Ramping Up

Here's a couple of pictures of Tyler's first hike. It was Veteran's Day holiday. Tyson planned to work that day, until he heard I'd made plans to spend the day with the Bushmans. Suddenly he decided it was okay to celebrate this holiday after all.

Ruby is one of Tyler's favorite people. He was so happy to spend the day with her!

We made it to our destination, this house. It wasn't as old as we expected, but it was cool nonetheless.

I remember Tyler enjoying Christmas last year, but I sure don't remember him being so excited about it. This year, this kid is PUMPED. For one thing, he listened carefully when we explained the order of the fall/winter holidays - Halloween, wedding anniversary, Thanksgiving, Mama's birthday, then finally Christmas. We know he paid attention, because when asked what he was thankful for at school the day before Thanksgiving, he answered, "Mom's birthday." He really likes cake.

This year, he's been into the Christmas movies on Netflix. Remember when we were kids, you'd happen to catch Charlie Brown's Christmas Special, or maybe Rudolph Claymation on TV,  and count yourself lucky? Now he gets to choose from several movies, and can watch on demand. Foreign concept to me. He likes one about some reindeer, and he loves the Curious George Christmas Special.

Just before Christmas we got our new couch. It occurred to us at some point that it really was ridiculous to have only one two-seater couch and a broken rocking chair as seating for our living room. So we got a sectional, and we worried that it would seem too big and overwhelming to such a small space. On the contrary, it somehow makes the living room seem bigger, and definitely more inviting. Tyler played bumper cars with it, running into one side, then the other, back and forth and all over the place. He ran all over it, jumped on it...so much energy! Eventually we got him to calm down, but today he was all over it again. Vader's more tentative, he waited until we were gone to try it out. When we got home, we could tell from the sheet we'd layed over the couch, he definitely spent some time on the chaise lounge. Who can blame him?