Your passenger isn't all that thrilled.

I have more photos which I will post later but for now I just want to post my candidate for movie of the year. Your first “Free Fall”.

As you rode up it was clear to me that you didn’t quite grasp, while watching from the ground, what you had signed up for…on the initial drop I could see signs of the whole thing going very wrong very quickly but you quickly found your feet, so to speak, and had a blast…so much so that on the way out it wouldn’t do but you had to ride it one more time (luckily for me, we made it on line just before they shut it down!).


(The whole thing is great but my favorite bits are the little wave before you got going and your “bravery” at the very end).

So back in October our friend John came to visit us in Spain. While there he tried to get you to tell us “what the fonz says”. However, you refused to say the iconic “Ayyy”, choosing instead to put up your thumb and say “Beeee”.

In the midst of all our travels we quickly pushed this to the back of our minds. Until last night at dinner when you started asking (with your thumbs up) “who says Beeee, daddy”. It took us about ten minutes before your mother correctly guessed the Fonz.

Lilah, you have finally come around on some of Daddy’s “moogis”. Last week you woke yourself up coughing and so you got to spend some insomniac hours with the old man. I happened to be watching some Little Feat videos on You Tube and you were interested enough to ask me who was singing. After thinking about the answer, Little Feat, for a bit you replied that “I like little feat, that’s my moogis daddy”; “they don’t have little feat, they have big feet.”
Which made me smile, both on the inside and the outside.

Ever since that night you have also been going around singing:
“der’s a fatman
in da tub
with the blues on” (Winnie).

While I appreciate the fact that you have been asking to hear “Fatman in the Bathtub” ever since, I can’t help but get the feeling that you are calling me fat.

We took you swimming in the Mediterranean sea this afternoon. As promised the water was clear, warm, and quite calm (quite a difference from last summer on Ocean isle eh?). While you are still very adamant about not going under the water, you continue to get braver and braver with each visit. Today you even swam around on your own with your water wings, and after the first couple didn’t even mind the small waves that splashed in your face.

The highlight of the day, however, was while we were playing in the sand where I was teaching you to make drip castles. Three minutes in and you made the declaration “I’m Poopin’ on the Castle Daddy”. Made up several chants about poopin’ on the castle, and wanted to know “What’s the princess say when I am poopin’ on her castle?”. As I howled your mom just shook her head and muttered something about the trials of being in charge of two 3 year olds.

Alright kid, first of all you have been a bear for the past month (since the day you turned 3 actually), completely un-cooperative, refusing to sleep, and temper tantrums galore.

Today, however, you were back to your old self full of cheer and ready rock-n-roll when I got home. As is the the habit of late, I had to assume the role of pooh bear as soon as I got home and, apparently, you were Eeyore. Made clear by your crawling around on the floor while complaining, with the proper amount of melancholy in your voice, about the impending rain.

Eventually we made our way over to your blocks and after building your castle 4 blocks tall you declared, with much enthusiasm, it to be “normous”, it doesn’t sound as cute in print as it did in person but I promise you it was quite cute. In fact I coaxed you into repeating several times to my own delight.

It was about this time that you decided you were the “Bad Wolf” and immediately knocked over the tower.

• Books are, and always have been, your favorite toys (though puzzles are closing in).
• I can get you to go almost anywhere by challenging you to a race (you don’t like to lose, and when you get there you declare “I RACED!”)
• “It’s alright Daddy, you can try it if you want to”
• The fact that we can tell how tired you are by the frequency of unprovoked “I Love You”s bestowed on us as you lay in bed on your way to sleep.
• A little while ago mommy told you to leave me alone because I had to an emergency at work that needed my attention. You then told me “Ima ‘mergency too daddy”. That one broke my heart.
• Just today your threatened me with “I will take your work away Daddy” apparently you think I like work in the same way you like your puzzles.
• “I Can do it all by myself”
• How you ask me to be Winnie the Pooh and get all tickled when I say “Oh Bother”
• When you are Eeyore and claim “It’s gonna rain”
• The unbridled enthusiasm when “Its morning Time!”
• “I Like to jump on ‘er fat belly daddy”

Just wanted to put up these pictures of wayne

Before our day trip to Segovia

And after our day trip to Segovia

Just came across this picture today, taken last Christmas (2008) as you enjoyed (thoroughly) your first candy cane (which your mother handed to you as she LEFT to go get groceries, thanks honey).

As you can tell from the title I think you look a bit like a photo of Janis (that I can’t seem to find now) that I have seen (difference being that you are high on sugar, lets keep it that way).

I can't see

We left the restaurant about dusk yet you insisted on wearing your shades. Immediately you complained about not being able to see and then “walked” into 3 trashcans and a sign post to drive home the point. I wouldn’t say you sold it very well as you did stop short and kind of leaned into them before looking back and laughing [Note from Camille: well she did more than lean into the garbage cans; she crowed "whoa, can't see" "look out" and "hey, how this garbage can get here?"], but we can work on that.

It only took three years of training, saying her prayers and eating her vitamins, BROTHER!

Photo Booth in Segovia