McKay - 4 Years Old

I can't believe McKay is 4 years old! We've been looking forward to and counting down to his birthday all year! A few things about my four-year-old McKay are:

• He loves to sing, dance, and listen to music. He can often be heard singing primary songs such as 'Follow the Prophet' while he is going to the bathroom.
• He is and always has been quite independent. Once he has done something on his own he (typically) doesn't ever want help again.
  
• McKay loves to exercise and do things that are 'good for [his] body'. He is a fast runner with excellent endurance. He also loves to jump, do summer saults, and ride his bike.
• He is learning to read by recognizing words when we read books and wants to read the words he knows when we read scriptures. He often figures out what things say such as 'I Am A Child of God' in the hymnal at church.
• McKay has an excellent memory and constantly amazes us by what he remembers. He remembers things we did or said when we lived in our 'old house' and has learned Articles of faith #3 & 5 and almost has 4 learned (if his mother would ever remember to practice it with him!)
• McKay loves to talk on the phone and webcam and knows how to call people he knows on each.
• He is very proficient with the mouse and has picked up on how to exit out of things, shut the computer down, etc and is very good at navigating starfall.com
• He enjoys going to the library, attending story time, reading books to himself, reading books to Maxwell, and having books read to him.
• McKay loves attending primary and listens to what he is taught. When we ask what they talked about he can tell us!
  
• I have had several people tell me how impressed they are with his manners and good behavior, particularly his 'no thank you'.
• McKay is signed up for soccer this fall and is currently taking swimming lessons, which he loves. After completing a challenge I had given him (put his head under the water at the end of 'ring around the rosies') he gave me a big thumbs-up which totally made my day.
• McKay loves 'm-e-m's' and watching 'shows'. He has a lot of favorites but Toy Story, Cars, Word World, and Mary Poppins are definitely at the top of his list!
• He loves to 'do something fun'. Some favorites are crafts, particularly painting, making things to send to 'Dustin in Peru', working in his workbook, watching shows, dancing, playing with Max, etc.
• He loves saying his prayers by himself and Maxwell has picked up on folding his arms at the appropriate time like McKay does. McKay chooses to interlace his fingers.
• McKay gets 'so excited' and loves to anticipate and look forward to things such as his birthday, Christmas, and going to Nanna & Papas house, to name a few. He likes to 'check what day it is' on his calendar and count how many more days until whatever we are counting down to at the time. Since he had his birthday he is counting down the days until we go to to Nanna & Papas house.
• McKay can usually recognize where we are or what we are close to by what he recognizes around us ie, the library, Henry's (grocery store), swimming pool, almost home etc. He is also frequently asking what street we are on.
• He usually explains to me what a red or green arrow means as follows: "If you want to turn this way you have to stop right now!"
• McKay likes to sing songs to get them stuck in my head. A favorite is 'Lets go fly a kite!" *sigh* Unfortunately for me, he is very effective!
  
• McKay talks a lot. He gets it from Jordan (according to his mother). Maybe that is why it drives Jordan crazy. :)
  
• After a string of nonsense words, McKay will say "that means (insert whatever) in spanish".
  
• McKay likes to do or say 'tricky' things.
  

It is hard for a 4 year old boy to smile while his mother tries to get the perfect picture.

So we took a few silly pictures too. This is McKay!

The promise of "m-e-m's" for a good smile definitely helped!

It is truly a delight to have McKay in our family. I feel very privileged to be his mother and am so lucky to be able to stay home with him all day.

Trendsetters

My dancing boys
McKay and Maxwell are setting a new trend. A fashion trend that is. In McKay's defense, he only has a couple of shirts that match those shorts and both were dirty. He is actually really good at matching his clothes. Maxwell LOVES to wear shoes. Actually, he just loves shoes. He is constantly getting our shoes out of our closet and bringing them to us. Jordan is happy to have someone else to blame for his shoes being all over the house. Max always brings us pairs of shoes too, which is actually quite nice. Sometimes he'll even ask to have shoes on when he already has some on. It is becoming a rarity for Maxwell's shoes to be where they 'go'.

Here you can see their 'outfits' a little better. McKay loves to dance and often tells me it is 'good exercise'. Max can't sit still when he hears music.

Maxwell loves having McKay push him on the lion and has gotten good at holding on tight and keeping music playing by pushing the lions nose. McKay likes to go fast and Max loves it.

Maxwell even takes a turn pushing sometimes.

Notice all the balloons under the table. No wonder Max can say 'ba-lloon'; the boys get at least one balloon each week when we go to the store where they give them to the kids. Max loves balloons and sees them everywhere whether or not they really are balloons, including the jellybeans in his ABC book.

