Park City 2013

Last week we attended the annual L. Family Park City Reunion. In the days leading up to the reunion I told Ike as often as possible that we were going to go to Park City and play with lots of kids. I told him who was going to be there - uncles and aunts, Grandma, Grandpa, Grandma Great, Andrew, and lots and lots of other kids. (There are 35 children in Ike's generation, not all of whom were in attendance, of course, but still a large number of little kids to play with.) The more I told him about it the more certain I was that he understood our destination as a huge place full of playgrounds. When we got there he asked where the parks were.

Even though he was a total stinker about sleeping, this kid had such a blast. He loved the pinata, and he really loved the Alpine Slide. I told him we were going to ride a big swing [a ski lift] to the top of a mountain, and then we'd ride in a little car all the way down. Once we started talking about the Alpine slide, he became more excited than I've ever seen him. He was jumping and skipping shouting, "I go BIG SIDE! And mom big side! And Dad and Felix! And Ike! On BIG SIDE!" [Spelling deliberately modified to reflect his pronunciation. Also note that we did NOT take a nine-month-old Felix on the Alpine Slide.] When it was all over he even cried because we couldn't do it again.

We all stood at the bottom of the slide waiting for Eric's Grandma to ride down. It's a tradition to cheer for her as she comes down, and some years (including this one) people who are not a member of our party join in our "Grandma! Grandma! Grandma!" chant. This year the people marveled at the elderly lady (84 years old) who had ridden the Alpine Slide, which tickled me to no end.

We ate so much good food. We went swimming. We went on walks in a nearby historic cemetery. (I love old tombstones.) We talked and talked and talked with grownups. We even managed to get in a few (and I mean a very few) games. Ike followed kids around all over the place. And Felix figured out how to climb onto the dishwasher door.

Since 2005, which was my first year to attend the reunion, I have loved it. There will probably be a time when we don't do it anymore, but for now we will love it as much as we can.

Felix - Nine Months

Felix is such a delightful baby. He's getting very curious and adventurous. He loves to find things to put in his mouth, and he also loves to eat. He loves eating so much that he regularly overeats. He also gets very noisy while you are feeding him if you take to long to shove another spoonful in his mouth.

In the last month he has transitioned from army crawling and now mostly crawls on his hands and knees - until he remembers that army crawling is so much faster than regular crawling. He occasionally pulls himself up to standing, but for the most part he isn't that interested in things beyond the floor - thank heavens.

Felix is still obsessed with his older brother, and every now and then Ike expresses interest in Felix too. It has been nice to watch Ike gradually become more interested in (and very rarely, concerned about) Felix.

I'm glad this little guy is a part of our family. (In this picture he's chowing down on the remnants of an ice cream cone, after swimming at Grandma Great's house.)

Bad Apples

I'm not crazy about apples. Actually, I like a really good, juicy, sweet, crispy apple. But it's hard to tell from the outside what kind of apple it's going to be. Usually I only eat an apple if Eric cuts one up and shares it with me. I just hate to bite into one and then be disappointed, you know? Apparently a certain toddler in our household feels the same way.