Pictures from today

I uploaded the pictures from today to send a video to some friends and when I looked at the assortment I realized there was really no way to tie the pictures together into a coherent post, so here is snapshots of our day . . . literally.

Everytime we go out to eat they hand Nicholas a menu/placemat and crayon. We generally just ignore these. Last weekend Nicholas saw the crayon and wanted it. He then proceeded to carefully hold it in his right hand (and really focus on how he was holding it) and try to draw on the menu. Our only guess is that they've been coloring at daycare. So this morning when I had half an hour to kill before even the library opened (which I was going to use to kill an hour before the zoo opened), I set him up with a piece of paper and some crayons.

From 2010 July

I didn't get a good shot of him actually coloring because by the time I got the camera out he was done, but he mostly likes to make dots, but sometimes will do lines. And the paper really has to be taped down because his motions are so forceful that otherwise the paper ends up on the floor or in a crumpled mess. But it is good to know that he is now old enough for coloring.

Today is our last regularly-scheduled non-daycare weekday (i.e. Nicholas starts fulltime daycare on Monday, but I am sure that there will be days he can't go for whatever reason) and the weather was gorgeous, so I took him to the zoo. We never got past the kids' zoo since they open so late and he still really wants a morning nap, but we had fun.

He was really interested in the goats in the petting zoo this time. He pet them some and used the brush to brush one, but mostly he just wanted to walk around from one to the other, getting very excited with each new one he saw. And if they took off walking and he could consider it a chase, he was thrilled. When we first got there he was calling them dogs (or the word that seems to be doggie, although it isn't very clear), but after I corrected him only 5 or 6 times he had switched to "a go." That kid and his indefinite articles. I'm sure it must be my fault. I must name things that way. I was probably saying, "No, that isn't a doggie, that is a goat" or something like that without paying attention. Unfortunately there are no pictures of the petting zoo because I couldn't safely leave his side to get an angle.

Anyway, on to things I do have pictures of. They finally opened the new train at the zoo. It was a pretty long ride (like 10 minutes) and Nicholas seemed to enjoy it. He did have some trouble with the idea that he had to sit still even though there was no seatbelt, but shockingly did better with staying seated while sitting on his own than he did in my lap. So he spent most of the train ride sitting by himself like a big boy:

From 2010 July

From 2010 July

Speaking of a big boy, Nicholas has learned to climb in and out of his chair. Because he used this chair the most when he was an infant, seeing him in it now really brings home to me how big he has gotten. It is so hard to believe that just a year ago he would nap in this chair for hours and we were so proud of him when he figured out how to kick to make the toys on the toy bar move. Now he climbs in and out, rocks the whole chair with ease, and is just massive!

From 2010 July

For some perspective, here is a picture of him in this chair last July:

From

The below video is somewhat staged, but it was my effort to recreate what had happened spontaneously earlier in the day because I wanted to show it to Katie and Wes. (And while I'm posting random stuff from the day, I figured I'd show you all too.) Well, I guess it isn't staged so much as intentionally prompted. This morning I was telling Joe a story and in it I mentioned the name "Alice." As you all know by now I'm sure, Alice is the name of our friends' daughter who is Nicholas' age. A couple days ago when I told Nicholas we were going to see Alice he smiled and it sounded like he said "Allie," but then when we were at their house he didn't say it at all, so I figured I had imagined it. But this morning as soon as I said "Alice," he broke out into a huge grin and took off for the door saying "Allie, Allie, Allie."

From 2010 July

It was so cute and I wanted to send it to her parents, so later in the day when I had the camera I asked Nicholas if he had a friend named Alice. And, sure enough, his reaction was the same. His pronunciation wasn't as clear, but he was obviously trying to say her name. And he is just so excited! Apparently they are getting more out of their playdates than we realized because he really wanted to go see Alice. I felt pretty mean and will have to be careful not to mention her name when we aren't going. (Random aside: why is it that this child still won't say mommy or daddy, but says other names? Grandpa, Elmo, and now Alice.)

