CAT | Baby
Kyler and I had dinner together this week while mom got her hair done. After dinner I told Kyler we needed to go to the bank to deposit a check. We get to the bank and Kyler recognized it (still not sure how since we rarely GO to a bank) and he says “Um. Dad? Dad get money?”
“Maybe. I need to give them a check but I’ll see if I need money too,” I answer.
“Get some moneys, dad. I need some. I need some moneys in here! Kyler need some money in here,” he says pointing to himself as he sits in his car seat.
Hilarious.
I’m sure Kyler still doesn’t fully get things like Halloween. To him it was just a day when the doorbell rang more often and mom & dad actually opened the door vs. avoiding solicitors.
The highlight for me was carving a pumpkin. There’s an old photo of my dad and I (couldn’t find a digital version of it – sorry) carving a pumpkin at the dinner table. I had been looking forward to duplicating those photos with Kyler. He really got a kick out of carving a pumpkin — how could he not? It was messy, gooey and we used a knife to destroy something making it into a silly face … pretty much describes: ‘best toy ever’ for any boy.
He clearly had a bit of an attachment to it. He often wanted to go outside and check on it. He was curious about how it lit up. He wanted to make sure it was still there if he forgot about it for more than 15 minutes. Although the next day – he could care less.
We didn’t get to visit any houses with him dressed up – which we weren’t expecting to… its Minnesota after all; we were thankful it didn’t snow. But he still had fun just the same.
In all, we had about 12-20 kids stop by. I was giving out handfuls of candy by the end of the night to try to get rid of it. The kid next door saw his bag go from empty to pretty full in one house, looked up at me and said “Woah!” – Glad I made his day.
Anyway… pictures from the whole thing:
The other day I was in my office at home and heard Kyler walk in. He was quiet and I didn’t turn away from my computer right away to see him… until I heard him… eating an apple!
I had never seen Kyler eat an apple that wasn’t sliced before. I’m still not sure how exactly he got it, or how he learned how to eat it since we almost always slice it – even when we eat apples. As you can see, he did just fine!
We just got back from the South Dakota Convoy, an event that raises money for the Special Olympics. I’ve never been to this before and have heard lots of stories about it from Johna’s dad, who gets quite involved in running the event. Among other things, there were music performances, an auction and the biggest convoy of semi trucks in the U.S. – an impressive parade that runs through the heart of the city.
We’ve got lots of pictures and videos from the event, so here’s a starter set of a few from the event and our weekend there visiting with family…
More random photo updates from this summer. Check out the captions in the large version of each photo (click on the photo) to see what’s goin’ on in each. Enjoy.
Last weekend, we took Kyler out to the farmer’s market – where he loved checking out the flowers and other kids, and then to a local park – where he enjoyed the 3 mile walk (most of which was from the comfort of his favorite stroller) but he did take time to walk around and even try walking some of it backwards.
So I’m cutting vegetables for dinner tonight and Kyler comes into the kitchen and puts a couple of his trucks up on the counter. He runs off to play with something else and comes back a few minutes later wanting his trucks off the counter. My hands are all wet so I say “Can you reach your trucks?”
He disapears and I resume making dinner thinking nothing of it. He returns with his step stool and puts it in front of the kitchen counter and says “Reach!”
At this point I’m pretty amazed at his creative thinking. He climbs up on his stool and says “oh wow!” as if the 8th world wonder is on the kitchen counter.
The next one is bound to be dumb as a box of rocks.
Kyler LOVES trains. (He loves cars and airplanes too, but that’s a different story.) Lately the only thing he wants to talk about is trains. We think this came about because the library and local bookstore both have Thomas the Train train set tables that he loves to play with.
The Disney Channel show “Choo Choo Soul” might have had something to do with it as well. He doesn’t really watch the show (or any TV for that matter) he just likes the theme song.
We decided he would get a kick out of Choo Choo Bob’s, a store in St. Paul specializing in all things train.
He. Loved. It.
We also couldn’t help but notice that most of the kids there were all boys about the same age (although with more hair) as Kyler. Incase you’re wondering – none of those kids had an easy time actually leaving the store. Its an easy store to go to, a hard one to get OUT of.
Last weekend, we took Kyler up to Maple Grove days – an event we attended for a whole 45 minutes, if that. But we got to see what Kyler was most interested in (diggers, trucks, etc.). The highlight of the trip was picking up a construction hat, which as you can see, Kyler took quite seriously the rest of the weekend.
Kyler loves Mickey Mouse (“mee mou” as he says). That statement shouldn’t surprise anyone considering his parents. During our last trip to Disneyland we made sure to introduce him to Mickey in person, which he loved. We learned that Kyler likes the characters that are shorter (Mickey, Dale, Chip) and loves it when they have big noses and let him kiss (or in one case, lick) their nose.
Hmmm… they clean those costumes regularly, right?
Anyway… we met Mickey at his house and, for the first time ever, used the Disney PhotoPass service where they take a picture of you and issue you a card where you can look at the photos on-line and then order them. One of the really cool things about Disney is that they will still take a picture with your camera if you want even though they staff a “professional” photographer for the purpose of trying to sell the photo.
I should have asked them for a photo on my camera. I didn’t because I figured their camera was nicer, it was a “pro” photographer and even the lighting in the room seemed to be rigged specifically. I figured that all this person has to do is take 700 photos each day with a pre-set camera in a room specifically designed to get great photos of your kids meeting Mickey.
I’ll let you judge the quality of those photos based on the thumbnails below. I’d try PhotoPass again, but now I’m not going to hesitate to ask them to use my camera as a “backup plan.” — Regardless, it was SOOOO cool to introduce Kyler to Mickey. He loved it and it was one of the highlights of the trip for me. Even if the pictures didn’t come out great, the memory did!
I have also posted some more pictures from the trip on Facebook and will post some here as well whenever I find time.
