A VZ Fourth of July

Fourth of July may seem like a distant memory, but we had some special guests in town...GG and Aunt Vanessa.  I took only a handful of pictures the entire weekend so I am hoping that someone (hint, hint) will send me the ones they took.  

They got in super late on the 3rd and were woken up super early on the 4th by the welcoming committee, ie a four-year-old demanding that someone play pretty ponies with her.  Our neighborhood was having a parade and block party, so we rallied and headed out.  We totally missed the parade.  Maybe there wasn't really a parade?  Who knows.  We walked to the pool/playground area where there was free watermelon, sno-cones, and a boy scout hot dog sale.  The line for watermelon was too long, the sno-cones were not gluten free, and I wouldn't let BVZ buy anything from the boy scouts.  Basically we were three for three.  But there was also a jump house and free face painting, so all was not lost. 

Our neighborhood is very family-centric which is very nice, if a bit overwhelming at times. Overwhelming in that people here are very friendly and that doesn't always, ahem, come naturally to me.  

We spent the rest of the day trying out BVZ's new fancy-pants grill and swimming in the pool.  The pool is awesome.  You too could have a pool in Texas (hint, hint).

The rest of the long weekend was spent swimming, watching movies, and hanging out.  GG and Aunt Vanessa were fabulous kid entertainers and very understanding of the fact that it is basically impossible to go anywhere with small children when it is 100+ degrees outside.  It's always tough because everyone (especially Norah) gets very attached.  She knows a good thing when she sees it.

There were a lot of craft projects.  Yes, I make my children do crafts naked.  (At least GG has a shirt on.)  It makes clean up so much easier. 

We did venture out to eat the last night.  It went surprisingly well given the fact that there was a half hour wait at 5:00 pm and Lou squirted a pouch of baby food in his eye on the way there.  Aunt Vanessa procured mexican martinis for the wait and GG may or may not have attempted to give Norah her tequila soaked olive (hey, at least it was gluten free).

*I would just like to note for the record that Lou's outfit is totally of BVZ's choosing.  I would not willingly dress a one-year-old like Johnny Cash in the dead of the Texas summer.

It was a ton of fun and we can't wait until the VZ's are back.  We promise that in, oh, 10 or so years we might be able to actually take you to do something fun.  Promise.  

Despite...

...the fact that this was right after his 18th puke of the day (stomach virus), Lou's hair looks awesome. Life's gonna treat this kid just right.

Words

I paid a lot of attention to gross motor skills, fine motor skills, and language development when Norah was a baby.  Louis has sadly not gotten the same kind of attention.  He walks, he talks, he eats, he likes books.  I figure I am doing my job.  But since this is in fact his baby book, I should document that at 16.5 months he regularly says a lot of words.  Here's the list I could come up with when I thought about it:

Mama

Dada

NaNa (Norah)

Bubba (Bubby)

Hi

Bye

Uh-oh

Up

Baby

Hot

Sasa (thank you)

Milk

Bear

Oovie (lovey)

Ball

Car

Digga (digger)

Do-tee (dump truck)

Go

Nigh-nigh (night night)

Tain (train)

Tee (tree)

Cat

Da (dog)

Wa-wa (water)

Muh (more)

Ticka (tickle)

Baaa (as in what does a sheep say?)

He might have more words than Norah did at this age, but she was very articulate (almost everyone could understand what she was saying whereas for sure I am the only one that understands most of what Lou says), and never omitted sounds.  Lou doesn't appear to have any "R's" (ie, he says tee and not tree).  

Speaking of Norah, she no longer says thank you, she says Merci! Because she is obsessed with Fancy Nancy.  She has an excellent vocabulary.  The other night BVZ miraculously came home before bedtime and he and Norah hung out and went swimming while I worked like a crazy person on a lingering California case I have.  He gave her a bath and I went in to say goodnight and asked if she got her hair washed.  She said yes.  I asked if she got conditioner and BVZ said no.  Without skipping a beat Norah said, "well, fuck."

Yikes.  She didn't say it out of anger, it was perfectly proper contextually, and it was funny as hell.  I actually had to leave the room so that BVZ could give her a talking to about appropriate language.  And then I got one too. 

It's Hot and I'm Tired

Moving is hard work.  For the most part the dust has settled and I now have an entire room full of crap I have no intention of unpacking anytime in the distant future.  I have also been working a ton, running after Lou a ton, and playing pretty ponies with Norah a ton.  That leaves time for pretty much nothing else.

We've been taking a lot of bike rides after dinner when it cools off to a balmy 95 degrees.  Norah loves her bike but falls off it at least once every.single.time. we take it out.  Lou is more adept on the tricycle than Norah ever was.  I hope that means he will be able to someday ride a bike with training wheels without falling off every.single.time.

The backyard has an awesome play structure but it's so hot that we can only really use it either first thing in the morning or right before bed.  Norah does great on it and Lou pretty much gives me a heart attack every second he's on it.  He's a freaking mountain goat.  He climbs up the ladder, attempts to flip himself off the side, and then goes down the slide head first.  I pretty much have to shot gun a beer to calm my nerves as soon as we go back inside. 

Last week BVZ got free tickets to the Round Rock Express game, the local minor league baseball team. It was no Giants stadium, but beer was cheap and Norah had a good time.  

Fascinating, yes?