Kindred Spirits . . . and Bubbles

From 2010 July

I never realized it before, but dolphins and 1-year-olds are kindred spirits. Yesterday at the dolphin show at the aquarium I caught myself saying "Look, Nicholas, the dolphins like to/can . . . . just like you" repeatedly. Here are the few I can remember right now:

• Swim in a pool
• Splash
• Play with balls
• Play Peekaboo
• Wave
• Make squeaking noises

It is really fun going back to places we haven't been in awhile and watching how differently Nicholas experiences them. Nicholas was much more interested this time in the what the dolphins were doing (and had a name for them that I couldn't make out but which he used consistently each time they came into view). He did not do as good of a job with sitting still, though. The steps of the stands were too enticing. But since they were made of concrete and very steep I wouldn't let him climb them. Let me tell you, he was not happy with me.

He also still loves the bubble tubes, but as he has gotten older, his way of reacting to them has changed. This time he ran around going "bub-bub-bub-bub-ble!" in his super-high-pitched excited voice. It was so hilarious that eventually I took a video. You have to listen closely to hear him over all the background noise, but click on the picture below to hear/see the excitement:

From 2010 July

Also, I love how he stops mid video to take a break to suck his thumb and then jumps right back into his excitement. It is just so characteristically Nicholas.

Also, next time we go I am taking the leash. That child is fast and able to dart in between people's legs where I can't follow. Jeez.

On a completely unrelated note, there are some funny pictures of Nicholas and Alice trying to climb a really steep slide at the playground last night at the end of this album.

Wordless Wednesday: Playground Fun

From 2010 July

From 2010 July

*Click on the picture of Nicholas on the slide to watch a video of him climbing up.

We're in Trouble

Remember how a few weeks ago I commented that "here comes trouble" was now a good slogan for Nicholas? Well, we seem to turn to each other and say "we're in trouble" multiple times a day now.

I'm trying to think of specific examples and drawing a blank.

Here's one. On our drive back from Rochester (which was rainy and painful, by the way) Joe got fries with his lunch. Nicholas asked for one (well, in Nicholas-ese, which consisted of reaching for them while saying "nummy nummy"), which Joe complied with, and Nicholas promptly reached over to Joe's plate and dipped his fry in the ketchup before eating it. No fuss, no awkwardness, nothing. It was as though the baby had been replaced by a 4-year old who had been dipping french fries for years. I know this doesn't sound impressive, but he had never done this before, we had never taught him this, and he did it with perfect and deliberate technique. He carefully and easily moved the fry from his left hand to his right, shifted his fingers to the top of the fry to make room, dipped it perfectly, and then put it right in his mouth and reached for another one. All matter of factly. And we looked at each other with our jaws on the table. We need to start being really careful what we do because the boy is obviously watching.

He also suddenly climbs on everything. And yet does not yet understand the concept of falling off. Yes, trouble. We were on a walk yesterday evening and had to walk past the park because I vetoed the other route due to a large stray dog. Of course we then had to stop at the park because Nicholas insisted. As usual he went straight to the swings, but after about 5 minutes he wanted out and walked over to the play structure and promptly started climbing up it. Serious trouble.

There are countless more examples I'm sure, but for now I am off to bed because I'll need all the rest I can get before Mr. Trouble and I attempt a day of fun outings tomorrow.

Museum of Play

We are in Rochester for a conference and Nicholas is getting a bonus visit with his Uncle Mike and Aunt Melinda. They are babysitting the two mornings we both need to be at the conference, which is a huge help. And this afternoon Nicholas and I went with them to the Museum of Play, which is awesome!

Nicholas had a great time and found tons to do, even though there were lots of things he was way too young for. I am glad we came now instead of a few weeks ago, though, because being an independent walker made it a lot more fun for him.

There was a whole Sesame Street section, where Nicholas walked around going "Elmo, Elmo, Elmo, Elmo." He couldn't even play with anything in that section because he couldn't sit still long enough. He was a boy on a mission.

From 2010 July

After we pried Nicholas away from the various Elmos, we went "shopping" at the mini play Wegmans. (Yes, because it is Rochester the play grocery store is a Wegmans.)

