Story Time With Daddy

Lately Ryan's been the one who reads to Bears before bedtime.  Bears just loves it...once he's been successfully wrangled and convinced to sit still, that is.  That's the part that takes some doing.  On this particular occasion, he simply did not feel ready to settle down until he was dressed in some too-big winter pajamas, athletic shorts, and some very fashionable librarian glasses.  Oh, and forget about parting him with the shiny pink wallet that he found that day which contained a pretty glorious picture of Uncle Matt.  This actually used to be my primary wallet for years...and that's the only picture that I ever put in it.  I'm pretty sure that the reasoning for that will be self evident once you lay eyes on the picture:

Hill Air Force Base

This morning we headed on up to Hill Air Force Base for their free air show because Ryan thought that Bears might get a kick out of it.

Here he is on the bus ride out to see the show.  He kept saying "Ride bus together!!" over and over again.  Doing anything together (or "gegger" as he likes to say) has been a huge priority for him over the last couple of weeks and he's been obsessed with buses for as long as I can remember so the combination was pretty great.  He's trying to play it cool here though.

Turns out that bears do indeed love airplanes.  He was simultaneously fascinated and intimidated by the whole thing and was clinging tenaciously to Ryan for almost the entire time.

He's a natural when it comes to aviation and soon they were letting him fly their helicopters

He tried out being a passenger as well and decided that that was pretty cool too

Watching an airplane that appears to be spiraling out of control toward the ground.  Luckily the pilot managed to recover from the nose dive at the last second.  Phew.

Waiting in line to pilot a helicopter

All too soon it was time to head home.  On the bus ride back, he kept giving me this look and asking to see more airplanes.  Over and over...and over again.

Good times.

New Camera and the Zoo!

 Ryan decided to give me just about the fanciest camera ever for mother's day.  It's pretty much the most exciting gift possible but I've gotta say it's a little intimidating owning something so professional when I know absolutely nothing about photography.  Bears really wanted to go to the zoo today so we took the camera along to see what she can do.  Turns out that I've got no idea how to use it yet but it was still fun and I was at least able to catch a glimpse of the awesome pictures I might take one day if I ever figure out what I'm doing.

Here he is showing his fearsome bear face while hanging out in front of the carousel.   

Gazing at the Rhinos.  I tried to get both him and the animals he was looking at but failed every time.  So I ended up with a bunch of pictures of Bears looking transfixed a bunch of mysterious animals who's identities are doomed to be lost in the sands of time.  Ah well.

Hangin' out by some antique looking bike that apparently really sets the stage for a big cat exhibit. At least that's what the zoo people must have decided since it's bolted down right in front of the tigers. 

Riding boldly on said bike.

Pointing out the frightful tigers to daddy.

Checkin' out the drains.  A very important task which he dedicates quite a bit of time to every time we take a trip out to the zoo.

Trying to make friends with some kids passing by

Conversations with Daddy

"Scared panda" face

Trying to overcome his fear of the big orange elephant who is apparently a "big fright" by touching the less frightful tiny elephants that are painted on it's side.  He's always saying, "orange elephant.  FRIGHT!!!  Gray elephant...niiiice." All the while nodding emphatically. I guess statues of animals are much scarier than the real thing.

This cub loves fire hydrants and always wants to give them hugs whenever he gets the chance.

Contemplating the plight of the bald eagle

Peeping out of his hiding spot on the playground

Riding some sort of giant caterpillar 

His favorite zoo activity of all: sliding down the "big snake"

Playing with the giant water-covered, rotating ball.  It's always a hit.

Some Pictures and Videos

Bears decided that he wanted to dress himself yesterday.  He insisted on wearing "Pop's" moccasins and his teddy bear backpack.  That's all he wanted to wear but luckily I was able to convince him to add a diaper and pants to the ensemble.

 We walked around the neighborhood for a while but when I mentioned that Daddy was coming home soon, he wanted to sit in our front yard and wait to surprise him.  Here he is waiting very patiently in the pic below.

Here's Zoey giving him a nice hug...he got shy at the last instant and turned away.

He went Shopping with uncle Matt and aunt Jessica a little while back at Babies R Us and had the time of his life.  As soon as he saw the exersaucers, he insisted on hanging out on the shelf with them and sneakily climbed into one when Matt's back was turned for a moment. I don't think he could be convinced to get out for at least a half hour or so.

Riding one of the tractors at Wheeler Farm

Bears doing the slide by himself with Daddy

 Listening to dog barking and trying to say "I love you."

Here he is opening some easter presents from Grandma and Pop Elkins. This one's just for them but I'm pretty sure that the blog is the easiest place for them to see it.

Sick Bears

Anyone who knows Bears knows that he's always been far too busy to cuddle with the exception of when he was a newborn.  Because of that, it wasn't all bad when he came down with a tummy bug that left him throwing up for days and needing tons of snuggles.  I felt really bad for the poor little tyke and did everything I could think of to make him feel better but I can't deny that I was eating the whole experience up...with a few twinges of guilt here and there for loving it so much.  He had tummy troubles for about five days and every one of those days involved hours and hours of cuddling.  Since I've only gotten 1-second hugs out of him for well over a year, this was heaven.  We even cuddled up and watched a movie.  Well...half a movie.  He was still Bears after all and did eventually realize that he had more important things to do.  He was patient enough to let me spoon feed him broth every couple of hours and wanted to give out plenty of kisses.  I still feel a bit guilty thinking about it now but I would say that this easily ranks in my top 5 best Bears memories so far.  It was the first time in a long time that I really felt like a nurturing mommy instead of a slightly frazzled person just trying to keep up with her highly curious, adventurous, and (sometimes) troublesome cub.  Of course, it's nice to have him back to his very busy self.  I think,.  As I'm typing this I'm trying to teach him not to bite my arm or head-butt my leg...aggh

alright, grandma videos

I apologize for the really terrible audio.  it seems the mic on this camera doesn't have much of a sound threshold so either things are super quiet or deafening. ah well.

These first two feature chasing games and our constantly-torn-apart apartment




Counting with daddy


Hunting FLIES!!!


Random summer video of bears and his ball

Happy Father's Day!

...to some pretty awesome dads and grandpas.

Silly Fail

We recently had our Anderson family picture taken by my sister-in-law, Kristen.  Of course, we had to do one silly shot because...well, that just seems to be the thing to do with group photos.  Maybe it's a Utah thing, I don't know.

Pretty typical, right? Everyone's doing their best to look adorably daft.  Or are they?



Let's take a closer look...


(it might help to know that Katie dog is slightly suicidal under normal circumstances)

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!!!