A new year with a 4 year old boy! And a girl that lost a tooth!

Happy New Year to you all! We had a great New Year's Eve celebrating our little Adam, who, as per usual, was pretty oblivious to the celebrations:). Lynsey made him the sweetest gift - a stick with a necklace on the end of it that he could shake. She has such a big heart! He actually seemed interested when we were singing to him and was smiling the whole time, which was nice to see. He really does look like a 4 year old now. He's grown a few inches in the past few months and just looks like a school kid when he's got his backpack on. Chokes me up a bit! I just want to keep him close to me and protect him forever, but apparently he is going to grow up anyway!

On New Year's Day we went to the Aquarium with a few friends. It was a nice time, although I have decided the Aquarium is a bit of a hectic outing to be done sparingly. It's just too hard to keep track of the kids. Adam wandered away from us right at the end of the trip and we couldn't find him for probably 5 minutes. Terrifying! On some level I knew he was probably sitting somewhere waiting for us, but you just never know. He was in fact sitting on a bench, no stress on his face. He looked like he was waiting for the bus, business as usual. Yikes! Even after that incident, I decided to take the kids to the zoo on Friday all by myself, and it went so well! It is way easier to keep track of everyone at the zoo! The kids had lots of fun, jumping in the puddles was a highlight for Lynsey and Nathan (Adam was happy to watch them jump in, didn't actually go in himself). The weather was beautiful, I was really glad I attempted it:).

It has been nice to get back to routine this week. Adam had a little bit of trouble getting in the van the first few days back to school, but once he was at the school, it was automatic and he did fine. The music teacher was telling me today that he's been singing along in music class, which is so cute! My musical little boy:). Lynsey claimed to not want to go back to school, but I think she's enjoyed being back with all her friends. Nathan is a bit lonely, but he actually played by himself for like an hour this morning in the basement which was such a relief for me! He would love it if all I did all day was sit there and read him books and play trains and cars, so little breaks are very nice. I do love how much fun he is right now:). High maintenance, but fun!

Lynsey lost her first tooth on Monday night! We were getting ready for bed, and her tooth had been pretty loose all day. She was biting on some toy and all of a sudden there were very excited exclamations of "My tooth came out!" to be heard! It was fun to see her be so excited, and we played along with the tooth fairy thing, even writing back when she wrote a note to her:).

Oh and I just want to mention that I can't remember the last time Adam had a #2 accident! We are officially declaring him 100% potty trained as of his 4th birthday:). Considering what we thought our potty training journey might be, that doesn't sound so bad at all! Now we just have to decide if we want to give Nathan a try . . . while Brian's parents were here, and sat down on the potty and immediately peed, giving me all kinds of hope! He hasn't repeated this, and when we ask him if he wants to go potty, he always says, "No potty" so I'm not too sure this was a sign at all. I am toying with the idea of one or two days in underwear just to see what happens! I am trying to have the same mindset I had with Adam, low expectations so as to reduce frustration, I will not have a repeat of the Lynsey potty training saga!