I don't think Nicholas understood the imaginative element, since he didn't focus on foods he likes, but he definitely understood that he was supposed to push the cart around, take things off shelves, and put them in the cart.

Here he is adding some cans of "Manwich" to his full cart:

From 2010 July

And checking to make sure he has enough Pedialyte before moving on:

From 2010 July

In the rest of the museum there were also trains to watch, toy trucks, blocks, a piano to play, stairs to work on climbing, a magnetic giant Mr. Potato Head, and so much more.

One of Nicholas' favorite things was a ramp to race toy cars. He spent a lot of time refusing to use it the "right" way, instead pushing the cars up the ramp and then walking them back over to the bin at the bottom and dropping them in. But then something clicked when Uncle Mike showed him and the two of them dropped cars from the top over and over and over again. And giggled.

From 2010 July

From 2010 July

We spent a total of over 3 hours at the museum and Nicholas was walking almost the entire time and playing hard! That in and of itself would have been exhausting, but he also missed his afternoon nap. So I wasn't surprised when he slept the whole way back to Mike and Melinda's. I was however surprised when he immediately went back to sleep once we got to their house.

After a nap and dinner we had another treat in store for Nicholas. Ice cream! Or as Nicholas refers to it, "nummy nummy." The ice cream stand we went to had free "baby cones" for anyone shorter than the counter, so Nicholas got a small ice cream cone all to himself. We ended up dumping it into a cup and feeding him with a spoon to prevent it from ending up all over the ground. But when the ice cream was gone I let him chew on the cone to stall him while we finished our ice cream. Here he is working on the cone:

From 2010 July

Pretty soon after this picture was taken Nicholas started handing me his cone to dip it in the melted ice cream left in the bottom of the bowl. By the end of the process his cone was a wet, flat mess.

But nummy nummy indeed.

What we Forgot

Each time we've walked out of the house for a trip this summer I've had a feeling we were forgetting something. And I think each time I've been right. It is almost inevitable given the amount of stuff we travel with these days and the insanity in the apartment as we try to get all of our stuff out the door, while also remembering to finish dishes, empty trash, clean out the fridge, etc., and all with Nicholas running around yelling "go" and pulling things out of bags.

Anyway, most of the things we've forgotten have been pretty minor. But tonight we opened the trunk when we arrived at the hotel and started pulling stuff out and I realized we had forgotten something very important.

The crib.

About halfway into the wave of panic rushing over me I realized that the hotel would probably have a crib we could use. We try to avoid hotel cribs because they make me anxious and on this trip using their crib would thwart our plan to put Nicholas down for naps at Mike and Melinda's, but no longer was the situation tragic. And it turns out the hotel gave us a pack n' play, so I feel safe about it and if we really want we could probably borrow it to take to Mike and Melinda's as long as it is in the room when we check out.

So crisis averted. But man do we feel dumb. We packed all the sheets and pads and everything for the pack n' play but somehow the pack n' play itself never crossed our minds.

Let's hope that a little bit of my brain is back in time to give my paper at the conference tomorrow.

"Apple"

Those of you who have seen Nicholas in the past few weeks will be shocked to hear that he no longer asks for crackers ad nauseam. In fact, he literally cried today when I gave him a graham cracker as a snack and proceeded to throw it on the floor.

Apparently crackers have been replaced by Nicholas' new favorite food. At least a couple dozen times a day he asks for an apple. You know when it is coming because he gets this look of excitment, anticipation, and hope on his face and then says a very clear if somewhat breathy "app-pa."

Except by "apple" Nicholas actually means grape. Red seedless grapes to be exact. I guess I can understand the confusion, but we've corrected him probably close to a hundred times over the past few days (I told you he asks for them a lot) and he recognizes when we say "grape" what we are referring to. But "apples" they remain. Oh well, we know what he means.

Louisville Travels

Joe is swamped with work, so he has delegated me to write a post about the comedy of errors that was our recent trip to and from Louisville.


We had gone back and forth with my parents on whether to drive or fly to Louisville, eventually settling on flying all together on Monday evening using my dad's frequent flier miles. Reservations were made and a plan was set.


