Andy, Jonathan and I took my dad to a Cardinals Vs. Cubs game last weekend as his Father’s day present.  We drove to Busch stadium for the day.  It was 95 degrees out, Jonathan and I immediately started sweating after exiting the air conditioned car.  Here is the little guy sweating…

We made it through 6 innings before getting a little too hot.  It was a fun day to go to the park, and it was fun to see Jonathan realize that the baseball players were really right there instead of on the TV.  We also ran into Daffy Duck at the park.  Jonathan was a little intimidated at first.

This morning, Jonathan loaned me one of his cars so that I can take it to work.  When I got home and returned the car, Jonathan asked if everyone was jealous.  Of course they were.

On Friday. JHK and I went to a Cubs game at Wrigley Field.  We picked up the EL in Evanston and took it to Wrigley.  We only made it to the 7th inning stretch.  The temperature got up above 40 somewhere, but I don’t know that it made it to much over 40.  By the 6th inning JHK was shivering relatively well, but insisted that he wasn’t cold.  On the way back we made friends with the conductor, he even made the horn go peep peep.  The next day, there were two highlights, he went to a game and the train went peep peep.

On Saturday, we were looking out the window when Jonathan noticed the squirrels in the yard getting really close to his tricycle and he said how they were going to get his tricycle.  So I let him run out and get it and put it in the garage.  When he got back in, I asked him where all of the squirrels went.  He said, “The squirrels all went back to their mommies because a Jonathan Monster was outside and scared them.”  I assured him that his assessment was 100% accurate.  

So, call us crazy, as many other people have.  We took Jonathan and Grace on a 16 hour drive 2 weekends ago.  That’s right.  16 hours out on Thursday, a birthday on Friday, a wedding on Saturday, a birthday on Sunday and we celebrated Mother’s day with a 16 hour car ride back to the homestead.

There was not as much crying as one might expect on such a long trip.  We put a DVD player in the minivan which occupied a lot of Jonathan’s time.  And Grace was good enough to sleep a lot of the trip or to play with many many different toys that we kept giving her throughout the trip.

We had a great time in Bethlehem as always spending time with Amanda’s family.  It was good to spend time, but the time was really short.  The wedding was very nice, but Grace fell asleep in my arms during the wedding and Uncle Tom spent the wedding reading books to Jonathan. Jonathan loved all of the bubbles as bride and groom exited the church.  And he made it through many many pictures before finally falling apart.  After a decent nap, we went back to Amanda’s brother’s house to finish the festivities.

I know this is off subject nevertheless I just wanted to ask.

We went to Springfield for the weekend.  Spent time with nana and papa, andy and ferfer, gigi and dadadaddy, grandma and grandpa on Saturday.

Nana and papa hid eggs and match box cars all around their house.  At first Jonathan didn’t really understand what was going on, and why nana and papa would have misplaced all of this stuff, but then he started to find some on his own.  And then he found an egg with two jelly bellys in it.  They scattered as he opened the egg.  He picked them up and plunked them in his mouth quicker than I could figure out what they were.  We all laughed after we figured out what had happened.  After that point, Jonathan was very excited at each egg he found! 

He also loved the match box cars.  He lined all the cars up and counted them, we all applauded his counting abilities.

For Easter, nana bought Jonathan and Grace some bunny ears.  And fortunately, Uncle Andy defended Jonathan’s honor.  Jonathan did not have to wear the bunny ears, that day!

It was good to see the family and spend some time over Easter.

Today, nana and papa (my parents) left to return home after a 4 day visit.  Tonight, I tucked Jonathan in for the night and he immediately went to his list of individuals who might free him…. “Nana”…. “Papa”…. “Nana”…. “Nana”….. “Mama”…. “Nana”….. hoping that someone would give in.

Everyone had a great time.  The women all spent some time at Jo Ann Fabrics.  Amanda and I had a birthday dinner for Amanda.  Jonathan spent time walking Riley around the house.  Many cookies were made.  Dog N Suds was ransacked.  5 little monkeys Jumped on the bed.  And Grace spoke her mind and called for Da-Da!

Yea!

Last week we left the kids with my parents and took a cruise to the Bahamas.

It was my idea and a fabulous one at that.  Amanda and I drove down to Charleston, SC and got on the boat.  On the way, we visited Pinehurst, North Carolina which had just had a massive snowstorm– all of 2 inches. The entire county was closed. We were lucky to find somewhere to eat.

Overall, the trip was very relaxing, which was goal one.  We enjoyed the time on the road to and from SC (listening to podcasts, chatting, and playing the state license plate game.  It also only took 16 hours on the road before we stopped talking about the kids).  We also enjoyed the time on the boat.  It was like a little city (that was 12 decks high, a couple football fields long, and has a staff of people that wait on you day and night).  The part that we enjoyed the least was the ports.  We were dropped off in seaports where the only objective was for you to buy their stuff.  If we were to cruise again, we would map out each port ahead of time and make full arrangements for the day.

Every day I come home from work to find some new stack of books, Jonathan using new words, a new toy, newly painted artwork, or a house full of children running and screaming together.

Last week, I came home and there was some new artwork on the wall.  It was more of the impressionist type art work.  It was very good for his age category, I’m sure.

Later that evening I sat down on the couch and began watching a TV show and then realized that there was some weird bluish blob on the ottoman.  After a couple minutes of discussion with Amanda, we pieced together the day of activities which included the artwork which was created by dipping balloons in paint and then rubbing the balloons on the canvas.  Well, apparently, one of the balloons wasn’t totally cleaned off and Jonathan strolled off with it to the ottoman, and voila, I now have a brown ottoman with a dash of blue!

The day has finally come.  Jonathan has his own “safety blanket” for when he’s upset or a little uncertain of what’s going on.  Surprisingly it’s not a blanket or any physical item.  I finally noticed it tonight.  Everytime Jonathan gets upset or just is uncertain of if he’s in trouble he goes into the chorus of Old MacDonald.  He says as best as he can… E-I-E-I-O.  When we figured this out tonight, Amanda and I just started to laugh which made him smile and thus he started another line of E-I-E-I-O, which led us to laugh even more.