::grandparents' house fun::

I remember when we used to visit my grandparents houses. It was so fun to go to a place where we belonged, kind of like home, but was so new and different and changed while we were gone. I remember my grandparent's in California had some really cool toys. They had a big yellow stuffed dinosaur that I loved when I was little, even though it wasn't really very soft. It kind of crunched when it was squeezed. They also had these crazy sand/oil/water things. Flat and oval shaped with beautiful blue and beige sand that would mix together with the oil in fantastic shapes when tipped. I loved playing with that stuff.
I remember that my grandparents in Texas had a ton of books. And that's a big deal to me. When I got there and saw all the books I could hardly wait to start reading. It was awesome.
Anyway, all this leads me up to watching my own little son enjoy his grandparents' houses and connect with different objects. There are so many things that he loves and things that he looks forward to playing with. It's really fun.
There are a lot of magical things to find in UT too.
I think probably his very favorite (out of so much fun stuff) thing in Highland would be Robby the robot. He's a vacumn, but I don't know what Max sees him as. When he realized there was a remote and Robby could be directed it was probably the best day ever. But the bummer is that Robby has to charge up for hours at a time. So poor little Max gets to practice patience. (Which of course in my mind is never a bad thing!)


In Provo this visit he found a couple of things to love (out of the many magical things).
Some "colorful blocks" that he spied when doing illegal recon in my parents room. He requested some play time with them, and luckily my mom allowed it.



What a classic little boy pose! No, he didn't step on them.
(hmmmm, anybody else think he's growing out of his PJs?)

Another favorite this visit was the "trick pony" money bank that has sat on the hearth in my parent's living room for pretty much ever.
I snagged some change from various parts of the house and he played with it for hours.

you put the money in his mouth

you pull the little lever in the back and....

he drops it in the feed box or whatever that is.
This is a very dramatic process--or at least his out of control photo pose says so.


Silly.
What a lucky guy to have such great grandparents.

::highland fling::

On saturday we got to go with Kris's family to the Highland Fling. It started with a parade. There was a lot of candy thrown from the floats, which the kids loved of course.

They were pretty excited to be at a parade--the big fleet of police motorcycles that came by first thing doing formations and flashing lights and sirens didn't hurt the excitement.

Parker.

Here are the boys waiting for the candy train to come along.

They dumped all their spoils into one bag and we farmed it out to them later. They were really cute.

Then we got to go into the park and listen to Grandpa Ken's band perform on the big stage. It was fun.


Max was way into the music and was dancing like a crazy man. He was so serious about his dance moves. It was hilarious to watch. Still photos don't really capture it, but I tried.



Here he is dancing up at the front. He especially liked Sweet Home Alamaba.

And then to top it all off, some karate studio came along offering free "light sabers". Does it get much better than that? Luckily we got one for each of the three boys, so that helped to stave off any big problems.

It's so fun to see cousins have a blast together. So fun to hang out with everybody!

::nifties::

So I don't know if everybody feels this way but to me, growing up, my grandparents houses were pretty magical places. Like my grandparents in LA had a pool, which was awesome. And that gumball machine I mentioned earlier. And a cookie jar that was always full. And special cereal just for us to eat in the morning. And an orange grove in the yard! It was all pretty special and exciting.

I didn't get a chance to spend too much time at my mom's parents house, but I remember cool things there too, like my grandad's woodshop, and their cool decorations. Their fuzzy wallpaper in the entry hall was so interesting, and I remember them having a closet full of kid's books, although my mom claims that never existed. I also read Charlie and the Chocolate Factory there for the first time. Good associations.

Grandparent's houses are cool places no matter what. They're just fun. But my mom has gone to a lot of trouble to find a bunch of cool exciting things to make her house a super magical grandmother house. Such as this awesome chinese checkers set with big gorgeous marbles.

My mom and max played with this a whole bunch. Max loved it.
And I have to show you a color picture of this set, it's too cool!

Another thing, one that Max is completely in love with now, is this cup.

There's a puppy in it. He's hidden if you're drinking milk, and slowly shows his face as the milk is slurped up. Or he just sticks his head out of the water the whole time you're drinking it. "Dog water!" Max says in delight.

He's been drinking and drinking out of it which is so cute.

The last thing I'll show you now (though there are lots more fun toys and such) is this cool marble tower thing. You put marbles up at the top and give the first one a push.

Then as the first marble goes down the little track it gets dumped into buckets which dump it down to the next level. Kind of hard to explain. But the 2nd marble waits somehow until the 1st is far enough down. It's really cool. The little marbles are very civilized and take turns!

Max calls it a marble party. It's really a neat thing.

I think Max is going to have very special memories of his grandparents' houses out here in Utah. He already has particular things he loves and remembers about each house. It's really fun for me to see.  He's a lucky boy.

::grandparents::

My parents flew in yesterday for a week long visit.
So far we've had a great time, doing lots of fun grandparenty type things.



I'll have more to report later.

::Fun in St. George Pt.1::

We just got back from a week long visit to St. George. Kris's mom and dad have a condo down there where they like to spend a lot of time, especially in the winter. Actually, they're going to be moving down there more permanently after we leave UT, but that's a story for another day.
The week was great because as those of you that live in utah county know, the weather there during memorial day was cold and rainy. Which translated in St. George to cool and pleasant. Just the way I like it out there.
Today's post will concentrate on the funnest feature of the condo, which is the communal pool. Everyone loves it, especially Max. Max did a lot of swimming last summer because we belonged to a fitness club that had a couple of outdoor pools. It was just a short walk from our house so we went there all the time. As a result Max feels very confident in the pool, and is able to have tons of fun.
He was tall enough this time to actually walk in the shallow end which made him really proud of himself.

We had to force him to put on his waterwings--and he would only agree to do it in the deep end.


He made up all these great "dives"--you know, all the same jumps that we all made up at the swimming pool when we were little--jumping in all straight, backwards, spinning, etc. etc. He was so brave with jumping in. Nothing slowed him down. He actually made me nervous several times because he jumped in with such complete abandon.

Swimming is such a fun activity to do with Max because everybody has a good time. This is unlike a lot of small kid activities that sometimes have to be endured. We all like swimming. Grandparents included.
Here are some more fun shots for you.



I love this one, he just looks like such a cute little fish or a puppy or something!

Max and his Grandpa--Grandpa Ken was very helpful in making up crazy jumps with crazy names.

We're going to have to find a pool somewhere in Rhode Island!