Spring is coming!

The weather was great this weekend, so we took advantage of it by playing outside. I'm happy to report that Jackson loves riding his bike and is really good at it, so no late night bike training sessions here! After a good bike ride and a trip on the scooter, Jackson decided he wanted to pull all of his nap buddies around in his wagon. As he was pulling them on the sidewalks, he'd exclaim, "They're so happy! They're having fun!"

Our attention span doesn't last too long, so 5 minutes later (or 1-2 trips to and from the neighbor's house), we had to switch to the truck. Jackson is still a little scared of this and wants someone by his side at all times. He finally started going down the sidewalk and into the neighbor's driveway when he got scared and told Tom, "I'm going to crash into the door!" Here Tom is trying to explain that Jackson just needs to turn his steering wheel to get back to the sidewalk. Looks simple, right?

Ummmm.....No. Jackson decided that it would be much easier to push it and physically turn it using his brute strength.

Finally Tom convinced Jackson to get back in the car. Tom steered the truck while Jackson pressed the gas pedal. Somehow I don't think this is what the manufacturers intended for this toy! On the bright side, I don't think we'll have to worry about Jackson begging to drive our car anytime soon....or hopefully within the next 13 years.

Next he tried his smaller vehicle, but he's getting too big for it. Jackson doesn't seem to understand why it suddenly got so much smaller!

Once he got tired of that, we moved back to the wagon. Only this time Jackson wanted to ride with his nap buddies, too.

Since he hadn't ridden his small trike yet, he decided his nap buddies should get a front row seat to watch him ride it around the driveway. I love the focus and deliberate placement of each of his friends that he's showing here!

A little while later, he rearranged them so that they each got a different view. Once he got them the way he wanted them, he said "Mommy, take a picture of me!" .

He decided to try the truck one more time that night. He said Woody, Buzz and Jessie wanted to come, too. Aren't they so cute sitting there in the seat with him?

We had another big first this week - Jackson's first soccer practice! We went to Academy this weekend to get him some cleats and some shinguards. We also picked up a water bottle (Thanks for remembering, Tom!) so that he could actually have something to drink at practice. We kind of felt like it was the first day of school - what should he wear to the first practice? Is it going to be a full practice or more of a get-to-know the coach and team with a little bit of kicking the ball thrown in? Should he wear tennis shoes or cleats? Does he need to wear his shin guards? Where is the field? So many questions....no one to answer them. (OK, we were prepared for that last question. We drove to find it the night before. See, we really are treating it like the first day of school!)

We did what any prepared parent would do - we brought it all with us! (and yes, even though I don't have treats in the car and I don't carry puffs in my purse with a sippy, I do count myself in this crowd for at least one night!)

He was so excited to go to practice. He told all of his friends and his teachers that day that he was going to play soccer. He told me "Holden will be so happy." Apparently Holden really likes soccer, too! Jackson picked out his shirt special for this great day. But with all of the new things going on, Jackson was most excited about......his water bottle.

When practice started, Jackson jumped right into the crowd. It was so cute watching him with the other kids and the coach. Jackson is definitely a pleaser. You could always count on him being right in front of the coach when the team came together for a talk. Here is he stretching as far as he can to get ready to practice.

Next it was time for some drills. I was surprised how good Jackson was with his footwork (look at me talking like I actually know something about soccer - it sounded good, though, didn't it?).

Patiently waiting his turn to knock down the bowling pins (aka orange cones) with his ball.

1/4 of the practice was spent like this:

Next they practiced kicking the ball up and down the field. Jackson was really fast.

Here's a video of Jackson and his teammates practicing kicking the ball into the goal. It was really windy, so I apologize for the noisiness of the video!

About halfway through the practice, the coach had them scrimmage - 4 against 4. There were only a few issues:

1. No one knew each other, and had no clue who was on their team (do 3 and 4 year olds really understand the concept of "team" any way?).
2. Rules.....who needs rules?
3. The goal they were aiming for was the one directly in front of them....even if it was on the next field (or two) over.

Jackson was really fast and could easily catch up to the pack, but he didn't seem to want to get into the crowd to try to get the ball. He got bumped a couple of times, which he didn't like. He got pushed down 3 times, which he REALLY didn't like. The last time he got pushed down, he started bawling, and it took us about 5 minutes to get him to stop. Fortunately, we had the water bottle handy, and he went back to his coach to tell him that he had 2 drinks. Not 1, but 2! When we asked him after practice how he liked it, he just kept saying that people hit him and knocked him down. I'm not sure how well this is all going to go. We tried to keep telling him that he was ok, and that getting bumped or knocked down was going to happen - everyone is going for the ball, and sometimes people get in the way! So stay tuned...not too sure how this one will turn out!

I've posted all of these pictures in an online photo gallery. Hopefully if you click this link, you'll be able to download any pictures that you want on to your own computer.

https://picasaweb.google.com/TMCGILLEN?authkey=Gv1sRgCPuwi7K1np-t7AE