We’ve been looking for something for Evan to do lately. He missed out on soccer sign up and another class, but then we saw that he was just old enough to take his first ice skating class! He’s a hockey nut, as you may know. He loves going to watch hockey while Dad has curling, and is just obsessed with it.
He did a great job too! He fell a lot, but he marched and skated all the way from one side of the ice to the other without any help from the teacher. So, without further ado, here are two videos of his first ice skating lesson. (He’s the one with the blue helmet and green sweatshirt.)
Category: Third Year
Evan Turns Three
In this episode of “we are horrible parents,” we recently discovered that we still had all of Evan’s third birthday pictures on our old camera (we got our new one a couple of weeks after his birthday and promptly forgot about all the pictures remaining on the old camera). So, without further ado, Evan’s third birthday party.
Evan and his girlfriend Abby.
Evan’s buddy Cole, too fast for the old camera!
Joseph overanalyzing the 101 Dalmations game.
Lisa’s wonderful Corduroy birthday cake.
Evan blows out the candles.
Family portrait!
Almost Three
Evan turns three in a few short days. He celebrated his birthday at school today with his friend Abby, who has the same birthday. Lisa made special Dora and Diego cupcakes for the birthday couple.
Diego.
Dora.
She’s got some talent, that wife of mine.
The cutest birthday couple ever.
What would a party be without birthday hats?
First Day of School
After much trepidation in the weeks leading up to the first day of preschool, we decided that Evan was potty-trained “enough” to start school. It was a busy morning, but I managed to gently wake him up by reminding him that he’d see his friend Abby at school, and asked him what he wanted for breakfast. “French toast!” Now there’s a boy who knows what he wants. He peed on the potty while Mom got breakfast ready. He excitedly ate his french toast and drank his orange juice. We got him all dressed, and bundled in his rain coat (it rained on Ellie’s first day too), and started walking to school. Mom walked him to his class while I took Ellie to her class. (Ellie’s school starts later this year, so now both school start at almost the same time, a bit of a logistical problem.) Ellie was in the same classroom again this year, so she was totally cool with it and didn’t really need me there, except to take pictures. I met Evan’s friend Abby on the way back to his school. Lisa was just coming out as we arrived and said that she couldn’t go back in because Evan couldn’t figure out why Mom wasn’t staying. When I walked in, he was pretty sniffly, but I showed him that Abby was there, and Abby, being the happy-go-lucky kid that she is, just started playing with the toys, and I managed to convince Evan to play as well. He gave me a hug and a kiss, and he went off to play.
When we went back to pick him up, all of the kids were in their seats ready to go, except Evan and one other boy, who were still off playing with some of the toys. He had a good day, and even went on the potty at school! He even colored a picture of the school which looks eerily like Ellie’s picture from her first day. Hopefully he can keep it up, but we’re fairly sure that the worst is past us now. Way to go buddy!
Potty Training Gone Wrong
Shockingly enough, Evan is supposed to be starting preschool in just over three weeks. The catch is that he needs to be potty trained to attend the school. Or at least, potty trained for the 3 hours he’s there. So the potty training has been shifted into overdrive. First thing in the morning, we try to get him to go. Then he will usually get to go naked or wear underwear from then on, trying to get him to understand what it feels like when he needs to go. On Saturday morning, it was naked time. He had just peed, and had grabbed his cars to play with. He was climbing up into his chair to play with them on the table when I heard something hit the floor. I figured it was one of his cars he had dropped. Nope. Poop. He pooped all over his chair, on his leg, and onto the floor. Lovely.
Apparently he could just care less about “feeling” like he has to go at this point. Three weeks to go? Not looking good. Still, he has been doing fairly well with trying to pee, but he does need to be reminded often or he will just pee wherever he is. But I could do without the poop accidents.
The Kid is Too Cute
Evan can drive us a bit crazy these days: whacking people (his sister mainly) with various objects, rolling around on the floor randomly, banging the wall when he’s supposed to be sleeping. But he sure can be cute too.
He walks around saying “Awesome” all the time. We really need to catch that on video, because just writing that he says it does not do it justice. Me: “Hey Evan, want to go to the library?” Evan: “Oh, awesome.”
Barack Obama is on the TV. “Evan, who’s that?” “Obama!” Yeah, we brainwash our kids, so what?
These days (except for last night of course), he even sleeps in his own bed for the whole night. Awesome.
Scenes from our House
Lisa is sitting in the office at the computer. Evan walks behind her with a step stool.
Lisa: “Evan, what are you doing with that step stool?”
Evan: “Nuffink.”
Oh boy, are we in trouble.
Trains and More Trains
In case you hadn’t heard, Evan really likes trains. A lot. So for his birthday we headed down to Alexandria to the Amtrak station and watched trains. Mostly the Metro trains on the other tracks, but a couple of VRE commuter trains and Amtrak trains went by.
His party on Saturday evening was also a train-filled affair. We painted a bunch of cardboard boxes to look like boxcars and an engine (I used the Mr. McGroovy’s rivets to make the engine out of two boxes). He loves his new train table, aka our new coffee table. The only problem is that we now have bits and pieces of three different types of Thomas the Train sets: the classic wooden, the “Take Along” plastic, and the Lego Duplo. Not a lot of room left for things like, oh, furniture. Luckily, we are dual-purposing the train table as a coffee table, so there’s that.
The train table, with the wooden tracks ready to set up.
Evan and his buddies AJ and Henry playing with the cardboard train we made. Aside from one box car ripping, the train held up surprisingly well to their abuse.
Another one of Lisa’s masterful cake creations. Evan looks a little worried that it’s going to topple over, but it stayed put. OK, the very top did fall over, but it landed right on the chocolate, so we were able to just get it back on top without too much trauma.
The obligatory cake face picture. Note the skillful use of spoon in one hand and fork in the other for optimal cake consumption.
Happy Birthday Evan!
Time to add a new category to the blog, because Evan turns two today! I can’t wait to get home and show him his present: a train table and wooden train set. And his birthday party tomorrow is going to be train-themed as well, complete with another one of Lisa’s epic cake creations.
Happy birthday little guy!
The D's 