Wednesday in our World

Here are some of things going on in our (or James'!) world these days:


James has been asking for a trumpet for months now, and I really wanted to get him one for his birthday but they were either too babyish or too expensive advanced for a three year old! We were at Walmart the other night and happened to run across this one in the Easter section. It was perfect - fully functioning but also only a $2 investment. We both squealed in delight when we found it, and I knew I couldn't wait until Easter to give it to him. When he climbs on a "stage" with any instrument, it is always a good sign that he loves it! And now that he has finally acquired a trumpet for his instrument collection, he is asking for a tuba...oh my! I think there is lots of music in our future with this one, and I love that. :)

I haven't been taking pictures of all of them, but we have been doing lots of Easter/Lent activities to help prepare James (and our hearts too!) for Easter! One day we painted an egg with watercolors that opens on the side by attaching a brad to reveal a little chick inside (all credit to Pinterest!). I talked to him about new life in Jesus as we painted.

We just had James' three year old well checkup this week. He is doing pretty well with potty training, but we are planning to go a little more full-force now that some other factors in our life are more normal (holidays/birthdays are over, morning sickness is over, car searching is over, etc.) I don't really consider myself to be a laid back person, but at the same time, I didn't see any point in forcing James in this area before he was ready and stressing us both out. I definitely think he is ready to take the plunge now, and it will be nice if we can get him pretty potty trained before baby Jude arrives. The doctor suggested this idea for potty rewards, and we thought it was amazing - hang Hot Wheels cars up high in the bathroom as motivation to stay dry and use the potty all day long. We are starting today complete with Thomas the Tank Engine underwear. If he has lots of success today, he will get to choose one of the Hot Wheels cars to take down and add to his collection. Luckily, Stephen has tons of Hot Wheels in the attic from when he was a little boy. James asked last night when Stephen was rummaging through the attic for the cars, "That's the Hot Wheels store!?!" Pretty funny!

James asked to watch Diego inside his bucket of stuffed animals one day while I was getting dinner ready. This picture looks a little ET-esque, but I thought it was really cute. To me this picture is truly worth a thousand words (about what our life is like at the moment..!)