Happy Birthday Grampa!

My gift to you is that I took out the hairdo Mommy gave Ben. He looks better like this hey? (Not very happy though. Oh well. You can't have everything.)

Sweet Sam

Here's my scrambled egg, just being sweet sweet sweet. Doesn't he just make you want to SQUEEZE him?

The Boy Loves a Parade

Sam loves parades. Ben likes going because he loves getting the candy at parades, but Sam just plain loves parades. There was no firetruck at this one, which disappointed him, but he was still pretty impressed.
Here he is in his classic parade watching pose.
Sig and Sylvia came to the parade with us last year, we had such a good time we decided we needed to keep up the tradition and watch it with them again this year. Here we are trying to convince Sam that the parade is over.
He wasn't buying it.

Everything Ben Does is Hilarious

First Snow

Here I am making my very first snowball.
Look out Daddy! This one's got your name on it!
Here I am taking my first taste of this year's batch of snow.
Some for me...
... And some for my puppy.
(That's really what I'm trying to do, feed my puppy.)
And, finally, here I am, happy to be coming inside.
I am NOT done playing yet!
(This is after way over an hour in the backyard and it has turned completely dark outside.)

Sam the Firetruck

There he is. My little firetruck. (NOT a fireman.) He looks grumpy here, but he actually had a pretty good time. Sam's neutral expression tends more towards a scowl, so if you don't know him well sometimes it's easy to assume he's in a constant state of irritation.

Here is the closest we could get to having him help with the pumpkins. I was a little surprised that he wasn't more adventurous than Ben, but it turns out the messy part that I thought they would love was a horrible ordeal. Oh well, live and learn.
Here's my little axe murderer heading for his first house and his first victim. I'm not sure why it looks so dark in this picture, it was not that dark when we left.
It's easy to forget how little he is till I see him from a distance waiting on our neighbor's doorstep in his (admittedly over-sized) costume. Doesn't he look cute though?
After about three houses he got tired and insisted he needed to be carried. I sent Glen back for the wagon. He was quite happy to yell "Trick or treaty!" from his comfy seat, and then watch while Ben did all the work collecting the candy.
In all honesty, I think Sam prefers our old method of trick-or-treating, which is driving from house to house visiting our friends. This takes much longer and we usually only make it to six houses before Glen and I get tired of taking the boys in and out of the van in their costumes, but there isn't nearly as much walking and we let them eat candy in between houses while we're driving. I can understand why a little one might be able to last a lot longer with this method. His big brother likes going door to door though, so we kept the friend visits to just our friends who live in the neighborhood and one quick stop at Ben's new preschool friend's house on our way to Boston Pizza. Maybe next year Sammy will be able to keep up with Ben a little better. If not, there's always the wagon.

Just Sam

Since I'm not only behind on the boys' blogs, but also way behind on their baby journals, I've decided to describe some of the funny daily things that Sam does that don't usually make it into a post. I'm including a picture of him "helping" me grocery shop that isn't interesting enough for a whole post, but is just one of the many cute daily things that go on around here that make me smile and are passing by so quickly I have a hard time remembering them all.

Funny stuff Sam does:

• Dances by doing a sort a galloping hop.
• Rolls his body all over people. It's his way of wrestling.
• Likes to pretend to squirt people with my hairdryer, the Mr. Potato Head lightsaber and fire extinguisher, and his favorite: his thumb stuck between his pointer and index finger clenched into a fist.
• Copies almost everything Ben does, and then gets mad when Ben copies him. This is especially noticeable when they are playing with toys, but also when they are choosing places to sit.
• Sings the opening song from Hairspray over and over anywhere, anytime, anyplace. "Oh, oh, oh! At my hair! Uh mine today!" (This is my favorite thing he does, and incredibly hard to capture on video since he hates cameras.)
  
• Rocks his head and sings "Twinkle, Twinkle", "Row Your Boat", and "Jingle Bells" while he looks at books in just the cutest possible way.
  

