Spreekt u Engels?: Harrison

Today was the official first day of school for Cameron and Harrison! While most Belgian schools started yesterday, the boys were able to go to the school for a few hours yesterday to meet their teachers, see their rooms, and meet the other children in their classes. Cameron was very excited to start another school year, especially after seeing his good friends yesterday. Harrison wasn't quite as sure when we left this morning, but he seemed to be fine when we dropped him off.

Cameron will be in the equivalent of a kindergarten class (upper pre-primary) this year.

Harrison will be in the equivalent of a preschool class (lower pre-primary) this year.

The boys wanted to ride their bikes to school this morning.

There are seven kids in Cameron's class right now, mostly five year olds, and he has a new teacher this year, Miss Mia (from Ireland). This year he will start to read, count and recognize numbers 1-100 (although he can already do that for the most part), learn more about addition and subtraction (he can also do this pretty well), and follow IPC theme units.

Harrison will be in a class with 13 children, two and a half to four years old. He will have the same teacher as he had at the end of last year, Miss Inbal (from Israel). He will have IPC theme units and continue to work on literacy and numeracy, more specifically, recognizing the sounds of each letter and working on numbers 1-20. There will also be plenty of playing and fun in his classroom! Harrison will be one of the oldest kids in his class and one of two returning kids this year, so I think he will have a different role at school than he did last year. Last year he was one of the younger kids and more of a follower. We are interested to see if he takes more of a leadership role this year or not. He was not too sure about being in class without Cameron, but I think being on his own will help him develop and grow!

It's usually difficult to get a rundown of the day from the boys, but from what I could gather, they both had a good first day. They had big smiles when I picked them up and are looking forward to going again tomorrow. We are looking forward to a great year!

Today our sweet Harrison turned three. THREE!!! I could go on about how it goes by so quickly (because it does), but that's been said a million times. Instead, I am choosing to celebrate this little man and be thankful for what a wonderful part of our family he is. Random side note, Harrison has celebrated all of his birthdays in Belgium!

As I sit here and think about Harrison, it's hard for me to feel like I can accurately describe who he is. For those of you who know him, you know that he is quite a character. He loves to laugh and play, be chased and tickled, play with trains, watch cement trucks, jump on anyone who will let him (without mercy or warning), talk in funny voices, ride his scooter, sing and play instruments, help us cook and bake, read books, ride the tram, run around with Cameron, hold Zoe, ride his bike, and be silly. He also loves his blue blanket (he always refers to it as his blue blankey). Additionally, Harrison LOVES to eat! He eats with much gusto, which is a nice way of saying that his food gets everywhere! And he even out eats us sometimes...I'm pretty sure we should start saving now for when he becomes a teenager! He is also the king of funny faces. Whether he's being silly, or checking out a stranger, or just not enjoying what you're doing or saying, you will surely be able to see what he's thinking written all over his face.

Harrison is a pretty agreeable little guy, most of the time. He's happy to play by himself or with others. He has a great imagination and loves to play. However, he does have a bit of a temper, which really showed itself over this past year. The terrible twos were in fact terrible twos for Harrison...not all the time, but the whining, tantrums, and stubbornness really introduced themselves this year. We've had some different/new issues to try to understand with Harrison than we did with Cameron, so it's been challenging and frustrating at times, but we wouldn't trade those times for anything.

We still refer to Harrison as bunga bear. Why, we still don't know! We also very lovingly refer to Harrison as our wild child. He says and does the craziest things all the time...so much so that we sometimes send our family pictures or videos with the hashtag #HBC (Harrison be crazy). For example, he has a knack for falling into bodies of water. Whether it's a fountain, pool, lake, you name it, he's fallen in! He's also a wild man when he sleeps. Case in point - he fell out of bed head first one night and got a big gash on his chin. When I took him to the doctor, she put strips on the gash and told me to keep them clean and dry for four days. I left wondering how any two year old, much less Harrison could keep something near his mouth dry for four days?! Well, he proved my point pretty much immediately as we left the doctor's office and he fell in a puddle face first and got the strips both dirty and wet (see above point about falling in bodies of water).

Although Harrison is our wild and crazy child, he also has such a big heart. If he sees one of us sad or hurt, he is very quick to come check on us and make sure we're ok. He likes to offer his blanket to anyone who seems to need comfort.

Harrison has changed and grown so much this past year. He was still very much a toddler last year, learning to do many things on his own. However, he's become a very independent boy. He's lost most of his baby fat and he even got a big boy haircut this year. Additionally, he is now potty trained, can put his shoes on, and has very quickly mastered his loop fiets (balance bike)...which he calls his "new old bike" because it was Cameron's before it was his.

Even though Harrison has grown and changed so much, I can still see tiny glimpses of our little boy every now and then. Like when he gets tired and snuggles with his blanket and sucks on his tongue. I will hold on to those little moments for as long as I can.

For his birthday, we started the day with our birthday tradition...pancakes!

Who wears sunglasses inside...for breakfast...??

They also had a nice celebration at school for Harrison this afternoon. I made cupcakes for the celebration and the children in his class sang to him and made pictures for him!

Birthday crown and cupcake all over his face!

Tonight we went to a restaurant of Harrison's choice to end our day of celebrating. Although we try to appreciate our kids every day, there are days when we are busy, or frustrated, or tired, or whatever and don't always appreciate them like we should. I'm always thankful for the opportunity to really think over the past years and reflect on what a joy it is to have been given our children. Harrison keeps us on our toes and makes us laugh all the time. I love his wild blonde hair, beautiful blue eyes, cute dimples, wonderful smile, and his infectious laugh. I am so thankful for this silly, loving, feisty, full of life, healthy child!

Here are some pictures of the last year!