And then we tried to actually put said plan into motion.


The wheels came off the wagon as soon as we left the house. And proceeded to roll further and further away until we arrived in Louisville . . .by car . . . at noon the next day.


We almost didn't make it to the airport because a sudden storm dropped sheets of rain so fast that the road completely disappeared from sight. Then we had an incompetent person checking us in who didn't know how to deal with a lap child. Then our flight to Atlanta was delayed . . . and delayed . . . and delayed. And then we discovered (and I use that word intentionally, because the staff kept insisting there was no problem) that our flight from Atlanta to Louisville was cancelled and they wouldn't be able to get us there for a couple days. So we strong-armed the airline into retrieving our luggage (including Nicholas' carseat, thank goodness my dad flies a lot and so has earned special status), piled into the car, and started driving. We drove 4 hours, stopped at 1am to sleep for a few hours, and then got back in the car, making it to Louisville with just enough time to get changed.


Nicholas did quite well during the hours of waiting in the airport (chasing Grandma Kathleen around columns was apparently hilarious) and on the drive out (the benefit to driving late at night is that he slept). The drive back was more difficult because we drove literally all day (9am-9pm). And just to complete the trend of the trip, the place we stopped for dinner had no pasta in the restaurant (Nicholas' go-to food) and were out of turkey for Joe's turkey sandwich.


The one saving grace of the drive was that Nicholas is currently obsessed with trucks and there are plenty of those on interstates. He would see a semi in front of us reflected in his mirror, get excited, and then look out the side window for it as we passed it. (By the way, I'm totally impressed that he has figured out how the mirror works enough to know where to anticipate the truck moving.) And of course he yelled "guk guk guk" the whole time with great excitement.

In actuality the drives weren't bad. The only real construction we hit was at midnight when traffic was really light. With the exception of the initial drive to the airport the weather cooperated pretty well. There were no accidents or other long delays. We split the drive among 3 drivers. The list goes on. It was one of those trips where every piece of the plan fell apart and yet it all worked out just fine.

Let's hope this next trip goes at least as well. (Because, yes, there is another trip. Believe me, if I wasn't presenting at this conference we would seriously consider cancelling. We are so sick of driving, hotels, suitcases, etc.) The drive isn't quite as long, but Nicholas won't have his grandma to entertain him in the backseat. And the route has fewer interstates, so probably fewer opportunities to watch "guks."

Swimming

From 2010 July

It is yet another 90+ degree week here in Baltimore, so I've finally gotten over my laziness and have taken Nicholas to the pool a couple times since we got back.

And Nicholas loves it!

When we went with Katie and Alice on Friday he broke into a huge grin as soon as he saw the pool. And tonight I wanted to take him out for a bit after dinner while Joe finished cleaning the kitchen and when I asked him if he'd like to go for a walk or to the pool, his face lit up at the word "pool" and he started giggling and ran towards the door.

Here are the kids waiting to get in on Friday:

From 2010 July

This evening there were two other little boys Nicholas' age in the pool and they enjoyed hitting a ball back and forth.

Nicholas loves "swimming" around (kicking his legs and pointing in the direction he wants me to take him) and being tossed up in the air, but he isn't 100% comfortable with the water. Sometimes he looks like a fish and perfectly at ease while other times he clings to me or freaks out when water gets in his face. But since he absolutely loves going to the pool, hopefully he'll get more comfortable as the summer progresses. And since the water is delightfully warm (the one benefit of the weeks of record heat) I don't object to going swimming frequently, especially in the evenings when I don't have to deal with sunscreen.

(Great) Grandma O.

For those of you we haven't spoken to recently, the long unexplained blog absence was because we made an (obviously) unplanned trip to Louisville this week for my grandmother's funeral.

I think Joe is planning to write a post more appropriate for Nicholas' blog about the trip, but I am going to step out of the parenting blog voice for a few minutes and try to capture a little piece of my relationship with my grandmother and my very mixed emotions at the moment.

That is if I can figure out where to even begin.

