Sweet Boy

Cole-
You are definately the boy that brings out all my emotions. You make me laugh, get frustrated,and melt all within a matter of minutes. I love your sweet, curious personality. I wanted to write down a couple cute things you've said lately:

- "I love mom so much that I like her!" (cutest thing EVER)
-After getting a hair-cut "the back of my hair feels like a bad rug!"
-While I was telling Mitch that Cooper has his nose "Well I have a booger nose! I really do! There are always boogers. Sometimes I have to blow them out and sometimes they just come out all by themselves!"

You just finished tball, and sometimes you were great and you loved it, and other times you hated it and it was kinda painful for all of us! (the 100 degree humid weather didn't help)...We'll see if you continue.

You are starting to swim on your own now and you are soooo proud about it! I wish we had a better pool in Victoria because I love watching you learn and be so happy about it.

Sure love you!

Dennis the Menace

We watched the movie Dennis the Menace as a family last night, and I laughed all the way through it! You are MY Dennis the Menace!! You are the sweetest boy I know, telling me how much you like me, love, me and telling me that I am the best mom in the whole world. Even though you are so sweet, trouble seems to follow you everywhere you go! It is never a dull moment with you around and we love you so much!

Preschool graduation

You didn't officially do preschool this year, but we were part of a group called kids connection down town. Your teacher, Ms.Kim was amazing!! You loved going there, and were good to participate. At least in the beginning of the year. Towards the end of the year it got busy, and you became less interested. Regardless, it was a great experience and we loved it! You had a water party the last day.

You only enjoy learning with me for short periods of time, and it was good for us to be able to go other places for learning too. You have picked up a lot just from watching Cooper. You know most of your letters and their sounds, you can count to 10, you can do simple addition, you love nursery rhymes and are great at reciting those, and you can write your name. We really need to work on writing other letters and recognizing/writing numbers. You are doing great though! Love you buddy!

Driving

Sometimes we have the best little moments when Ivy's asleep and Cooper's at school. The other day you were pointing out how many "boosters" cars had, and how fast they are. It took me a minute to realize that you were talking about exhaust pipes. I really love raising boys!!

FOUR

COLE-

You are FOUR! You had your first friend party this year and loved it. We also had a neighborhood easter egg hunt on your birthday, which you thought was just for you. You loved the attention, and I actually had a lot of fun throwing the party. Your friends are so good. We had a 'hot wheel' party. You and your friends got to paint  your own wooden car, and race them down the track that Mitch made. We had a donut cake for dessert, a pinata, and played a few games like red light-green light. It was perfect!

I am loving and yet still struggling with this age! I love having time with just us when Ivy is napping. Last week you said "i love you mom, we are best buddies." Melted my heart. Not five minutes later I got a snack for us to share and you started throwing a tantrum that we had to share it. This stage will surely end soon right?

You are getting good at your alphabet and numbers/counting. Your latest thing has been rhyming, and you love rhyming everything. You are great at memorizing and know a lot of songs and nursery rhymes by heart. You love music and dancing and have some pretty sweet moves. You add so much life and fun into our family, and we sure love you!

First time in Primary!

On Sunday, your future sunbeam class got to go into primary for singing time for the first time! They are going to start letting you come every sunday now for a little bit. Luckily, Kamri's mom snuck a picture of you with your friends. Your class is Caleb, Jack-Jack, You, and Kamri. You are the oldest one in the class. You all did so good at going into primary today. I can't believe how much you are growing up!

Good Days

Dear Cole-

Today we had a really, really good day together. I bought you a thing of blue play-doh yesterday and played with it for hours today! It was so fun. I love being able to spend time together. We made olaf (the snowman), dinosaurs, letters, monsters, balls, and all kinds of things with play-doh. One thing that I love about you is that you don't need fancy things to be happy. You really just want to spend time with your family having fun more than anything else. I think that me spending time with you and playing with play-doh was the very best thing in the world to you. I love you for reminding me about the simple-and most important-things. I also love your sense of humor and contagious laugh, and the words that you say like a toddler! My favorite sentence that you say all the time is "my brudder is at kindagarten"

xoxo
mom

Preschool

I decided not to enroll you in formal preschool this year. I wanted to be able to spend time learning together this year. We are doing a lot of activities though. We go to story time at the library, music time with friends, preschool taught by moms with Blaine Bass from church, and sometimes another story time activity the city offers. You will also be doing soccer like Cooper, so you have a lot of things going on.

You have a hard time sitting still, and don't like when a lot of attention is on you. You like when I go to things with you. I have been impressed with how much you know, because we haven't worked on much yet. You are pretty good at tracing your name, and are such a great counter.

I am excited for this year and the time that we get to spend together!!

BRAVE

Cole,

You are such a brave, brave boy! We have had to get a few tests because the doctor says that you aren't growing as much as she'd like. I've been worried about it too, so I'm glad we are looking into it. Right now, the tests are just blood work-she is checking your thyroid and checking for celiac disease. We should find out next week what the results are.

When I took you to the outpatient lab, they drew about 6 tubes of blood from your arm. You were AMAZING! I don't think there has ever been a braver 3 year old to get his blood drawn! You didn't cry, and I don't think you even flinched.

I hope that you're strong and healthy. Dad gave you a blessing tonight after Cooper's school blessing. He blessed you that you will be heathy and strong.

Your nursery teachers always tell us how much they love having you in class! This year will be a fun one that we get to spend together. I love you lots!

xoxo
mom

preschool

You are potty trained!! You did amazing and only really had one accident the very first time. You cried when you had the accident. We talked to you and told you it was ok and that you could do it, and after that you've been doing so great and never having accidents! I am so proud of you!

We have started doing preschool together. Today we glued some cheerios to your name that I wrote big. When you saw what my plan was for the cheerios you said yuck! I think you were hoping to eat them! 

Dear Cole:

Dear Cole:

I want to start out by writing what I hope for you. These are some of the wonderful qualities that you have that I want to help you keep while you are growing up because I think that they will bless your life and the lives of others!

I want you to always keep your spunky personality. I hope you always are able to spread happiness and smiles wherever you go, just like you do now.

I hope that you love others the way I see you love them now. Your friends and family are your favorite things in the whole world, and if you stay close to the people that love you, I see you having a great support throughout your life!

I hope that you always pick good friends and that you are always a good friend. Good friends make you a better person. You will be one that people want to be around because you make them happier. You are so good to let people know that you love them. You bring so much love into our family, and all of your friendships.

I hope that you are able to develop a love for your Savior like you have for your friends and family.  Develop a close relationship with him through prayer and scripture study. He will never let you down.

I hope you always are true to yourself, no matter what kinds of pressures you might face, you are strong enough to do what is right for you. You have never been one who cared what others think.
This can be a strength if you use it to resist temptations and problems.

I love your determination. Life will be hard, but you will be able to handle those times because of your optimism, humor, and determination. You will be able to handle anything, and probably with a smile on your face.

You are a competitor. You love to win. I hope that you use that fierceness to push you to always want to be your best self.

You love to read. In all of your fun, don't forget to save time for learning. Learning can be fun!

There is probably so much more that I want to say, but this is a start :)
We love you so much, Cole, and can't wait to see who you turn out to be!

Mom