Re-read that post title in the voice of a pirate. It’ll make more sense when you see the pictures. 

We had great fun with the crowd at the ‘Lover’s Brunch’ at Gabe and Charlotte’s house. The Valentine’s Day fairy even showed up to give a special wish to Ezra. Okay, perhaps Jennifer was just looking for an excuse to dress up, but Ezra was fascinated with the pink hair. Tori brought everyone a small gift, and for Ezra she brought him a pirate eye patch. It is pretty funny. 

Later that evening, the three of us went out for a really nice dinner at a local restaurant before retiring to the house/bedroom for the evening. We all layed in bed and watched Dan In Real Life before nodding off for the night. 

It was my intent to remove the Obama ’08 sticker that has adorned my car for more than a year just after the inauguration. I figured that was appropriate time to bask in the victory without being one of those people who are driving around with Gore, Kerry, or W  stickers 8 years later. Well, every time that I was going to do it, I would be driving on the road and see someone with a Nobama sticker, or a McCain sticker, or a Palin sticker. Just between you and me (because doing something this silly is not worth while), it was great fun to speed up and pull in front of them on the interstate…..and drive there for a few miles, thus forcing them to stare at the Obama sticker for a while. Yea, I know….pretty immature…..but after the last bunch of years…..great fun. Alas, yesterday was the time. The sticker came off of the car. The rear window now seems a little naked – you have any suggestions?

So today we will participate in the celebration of Ezra’s first Valentine’s Day by going out to brunch with our ‘family dinner’ gang, then later heading out to dinner as just the three of us. Ezra got a head start on the partying at his day care on Thursday, as Peggy hosted a Valentine’s Day party for all of the kids. It sounds like it was a good time….for the other kids…..Ezra apparently slept through most of it. He did write everyone a Valentine’s card, and gave everyone a little piece of candy. Of course, he came home with a little brown bag full of cards and candy from the other kids. It’s a shame that he can’t eat that stuff yet, and someone will have to pick up the slack. Also, Peggy gave him a little gift of a sippy cup – which transitions well to the next paragraph. 

A few days ago, we got Ezra his first drinking cup. He has been fascinated with whatever we have been eating/drinking for some time, but we were holding off on getting him anything until now. In the past, he has been able to drink out of our water bottles: he figured out how to bite the top of the straw and suck the water out (they are made by Camelback)….so we didn’t think that this would be too foreign for him. Turns out that we were right: he took to it very well…as long as we hold it up so water can come out. Since the bottle is metal, it’s a little heavier than the plastic ones, and he has a hard time of picking it up and holding it upside down…either that or he just doesn’t understand the principal yet. Regardless, he loves to hold it and bite/suck on the top. Oh, and he loves to throw it also. 

Yup, that’s him standing on his own on the table. He has gotten really good at sitting on his knees and picking himself up to a standing position on nearly anything. He also is loving climbing stairs, and can do two or three on his own before forgetting what he was doing.

I couldn’t resist this montage/homage to the reason why we are excited about Tuesday.

I don’t think that it’s normal that I get excited when I go shopping (unless it’s for some new electronic piece), but I did get excited at the store this morning. We were up in the Park Meadows area looking for a baby gate, and we decided to stop by Old Navy. We stumbled upon the kids section, and a groovy sale that they have going on this weekend: 50% the lowest marked price of the clearance stuff: they were dumping their winter stuff for summer attire. We found him some winter stuff….some for this winter (it is only January, after all) and a jacket for next. The total price of everything as originally marked?  $121.00. The total price of everything today? $21.00 (including tax). 

Sorry for the consumeristic excitment, but saving over $100.00 is a nice gift in today’s climate. 🙂

We figured that along with the crawling, which he is getting really proficient at (he will motor all over the place in no time…at the firehouse he crawled all of the way from the living room, under a table, and into the dining area; roughly 25 feet….and he did it 5 or 6 times), we would add some safety features to the living room area – where he spends the vast majority of his time at home. We let him sit there and play (now crawl), and have found him closer to the top of the stairs to the garage than we would have liked. He also made one attempt to pull himself up the coffee table – successfully lifting his whole body off of the ground – so we added the corner protection. And finally, we put some stuff up to hopefully prevent him from becoming a DJ before we are ready. 

Oh yea, the ‘simple, easy to install’ gate wasn’t. The advertised 10 minutes turned into 60, including a trip to the hardware store. Argh. 

One picture of the gate from Ezra’s point of view.