It's a Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood!

Finn and his buddy, Luke, decided to go on a picnic. They invited their Moms to come along. (Apparently they don't yet cramp their style.)

Wow. Now if I could just get my legs to move that fast...



"S" is for sharing. "S" is also for the strawberries we ate.



Soft, plush grass: the perfect medium for working on crawling, rolling, and giving Mama lots of grass stains to wash out.



Snuggling with Luke. And then I snuggle with Auntie Heather to help her settle down for a nap.



Yee haw! This new swing thing is pretty neat, but not nearly as captivating as that funny guy on the ground who seems to do everything I do.

A Wild Kind of Weekend

The weekend began with a family trip to Caw Caw nature preserve, about 10 minutes from our house. A beautiful former plantation site where the landscape offers all kinds of wildlife and beautiful scenery.

Me and my alligator:

Sprout's (my baby brother's/sister's) alligator:

Mommy and Daddy's Alligator:

Cool. Swampland.

The weekend continued with a visit to Marion Square downtown for the annual Southeastern Wildlife Expo. Finn met his pal, Luke, and the two enjoyed visiting with the bald eagles, the camel, llama, zebra, osprey, and vultures (not buzzards, mind you, as we were sternly corrected).

The Stages of Bedtime

Stage One: Dinner, usually whatever Mama and Dad are having, pureed if necessary. New favorites include Dad's collard greens (makes for an interesting morning, however), Thai coconut soup, spicy General Tao's chicken, pasta with sauce du jour, salmon, and grouper. Gouda cheese is the new favorite snack.

(This is the "before" pic).



Stage Two: Bathtime. Finn loves his bath and would stay in for hours if he could. The crab and dolphin are his favorite squirters, the duck a close second, and the pelican his least favorite. He shows potential for being a swimmer as he now thinks it's fun to plunge his head forward under the water.





Stage Three: Cuddle time. A gentle rock in the rocking chair makes sleepy eyes even sleepier.



Stage Four: In bed and sucking the thumb. Need we say more?

Finn has a Cousin!!!

Woo hoo! Yippee! Oh yeah, baby! And yay, too!

Lucky me! Aunt Chris and Uncle Joel had a baby two days ago so now I have my first cousin!

His parents haven’t yet decided how they’re going to spell his name, so I don’t want to give anything away, but I am so excited to have a cousin to play with and grow up with! I can’t wait to exchange visits between Madison and here, though we’ll probably spend more time here because there’s lots to do in Charleston and in the winter this place doesn’t become a frigid, icy wasteland of agony.

Anyhow, here’s his picture. Isn't he cute? Clearly we're related. Hopefully it won’t be too long before we can get our pictures taken together and play trucks and space missions and car racing and duck chasing and wrestling with the dogs and tree climbing and everything else.

Drink your milk little cousin, so you can get big and strong and highly coordinated like me! Let's do stuff!

Welcome Home Grandmama and Grandad!

Yay! Grandmama and Grandad have moved back to Virginia from Tokyo, so now I'll be seeing them a lot more frequently! They came for a visit just a week back from returning, and though still a little jet-lagged we all had lots of fun together:

We went out for Mexican food; at first Grandad fed me some squash, but later I discovered that I love enchiladas, burritos and refried beans. Mama says the beans are good for my digestive tract, whatever that means. I made friends with one of the other diners and she made me laugh, so I flirted with her for a bit. I am a Southern Gentleman, afterall.



Grandmama cooked lots of food for me over the weekend and I discovered I especially love roast beef with gravy and mashed potatoes and lemon chicken. I also love Zweiback and I've become pretty proficient at feeding myself.





The second most exciting news of the month? I learned to crawl. Yup, I'm on the move now. It's only the army crawl, but I've now mastered that and am focusing on trying to crawl up on all fours. Mobility is great. Pretty soon I'll be walking, too!



Grandmama and Grandad had to return to Virginia to move back into their house, but they'll be back next month. By then I'll really be mobile.