Funny stuff Sam says:

• "Ow! Dat hurty me!" This is said a LOT whether you really did hurt him or just stroked his hair. It totally cracks me up every time. So much so, that sometimes I poke him just to hear him say it.
  
• "Go away!", "Stop dat!", "Don't talk now!" and various other commands. Usually these are issued in a very loud voice complete with an imperious point at the person he thinks he is commanding, usually me.
• "Benny". He used to only call Ben by his full name, "Bejamin", but lately has switched to Benny. I find either completely hysterical for some reason. Probably because he tends to use his name in almost every sentence he directs towards Ben. For example, "It's dancy time Benny!"
• "Hurty, dumpy, trainy, Benny, dancy, blanky, sharky... etc." Sam likes to add a "y" to some of his favorite words. Hurty is my favorite, followed by sharky, and dumpy truck.
• "Go Gabba Gabba!", "Backyardigans!", "Mickey Mouse!" or pretty much any TV show that comes on. The thing is, he doesn't just say it once, he sings it over and over accompanied with his funny little galloping dance.
  
• "Huh?" This is one of my favorites. It is often used when I call him or ask him to do something, but can also be used in a sentence of his own construction. For example, "What you got? Huh?"
  

Stuff Sam really likes:

• Boston Pizza. Ho man, that kid gets so excited when he sees a Boston Pizza. He really should be on a commercial.
• Swimming.
• Sharks and pretending to be scared of sharks. "Ohhhh! I'm cared! Cary sharky!"
  
• Macaroni.
• Any food that I, or anyone else really, am eating. ("What you got? Huh?")
• Any toy that Ben is playing with.
• His blue blanky. This one is actually becoming a bit of an obsession.
• Fake barfing. "I pooky!" (Pukey.)
  
• Watching kid's (for lack of a better word) music videos on YouTube. His favorites right now are a song called "Slippery Fish" which someone filmed with a book they drew themselves, and then of course, the opening song from Hairspray.
• Operating the TV and DVD player. This is a problem only because he has not mastered getting the DVD's out of the case without busting them in half, the rest he's got cased.
  

Stuff Sam doesn't like:

• Peeing on the potty. He can do it on command, but he sure gets mad when we make him.
• Getting his picture taken.
  
• Going for a nap.
  
• Waking up from his nap.
• Getting dragged out of Ben's preschool every time we drop him off and pick him up. Sam really wants to be able to stay and play with the kids and the toys. Why can't they make that place look like less fun?
• Being teased by Ben. This happens more often than you would think by looking at Ben's angelic countenance. Ben loves to tease Sammy and Sammy gets enraged very easily. Luckily they don't usually hit each other and their usual method of expressing their anger is to roll all over each other. (Which I find hysterical.)

So there you have it, all the strange little things that make Sam the fried egg we all know and love. (I'm sure I'm missing some and if I think of them later I'll probably add them to this post.) Overall, he is a weird, WEIRD little crazy person who makes me laugh every single day. I love him. He's just the best and funniest kid ever.

Buster Days Weekend

Yes, Mommy is still WAY behind on here. WAY behind. What are you going to do though? No one else is volunteering for the job so this is what you're stuck with.

For this post we'll all travel back in time to June of this year. Mommy took Benjamin and I to see Gramma and Grampa. Daddy had to stay home and do school work. Poor guy. He missed a pretty sweet weekend.

We helped Grampa build some stuff. I love building stuff because you get to use tools. Drills and tape measures are my special favorites. Mommy has a hard time keeping track of our measuring tape at home because I like to steal it and play with it. Grampa is the only person who is smart enough to find my hiding spot for it: My tool bench. (Sheesh, you'd think Mommy would think of looking there. Every good fixer knows you should always put things away when you're done with them so they're ready and waiting for when you need them next time.) Here I am enjoying Grampa's tape measure. I think I like it better than even Mommy's.