I can only really talk about her as my grandmother because as a kid I only really saw people in terms of their role in relation to me. When we were in Louisville for Christmas, however, I took pictures of letters she wrote my grandfather in the 1940s and this past week began to organize the images. I haven't had time to read the letters closely, but based on the paragraphs I've read as they caught my eye, I can see the unique opportunity I have to gain a glimpse of the woman my grandmother was long before she was my grandmother, when she was just a little younger than I am now, going to school at the same university.

Growing up she was always my favorite grandparent. I am only starting to piece together why that was. I think a large part of it was because she made me feel so loved and special. As a kid I had this impression that she thought I could do no wrong. It is a role only a grandparent can have. And even if I couldn't articulate it, I think I knew that the pride in her voice when she introduced me to everyone we met as her namesake wasn't related to honor role lists or awards and that I didn't have to do anything to earn it.

People keep asking me how I'm doing and I don't know how to answer. Mostly I'm fine because her death was not unexpected and I said my goodbyes when I saw her a couple weeks ago. Part of me is happy for her, as odd as that sounds. She has been sick a long time and in some ways trapped by dementia, and I feel like she has been freed. Like she can be fully herself again for the first time in years, no longer restrained by a body that held her back. And sometimes I get really really sad. Just as Grandma has been freed from her body, so my mind has been freed from thinking of her in the present to remembering what she was like as I was growing up. And I realize just how much I have lost. How lucky I was to have had her. But how much emptier my life is to not have her in it anymore.

And since I have now made myself cry, I think it is time to end this reflection and return to a reflection related to Nicholas. Nicholas won't remember Grandma O. but I'm glad they spent some time together. Here is a picture we took last August, on his first trip out to Louisville:

From

Grandma and Nicholas were always happy to see each other and had a connection. It is unlikely that either really understood who the other was and they were never able to interact much, but they each instinctively reached for the other and seemed to just know that this was a person who mattered. It baffled and yet deeply touched me on our last trip and those images keep reappearing in my mind.

Thank you, Grandma. For so much more than I can ever articulate.

Here Comes Trouble

From 2010 July

We picked this shirt as Nicholas' Bermuda souvenir shirt because of the cool looking shark, but it turns out it was very appropriate. Nicholas has transformed into a complete monster! And by monster I mean toddler.

The first problem is that he now walks/runs around the apartment at will. The second problem is that he thinks that opening and closing doors is more fun than any of his toys. The third problem is that he thinks it is funny when we say "no" or are mad at him and laughs and then keeps doing whatever we were trying to get him to stop doing.

As far as doors, so far he has no interest in what is inside cabinets, but he slams them with force and without paying attention to whether his fingers (or his face) are in the way. This is a little problematic. I think putting latches on each of the couple dozen cabinet doors in our little apartment may just drive us all crazy so I think the plan for now is to start keeping our bedroom and bathroom doors closed and put latches on the couple cabinets with dangerous stuff inside. And if he smashes his fingers inside the other cabinet doors . . . well, he'll learn eventually, right?

Yes, here comes trouble indeed.

Cruise 2010 Day 5

**I originally wrote this post on Wednesday afternoon (July 7th)**

Today is the last day of the cruise and we are at sea. Unfortunately there isn’t much on the ship for Nicholas to do. There is tons of stuff for older kids, but we have been really disappointed with the amenities for the under 3 set. So he is pretty bored.

But right now he is playing with his aunts and uncles in the bar with fish tanks. Between the fish and the elevators (which he still insists on calling bupbups), hopefully he’ll be entertained enough not to be too much of a pain. They babysat him yesterday afternoon for a bit and he had a lot of fun, which reminded us of how much better he does with other people when we’re not around. So we figured that if we weren't there they’d get better play time and we’d get some downtime. Win-win. Hopefully it works.

We haven’t really done much of interest since I wrote yesterday afternoon, but there was one funny line we overheard. Joe was walking around with Nicholas (who was in a sweater vest outfit for dinner) and overheard someone say to her husband, “Look, it’s the tuxedo baby!” Nicholas was pretty dashing in his tuxedo on Sunday night, if I do say so.