In other news, Max is showing signs of his age. Walking at 11 months pushed him out of babyhood and into toddlerhood but he is starting to get REALLY busy these days! He is constantly opening these three drawers and taking their contents all over the house. I guess I should just be happy that he doesn't totally empty them every time (yet).

He is also climbing on EVERYTHING! Most of the time he can get down by himself. Other times he calls for help. Maxwell loves when it is time to brush teeth and runs to the bathroom after prayers saying 'teeth'. It is so fun to watch his excitement. This picture was taken just before his bath. I am constantly amazed (and alarmed!) at what he can reach!

McKay started swimming lessons this week and is absolutely loving it. The first day he said over and over 'that was so.much.fun!' and 'I really really really liked that!" I was relieved! He asked if he could go again sometime and was happy when I told him we would be back the next day. I took this picture of Maxwell after we got home. The picture does not do his cheeks justice. They were very red. It was so hot and there is NO SHADE. I was glad I had my sportsbrella in the van and made friends with a couple of other moms there and one of them had an extra chair since I didn't have one. I am glad I only have to keep my busy Maxwell entertained for 30 minutes!

One week until McKay's birthday and he is so excited!!

Independence Day Weekend!

I didn't take very many pictures this weekend but we sure had a lot of fun. In fact, McKay put 4 pictures on his calendar for the 4th. In his mind more pictures = more fun. So he has 2 pictures of fireworks, a party hat and a present all on one day. I made this calendar for McKay after he kept asking me what day of the week it was and what the date was and if it was still spring or not and how long until July, etc. It is just a simple calendar I created in excel and then laminated. I use a wet-erase marker to write in the days of the month and what we have planned for that day. Then I have the months, seasons, and various little pictures laminated with magnets on the back. He loves his calendar.

Saturday morning we went to Santee Lakes and Jordan and I ran with the double jogging stroller for a couple of miles and then Jordan took off to get a real run while the boys and I went around one lake another time so McKay could run too. It is the first time I've been jogging in a really long time. McKay is a fast runner and I really had to run to catch up with him when he first took off and then had to walk/run to keep up with him. We enjoyed 'getting exercise' together. Then the boys played on the playground until Jordan finished running. The boys had a lot of fun playing on the playground and McKay (as usual) made a few friends to play with. We all went and bought some food for the weekend and then headed home for the afternoon. After Maxwell woke up from his nap, we went swimming in our bishops pool. It has been super hot and humid here so the cool water was very refreshing and we had a lot of fun.

Sunday we had a delicious salmon dinner and then while Max napped, Jordan and I both fell asleep (not intentionally but also not unwelcome!) while McKay watched the home videos I burned on Saturday.

Early Monday morning Jordan took his camp chef and went to the church to help cook breakfast for the ward. After the boys woke up we also went to eat breakfast. It was a great breakfast (with delicious turkey bacon!) and we were fortunate to have cloud cover for the majority of the time we were there. Both boys ate really well and then McKay had fun running around with other children of all ages in our ward. Just before leaving he rode his bike around a bit and proudly showed Sister Gess (the primary chorister who is his 'friend') how well he can ride. While Maxwell napped McKay went with Jordan to get a movie for our movie night during the day. :)

The boys ready to watch Gnomeo & Juliet. It was a cute show, thus the smile on Jordan's face. Usually Max isn't awake for our family movie nights but since we had this one during the day, he was awake to climb all over us and dance to the music. :)

Jordan barbecued ribs for our lunch and found out he is good at that too. :) Around 5 we went to some friend's house for a party (when we had lunch we didn't know they were having ribs... Jordan's were better of course). We enjoyed visiting and the boys enjoyed playing until dark when we walked to a nearby ball field and watched the Santee fireworks. They were NOTHING compared to the Santa Clara fireworks show but we suspect we may not see another show like that again. Max watched for the first 5 minutes!

McKay and Maxwell love to dance to 'fast music' no matter the genre or the source so I try to mix it up a bit.

We successfully wore ourselves out this weekend!

June

Slowly but surely I am catching up on all the things I let go of during tax season. It seems like it is taking me longer every year to get back on top of things! It could also be that THIS YEAR I want to do some of the things that have been on my 'list' for a long time. Hopefully I'll be able to blog more so I don't end up doing these forever long posts! Anyway, here are a few things we did in June.

We started off the month by going to the San Diego Zoo. This time it was a much better experience since we avoided the Tiger Trail and didn't get lost! We saw the elephants first and one even did a dance for us. We also saw the polar bears and several reindeer. None of them had red-noses though.

