Taking the police car out for a scary spin

The hilly lots/roads really REALLY suck.

We started in the backyard but it’s SO steep that it really taxed the car battery—and it’s SO narrow that it really taxed Owen’s driving skills. And consequently my patience. 😐

So we headed to the front.

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But if they’re not actively moving forward they’re rolling backward and even on the low speed they can get going pretty fast downhill. I don’t trust him not to go off the sidewalk (even accidentally) and hit a car or mailbox so I let him go downhill on the side of the street but it was still nerve wracking and I walked in front of the car the whole way.

Heading up on the sidewalk.

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Heading down in the street.

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It looks less intense than it really is:

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Heading up the somewhat flat sidewalk along the main drag.

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I’m not sure if we’ll be keeping the car or getting rid of it. I had high hopes of being able to use it here but it’s just SO SO STEEP. So of course I’m feeling super guilty about it again. 🙁

TiVo friend visit

A TiVo friend was in the area so he came over for a visit with his wife and two of his kids. Tom and I had met him before in 2008 at a big TiVo meet but we wanted the boys to meet. 🙂

The kids all had fun in the police car, except it was a little crowded so the threesome didn’t last too long. 🙂

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His son, Josh, is one month younger than Owen. By now you shouldn’t be surprised at size differences. 🙂

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Gardening girl + ride along + kittens

We went to a friends house for a play date and Katie grabbed the gardening gloves and shovel. 🙂

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And enjoyed being driven around…

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She also managed to get up into and out of the trampoline (using the stepstool) which nearly gave me heart failure.

Then she got to pet a kitten (they have a few strays that they feed) and she loved it—“Kitty cat! Kitty cat!”

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Then she got up on the swing herself but needed me to push her. 🙂

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You can’t beat a great morning spent with friends.

Two kids in the police car

We’ve been debating selling the police car because Owen just never uses it—we practically have to force him to drive it. We mentioned selling it and he kinda freaked out saying he loved it. So we told him if he used it, we’d keep it. It would kill me to get rid of it since it was EXPENSIVE and he WANTED IT…but I hate to move it if he’s not going to use it (since there’s lots fewer places to drive it at the new place). I had hoped Katie would like it, but thus far she’s been mostly scared of it. So Owen got in it today…and had A BLAST. And after watching Owen in for about 20 minutes, Katie wanted to get in…and boy did they have fun.

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Helping Katie with the speaker.

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Awwwww!

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The car was charging so the seats were out—so Katie hauled them around to sit on them.

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Then daddy put them up here for a photo op. 🙂

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That’s not where cars go.

Owen came up and told me he needed to put his cars in water (he has Cars cars that change color in water)…but the one he was holding was already wet. Hmmm… I asked if Amy got out water for him. No. He told me he would show me.

This is what I saw:

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Me: Owen, cars don’t go in the water bowl.
Owen: Why not?

It’s like he’s 14 months all over again…until I realized that he was actually doing a good thing because I’ve told him he can’t play in the bathroom sink (because it has a leak) and he couldn’t play in his water table (because it needed cleaning). 🙂

He’s good at building cars!

I have had magnatiles on Owen’s wishlist for quite some time but have never bought them because A) he has so many toys already and B) they are damn EXPENSIVE. So when I saw these Magformers available on Amazon Vine (the program where I get to pick items for free and then I just have to write a review on it), I snatched them up!

Owen picked them as his weekly Chore reward this week. (Normally expensive toys aren’t options, but since they didn’t cost me anything—and mostly because he saw them before I could hide them!—I let him choose them.)

As it happened, Tom Skyped in right as Owen was wanting to open them, so Tom got to watch the fun for about 20 minutes! Even though the age said 3+ I wasn’t sure if he’d be able to follow the patterns to make the cars without getting frustrated—but he jumped right in and before I knew it, he had laid out all the pieces for the spaceship with no problem!

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Then he made two cars (with a little of my help since the pieces kept snapping together) and then he was making his own shapes and vehicles without the patterns.

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Of course, now I want at least one or two more sets so he can build bigger and better things…I’ll be adding some to his wishlist. 🙂 The other good thing about these is that the pieces are big enough AND the magnets are enclosed so they are fine for Katie to grab and play with (though it tends to make Owen melt down when she does that).

Lego Carnival!

We took Owen over to Traverse City to one of the museums because they were having a Lego Carnival! When we asked him what he saw, he said “LEGO HEADS!”

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A carnival sounds quite a but more exciting than it really was—basically just a few rooms of big pre-constructed Lego buildings and then a play area—but he enjoyed it. The hardest part for him was not being able to touch the minifigs that were with the buildings…especially the one that had fallen over. 🙂

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But then there was the big Lego tunnel with daddy…

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And then he got to the big Lego building area…and his running commentary was about like this: “Awesome. Awesome. This is amazing. Lets get going. Holy mackerel. Wow!”

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Yes, I realize that the last picture should be the first picture, but I didn’t feel like redoing the whole collage.

And his final product!!

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Then it was off to build cars! We got the base ready for him and then he did the rest. Daddy also built one!

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Then it was time to send them down the slide to see if they survived (both did!).

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Then he just wanted to play with his cars.

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Then it was back to the Lego building tables to rearrange his car pieces.

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Then we told him it was almost time to go and asked how many more minutes he wanted to stay. We never know what we’re going to get when we ask him open-ended questions (How many M&Ms do you want? is a typical one) so we all had a big laugh when he said “Five hours.” I don’t think he knows time that well yet but who knows. So we said 15 minutes and set a timer and when it went off, he just asked to run his cars down the ramp one more time so we did:

Then it was off to lunch at North Peak Brewery. Owen decided he wanted to eat outside and us three adults all looked at each other like “Ugh—it’s too warm” but we did it anyway…and it ended up to be REALLY nice as it was mostly overcast and there was a nice breeze! Owen passed the time putting together a new Lego set that Grandma Marsha had bought him for being such a good boy! (I helped him but he did most of it!)

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On the way home, we were thinking about stopping for ice cream but thought we could go either way…so we let Owen be the deciding factor.

Tom: Owen, would you like a treat?
Owen: No thanks.
Me: Don’t you want to know what it is?
Owen: Okay.
Me: Ice cream.
Owen: No thanks. Legos were my treat. [Remember, Grandma Marsha bought him the Legos earlier as a treat.]

This isn’t normal for a 4yo, right? To give up ice cream?! He constantly surprises us. 🙂

Watching Cars is a riot.

First, he DOES NOT WANT to watch Cars—but as soon as it starts, he’s dancing around and getting out all the matching cars as they come on the screen.

Here, he’s crashing the cars as they crash on TV:

Then I had to pause Cars 2 when Crabby comes on the screen because Owen NEEDS to get his own Crabby—but it’s out of his reach and I’m feeding Katie and can’t get it.

I get Crabby AND Siddely (to prepare for later in the movie) and then it’s okay to start the movie again.

And on and on.