Personality

It is so much fun watching Sammy's personality develop. I can't even believe that in one month he will be old enough for Nursery (hallelujah!). Here are some of the new things that Sammy is doing.

Building "Forts" Sammy gets into these creative moods where he will pick a few choice toys and then take them to his special place and sit among them. He is very picky about what toys he takes into his "fort." And we've learned NOT to take the toys away from the fort for fear of retaliation (okay...crying hysterically).

Discovering "new" toys
After building a fort one day - Sammy realized the toy basket was a great thing to play with. He brought it over to me and we sat on the couch with the basket over our heads. The basket is kind of see through, so I would put my hand on the outside and pat it - and Sam would laugh and laugh and laugh and try to poke my hand from the inside.

Later that day - he picked up the basket and put it on his head and started walking around the house. The best part was when he walked into the fireplace and then he couldn't figure out how to turn around - so he kept bumping into the wall. After a couple of minutes of me laughing - started crying. I'm sure it would be frustrating to not get anywhere.

He's always had a love for shoes, especially mom's and dad's shoes. Here he is giving Mom's shoes a try. He didn't walk very far before he fell - but he got a big kick out of wearing these big shoes!

"Demanding" food
His newest trick is walking over to his high chair - pounding on the seat and screaming "Ahhhh!" I guess we taught him this one because we'd try to get him to open his mouth during feeding times by saying, "Ahhh." He also does this to the candy/cookie jar. He knows right where it is in the kitchen and will walk over to the jar and point and scream, "Ahhhh!" What a funny boy!

Feeding Himself
A MeSsY operation! He does great with finger food, but we've been trying to get him to learn how to use a fork and spoon. His cereal in the morning mostly ends up on his bib/pajamas. What fun to develop fine motor skills!


We LOVE this boy so much!!!

Super Halloween Night!

Happy Halloween! We hope that your Halloween was just super. We had a fun night. It felt like we were just running here and there, but all in all it was a good time.

We started the day going to get some shots for Sam. What kind of parent chooses to get their boy his shots on Halloween? Yeah we pondered that question for a bit, but I guess we figured that if you start off bitter the sweet would seem sweeter? Maybe that's just what we told ourselves...

So after some shots, and a quick stop at the community center for an early vote, we were ready to start our evening festivities. Okay so seriously?! Sammy has already had way too much candy and we haven't even started the day. Of course the doctor's office gave him a candy bar, as did the Wal-Mart cashier, and the Quizno's cashier. At least the poll place had some good sense and didn't offer the poor guy some more sugar!

Oh well, let the sugar infestation continue, First stop Grandma's:

Visit to Grandma

I don't know why we didn't get a picture of Sammy with Grandma, but we didn't. Her legs do cameo when we went to go visit grandpa, but for some reason we didn't think to get a picture. I guess we at least had the camera with us, so that is a start. This next threesome of pictures is kind of an omen for how the day will progress: Happily eating candy, and then when it is gone, bring on the whinery!

Ah well, it's Halloween.. Even Superman has his weaknesses, and apparently there are few things worse than coming to the end of a delightful bag of M&M's.

Visit to Grandpa

Next on the flight list for the super man is a visit to grandpa. Grandpa was at work and we didn't want to miss him, so we thought we would take him a couple treats and give him some happy Halloween wishes. Earlier in the day we got him a king size snickers and Sammy was excited to fly in and grant some sweet wishes.

A quick sidenote, Sammy recently got a new pair of shoes that are a size too big. Occasionally he trips up on the larger than life shoes...

As we were running to Grandpa's office, the carpet monster jumped up and tripped Sammy. Yep, he did a little spin and landed hard. So instead of a fun smile with a candy bar in hand to greet grandpa, it all fell apart and he screamed in pain. Don't worry we came prepared, and quickly broke him off a piece of that Kit Kat bar (how many has he had today, ugh we are bad parents!)

Also to cheer the little guy up, Ralph offered him a CEO position. He was only on the clock for a few minutes, but come on, the guys handling our wonderful financial institutions make a Mercedes a minute; so we are trying to figure out the payment deserved... Here is Sammy hard at work -- looking at some plans and relaxing in the important seat.


Here is a video of the Tricks and Treats received from Grandpa.

Next on the flight plan was a trip to our other Grandma & Grandpa:

Visit to Grandma & Grandpa

superman with his super grandparents

At this point in the evening, Sammy has figured out exactly what is in these buckets, a whole lot of goodness! The perfect part in Sammy's mind is that wherever he goes, he has the effect of people wanting to feed him. This is actually not just a Halloween spectacle. I swear day in day out, complete strangers ask if they can give this boy food. Does he look hungry? Or is it just so fun to provide nourishment and enjoyment to cute little faces?

Here is a clip of some tricks and Sweets at Grandma & Grandpa's:

Trick - or - Treating!!

By quarter to 6, we were finally home and ready for some trick-or-treating. We didn't go out with Sammy last year, so this was a first for both parent and child. Michelle decided to stay home and pass out candy, so I took the little superhero around the block. We ended up being out for about an hour, and by that point Sam was completely exhausted.

He did pretty good though. After a couple houses he figured out the whole idea of grabbing a piece from their bowl and sticking it in his bucket. The funny thing is that even though we only hit a few houses, he still made out like a champ because they would let him do the grabbing. Of course he wouldn't grab just one, but because of the before-mentioned phenomena of wanting to feed the child, they just thought it was darling! But honestly like anyone would take it back from a tiny superhero.. a 15 year old hardly dressed up maybe, but certainly not a first-timer who doesn't know the rules yet!

Many times as Sam was about to grab some candy, he hesitated for a little while because of the distracting outfits that everyone was wearing! I guess as a little boy you just aren't expecting a werewolf to be holding out a bowl full of candy.

Here we are getting ready to go:

Dinner & Relaxation

Well finally the night came to a close (and finally this post is coming to a close). We had dinner and relaxed and watched Sam eat yet more candy. When bed time finally came calling, he was completely pooped. What a fun but exhausting day!

Before bed, we took a picture of Sammy with the pumpkins we carved. All of these came from our garden this year!

Happy Halloween!!