The First Loose Tooth

Sam has his first loose tooth!  It's one of his bottom middle teeth.  It started wiggling last week, and you can see the grown-up tooth coming in right behind it.  He's excited; Mama and I are trying to figure out what the Tooth Fairy gives these days.

Not Getting Any Younger...

One other story from the wedding trip to Ottawa:

Unsurprisingly, the cousins got started at the wedding shower.  I, apparently, showed up to party.  This isn't that strange an affair; that's what pretty much always happens.  I also stayed out way too late.  Also not strange (though this time my wife didn't have to phone my parents at 4 in the morning to go searching the hotel for me).  It wasn't even that strange to be walking home as the sun came up - 5:50am is a beautiful time in Ottawa round this here time of year.

What was strange, at least to me, was how long it took me to recover from that kind of abuse.  Not being able to sleep in is part of it; I was up with the kids at quarter after eight.  It still quite caught me by surprise that it was more or less three days before I felt like a regular person again.  I'm going to blame it on Ottawa water...

Nerves? Yeah, right

Sam's best friend Cole has been busy over the summer - as have we, on occasion - and their schedules just haven't synched up.  We finally arranged dinner with his family tonight.  As we walking up to their door, Sam grabs my hand and whispers, "I'm a little nervous.  I haven't seen him since school ended!"

Within literally two minutes, Sam and his brother and Cole and his brother are running around the basement screaming like banshees.

Apparently, he got over it.

Super Troopers

It was my cousin Max's wedding last weekend in Ottawa.  We decided to have a cross-Canada family road trip.  (Air Canada ticket prices "helped" with that particular decision...)  Although my wife is a consummate planner and road-trip-passenger, we were still pretty concerned; she and I can do the trip in about 13 hours, but we have advantages over our children, like bladder control and stop-whining-ness.  We figured roughly 16 hours, and maybe half a bottle of Tylenol for the ensuing headaches.

We set off on Friday morning.  (I'd say "bright and early", but I don't remember if it was actually bright yet when we left.  There were probably still stars out - we definitely got the "early".)  15.5 surprisingly uneventful hours later, Sam says, "That wasn't very long."  A couple of movies, some Where's Waldo? books and a Tupperware full of Lego is about all we need, as it turns out.  The return trip - equally early, equally long - was about the same.  We had maybe one extra stop each way with a long lunch break, but no fighting, no whining, no complaining.  J and I were in shock, but didn't want to say anything out loud in case it broke the spell.  And no, it wasn't because they were sleeping; Joey had a quick afternoon nap on the way up, and neither of them slept on the way home.

Apparently we're ready to be honourary Romani.  Now if only Julie wasn't allergic to horses...

The Best Game In The World

How was I never introduced to this game?  Julie tells me that the kids occasionally play a game they call "Play-Doh In The Dark".  What kinds of crazy game is that, you ask?  Well, they play with Play-Doh.  In the dark.  It gets complicated.

The two boys set up their Play-Doh table in the basement with the lights out and a flashlight to see with.  The very best part of the game is that Julie has to "pretend to take a nap" while they play.  To be fair, I'm guessing that she doesn't do that part very well - there's probably very little pretending.  The boys made up those rules, by the way.  I'm sure that's no commentary on her.

I think I may suggest similar games in the future, possibly starting with "Lego In The Dark", where Daddy has to pretend to play video games.