One of our regular stops when we visit The Woodlands Mall is this mat with neat projections on it. It's an advertising tool, but it has lots of fun games for kids. There are soccer games, hockey matches, cars racing around a track, and much more. It's really neat and the kids seem to enjoy it.
A picture of Randy and Dawson riding the carousel at The Woodlands Mall. The bench has been his seat of choice recently.
Dawson is VERY excited about Christmas. He loves going to the store (mainly Wal-Mart and Target) and seeing all the Christmas decorations. Most children want to go to the toy section, but Dawson prefers the Christmas section. He especially likes pushing the buttons on the musical dolls and watching them sing and dance.
Checking out the musical villages. He really likes those with trains, like the one in the picture. 
Enjoying the Santa and Mrs. Clause musical dolls.
So many buttons to push!
The recent cold weather has allowed us to enjoy nice warm fires in the fireplace at home. While we all like the warmth and ambiance of the fire, Gertrude seems to enjoy it the most. She will sprawl out in front of it for hours - or until Dawson comes by and decides it's time for a game of chase.
Dawson loves building tall towers with his blocks (mainly because he can knock them down once he's completed them). Randy bought him a giant bag of 120 mega blocks, which allowed him to build the tallest tower he's ever built.
He had to climb up on the table in order to continue the building.
Dawson playing with his new hot wheels track. It was a super after-Thanksgiving buy. :-)Here are some cute phrases Dawson has been saying recently:
I'm not sure where Dawson picked up the concept of a finish line, but recently when he's been drawing, he'll make a straight line and report that it's a finish line. The other day when we were drawing with sidewalk chalk he asked me to draw a finish line. I drew a line from one end of the street to the other and we had the best time playing on that line. Dawson doesn't want to cross the finish line, he wants to actually run on the line - back and forth, and back and forth. Sometimes we'll run fast, other times slow, we'll hop, or we'll walk backwards. It's been a really fun game lately.
Dawson seems drawn to babies. He is so sweet and gentle with them. He'll stroke their cheek, rub their tummy, put their pacifier back in their mouth if it falls out.
At the park yesterday, he enjoyed playing with baby Madeline (little sister of his friend Mackenzie). He seemed happy to just sit and watch her. And they played some silly baby game where Dawson would put his forehead up to her forehead and then she would rock her head back and forth against his and just smile and squeal. She also enjoyed grabbing onto his hair and pulling it, and he was happy to comply. He's such a sweetie - and so is Madeline.
The new playground in our neighborhood is finally complete. Dawson has been having a great time on the new equipment. Here are a few pictures of him and his friends on a recent play date.
Dawson and Mackenzie climbing the stairs. 
Peeking through the railing.
Climbing one of the ladders.
All the kids trying to solve the number puzzle.
Dawson and Mackenzie getting ready to jump.
And down they go!Dawson has been practicing counting a lot recently. He's so cute when he counts because there are times he's so excited that he practically yells all the numbers. And whenever he reaches his high number (usually 20) he'll clap for himself.
When we were at the playground one day there was a hopscotch game drawn in chalk on the basketball court. Dawson had the greatest time jumping from square to square and counting all the numbers. After that he wanted me to draw "squares" for him at home. So now he's become very proficient in counting to 20, has extended his counting to 30, and even learned how to count to 100 by 10's - and this all came from having fun playing hopscotch. What a great, fun teaching tool.
Chef Dawson cutting his Play-Doh pizza. 
The chef hat wasn't enough - he needed the chef jacket too.
Dawson loves staying at hotels. We first realized how much he liked hotels when we went on a trip to Orlando last summer. Dawson was much more impressed with the hotel elevators than he was with any of the rides at Disney World. Of course, he was only 1 1/2 at the time so he was easily amused, although he continues to be thrilled with elevator rides. During our most recent hotel stay in Dallas, our room was on the 28th floor and Dawson was very excited about the long ride up and down the elevator. There were also escalators in the hotel, which were another great source of amusement, as was the breezeway across the roadway to other hotels and shopping centers.
Another feature of hotels that really gets Dawson excited is playing on the phones, something he's not allowed to do at home and so really looks forward to doing while at the hotel. Of course, we unplug the phone so he's not continually calling the people at the front desk or inadvertently dialing people in other rooms or making long-distance calls to China. He especially likes it when we have 2 phones in our room so that he can talk on one and have Randy or I talk on the other.
I think Dawson mostly just enjoys exploring a new place. He has great fun going in and out of the closets and bathrooms, which he calls his home. He also really likes having new "roads" to drive his cars on and new places for them to visit.
Dawson enjoys his hotel stays so much that he doesn't want to return home. On the return trip home, he pleads with us to go back to the hotel. He'll even tell Randy to turn the car around and go back the other way, back to the hotel. There have even been times when we've pulled into the garage and he doesn't want to get out of the car - he just wants to go back to the hotel.
It is nice that something so simple and ordinary excites him. I hope he's always able to find joy in the little things.
This was a really neat exhibit at the Dallas Zoo. There was a tunnel with 3 different peep holes that popped up inside the exhibit to allow kids a close-up look at the animals. Dawson and a little girl had a wonderful time crawling through the tunnels and popping in and out of the peep holes. 
He's bursting out from under the pillows to scare us. 
Dawson and Aunt Julie.
He was very amused by this parrot that repeated everything he said.
These are some pictures of Dawson playing at a very cool park near Aunt Julie's house in Lewisville. Dawson loves playing at parks and is always excited to explore a new park. He was especially happy to have Aunt Julie there to play with him.
Dawson loves his cars - and he has plenty of them to love. He's so intent when he drives them and meticulously parks them just so. Sometimes the cars will talk to each other, sometimes he'll tell us who is driving each one, but mostly he just enjoys driving them all over the couch.
The kids found a very long stick at the park and had the best time carrying it around. Who knew a single stick could provide such entertainment?