There are a couple of different areas for the flamingos so we saw them again this time. Those mounds of dirt they are sitting on are nests. One stood up for a second and we saw the egg it was sitting on. Very interesting.
While we were watching the flamingos a couple of peacocks were in the trees around us. One was behind us and the other was in a tree in front of us and they were 'yelping' back and forth. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't want to hear that at night... it is quite a sound.

These ducklings slipped through the fence but (of course) the mother duck couldn't fit. One by one they went back through the fence to the mama duck.

Max helped himself and finished the rest of McKay's lunch he had 'saved for later'. Didn't bother McKay one bit.

McKay finished off the rest of his grow capsules and made a bunch of little foam animals that he and Max had fun playing with. Max was being so silly.

Here he is entertaining his brother (while he eats his lunch) by putting the animals on his head and saying 'uh-oh' when they fell off as he bent over to get more.

I love that smile.

And that hair!

I love that smile too.

We have a weekly park playgroup I organized when we moved here. Sometimes we are the only family there and other weeks more join us. But either way we love going to the park. Here Max is trying out a scooter and lovin' it!

McKay has been itching to ride his bike again so we took advantage of an overcast cool morning and went to the church parking lot. I didn't have to help him at all; he remembered everything.

Max had fun chasing McKay.

He also enjoyed kicking and throwing a ball around the parking lot. He is really coordinated and loves balls. He is the first one to see a ball no matter where we go.

He also enjoyed playing on the rocks, which made his momma a bit nervous. He thinks he can climb on anything...
It really was a lovely morning.

I did a few sewing projects this month including several hooded bath towels and a few burp cloths for friends having babies and for myself. I bought material to make burp cloths before Maxwell was born but didn't have time to make them. And I definitely could have used more with Max! SO I made a few now so that if (or more realistically speaking: when) I don't have time the next time I am expecting a baby I already have a few new cloths ready to go. Good idea eh? McKay loves to watch me sew and entertains himself by playing with my pin cushion and 'making things' with ribbon and pins. I hadn't noticed what he had done to my pin cushion until I picked it up to get a pin. Ouch!

The boys have enjoyed playing in the water on the patio on some of these hot days we've had so far this summer. After the first time I set it up I realized I needed to be prepared with towels for the boys and a chair for me to sit on BEFORE I let them play with the water. When I left them the first time Max was drenched when I got back, thanks to his brother.

This was taken at Mast Park, which is my favorite because there are lots of trees shading the playground. Max likes hats but I haven't found one he will keep on for very long, unlike McKay who will keep his on the whole time. We were the only people there from our playgroup but McKay made friends with some other boys there and had so much fun playing with them while Max enjoyed having free reign over the sand toys. He enjoyed it so much I had to give him a bath when we got home!

This is how Maxwell eats: mouth full, fist full, and tray empty. Usually both fists are full. Once one hand is free he starts asking for more. Funny boy!

It is not unusual for Jordan to fall asleep on the floor after dinner in the evening. His commute is usually about 45 minutes. He gets to work and has to walk 15 minutes from where he parks to the office. He has to be to work by 6 am and doesn't usually get home until about 6 pm on good nights, which makes for very LONG days. This is how I found him one evening.

We went to La Jolla Shores Beach to help our friends celebrate their baby's first birthday and the boys had fun flying McKay's Buzz Lightyear kite. Notice how Maxwell is all tangled up in the kite's tail.

McKay busy trying out the new sand toys.

Max is in the phase where he wants to play with whatever McKay has. At least I hope it is a phase cause it is sure making life interesting.

McKay loves to chase birds.

Our friends had an un-birthday party for their little girl whose birthday is in December. A pool party isn't too much fun in December! Both boys had so.much.fun. I didn't grab my camera when the boys first got in and I didn't want to leave Maxwell alone so this is the only picture I got, which was toward the end. They loved playing in the pools, running through the sprinklers, playing with toys and having a nice little lunch. Seriously, it was great. In this picture McKay's friend Melody Jacobson had this great idea that if McKay took off his hat they could both fit on the spinning toy, in the pool, inside the ring. Once they got in there they giggled and giggled and called for Melody's mommy (Tasha) to see.

Maxwell loves strawberries. He saw them at Costco and couldn't figure out why I didn't give him some right then. So we had some for lunch, and for a snack after his nap and after dinner... pretty much every time he saw them! :)

Family Pictures

We took our family pictures using the timer on our camera. Jordan gave me a remote for it for Mothers Day so that helped make it easier. We were wondering if Max would look at the camera with no one behind it. It turned out that McKay was the one we should have been worried about!

Love these boys!