Busy Bees

We have been running all over the place these days, and I've even been taking pictures of our adventures! In the above photo Ezra is preparing some Christmas gifts.

Here he showcases his secret weapon for Christmas gifts this year (hand prints!)

Last night we headed out to our first Christmas event, it featured: a showcase of Christmas trees, a teddy bear hospital, face painting (he held SO still for his snow man), and SANTA! In the above shot he hangs out with Crystal and his bear, who he named Back.

Here's a close up shot of Back. We adopted Back from the teddy bear hospital, where Back then had a cast put on his arm, a tetanus shot administered to his butt, a cap from the OR, and a newborn size diaper.

There was also a performance of middle school kids who were actually really good. Ezra liked their jazzy rendition of Frosty the Snowman. He said, "more, more" and clapped Back's hands together after each song.

Here's the big moment! Ezra got really comfortable with Santa this year, and was talking talking talking his head off about choo choos, hats, and his new bear. Santa was looking fantastic with his mustache curled up at the ends and his lovely cloak. I had to pry Ezra away from him.

On to the last class of gymnastics!

Ezra really pulled out all the stops with his tye dye outfit today. It was gray, foggy, and cold when we woke up so we decided to bring in a little light.

Paired with the ribbon wand he is ready for the folk festival! Or a rave...

And finally here's Maya, Ruby, and Ezra, the dangle berries of class.

Gym Dandies!

Tis the second to the last day of Ezra's gym dandies class, so I crammed in the picture taking and video making. I must apologize for the blurry lens, I guess I need to clean it.

In the first series we see Ezra engaging in the activity of climbing the whale and jumping off. He did this several times, and was enjoying himself immensely. Here we go:

He thinks Why I could do that...

And he does.

Popular whale.

Leap!

Kaboom on the butt. This looked like it hurt but he kept doing it so it must have been OK.
Here's the whole sequence in video form to give you an even better idea of what was going on:

He ran over to spend some time rocking on his favorite dog rocker with Maya, who was not thrilled about the non rocking whale. The little girl you see in the background with the leotard on is the most serious child of the class. There were some pom poms out today and she grabbed two. Her mom snapped, "This isn't cheer leading class, this is gymnastics." I have been thinking about getting Ezra a leotard...

And the grand finale, the most exciting part of class every week (except for the stickers everyone gets at the end), the parachute!

And he did eventually go and sit in the middle.

I need to go to sleep!

Ezra recently got his very own toddler bed! It is very exciting, and he is really fond of it. Today he just laid in it singing to himself (and pulling that quilt off the wall) for like half an hour. I didn't realize until I saw this picture how much red we have everywhere. By the by, the quilt is from Honduras, it was given to me at my baby shower by my co-workers at the school. It was made in a village that is only accessible by basket over a river. So there.

So, as I might have mentioned he had his first gymnastics class this past weekend, Gym Dandies. It's for 18-30 month kiddos, and it was pretty much a free for all the first class. Those kids aren't listening to instruction! We did some fun parachute play and two of the 12 kids ran under it (not including my bunny boy). Ezra was more interested once we put some balls on top of the parachute and did some "popcorn" action. There was a balance beam that he wasn't too interested in, but we've got 8 more sessions so I expect him to master that and the uneven bars.

It's baby social hour basically. Here Ezra and neighbor Ruby (who has the exact same birthday as Ezra) play on the mats.

They had the pink and blue, girl and boy thing going on. Ezra looks pretty big next to the petite Roo Roo.

Bare feet are happy feet! (What's with the frown?)

Ezra got bucked off the whale squishy toy.

Huge nobby ball, sorry other kids, none of you get to play with this one. Ezra and his runny nose have claimed it.

He's getting to be a really fast runner!

The only real beef that I have about the class is that it's only a half hour long and there's another class immediately afterwards so we have to vacate the gym pretty quick. They don't want to leave. Luckily this past Saturday was sunny and warmish, so we were able to channel the play energy to the playground outside.

Here Ezra shows off his new hat, while looking super pale and very gringo.

He's going down big, curvy slides by himself now. It was hard to know when I was no longer needed. I see parents of children older than him still crawling around play structures, but I accept that it is not necessary. Although I'm not just going to talk on my cell phone the whole time either like some people. That seems very rude to me. There was one dad at the park with his daughter (who had a "pretend" cell phone too) and he was jabbering the whole time. Then when he was finally off the phone she was taking "too long" to come down the slide and he told her that she was "dirt in the wheels of progress". I wanted to smack him! This daughter was like 4 still with a pacifier in her mouth. I don't need to say anymore, do I? Not that I'm the best mom either, but you know what I'm saying.

Teeter totter down.

And up.

Somebody got into the Halloween candy stash of Butterfingers (me).

Ewwww! But look at the French on his hat! Gifted from Cayce, so nice.

And finally a little video of Ezra and Dovie eating yogurt like it's juice.
Dovie hung out with us almost all day today, which was pretty fun. She doesn't like playing with Ezra as much as he would like her too (the first girl to resist his charms!) but overall they managed some sort of "play". You will see what I mean about her lack of fondness when he is trying desperately to sit next to her. Oh my little sweetness.
Enjoy!