Christmas 2012

{archived from 2010}

{a note from the mother}

Ian is a joy. In 2010, Ian has really moved into the realms of Boyhood. While, at times, I want to dig in my heels and slow down time and keep him as toddler-like as possible....well, I know that I can't. So now I find myself embracing my boy. Few things in his life have been more exciting for him than his milestones of 2010: turning four and becoming a big brother. Ian is talented and thoughtful, wise and wonderful. His imagination overfloweth in jaw-dropping ways. And while few people manage to get Blake to smile, Ian always can. He is learning how to read and can write several words (especially ones relating to the spaceships he makes: 'STOP,' 'GO,' etc.). What follows are Ian's exact words relating to some pictures we took throughout the year. He's very proud of his "Christmas email," and I'll admit, we are, too.

Q. How was your year?

A. Good.

Q. What was the best part?

A. Uhhhhh. That it was a great day.

Q. But what was the best part of your whole year?

A. That I had some preschool. We put paper bones on our bodies to learn about the bones in our bodies.

Q. Is there anything you want to say to the people who are reading this page?

A. Ian loves them.

This is my first Sunbeam activity. I don't remember if it was fun. I don't know. Being a Sunbeam is fun and everyday we have a different lesson. I remember one day that the preschool was learning about radio.

This was from the Pinewood Derby race. And it was fun that I won one of them! My car is now a tow truck. My dad helped me with making it.

This is me in the birthing tub. Then it was my mom in the birthing tub with dad. We had that birthing tub to birth Blake in. I got in the tub so I could teach a lesson to my buddies about....I don't remember...that was a long time ago.

This is the day after Blake's birth and I'm holding him in the pink chair and he's very little and Grammy came over. My mom's mom came over to our house so she could give me a new buddy that was a rabbit buddy. I was feeling good that my baby brother was being born!

This is me eating breakfast in bed. I asked for eggs on toast and strawberries. That pillow is my mom's pillow so I could sit up in bed.

This is when I was building a lawnmower shed with Dad.

This is me at the beach. I was having fun. Why wasn't I in a swimsuit, Mom?

That's my swimming lessons. We were using some swimming noodles and I couldn't swim so that's why I wasn't doing what they did so I needed a teacher to help me. I liked my swimming lessons because it's so fun.

That's me and Dad camping in the back yard! I wanted to camp in the white tent but the bugs came in and I didn't like it so we went to the other tent that the bugs don't come in.

This is me holding a picture of a camera. It's a little bit like our camera but not really the same color and a different word on the back. I don't know what I'm pointing to in the picture, what are those called? Oh. Those are just letters on a word.

Me holding a potato at Grammy's house.

Ohhh, that's me in the Outback watching a movie. It was 'Toy Story.'

It's that I was the Preschool Halloween Costume Party and I was a pteranadon. Dad made my costume.

This is when I went geocaching with Dad.

This is a picture of me doing preschool and we are going to cook some pumpkin muffins. I'm using the beans to learn about greater-than and less-than.

{another note from his mother}

I think Ian left off a few things... =) He played on a soccer team for the first time and took several classes through the town Rec department...he discovered dinosaurs ('round about Halloween, if you hadn't noticed), and now likes to eat loads of salads to "be an herbivore like a brachiosaurus." (No really, he said that.) I've recently had occasion to discover he's quite the ladies' man...on one occasion he told his friend, Ada, that he'd been lifting weights...and just tonight while he was having a pretend phone conversation with the North Pole, he put Santa Claus himself on hold to answer another pretend call from his friend, Avery. Oy! He is a wonderful friend and listener and has taken a recent liking to British claymation, which does this mother-heart proud. (Side note: I love you, Shaun the Sheep.) Ian has also made a formidable collection of cardboard-box-spaceships that should be the envy of NASA. I love this boy.