Hello Everyone.

As I sat down to write this, I realized it was probably good we all had colds this week and didn’t do much.  Looking back this has been a really busy month.  Good, but busy.  And when did Easter sneak in there?

We have had a couple new things happen this month.  First a new park opened up really close to us.  So we have enjoyed that several times.  It has tons to climb on, a splash pad and frisbee golf.  Jeremiah really likes that (even though we only go to one or two of the goals).  It also has a huge snake head the kids can climb on, Jeremiah really likes that!  I also started a Women’s Accountability Group at church.  Jeremiah loves going and playing with the Iwasaki family.  He thinks he is big stuff because we get there and set everything up.  I think he thinks he “owns” the place now.  🙂

We took in some sights this month too.  We went to the surf museum for the first time.  It was nice, but “kids can NOT touch ANYTHING” so said the man at the entrance.  So that was a little intimidating with 4 kids under 4 and a baby.  There was an open area out back with a mural, so they could run around out there and pretend to surf.  We then walked the couple blocks to the pier and played on the beach and had lunch.  It was too cold to get in the water, but was beautiful on the land.  We also went to the Zoo…twice.  More about that later.

Aunt Anna came out to Auntie Katie’s for spring break and they came down here for a couple days.  Jeremiah now blames Aunt Katie for giving him his cold 🙂   He loved having both aunts around.  We went to the Zoo even though we had been there 5 days before.  Jeremiah called and begged them to go to there instead of the Wild Animal Park and being the good aunts they are they caved quickly.  Jeremiah loves the sky ride, which is really the only reason he wanted to go back to the zoo.  Definitely no fear of heights for him, considering he hangs his head out to be able to see the pandas from up above.  We did see the baby panda (born at the first of the year), he was about 30 feet up in a tree with his momma sound asleep on the ground.  There were a lot of babies (koalas, camels, meerkats, giraffes).  We had a great time.  The aunts also took him to the beach on Wednesday while I went to the women’s group.  He had fun in the sand with them but wouldn’t go in the water or even chase waves with them.  The mom in me was glad he was cautious around the water.  While Jeremiah napped we managed to sneak in a quick trip to the mall.  We also got to eat a few meals with friends.  Good times.

After the aunts left, we meet up with friends we hadn’t seen for a long time.  Almost all of the ladies I keep in touch with from the Child Preparedness Class met up at the new park.  It was fun to see how much the kids have changed.  They were all born within a month and 4 days of each other – Jeremiah was the last.  We had a good time catching up and the kids had fun running around together.  We hadn’t seen most of them since early December and some longer than that, so Jeremiah was a little shy at first, but then as usual he warmed up.

He also has finally warmed up to the Children’s Ministry Director at church.  He refused to say “hi” to her for the longest time.  But I am helping with her wedding in May, so now they are best of friends.  We went to her apartment for a meeting and now she is in.  He even gave her a gift for her bridal shower – the glittery easter egg (“because I not like that one, Miss Garyn will”) with a bouncy ball in it.  And finally after a year, he will say “hi” to the lady at Home Depot who helps with the projects.  He was really shy around her too.  He loves going and it looks like this year there are all new projects, so we will continue to go there, until he can do the Lowe’s building projects – those have a few more steps.

In the process of all of this we got tickets to go to Uncle Nich’s wedding.  Well I will go and Jeremiah and Andy will stay and enjoy the water slides at our resort.  Nich & Mel are getting married at an adults only resort.  Jeremiah is now ok with not going because only “old boring people will be there” – according to Uncle Nich.  So that will be our vacation for quite some time – not too bad – a trip to Jamaica.

Easter was so much fun this year.  Jeremiah can really remember most of what happened last year, so he was excited about everything this year.  We talked about Palm Sunday and waving the palm branch like he did last year.  He was VERY impressed when he sat in on the worship that Sunday and Pastor Matt knew about Palm Sunday too.  The look on his face was priceless.  He looked at me and his mouth dropped open and his eyes rolled toward Pastor Matt with this look like “did you hear that mom? HE knows the story about the donkey too!”  We went to Eggsapalooza again this year.  Evidentially it was advertised on the news this year.  It was PACKED.  We still had fun and Jeremiah did manage to get about 8 eggs in the hunt – pretty good with 60+ kids 4 and under rushing in for them.  He loved the bouncies, “train ride”, cupcake walk – he won without walking, and tattoo.  Oh and of course the cotton candy.  He convinced us not to wait in line for food and to go to Chinese buffet instead.  So he was thrilled and on a pretty good sugar rush.

Easter Sunday he found eggs right away when he got up.  He totally missed his Handy Manny present that was behind the Easter Basket, but was so excited when we pointed it out.  I think he was more excited to go to Iwasaki’s for lunch.  Then they did an egg hunt, just for him, Isaac and Reese.  He really liked that and came away with a whole bagful of eggs.  He still is not clear on the whole Jesus dying and coming to life again – a very hard concept for a 3 year old, but he loves the hymn “Up from the Grave”.  I am sure we will be trying to explain the whole thing for months.  The child has to understand everything and will often come up with more questions later.

All else is pretty normal – talking like crazy, singing and making up songs (the latest and favorite of the moment is “Jingle Bell Rock” – I know Christmas, but I can’t explain it), eating like crazy, playing and running and going non-stop.  I told him he needed to eat like a normal boy the other day and realized picking his mixed vegetables up with his fingers is probably normal for a 3 year old, but I wasn’t going to tell him that.  He hit 3 foot 4 inches and is staying right around 40-41 lbs.

So that is what we know this month.  Crazy and busy and fun and exhausting.  Hope you are doing as well!
🙂
Nichole