Random Fun with Daniel

I've collected random pictures again...here's a bunch just of Daniel! (Annabel's randomness will come soon!)

Daniel still loves to play in our sandbox and he's pretty creative these days...

 Daniel fell asleep on his floor one Friday night back in May, waiting for us to come home from dance class and tuck him in. It was so sweet. (This was before the new bed, so he actually had room to do this!)

Daniel LOVES his bike! He loves to ride it to the park. And I just love watching him- he can really GO! 

Side story, as long as we're being random: There was one day recently, we'd had a rough morning, but off we headed to the park to run off some energy...and I made sure to imprint this image in my head- no photo taken- just this perfect little image/memory of my sweet still 4 year old boy, riding his bike, tottering side to side against the training wheels, his Elmo backpack on with his stuffed green monkey's head sticking out...it was just so endearing and in that moment I was reminded he is still my baby, he is still young enough to want to carry his stuffed animal to the park in his little Elmo backpack. (The monkey's head was sticking out because he wanted the monkey to see where we were going.) The whole image was the sweetest thing ever. I had tears in my eyes; time just flies and yet, this moment has stayed with me, this image just had childhood and timelessness written all over it, it had the carefree spirit of being young all over it. Took my breath away really.

Daniel loves to swing these days. (And don't worry, Annabel isn't mad, she's just experimenting with how she can stand and fold her arms while waiting.)

Impromptu science experiment one day: will it sink or float? Daniel had a ball finding things all over the house and checking to see if they would float or sink. We had the most fun!

Daniel had his second dentist visit about a month ago. He did NOT like it one bit and kept swatting the hygienist away; it was a hard appointment to get through, but he got through it well enough in the end. I sat by him so he could hold my hand, and of course he had lion and kitty cat with him, but in the end, it was Curious George on the TV that helped the most! That show was clearly a better distraction than The Cat in the Hat show. I made his appointment for that time slot next time! Good thing he had no cavities and all is well otherwise!

I mentioned before how much the kids are into collecting nature "treasures" these days...here's Daniel's collection from one of those times. They really do have the most fun out there together; SO thankful for a fenced yard so I can let them head out and have fun!

I recently discovered these fun "crayons" called Slick Stix. The kids LOVE them. Daniel is finally starting to really draw pictures and name them- these crayons really kind of kicked that off. I think this was a truck carrying a dinosaur head, or something like that.

Daniel and Daddy enjoyed some special time together doing a Lowe's Build and Grow workshop a couple weekends ago. I signed them up for this one especially because I knew the project would be a hit- these Mike and Sulley (from Monsters Inc, a fave movie of Daniel's) wiggle guys. Daniel was really excited to go and loved the project of course! I'll have to keep my eye out for more of these workshops, which fill up super fast. Home Depot does them, too, and we've caught them at those truck shows and such that we've been to, but Daniel and Daddy have never just done this the two of them at the store, so this was something special we'd been wanting to try and they had a lot of fun.

Such a cute picture of Daniel with Mickey! He wanted the blanket on their laps which was cute. And also, he's been loving wearing his Thai outfit (you can just make out the shirt here) from Great Aunt Jackie, since it finally fits! I'll have to check if Annabel's fits her now and get a picture of the two of them in these neat outfits. Anyway, I loved this picture. Now here, he looks closer to five years old to me.

Things we've heard lately:

We were talking about cars on the road one day and I must have made some comment about the cars like they were from the Cars movie, and Daniel immediately exclaimed, "No-ooo! This isn't Eye-car land!" (He still calls the Cars movie cars "eye-cars" because, you know, they have eyes, as opposed to Matchbox cars which don't. This was something he did from THE very beginning of his cars collection.)

"Whoa! Who's gonna sleep on the floor?!"- Daniel's immediate response when he saw a mattress on the curb ready to be thrown away one day.

"Mommy, you sure made a good dinner!"- This from the kid who barely eats two bites at dinner most nights. And no I don't remember what I made now.

"No scrabbling" or "No scrambling"- when he tells Annabel not to scribble.

"No time to lose, no time at all!" This cracks me up!

"Certainly"- This certainly is good; this certainly is garbage- he's very certain about things these days!

"Definitely"- This is definitely for babies; this is definitely trash- things are also very definite around here lately!

The other day, I was helping Annabel with a Cars puzzle and I pointed out Luigi so she could find the rest of Luigi on the next piece. Daniel immediately and urgently said, "Mommy- you just said 'Luigi'," and I said yeah and man you could see him thinking about this and concentrating, so I finally said, "Well, you've always called him 'Wigigi' but his name is Luigi." I have secretly loved "Wigigi" and didn't want to end this, so I've never explicitly corrected him, but I have always said it correctly myself, he's just clearly never really heard it until this day. It was just too funny to watch Daniel think so hard about this- I don't think I will forget this conversation and the puzzled look on his face. He finally told me he will still call him Wigigi. This hasn't come up again to be confirmed...

And today, while Daniel was "not napping"/doing quiet time, he was clearly very busy in his room...he came down (he comes down when his hour long CD is over- that ends his quiet time if he's still awake, which he is most days) and urgently ran into the family room where I was puttering on the computer and emphatically said, "Mommy, this swim shirt does NOT even fit around my neck anymore!" and maybe you had to be there, but just his face, his urgency, his gestures, his attempt at describing how it did not fit plus the fact that this was what he found to do while he was not napping...well, it cracked me up, I was laughing so hard I had tears in my eyes. I finally put myself together enough to say, well then we would just keep the shirt for Annabel or donate it, and he grabbed the shirt back in his hands, hugged it to his cheeks, and said oh so dramatically "nooooo, put it in my baaaby box!" (a box he's never seen, because I know he'd just take stuff out, but that he knows I like to put special stuff into). And then he quickly proceeded to tell me that his swim shorts were fine though, he even had them on and wanted to keep wearing them until Michael's party, a classmate's party (his first party for a friend at school!), which mind you isn't until tomorrow. This all just sent me into more laughing fits. (I should also say he often comes down after naps in completely different outfits than I left him in. I just think it's funny how he fills his quiet time.)

Daniel helped us clean up our family room one afternoon after dumping the entire collection of toys (well, at least those from the family room mostly!) in the middle of the room and while we cleaned, we put a few bags of toys together for donating. We usually do this without Daniel (though I know the value of getting him to donate, don't get me wrong) because he's such a pack rat and everything becomes his "favorite toy ever" and nothing gets donated. But this time, we actually put together almost three bags full of toys and he had fun and was so proud of himself; at one point, he said, "I never donated before. I love donating." And don't worry, I made sure he came with me to Goodwill and got out of the car to carry his bags in- he was so excited. We'll have to do some more donating, since he seems to be ready and is always talking about donating now.

Daniel also loves doing school work and playing school these days. We have a few workbooks that he just loves doing. He's a hard little worker and can do most activities so independently now, though he likes me nearby. It's so much fun to sit and work with him a little bit on these.

And I think I mentioned before that Daniel is really into puzzles these days. Oh my gosh- he just loves them right now. We're stockpiling them like crazy (we did pick up a few at the project store the other the day and the kids were just SO excited to come home and do them right away, and we found a few cute cheap ones at Goodwill this weekend, too) and he's putting them together over and over again. And he wants NO help- he's very insistent on doing them by himself. So awesome!

I think that's all the news and stories for Daniel lately!