The Power of Observation...

...is sadly a power I do not possess.  Bears and I were walking back from a trek to the local fancy hippie market when suddenly I decided to cross the street.  Well, not suddenly per se, since we were at the appropriate intersection and I had been waiting a minute or two for the right time.  But for the sake of a riveting story, I'll stick with it.  There we were, rashly crossing the street...

 ...when I noticed that we also had to cross in the other direction in order to get to our destination.  After again waiting for the appropriate time, we boldly headed out.

 This is when my limited observational powers came into play.  I noticed that I couldn't continue going in a straight line because there was a car in the way.  I idly wondered what a car was doing out in the middle of the intersection but kept plowing ahead.  When I brushed past it, I noticed that it was a bit jagged and crumpled.  And also that there were a couple of other crumpled cars mashed into it.  That's when I realized that there had been some sort of accident.  The cars involved looked pretty mutilated but luckily no one seemed injured.

Now in my defense, I was wearing my new sweet action jogging shoes.  As you may have noticed, they're blindingly glorious and very distracting.

Peekaboo Bears!

Lately he's been really into initiating peekaboo games.  And also staring off into space and making squeaky noises apparently.  And random cackling has been a hit as well. I think I already posted the part with him dancing to "little red caboose" but I couldn't help but put it in again for some reason.



The last couple of days he's just done away with peekaboo altogether in favor of just ducking down and then shooting back up all the time, whether he's ducking behind something or just standing in the middle of a room.  And he's learned what "arms up!" means and will excitedly throw his arms into the air.  This can be somewhat detrimental to his balance when he happens to be toddling along when the urge to throw his arms up strikes him.

Bath and Play Time

*Caution - this video shows a naked baby bum*



Grandma video - Bears playing with his toys and dancing. 

A Bear's Best Friend

I think this picture says it all.

Happy Easter(ish)

Since I never remember to take my own pictures or videos at events, it can sometimes take a while for me to track down the documentation. Hence the very casual timing of these recent posts. Easter was definitely some fun times. Ryan's parents mailed a few dozen confetti-filled eggs over here for us to violently throw at each other. I never knew until now what the true spirit of easter is. And it is glorious.




Bears made a pretty great egg model.

Here are the eggs before obliteration.  Ryan's parents save the shells of all the eggs that they use for a year.  This year it was 60 dozen.  They stuffed, patched up, and dyed every one of them.  I've never before witnessed such dedication to a holiday.  Amazing.

This is me reeling after a particularly brutal egg attack.  At least I assume so since I have no recollection of this moment.

It got kinda cold out after a bit so bears had to put on his dino outfit. luckily, Jessica happened to have a matching hoodie in her car for me to borrow.  Phew.  That could have been really embarrassing.

And even baby Ryan decided to show up at the end!

wait a minute....

IMPOSTER!!!

Bears' Second (first) Birthday Party!!

Since he already had a big birthday bash out in texas, I feel it's not entirely correct to call this his first birthday party. The SLC party was thrown by Grandma Cupcake and it was pretty amazing from the tasty food to the perfect decor. Ryan made a huge, ridiculously fancy cake, Bears got to run around and cause all sorts of trouble, and everyone got him a whole bunch of presents. It was a smashing success.

Happy Birthday Bears!!

Ryan decided to work from home today so that he could hang out with Bears for his birthday.  During his lunch break, he wanted to take the birthday boy to the park.

 Bears discovered some sort of propeller that was attached near the base of the slides.  He worked his heart out for quite a while trying to propel the playground through the air but it was to no avail.  Clearly it was faulty equipment but he didn't let it put a damper on his mood.

He was very nonchalant while Ryan spun him around in this strange device.

They did some swinging...

...and then Ryan decided to pretend to throw Bears at me.  You can tell he's up to no good just by looking at his smile that made it in the picture.

On the way back, he rode on Daddy's shoulders like a big boy.  No hands!

Grandma Videos:

What is this blog lacking?

I'll tell you what it's lacking.  Random videos that go on for a long time where nothing much happens.  err wait.  That's what it features.  Well, whatever. Alright, I suppose I should include something that's actually new in this post.  Ah.  Witty puns.

Now that that's over with, let's get this show on the road.  We've done several films that I imagine will test the attention spans of even the grandmas.

Dancing to Bananaphone:


This video contains Bears making creepy sounds (he is not actually coughing up a hairball like he'd lead you to believe), peek-a-boo, walking, kicking a bowl around.


Creepy Bear sounds and a bowl


A bit of clapping then just lots of walking/falling

A Year In the Life of a Bear

Yup, it's been a year.  Well, almost.  This is craziness.  Little Bear Cuddles is 1/18 grown up already. My dad started calling him that a while back and it's kinda stuck.  Although it's not exactly fitting, since he has no tolerance for anything that even remotely resembles cuddling.  I guess this is where I'm supposed to say that having him in our lives has been the dreamiest experience ever.  The problem is, I can't really think of a way to put it that doesn't sound hopelessly cheesy and cliche.  Okay, here goes: having him in our lives has been the dreamiest experience ever. I guess I gave up on not sounding cheesy.  There's a whole bunch more that I could say but it should all really go without saying. I'm just so excited that I get to be his mommy.

Be Vewwy Vewwy Quiet...

...We'we hunting wabbits!

Or ducks, as it were.

In addition to his birthday party, our trip to Texas was full of lots of exciting events. Bears passionately hunted various forms of fowl prey but it soon became clear that it was really foul play, as those blasted birds kept eluding him.

He also tried his hand at picking oranges in Grandma and Papa's orchard but while he's very powerful, he couldn't quite muster up enough force to actually pry them from the tree.  It was close, though, I'm sure of it.

He spent quite a bit of time riding on daddy's shoulders on this trip...

...rode with Grandma down some slides...

...decided that tractors are pretty "meh."

Here we are grinning like idiots but little did we know that Ryan's Grandma was looking at Bears with despair in her eyes.  Ryan's mom later explained that back in the day, only the most destitute of people would let their children go without shoes.  And there Bears is, proudly showing off his bare (bear) hobo feet.  Apparently, it was pretty surprising that she let us leave without forcing some money on us so that we could buy shoes for him. 

Hangin out with Grandma in some fancy new clothes from his cousins...

...hangin out with Papa right before bedtime...

...hangin on the swing.  He's a pretty big fan of it.

Bears and grandma going down slides


He was very brave for the first one but the second one rattled him a bit. He got over it fast though.