I *heart* reading (and toys)

I got a magazine in the mail the other day because sometimes Mommy and Daddy buy me toys. (Well, mostly Daddy. Mommy usually says we can look at them but we're not going to buy anything today.) I love reading my new magazine.

First Day of School!

I had my first day of preschool today! Well, the first day without Mommy. Last week I got to go check out my new class and play with the toys for a little bit and Mommy hung around the whole time. But today it was just the kids and teachers. So cool!



Mommy surprised me with a First day of school breakfast. She decorated the table just like school.



We ate Applesauce pancakes with cinnamon syrup, sausage, and orange juice. It was so yummy.

I could hardly wait to get out the door and get to school, but Mommy wanted to take a first-day-of-school picture first.

My friend Amelia is in my class. We might be a bit of a handful for the teacher when we're together. But we were both super excited waiting outside the classroom.

We couldn't go in until the teacher opened the door, and as soon as she did, I practically ran inside. Mommy was somewhere close behind. I got to hang up my backpack on a hook and there was a tag with my name on it!

Then the teacher told us to come sit on the rug for circle time.

We sang "Open them, shut them" and I actually did the actions like the teacher was showing us.

After that, Mommy and all the other parents left. I waved good-bye to her and gave her a big thumbs up so it wouldn't be too hard for her to go. I hope she didn't get too lonely while I was at school. She said she was going to do some cleaning while I was in school.

When the moms and dads came back at the end of school, we had to wait on the rug until we saw our own mom or dad. I got so excited when I saw Mommy that I yelled, "Mommy!" and ran over and gave her a huge hug. Then I told her all about my day:

I painted and did circle time and played outside and played with toys and danced to music on the radio and we laid on our bellies and sat on our bums and I went potty all by myself and didn't pee my pants and washed my hands and we had snack time but Mommy gave me the wrong snack which was a fruit roll up and the teacher read the book from the library that I've read before and said that was a rack truck and when I put my fingers in my nose the teacher told me I had to wash my hands and my teacher tied my shoes in a double knot and Mary bonked her head and I was so glad that Mommy came to get me in my preschool.

I can't wait to go back on Thursday!

Random Naps

So, I'm in the random nap stage right now, which can drive Mommy crazy. Sometimes I nap, and sometimes I don't. But I will never just lay down in my bed for naptime. I usually fall asleep in the car driving somewhere and Mommy has to turn around before we get there and go home so she can put me in my bed. She loves it when I take a nap and she can get things done, but then if I do take a nap, I stay up longer at night, which she doesn't love. And what really drives her nuts is when I fall asleep from 4-6 and she doesn't have any time to do the stuff she wants to do because she's making dinner at that time, and then I'm up until 10 after that. Fun for me, not so fun for Mommy.

A few days ago I randomly fell asleep before noon. I was laying on the counch looking at pictures on a box that one of my new toys came in. Mommy ran upstairs to do something and when she came back down, she found this.

Luckily I slept from 11:45 to 2:30, so Mommy got lots of her own stuff done, and since I napped early enough, I still went to bed at a decent hour. She wasn't so lucky yesterday when I fell asleep at 4pm. If she would just play with me all day long instead of making me play by myself once in a while, this wouldn't happen. So technically, it's her own fault.

Fishing

Daddy went fishing in Alaska. I didn't get to go with him because he went with his friends from work instead.

They caught lots of fish, but only a couple these big silvers. It was actually bigger than it looks. Daddy has it bent in the middle. This must be the mommy fish of the one he caught on our camping trip.



He also caught some halibut. He said it is like reeling up plywood from the ocean floor. That doesn't sound very fun, but daddy sure liked it.

Camping

We finally got to go camping! I've been dying to go all summer. Daddy went camping for a week with the big boys from church and I had to stay home. But we finally got to go when the ward had a campout a few weeks ago. It was SO MUCH FUN!

I was a good sport and let Mommy lather me up with bug spray even though there really weren't any mosquitoes around.

But then she let me spray some on her.

Look what I can do...I can fill my cheeks up with air and make a funny face.

This is Daddy's new obsession. He bought a fishing pole for camping with the big boys and now he wants to fish all the time.

He even caught one! If you look really hard you can see it hanging near the edge of his shirt sleeve.

He let me hold it too, before he threw it back in the water. So cool!

I got to sleep in a sleeping bag for the very first time! I used to sleep in a pack n play and last time I only slept on a pad with some blankets over me. A sleeping bag means I'm a real camper. Of course, I only spent half the night in the bag. After I peed in it at 2:30 in the morning, I snuggled in with Mommy. I'm glad she doesn't mind sleeping half on and half off her air mattress.

Mr. Cool. Mommy would probably say Mr. Cranky. Since I didn't get much sleep the night before, I was upset about everything for a while in the morning. I even cried about eating pancakes with syrup and whipped cream for breakfast.

But then I got over it.

That dark spot in the middle of those logs is me. Normally I'm a complete scaredy cat when it comes to climbing and being in high places. But everyone else was climbing these logs, so I didn't give it a second thought. I loved it!

After packing up, we went canoeing. It was totally my idea and I loved it! I was such a big help paddling the boat.

Some of you might remember my first encounter with a canoe two years ago. (The canoe ride) I've obviously matured quite a bit since then.

This was my other favorite part of camping...the water slide. I went over and over and over and over again. Half the time I went with Mommy (while Daddy was fishing....again) and the other half my buddy Sam helped me go down. That's us sliding down.

I can't wait until next summer when we get to go camping again!

Bowling

Grandma and Grandpa de Jong came to visit last week and I got to go bowling for the first time. Check out the cool shoes I got to wear.

I got my own special ball--6 whole pounds. Man, that thing was heavy!

Mommy and Daddy showed me how to walk up to the line at the start of the bowling lane....

and roll the ball between my legs.

It turns out there's a reason you're supposed to stop at that line. If you walk any further, the floor gets really slippery.

I bowled so well for my first time. I knocked down pins every single time I rolled the ball! (Too bad Mommy, Daddy, Gma, and Gpa can't say the same thing.)

Here SHE is!

I got to go to the special doctor's appointment today with Mommy and Daddy to see the baby inside Mommy's tummy. I kept seeing weird fuzzy stuff on a TV screen and they kept calling it the baby. I just wanted to know when the baby was coming out. I'd much rather see it in person than on a TV.

But I guess this is the best we get until Christmas. Even though I told Mommy and Daddy I don't want a baby for Christmas.

She was moving around a ton but really liked to roll into a ball most of the time with her legs over her body and her feet near her head. You can see her leg in the picture below.

This is one of Mommy's favorite pictures. It was one of the first things we saw--her perfect, tiny little feet.

And I don't know why Mommy and Daddy keep saying I'm getting a sister, because as far as I'm concerned, there's a boy in there.