The Return of the B Team & Halloween!

Sorry that I'm a little behind on the postings, but I WILL catch up over the next week. Pinkie swear.

While Oma and Opa took a vacation, Nana/Papa (lovingly, the self-coined 'B-team') came into town to watch the big guy. And, man-oh-man, did they had fun. While we were at work, they ventured off to...

• Happy Hollow, where he rode his favorite fire truck and police car ride. 
• The Monterey Bay Aquarium, where he told every passerby about the 'night night' fish lounging on the bottom of the tanks. They even spoiled him with a stuffed dolphin (named Dolly). 
• San Jose's Children's Discovery Museum, where they got soaked with the water tables. 
• The train hobby shop, where he ran down the LONG display case and pointed out every 'do-do' train. 
• Vasona Park to visit the train there (yes, he has quite an obsession with do-do trains at the moment). 
• Carved a pumpkin in the shape of Mickey Mouse (who he calls, 'High-high-high' on account of the Mickey Mouse Club theme song, which Oma sings regularly to him, which includes  "Forever let us hold our banner high / High, high, high!") 

And, might I add, that I LOVE visits from the laundry, dog-walking, and dish-washing fairies.

The weekend before Halloween started out with a nice belated birthday celebration for Nana at Lark Creek Blue. E was a perfect gentleman and everyone left happy and full.

That Saturday, we all had fun giving our costumes a try at the Rodriguez's Halloween party. Of course, E loved having his pit crew push him around and it was good practice for the real Haunt Night.

After church that Sunday, we met with Mark, Dasha, and the girls for a fun brunch. It was great to catch up with them while E joined the girls at the 'kids table' (Still, sometimes I'm surprised to find out that I've graduated from it myself) to color and play.

Halloween itself was great. We picked up dinner, ate quickly, and then got our costumes on. Nana and Papa were nice enough to man our door while Lisa and I pit-crewed the race car driver E as we took him around the neighborhood and to trick-or-treat at Oma/Opa's house. He started to get the hang of it, though he had more fun just driving in his car at night with Mommy and Daddy than he had getting candy.  This isn't a picture of his car, but it's a car that he fell in love with at the Halloween Party.

A couple other things I wanted to share:

• We had the hardest time not laughing the other night at dinner when E put a noodle of penne on his head (covered in marinara, mind you) and proclaimed, "Hat!"
• Also, we've started to compile a list of words he knows and were blown away to find that between sounds, words, and signs he's got close to100! (and those don't count the 'words' he uses all the time that we have yet to decipher). 
• E commandeered the iPad and without us knowing, and decided to send an email to one of my friends.

}\\|||[=”¥¥"'ffignm,,,,,m l.Sent from my iPadasssssbnnn,,,,nbbvxxzaaZzzsfik
& 60:@"¥!>>>>€>€>.<~~~~;|~x vv ohfvhuujjk,lffvvfddxxccvnjuytrl

Some of those symbols I've no idea how to access, so good for him. My favorite part though: "Sent from my iPadasssssbnnn"  It's so brilliant that I may make that my auto-signature. 

This past weekend, we headed to Seattle for my Grandma Mary's memorial service and it was a really special weekend that deserves its own post...which I'll get to some time later this week. Until then...

Bret
Sent from my iPadasssssbnnn