Swimming with Gammie and Poppa

I'm a bit late in posting this but I got some great video of the boys swimming with Gammie and Poppa (my parents) last weekend. James is doing so well with swimming on his own - with the help of a floatie and close supervision from Poppa. He can swim from one set of stairs to the other all on his own. This is a huge improvement from last summer when he would only go a few feet before grabbing for me or the wall. John is also progressing a lot. Last year he wouldn't leave the stairs even if I was holding him. Now he's holding on to Gammie's arm and kicking his feet. The boys both start swim lessons at the Katy YMCA on the 6th of July. I'm hoping that these early summer pool outings help them get ready for their lessons. Here's a video of both of them swimming. It's about four and a half minutes just to give you a heads up.

Keira's Birthday Party

This past Saturday, we went to our friend Keira's birthday party. James and John had an absolute blast at the party, especially playing in Keira's pool. James was in the water non stop. The only time he came out was when we sang Happy Birthday to Keira. He didn't even come out to eat lunch. The party was a bit rough for John. He's at that age where he understands what birthdays are but doesn't understand that it's not always his birthday. He got really upset when he didn't get to blow out the candles or open the presents. Before we left, I asked Mo (Keira's mom) where she got the pool so I could pick one up for the boys. Later that afternoon while the boys napped, Sally and I ventured to Big Lots to pick it up. It will really come in handy when I don't feel like taking the boys down to the neighborhood pool. Here's a video clip of the boys playing in the pool and the birthday girl.

The Flip

I'm not sure if any of you out there have seen the ads on the Internet or TV for the Flip but we just got ours last Friday and are totally in love with it. Ours will record two hours of HD quality video and is just a hair bigger than our digital camera. We're so excited to have this wonderful camera so we can actually take video of the boys without 1. lugging out the big video camera or 2. using up a lot of memory on our digital camera. It was super easy to set up and is really easy to use. The software that comes with it is actually on the camera so there's no extra disc to keep track of. I've played with it some and it's fairly easy to use. I've e-mailed a video and uploaded a video to YouTube. We hope to post a lot more video of the boys to our blog now that we have this super small, handy video camera. A BIG, HUGE, GINORMOUS Thank You to Judy and Steve for this wonderful gift. Here's a little video of Jude and James.





If any of you haven't seen the ads below is the website. We also saw them at Best Buy yesterday when we were buying accessories for the camera.

http://www.theflip.com/

Water fun with Molly

James and Molly are two peas in a pod when it comes to fun with the water hose. They must have played in the water for almost two hours the afternoon of the 30th. James had a blast spraying Molly with the water and she enjoyed jumping in the water trying to drink/eat the water. Here are some photos of them playing. I see this becoming a favorite activity this summer.

Fence project

After being in our house for two years, we have grown tired of the yucky grey color the fence has become. Brian took it upon himself to make it like new again. He borrowed a pressure washer from a co-worker and after three afternoons got the fence all washed. Then this morning he, with the invaluable help of our good friends Kristen and Darren, stained the fence a nice redwood color. I'll have to see if I can dig up some before pictures but here's what it looks like now. Oh yeah, there's one photos of Brian's helper - James. I put him in some old clothes that he could ruin and Brian put him to work painting with a brush.

All About James - Age 5

This post is dedicated to our fantastic five year old son, James. James is your typical boy and is definitely his father's son. James loves all things super hero and science fiction. One of his favorite things to do is play games on the Wii. Not your typical Wii Sports games but the role playing games where the characters are all made from Legos. He got the Batman game for Christmas and the Star Wars game with some of his Christmas money. While he doesn't mind playing alone, he really prefers to play with Brian after we eat dinner before taking a bath and going to bed. I'm just amazed at how he's mastered all of these complicated movements and use of so many buttons at such a young age. I know I sucked at video games when I was a kid and there was just the up,down, left, right, A and B buttons. James is also obsessed with all things Star Wars. He's seen all six movies about a hundred times and can tell you what happens in each one scene by scene. He loves to battle with toy lightsabers and has probably 7 to 10 scattered in the backyard just waiting to duel with whoever is willing to play with him. When we went to Disney World, he rode the Star Tours ride three times with Brian and thoroughly enjoyed the live show they had just outside the ride. We had hoped he'd put up his hand to go up on stage but he was too shy. Hopefully when we go back he'll be more willing to go up on stage to attend Jedi Training Camp and battle Darth Vader. I know I commented on John's addiction to chocolate so I have to note that James is the complete opposite. James likes candy but not anything chocolate. He likes Skittles and Starburst. He also much prefers rainbow sherbert to any other flavor of ice-cream. He also doesn't care for cookies, cake, brownies, or any typical desserts. He asked for a birthday cake but will only eat two bites and then throws the rest out.

We can hardly believe that James will be starting Kindergarten at the end of August. We have no idea where the last five years have gone but we know they have been better because of James. He's such a wonderful little boy. He's always giving me hugs and kisses and runs to greet Brian every day when he gets home from work. We will be sad to see him get on that bus but are happy that he's growing up happy and healthy.

James had a wonderful birthday. The day started out with opening presents from Mom, Dad, John and Jude. James received the Lego Indiana Jones game for the Wii, books, and a backpack for the upcoming school year. After that we went out for quesadillas as James' favorite meal is "cheesies". Afterward, Brian took James and John to see the new Pixar movie Up while I stayed home with Jude. After the movie, we were off to the mall to have James' five year old photos taken. James was a complete and total ham. We had a hard time chosing between all the great shots the photographer captured. The next day, Gammie, Poppa and Aunt Jocelyn came down to celebrate with us. James got a game for his computer, Hellboy and a super cool water gun. They boys and Molly had a blast playing with the water guns and hose in the backyard that afternoon.

Our budding photographer

James has been really into cameras for a while. He got his own camera for Christmas and has been taking pictures with our camera from time to time. Here are some of the photos he snapped while he was visiting us in the hospital. Some of them were actually pretty good.