Here are a couple of pictures from formal night of "the tuxedo baby":

From Cruise 2010

From Cruise 2010

Speaking of Nicholas’ fame, he is getting a little full of himself. Whenever anyone says “cute,” he turns around, as though it is equivalent to his name. And last night when everyone was clapping after the waiters performed, he looked around with a look that clearly said, “what did I do?” As though it is impossible that anyone could be clapping for anyone or anything other than him. We need to get this kid back to daycare so he can remember that he is not the center of the world.

***

And so concludes our family cruise adventure.

From Cruise 2010

Cruise 2010 Day 4

**I originally wrote this post on Tuesday afternoon (July 6th)**

We have had a great time in Bermuda!

Yesterday we went to the zoo/aquarium, which was really cool. There were a lot of animals I had never seen before and the exhibits were set up in ways that you were really close to the animals.

From Cruise 2010

Nicholas couldn’t really pick out some of the ones I thought were most interesting (like a wallaby and this thing that looked just like a dinosaur), but he loved the flamingos and he was fascinated by the bright red birds and orange monkeys that walked right past him in the free-range section. He actually tried to chase the birds, but luckily they are speedier than he is (even though his walking is getting pretty good).

We then spent some time in Hamilton, where Nicholas made friends with the owner of the little diner where we had lunch and was captivated by sailboats.

From Cruise 2010

The rest of yesterday afternoon was really rough. After spending a lot of Sunday fighting to get Nicholas to nap (culminating in taking him out of dinner to nap after only 10 minutes because he was melting down so much he couldn’t even work up an interest in eating strawberries), he napped a little better yesterday but was still a complete wreck. Nap didn’t help, crackers didn’t help, bath didn’t help. He just couldn’t deal with the world. I finally concluded that he must not feel right and was a little worried because even though he didn’t have a fever, he has been pretty congested and I was worried it could be something more than a cold.

Then the idea popped into my head from nowhere that maybe that fourth molar that poked through a little a few weeks ago and then just stalled might be finally really coming through and hurting him. We figured it was worth putting a little Orajel on the spot on the off chance that was it. Literally within about 5 seconds he went from an utter mess to delightful. I was so glad that was the solution but felt bad because he was probably hurting for days and I could have fixed it but didn’t. Major guilt trip.

This morning we went to the beach, which Nicholas thought was really cool. He did his usual thing where he spends the first half of the time studying it and then can start having fun.

Here he is in the studying phase:

From Cruise 2010

He then got really brave, charging at waves and pushing in deeper and laughing.

From Cruise 2010

If the water came up higher than his waist, though, he started to get worried.

He was so worn out from playing in the ocean, the sun, and just trying to take it all in that he fell asleep on the taxi ride back to the ship. Falling asleep in the car isn’t unusual for him, but falling asleep in someone’s arms definitely is. But he was out like a light in Joe’s arms.

Here are a couple more pictures from Horseshoe Bay, which is the most beautiful beach I've ever seen:

From Cruise 2010

From Cruise 2010

From Cruise 2010

Cruise 2010 Day 2

**I originally wrote this post on Sunday afternoon (July 4th)**

From Cruise 2010

Today is the first full day on the ship and Nicholas seems to be enjoying himself so far. He is tired and overstimulated, so a little manic at times, but overall doing very well.

I am realizing just how much more tightly wound I am these days than in years past and how much more anxious I was about the logistics of this trip because I am having more trouble acclimating to cruise life. I think by day 4 I will have relaxed enough to really start soaking it in, just in time to pull back into port.

But everyone is so helpful and accommodating, so much so that it keeps catching me off guard. I have to give the staff major credit for all they have done for Nicholas. For example, last night at dinner the waiter brought Nicholas over a cup of fruit right away, which was wonderful because he was famished. And it meant he was distracted while we looked at the menu and ordered.

So far three problems/annoyances have arisen.

The first is our fault. I forgot to bring dish soap to clean his sippy cups and since they have milk in them they really need to be actually washed rather than just rinsed. It occurred to me as we were driving up but when we passed a grocery store near the port we couldn’t remember what we needed. The first staff person we asked said they don’t have any because they just use big industrial machines to wash dishes, but another said she would have some sent to our room. So hopefully some will arrive sometime today. If not we may have to search for some once we get to Bermuda.

