Oh James...

James... My James...

He is so fun, funny, energetic, dramatic, adorable, happy, and wonderful.  I love him.  He challenges me.  He makes me reflect on my parenting multiple times a day.  He is formative right now.  He is a sponge.  He wants to learn it all.  He wants to do what mama and dada do.  He makes me proud.  He can also make me look like a mess in front of other people, but I'm not embarrassed because I know that it's just part of it.  Every tantrum or outburst is part of him learning and testing and responding to my reaction.  His little brain is working overtime all the time.

- He loves to read.  He reads his books often.  He reads with us and reads on his own.

- He loves to build.  He builds anything and everything.

- He loves his brother.  He makes Luke laugh like no one else.  He is usually nice and gentle these days, but sometimes he gets too excited and attacks Luke, so they both require my constant supervision. 

- He is learning his letters, numbers, and colors.  We practice most of these things while reading books.  He so badly wants to be independent and know them all.  But he still gets some colors confused.  When he counts, he says, "One, two, three, six, seven, six, seven, six, seven!"  His favorite color is orange.  He gets really excited when he sees orange things... especially oranges. 

- He still scoots on his bottom when he just has to go a short distance.

- James loves people. I mean, he really loves people.  When someone comes to our house, he gets so exited that he screams and shakes all over.

- When he gets super super hungry, he starts imagining that he's eating food.  It's so funny... Until he starts crying because he's hungry.

- We started telling him to close his eyes when he goes to bed at night.  So every night, he goes under his blankets and we tell him to close his eyes and he puts his hands over his eyes.

- He loves Dr. Seuss books.  He knows the words in some of them and proudly declares them.  His favorite book right now is "The Shape of Me and Other Stuff."  At the end of the book, he says "Hooray" so so loud.  I can hear it with two doors closed between us on the other side of the house. 

- He only thinks there are two things that ever come on TV... Curious George and Football.

- He eats well.  He loves chicken... especially when I make fried chicken.  He eats fruit at every meal.  He eats eggs every morning.

- He wants to do everything himself.  When he's doing a puzzle, walking up stairs, or anything else... if you try to help him, he usually very confidently and strongly says "self!" Because he wants to do it all by himself.  

- He loves water.  Water is the only thing he drinks.  Ray told him to drink bath water the other night and he drank a ton.  Yes, he likes bath water.

- He still likes for us to wear him.  We wear him on walks and when we go shopping sometimes.

- He loves to go to church.  Again, probably because he's so social. When we drive in the church parking lot, he declares, "Home!" Well, yes, kinda, buddy. 

- He loves story time.  This shocks me.  James is so busy, but he loves to go to the library, pick up a pillow, sit on it, and listen to stories and rhymes.

- He loves playing outside.  It's been cold recently, so that's been more difficult.  He doesn't really like the snow.

- He says so much.  He repeats pretty much anything and he's learning new words and phrases all the time.  We love talking with him.  

- He loves his grandparents.  A day hardly goes by when he doesn't ask for Gigi, Pop, Mimi, and Grandad.

- He loves to help.  He helps us with the laundry, the dishwasher, sweeping, cooking (he really loves cooking), getting diapers and wipes for the baby, cleaning up his toys, cleaning the counter.  He loves to clean - is it too much to ask if I want him to stay this way for the rest of his life?! 

- He doesn't like clothes.  I probably made him this way.  At home, he just wears a diaper for the most part.  So now, when we come home, he asks me to take off his pants and his shirt.

- He likes to climb.  Kid is crazy!

- Sometimes he tackles his friends.  If he really loves someone, he tackles them.  I feel horrible when he does this to his friends!  Especially when he makes them cry!  But be assured that if James attacks you, he loves you ;) 

I know I'm missing stuff.  I love this kid.

Helping mama clean...

This was him looking at Luke when Luke was holding his bear, Jim.  I told James he needed to share.  He wasn't thrilled... but he was holding it together. 

James was trying to wrestle with Luke here.  Luke was loving it and laughing... and Luke grabbed a handful of James's hair.  James didn't know what to think and quickly surrendered.