone say her name but there is a small part of me that thinks there was some sort of higher force going on). Anyway he fell in love with the playground and the teacher and even met some friends. Jay got a brief look into Montessori from another source other than me after all of these years of hearing stuff from me and now we are SO excited to have Alex attend the school. And the bonus is I am going to sub there after my marathon is over so I will be able sneak peaks into his room and at the same time quench my thirst to get back to teaching.

Loving the Summer

I can't believe the summer is coming to an end next week, well at least school starts back and the pools close which is what I base it on. This summer has been so much fun and up until this week it has actually not been too hot. This week we are into the Texas Triple Digit weather but before this you could actually go to a park and not die from heat exhaustion. We have been able to hang out with our Social Butterflies (thanks to our fearless leader Dina) a lot, we took a great trip to Phoenix to visit Jay's grandpa, took in a few Round Rock Express games, swam a LOT, got a new bike and learned to ride with pink training wheels, saw school friends, caught a few movies at the theatre, lots of crafts and homeschooling (when I could get Alex to use sandpaper letters as letters not as sandpaper :)), and tons of other stuff. I thought this summer was going to drag not having Mother's Day Out or even going to Canada but it has been the best time ever and so relaxing with basically no schedule except to have fun and to keep busy. These are just a few pics of Alex hanging out this summer.

I Can Do it By Myself

Montessori motto-teach me to do it by myself. Well this is what I found after alex has insisted that he can wipe his bottom all by himself. I figure with him starting Montessori I had better get him fairly independent in the toileting department. When he was at St. Helen's I would always ask him what if the teachers help him wipe and his response in all seriousness was that "No, because I always save my poop for you mummy". Lovely!!

Stronger, Faster, Awesomer

Our great neighbours brought this shirt back from Colorado for Alex and it quickly became one of his faves. He loves to wear it to races!! He also loves to wear my old brownie belt with all of his tools stuffed in there. He is quite the fix'it man.