Always interested in a good “pictures!” viewing, Des looks on at grandpa’s photos of his camper build-out adventures. Who’s ready to go camping?
Desmond tries to coax most visitors into a lightsaber duel
Not shown: Eleanor trying to impress grandpa with her mad chili-eating skills
Sometimes even Eleanor takes a few minutes to fully wake up in the morning, but never without her new bunny friend
With a warm(er) day, it’s an evening outside after pre-school/daycare
A bit older and more eager, Des is jazzed to ride his bike around- even just in the garage while dad takes the trash and recycling out. Safety forever first, so Desmond requests his helmet
The Sunday morning crew, watching a few minutes of Planet Earth II
Ella modeling her new hat ma made
Ma also brought over a Peter Rabbit stuffed animal for each of the kids. Des has already decided on a new nap time buddy-
More Ella and dad naps
All bundled up, sporting her new hat
As Des continues to learn about making good choices and practicing good behavior, mom and dad have instituted a “pom pom jar” for rewarding unprompted good deeds. As Desmond reaches each new level, he gets increasing rewards: an ice cream outing, a movie at the theater, and eventually a new lego set. While filling the whole jar is several months away, he did get to the first level, so a trip to eCreamery was a special post-nap treat.
Eleanor was selflessly willing to show her support for brother’s good behavior
Eleanor can spot a dog a 100 feet away, through pedestrian and vehicle traffic 🙂
To the victor goes the spoils
Eleanor hugged her new best friend, Flopsy
Despite the impending late-winter storm, dad and the kids venture out to “the plant store” for seed trays and soil. “Come for the gardening supplies, stay for the pictures with old pickup trucks!”
Eleanor was eager for a good stretch of the legs
She does not trust giant tortoises, alive or bronze. Don’t worry, grandma will protect you.
These two are cute, not cute enough to convince grandma and dad to take them into the fragile housewares section.
What’s better than a weekend lunch at the food hall?
Apparently there are paparazzi amongst Team Llama…
Making some banana bread, just because
The “D” wasn’t detectable after baking, but worth a shot
Peter Pan for family movie night
Des’ glow-in-the-dark dinosaurs finally brought upstairs from Christmas. Not quite installed yet, it does appear they’re doing the dinosaurumpus (thanks again, great-grandpa Irv!)
Desmond in his nature habitat, reading.
At the annual St. Bernard’s fish fry, enjoying the more relaxed environment than Holy Name. Desmond is apparently really excited (or proud?) of his piece of white bread
Eleanor just ran laps the rest of the night. In toddler terms, she probably ran a 10K.
Desmond briefly returns to the table for a brownie.
Eleanor pretending she’s a big kid on the bleachers
Desmond’s new hobby: collecting icicles
With weather in the upper 50s, playing outside was nearly irresistible. Stinson Park provided the perfect snow-melt-mud-free destination
Ella shouted to the horizon as she ran, as if yelling “fore!” to warn the world she was coming
Ok, rest.
Not shown: Desmond sprinting off into the distance towards the tower. In open fields, the well-practiced and respected “red light!” system kinda breaks down :/
Ella giving it a good stretch of the legs
Eleanor definitely has the butt-scoot-shuffle-GO! move down better than her brother at this age, mastering the slide
“Take a picture of me!”
As dad was loading the camera back up to return home, this incredible “golden hour” light just jumped out. Ok, a few more.
Sunday evening art collaboration
Desmond honing his chopsticks skills on some of dad’s pad thai
A rare breakfast out, the wait at Culprit was worth it for the egg sandwich and coffee. These two did fairly well sharing their cereal appetizer
Mom makes some good oatmeal, but this was right up there as well. A bit more berries and syrup than at home, Des was all about it
A morning downtown is nice, even in February
As lead thrill-seeker in the family, it was time to introduce Eleanor to the slides in the Gene Leahy Mall
There may have been a bit more scooting and running involved without any of the accelerant materials typically found laying around in warmer weather
Yup, she’s a fan
Warm enough to be outside, but the water is still frozen most of the way through
As an ardent walker nowadays, Eleanor got a quick advanced tutorial on walking on ice. She’s certainly persistent.
The main event was seeing the light. installation at Kaneko.
Eleanor was stoked to play with what was essentially a large-scale Light Bright
All curled up on mom for movie night, a rewatching of Despicable Me
