Today was a teaching day for me, and on sunny days Emmett and I still have been riding the bike to the school and back (~40 minutes each way). On Thursdays we have taken to going by the zoo on the way home as Andrea was able to get a nearly-free family membership. I had told Emmett when I dropped him off at day care that we would be going after day care, but when I went to pick him up the wind was really howling and I knew we would be asking for it. I stayed true to my word, though, and we rode due West, into the wind, toward the zoo. I took a different route which took us along the beach for a bit and the wind was picking sand up and pelting us with it. It actually was slightly painful to me, so Emmett was not very happy about it, but we had to either ride the 1/4-ish mile through it or walk the same distance, so I rode on. We arrived at the zoo and Emmett's runny nose had turned into a sand magnet and he had streaks of sandy snot running down his face. He was very unhappy by this point. Once we were inside the zoo, though, we were mostly shielded from the wind so Emmett was happy...except those times that we would be in an open area with wind and he would start screaming "no wind! no wind!".
The time in the zoo was nice, but I was dreading the trip home as the wind seemed to be even worse. Half of the trip was running north and I knew that was going to be bad, but the second half was east and the wind wouldn't be a problem. The northern 3 miles or so was about the longest bicycle ride of my life. I took to riding on the sidewalk right next to the houses on the west side of the road to shield us as much as possible, but when we would near an intersection the wind would pick up and so would Emmett's crying. Each block was almost long enough that the crying from the previous intersection would have neared passing as we were in the shielded zone, but then the wind would strike and Emmett would start crying anew, screaming "no wind! no wind!" Emmett is not really a crier, so this was pretty uncharacteristic of him and not pleasant to deal with.
We got home, though, and Emmett recovered. I aided the recovery by treating him to Green Chile Kitchen, our local New Mexican eatery. This made Emmett happy, but what made him even more happy was the near-rock-star reception he got by the many children that were at GCK who were current or former students of Andrea's (with their parents, too). Emmett was leading or being led around by 7-9 year-olds and was in heaven. Hopefully he has forgotten all about wind. I have wondered what Emmett could be having nightmares about, and I guess this could be one thing.
Or, I guess another could be that I took him on the two-story-ish tall concrete slide at the playground the other day and he wrecked pretty bad. He had done the slide many times before, but this time Emmett and I were both barefoot and Emmett was in a diaper. You are supposed to sit on cardboard to go faster and Emmett likes to try to do this like the big kids, but always fails---well, always except this time. So Emmett hit the middle, flat section at top speed not having lost his cardboard then suddenly caught his foot on the side. He jammed his leg up into his chest in a strange way and was immediately upset as it hurt him pretty good. Andrea was at the bottom of the slide (perhaps it was her fault for not stopping me? She claims she thought I was going to go down with him. As he pushed off at the top, I thought, "I should go down with him"), and rushed up while I rushed down. What made it worse is that it was a Saturday and the park was packed with parents watching their age-appropriate children (8+, say) go down the slide and we looked like the worst parents in the world. Emmett recovered relatively quickly and continued to have fun at the park, but later in the evening ended up with a really bad looking limp. It was very sad to see, but the next day he was running around like normal. I am now trying to be a more careful parent (oh, he did an end-over-end fall down the back stairs a couple of days later---that wasn't good either. Rough week for the kid).
Emmett has been a lot of fun to be around of late. I can now understand why people frequently end up having a second kid that is just under 3 years younger than the first. Things are so good with him right now that it is easy to forget the sleepless nights that were plaguing us a few short months ago, etc. That being said, the happy times haven't encouraged us to get Emmett a sibling.
It has been really nice spending so much time in the city during weekdays. When I was working in Berkeley I never got the feeling that I really knew what the city was like. We definitely see a lot of interesting things. This week we saw a little more nature on our jog through the park. We were going along a sidewalk and a great blue heron was acting a little funny and not seeming very spooked by the occasional passerby. We stopped and watched for a few minutes and saw that the GBH was stalking a mole or some other burrowing animal. It stood over the hole for a minute, then lightning quick grabbed the mole and flew off. This makes Emmett's and my fourth spotting of birds catching other animals (pigeons caught by hawks, twice, a baby goose taken by a sea gull and the GBH/mole incident). San Francisco is knee-deep in nature.
Emmett's language is coming along very quickly of late. He is stringing together many more words and is definitely able to get across more complex thoughts. He has recently been very loving toward the doll Bob that he has. Tonight he spent a long time making sure Bob had a dry diaper and then feeding him a dinner of egg, pancake, and taco (three of Emmett's faves). Here is a picture from a couple of days ago where Emmett had dug out the ergo, which he hasn't been in in months and months, and begged to be able to carry Bob around.
Actually, I haven't mentioned it, but Emmett is obsessed with tacos. For a while it was burritos, but it is tacos now, and the best part is that they are the homemade type. I have been able to make a pot of beans and a container of rice and get lots of mileage out of it. I also made frozen yogurt the other day and have made him a couple of strawberry milkshakes with the strawberries which are coming into season. He is a fan even though the yogurt is actually pretty tart.
I am sure there are other things I should be mentioning, but I am losing steam. I unloaded the camera and will include a couple of pictures and movies.
This is an old steam engine-run train at the zoo which has been in service since the 20's or so. Definitely the high point of any visit to the zoo for Emmett. Notice the now ever-present "cheese" face.
Coloring Easter eggs in Susanville. I realize now that I didn't post anything about our trip up there. We had a nice time Emmett was very happy to get to see his grandpa and two grandmas. Andrea's mom had gotten Emmett a toddler bed outfitted with car sheets. Emmett was incredibly happy and slept in a big-boy bed a couple of times until he fell out and decided that the crib was still for him. The trip was great for Emmett as he rode his first horse (Bo, a white horse who he talks about all of the time), saw cows, sat on a real tractor and backhoe, and went to Walmart.
The back view.
And actually a video I took. I don't know why I am putting up so much Easter stuff---very non-heathen of me. Emmett really enjoyed the Easter Egg process.A picture from Andrea and Emmett's trip over the Golden Gate Bridge to the Discovery Museum. Fun times.
A video of Emmett vacuuming. I was vacuuming around the house and Emmett thought it looked fun so begged to do the same. The noise seemed very loud for his young ears so I put earplugs in his ears. He loved the whole process. This is him trying to vacuum up sand next to the door.Finally, a video I hesitate to put up here, but when it happened I thought it was one of the funnier images I had seen in a while. I had been in the kitchen doing some things and I heard Emmett playing in his room. I didn't know what could have kept him occupied for so long and I hadn't seen him in a bit. Keep in mind that the last time I saw him he was dressed normally. Well, I go toward his room, look in, and see Emmett playing in his very dark room with a sombrero he had found and put on his head. I turn on the light (one that warms up---it is weird) midway through.
