Swimming Lessons

Today was Mr. Mister's first day of swimming lessons. His class is called the "Guppies." It was really cute to see 10 little toddlers all in their bathing suits lined up in the pool!

I was unsure as to how he would do. He loves the pool and doesn't like to be told he can't do something, so I envisioned him wanting to jump off the side over and over and then screaming when I tried to get him to do the structured activities.

But he ended up doing very well...much better than I expected. He did have his eye on the big blue twisty water slide the whole time, but he actually did okay when I redirected him to what the teacher was saying. He liked laying on his belly and kicking and he loved blowing bubbles. He didn't like doing anything on his back. The highlight for him (which wasn't even part of the class) was when he realized he could walk in the water because he could touch the bottom. The two pools we swim in most often don't have a shallow end, so this was a new feeling for him. After he figured it out, he pretty much checked out of class and wanted to just walk around. He was very proud of himself!

So one day down, 7 to go. I hope that's not too many days. I like it because I like swimming and it's something fun for us to do together. And it's the perfect activity to make him tired enough for a long afternoon nap!

Straight from the mouth of Mr. Mister

I just love this process of him learning how to talk. He says the cutest things and always surprises us with words we didn't know he knew. Some of the fun things he's said recently are:

• Reaching his arms up to me, he says, "Mommy, hold you?" Of course, he means, "Hold me." But because I've always said, "Do you want me to hold you?" he says hold you too. Adorable.

• He was looking in the full length mirror in our room, talking to his reflection. He then said, "Bye bye!" and left the room. He walked away and started saying bye bye to everything he saw. "Bye bye door. Bye bye wall. Bye bye bed. Bye bye potty."

• He learned the word ladybug from a magazine we read. So the other day, we had a friend in the car (who was a lady) and after she got out, he told me "Ladybug sit" as he pointed to where she sat. How cute is that? Calling a lady a ladybug!

• When anything falls he says in a very worried sounding voice, "Oh my!"

• On Saturday, Daddy went to meet a friend for coffee in the morning. Two days later, Mr. Mister said, "Daddy meeting Joe coffee." I thought that was pretty good both for his memory and his words. The best part is that he says it with a big smile, knowing he's impressing us.

• One night as he was getting in the bath, he randomly said, "Bald eagle." It of course took me by surprise but I realized he learned it from the Little Einsteins video he likes to watch. (See, TV isn't all bad!)
  

Summer Love

Mr. Mister has discovered the sweet joy of a popsicle on a hot summer day. He enjoys them so much that he begins asking for a "pockle" after breakfast. We've been trying to teach him that popsicles are an afternoon treat, but that is hard for a little guy to understand. He even asks for specific colors, although I think he'd be content with any form of ice cold sugar.

Hanging out and Haircuts

Last Friday evening, we had dinner and a "pool party" at Pey Pey's house. The boys got to play in the kiddie pool while the adults hung out on the deck. We were talking about how both of the boys needed hair cuts so we ended up getting out the clippers and doing it right then! Daddy got his hair cut too. As you can tell from the pictures below, Mr. Mister didn't think it was too much fun!

Today's Highlights

On a lighter note than the post below, here are some funny moments from today:

• Mr. Mister wanted to choose his clothes for the first time! He chose a red t-shirt and blue and red pajama pants. I told him it was a little too hot for pants, but he wanted to wear them anyway. So we added green Crocs to the outfit and went to the grocery store. It felt good to let him be independent, even if it wasn't what I would have chosen for him to wear.

• This morning Mr. Mister was really interested in my coffee. So I gave him a sip, thinking it would make him realize that he didn't like it. But it backfired. He said, "Yum!" I think it's because it was mostly milk and sugar :) We'll stick with Daddy's rule about Mr. Mister drinking coffee - he can only drink it if he's content to be this height for the rest of his life.

• We went to a furniture store this evening to look at couches. The salesperson who helped us was named Walt and was a BIG man. Mr. Mister wasn't too friendly at first, but quickly warmed up. All of a sudden, he walked over to Walt and kissed his leg three times! It took Walt by surprise but made him laugh. They were buddies after that :)

Discipline

As a result of Mr. Mister's choices tonight, he had to go to bed right after dinner (which was 8:00 anyway) without rocking or reading books. This was devestating. To him and to us. We love that connection time before bed just as much as he does.

He screamed in his crib for what seemed like forever but was probably only 20 minutes. I thought back to when we were trying to get him to sleep through the night and let him cry one night for 2 hours. For some reason, tonight seemed so much worse. I even started crying.

Finally, after a long time of screaming, I went into get him. We felt like he had already experienced enough pain of a bad choice and it sounded like he was too worked up to calm down at all.

As he collapsed into my arms out of exhaustion, I started crying. I just love this little guy so much and hate when he hurts. It was a sweet time of rocking together and singing him to sleep.

The David Book

One of Mr. Mister's favorite new books is Oops by David Shannon. It's pretty simple with two words on each page and we've read it so many times that he has it memorized. Here he is telling us the words of the book (with only a little reminder from Mommy). Not only is he smart, he's super cute as he says it! (You can hear that he has a stuffy nose, too.)



The author of this book writes the "No, David!" series, based on his childhood of being a mischievous toddler and later a troublemaking student. We already relate to the toddler books!

Here are the words of this book (with the scene it's describing in parenthesis), to help you understand what Mr. Mister is saying:

David's first words were...
Ball, uh-oh! (ball breaking a window)
Dog, oops! (dropping food on the dog's back)
Ride, whee! (riding fast on a tricycle)
Eat, yum! (eating while getting food everywhere)
Bath, ahh! (sitting in the bath with his toys)
Mama. (sleeping on his mama's shoulder after his long day of mischief!)