Let Freedom Ring!

Alternate name for this post:  "And then I became an old lady"

When I was a little, little girl I remember sitting on the back of my Dad's truck and watching all the fireworks that the neighbors were setting off.  It was magical. In the morning my sister and I would gather up all of the debris in our yard (also magical) and dump out all the powder.  I'm not sure what we did with it, but sometimes we were extra lucky and also found a parachute guy or something. 

At some point when I got a little older my Dad actually brought us some fireworks of our own (that he said an Indian gave him which was always what he always said when he brought home something fun.  I really thought he worked on or near a Reservation.  He did not.  At least not that I know of).  Pretty soon we had convinced our parents to get us a whole bunch of bottle rockets and we had bottle rocket wars with the neighborhood kids.  Where was the parental supervision?  It was all fun and games and no one got hurt...at least not badly.

Not long later we had completely scrapped our own fireworks, or perhaps it became illegal, in search of the biggest and best fireworks shows we could find, complete with music, funnel cakes, a billion people and one hundred billion mosquitos.  (Side note... I am proud to say I have been to two of the nations top five firework shows).

And then I became an old person with kids of my own that go to bed before dark and the holiday got much less fun, I thought.  Around 9pm on July 3rd all kinds of crazy fireworks were going off right outside our windows.  Little Mister didn't like the noises one bit...until we took him outside to see what it was and he exclaimed "I like fireworks".  It was adorable but I was still upset that there was so much noise "while people are trying to sleep" - see, old lady.

By the 4th though, I had loosened up and thoroughly enjoyed the holiday by having friends over for a BBQ and to watch fireworks.  Or maybe things have just come full circle and now I am once again content to sit back and watch the festivities from the comfort of my own home.

Lately

A few photos of what we've been up to lately (in reverse order).

Watching Daddy race



 Visiting the fire station

 Picnicking in the park and playing in the fountain

My Brown Eyed Girl...

Is ten months old.

Has four big teeth.

Can climb up the stairs and insists on doing so most of the time.

Sings and bounces along to music.

Lights up when I come in her room in the morning, but gets absolutely giddy with excitement when the Little Mister comes in.

Loves to play with everything her brother is playing with (usually to his dismay), and also his tiny underpants.

Eats EVERYTHING as long as she can feed it to herself:  meats, cheese, fruit, vegetables, rice, even salad - I'm sure because it resembles the grass and leaves that she puts in her mouth whenever we go outside.

Can say "mama" and "dada" although she doesn't know what they mean.  But I think she can sign "all done"...sometimes.

Loves to crawl over things, particularly humans.  Sometimes when she crawls over slightly smaller objects, such as toy trucks or pillows, she gets high-centered and crawls around with said object stuck between her arms and legs until she wiggles free or someone rescues her.  It's really quite cute.

Is getting wispy waves and curls around her ears and in the back of her hair.  I can't wait to put her in piggies.

Check out these adorable photos from our last photo session with Jennifer Rogers!
http://www.jenrogersphotography.com/load/webIIkaren/

So little. So BIG.

Most of the time I still think of the Little Mister as my baby, until he reminds me "I'm not a baby, I'm a boy." And it's true. Without even realizing it was happening (well maybe a little) he has gotten so big. For instance:

A few weeks ago we went to the Greek festival. Brad and I went for the gyros, but the Mister was there for the rides. I didn't even think there would be rides but he was delighted when we got there and there were, in fact, carnival rides. He set his sights on the ferris wheel - a baby ferris wheel with cages. He insisted on holding his tickets and giving them to the guy operating the ride. I thought he was going to go up to the cage, get scared and come back to us like the boy in front of us did. He didn't. He went right up, sat in the chair and even tried to close his own door. He just sat there with a big smile on his face. So big. He did mention at some point before the ride was even really going that he was all done but we cheered him on and as it started to move he sat there nervously looking out.  And then I think he even started to enjoy himself a little, because as soon as it was done he wanted to go ride the train.

The next day I took him to swimming lessons. He walked all around the pool and grabbed a noodle out of the bin. He walked back and we went to the stairs. As I started to help him into the pool he said "no, I will do it myself" and proceeded to spend the rest of the lesson time swimming around with just the noodle. No life jacket, no floaties, just hanging onto that noodle. And if I got too close he reminded me that he was doing it himself.

Last Sunday at church I overheard him and his buddy having what I think was their first real conversation. It went something like this:

Buddy: "You don't take my cars."

Mister: " Ok, I will play with my cars and you can play with your cars."

Buddy: "Ok, I will play with my cars."

Mister: "Do you want to go to nursery class and play with me?"

Buddy: "Ok, but I need to go potty first."

Today he was trying to build a parascope out of letters. I asked him if he knew what a parascope was and he said "it helps me to see through the roof". Yep, that's about right.

He talks, and talks, and talks all the time.  This is not new information.  However, lately he ends his monologues by saying "and that's how that works!"