The second is that the baby/toddler playtime the cruiseline advertised was pretty awful. It was listed as for 6-18 months but the toys and the woman there really were targeting around 3-7 month olds. As we’ve mentioned before, Nicholas tends to just look at people like they’re crazy when they talk babytalk to him. The fact that the staff person was trying to get him interested in toys he grew out of last fall and speaking nonsense did not go over well. And so he was just giving her skeptical looks and kept saying “bye bye” or “go bye bye” until we let him leave.

The third is that apparently kids who aren't yet potty trained are not allowed in any of the pools on the ship, even wearing swimming diapers and even in the kiddie pool. Between that restriction and the crappy play session, there is officially nothing for him to do on the ship. Well, no that isn’t true, but no activities aimed at him and no amenities he is allowed to use. He is perfectly happy to walk around staring at all the lights and commotion and to watch the elevators go up and down, but I was hoping for more. (For some reason he seems to be calling elevators “bupbup” maybe as a variation of “up” but we’re not sure.)

On a completely different note, Nicholas seems completely unfazed by the fact that we’re in the middle of the ocean. It was the same with the plane rides last week. I guess he doesn’t yet realize how unusual those views are. He thought the forklift trucks that were lifting baggage yesterday were much more interesting than this giant boat. But man did he love those trucks! He was practically jumping out of his stroller shouting “Guk guk guk guk!” “Yes, buddy, I see the trucks, calm down.”

The main point of this vacation was for Nicholas to spend a lot of time with his grandparents and aunts and uncles. So far he is being a little shy and it is taking him some time to warm up to all the aunts and uncles. He was excited to see Uncle Patrick, who he has seen a few times in the last couple months, but a little more unsure of the others. But he isn’t being insanely clingy like he was in Louisville, so hopefully in the next day or so it’ll click in for him.

It is the Fourth of July, but it doesn't really feel like it. There are some decorations around the ship and there was a giant American flag cake (yummy), but obviously no fireworks. Joe and Nicholas are wearing appropriate attire, however (Nicholas is in a shirt with an image of the original broadside of the Declaration of Independence on it and Joe is wearing a shirt with Franklin's "Join or Die" cartoon), and "we" won a special 4th of July trivia session this morning.

From Cruise 2010

Tonight is the formal night and I am sure dozens (okay, or hundreds) of pictures will be taken. Nicholas even has his own tuxedo, which is sure to be adorable. Hopefully he is patient enough to let us put all the pieces on.

Cruise Pictures

I will post some more of the pictures from the cruise in individual posts on this main page, but if you're interested in paging through the whole set (well, the 90 I put online out of the 1,009 that were taken), they are now all posted in the Gallery.

Cruise Sneak Peek

We're back from the cruise and had a wonderful time. I wrote some posts while we were gone, but need to add pictures to them before I post them, so those will appear over the next few days.

But based on my first glance through the pictures, here is a sneak peek at our vacation.

There is no denying that the cutest pictures from the trip are of Nicholas in his tuxedo on formal night. Here is he is playing peekaboo on the ship's deck:

From Cruise 2010

And I got a photo-op with my handsome little boy . . . and a big beautiful ocean:

From Cruise 2010

And the little guy with his Uncle Mike and Aunt Melinda:

From Cruise 2010

And the family portrait on formal night:

From Cruise 2010

My favorite picture of Nicholas and his Uncle Patrick. This is the window next to our table in the dining room:

From Cruise 2010

Believe it or not, we did more than dress up and eat on the cruise. We also took Nicholas to the beach for the first time. More later, but obviously he had fun:

From Cruise 2010

And this picture pretty accurately captures the vacation. It looks posed, but really Nicholas had gotten sick of sitting in his assigned spot and I just set him down in the closest available spot and everyone else was laughing at him and the photographer had the presence of mind to get the shot.

From Cruise 2010

More to come this weekend . . . I hope.