We went to Kinsmen park next. That place is so great. There were gophers there. LOTS of gophers. I staked out a few holes, but they never came out of the ones I was waiting beside. They kept popping out of the ones I had just given up on! Tricky.

The train scared the living tarnations out of me. It was lucky I had Grampa along to keep me safe.

I went on the big ferris wheel too. It was almost as scary as the train, but not as loud. It was lucky I had Ben along to keep me safe.

We went to the Buster Days parade in Martensville. I loved it so much we watched it twice. Actually, I still talk about parades, and asked to go see the firetrucks almost constantly for weeks and weeks afterwards. In my mind there is a parade probably going on at all times, and all I need to do is convince my mom and dad to take me to it. Parades are only parades if they have firetrucks and candy and all that other junk is just the stuff you have to put up with while you wait for the firetrucks and candy. Here I am waiting in the gutter for candy:

And here I am waiting for the firetrucks. They're almost here!

Ahhhh... That was a good weekend. Isn't it fun to look back and remember good times? (There's going to have to be a lot of that around here if Mommy ever hopes to get this blog all caught up.)

Hanging Around (May 31st)

Sam. He likes to climb. And he likes to dangle. And he's STRONG. Once I saw him fall from some monkey bars and catch himself with one arm. He dangled there for a long time till he managed to get his feet swinging enough to be able to reach a foothold and pull himself back up. Whenever he does his dangle thing I laugh like crazy... Because he's seriously SO. STRONG.

Once he was playing by hanging off of the handles on my mom's treadmill. They are pretty much as far apart as his arms can reach. He grabbed hold of the vertical parts of the bars and then lifted his feet and hung there like a gymnast doing the iron cross. It blew my mind.

Here are some pictures of him climbing and dangling at the park near our house.





After all that climbing he got a little tired. Who wouldn't?


Good thing Daddy was around for him to climb onto for a ride home!

Weekend With Grampa...

May 21st

I finally got to go to school with Ben on his very last day. I've only been asking forever. Sheesh people.

I did some climbing.

And I blew some bubbles.

Then I did some more climbing.

I found a ladybug.

Hey! Where do you think you're going? (I guess he/she? likes climbing too.)

Then I did some more climbing.

Then I got in trouble and I had to sit on my bum.

I like school this school thing. Mommy says it's too hard for me because I am so little, but what was hard about that? School's a cinch.

Birthday Pictures: Part One

Well, here it is. As promised. Finally.

Sam had a mini-pre-party at Gramma and Grampa's a week or so before he actually turned two. I went all out on the cake:
Here he is with his Aunty: (I love this photo.)
Opening presents: (Check out Ben. He was having a hard time that day with waiting and with the fact that Sam had more presents than him. Good thing Gramma always remembers the two non-birthday boys.)
Opening his present from Aunty Melissa and Uncle Johnny and Noah:
Looking at his present from Gramma and Grampa:
I couldn't decide which picture I liked better so you get both:
Watching Aunty open his present:
Making music with his present from Aunty:
Mike and Johnny throwing plastic parachuting men from the garage: (They will use almost any excuse to climb up there.)
Blowing out his candles:
Looks like store bought cake does as good a job at getting the birthday boy dirty as a homemade cake: (And it actually worked out to be cheaper because Gramma bought it!)
Noah chowing down:
Sam cleaning up after the party:
So there it is. Sam's birthday extravaganza. It was nice to have a celebration with the family. Gramma Braun was there too, she brought a train whistle for Sam, which was fab for me because we already had ONE that the boys fought over all the time. Now they can be trains together.

I still have a birthday project in the works for Sam, but that will have to wait for another time, because of something I'm waiting for that should have shown up in the mail almost two months ago. I called to complain and they assured me it would be only five more days, which was Thursday. I'll probably have to phone again. It may be next year when I finally finish up with Sam's birthday!