I Love Tommy!

I love my cousin Tommy. He likes Cars. I like Cars. He plays with trains. I play with trains. His dad even looks like my dad. We both like to play with Pap-pap. I like Tommy so much that I let him enter my personal space; I held his hand and hugged him. Crazy, I know!


Tommy and I wore matching PJ's (thanks Grammie), held cars in our hands, and watched "Happy Feet" with Pap-pap and Grammie.


We wore matching outfits (thanks again Grammie!) to see Santa and ride on Santa's Express train. Tommy sat in Santa's lap. I opted out. (We have some differences, too.)

We rode the train three times.


Tommy and I were so inseparable that we even took a bath together.


I hope you are lucky enough to have a cousin Tommy, too!


I'm gunna go play with Tommy again soon.

Thanksgiving

We spent Thanksgiving with dad's side of the family in Huntington Beach. It was a full house - full of fun, boys, and germs. I suppose that is a common trifecta. We all had a great time (with the exception of getting colds). Here's a summary of our trip in pictures.


We spent some time down at the beach building sand castles.



We took the requisite family pictures.


Pap-pap, dad, mom, and I took a walk down to the pier.


There was a lot of horsing around.


And bubbles. Bubbles make me laugh.

Showing signs of withdrawal

Translation: "G-mommy, G-daddy, where are you?"

Creative

Look at the village that I made! I made 5 different bag buildings and then allowed Little People to purchase the property. Due to current mortgage industry conditions, few Little People qualified for the loans. Too bad. Dad was concerned about the placement of some doors, but mom supported my creativity. In today's market, these Little People shouldn't complain. At least I gave them a fixed rate! I got the idea from my Highlights High Five magazine. If you notice in the back, I even made a tree. G-daddy collected the leaves when he was here earlier this month. I got the idea for the tree from Ella. Of course, I have my own ideas, too. I've been painting some original pieces. We only have one color paint, so I'm calling this series: BLUE. I told you that I'm original.

5 Years

The Good Life

Yesterday, Josh and I (mom) went out for the morning while dad worked on his Sunday school lesson. Typically, when we are in the car, if I ask Josh if he'd like some music, his response is "No" and I sigh. This time, to my surprise, he said yes! I turned on the radio and Josh rejected all 6 of the stations that are preset on the radio. Great...his "no" means "yes." A true two year old. So, I turned on the CD player and he rejected the first Cure CD and then another. Double drat! Way to break your mom's heart, Josh! Big Audio Dynamite? Big fat NO! Then CD #4 started spinning - Material Issue's International Pop Overthrow. Josh calmly says, "yes." What? I asked to confirm that I heard him correctly. Yes. YES! Wow! We listened to the first song and then the second, "Diane." When the 2nd song ended, he asked for "more diane." I was so excited that he finally liked one of my songs that I pulled out the car's owners manual to figure out how to make it repeat the song. Tonight we introduced dad to the song and now all of us are singing the chorus together. It rocks!

After church today we went out to lunch together. While we were sitting in our booth waiting for our food a little boy - maybe 8 or 9 - stopped in front of us, started moving his mouth without talking, and then walked on by. Josh was mesmerized. He turned around and watched the boy who continued to send us silent messages and started doing the robot. Honestly, before having Josh I probably would have thought this kid was a nut, but now, he's free entertainment! Josh and this boy exchanged glances throughout lunch. At one point the boy even came over and asked Josh to turn back around. Then, the boy came back over and handed Josh the prize from his kid's meal. How awesome is that? I was stunned by this little boys act of generosity and kindness. Josh, as Josh does, stared at him, probably thinking "thank you." A DPS officer sitting nearby proceeded to thank the young man and gave him a "Junior Trooper" sticker. As the DPS officer was leaving he also gave Josh a sticker, which pleased Josh again. It really made me stop and think how easily we can be an example of generosity and kindness to others. A toy, a sticker, a smile...we have the power to make someone's day. Very cool Sunday lunch.

And because any post without a Josh picture isn't worth reading, here is a totally unrelated picture.