When I think of my curious little explorer, those are the words that come to my mind. They so perfectly wrap up his inquisitive nature in one perfect phrase. And, as mentioned in the last post, our favorite place to explore is the park. August was full of many trips to the park and so was September (the month that I am finally highlighting) However, the last entry failed to mention our favorite game at the park while we are enacting our "wild and free" rights. That game is what I call a baby's version of "Bigger and Better". I shall attempt to explain how it works by narrating one of my explorer's perfect execution of the game on September 24th, 2014.
Baby's version of Bigger and Better game: find an amazing stick, trade it in for a leaf, trade the leaf for a smashed pinecone, with much deliberation trade the pinecone in for a birthday candle, trade that in for another leaf, find the jackpot of all rocks and spend a lengthy time searching for the perfect one to trade with.
Here is a picture of the wining, best-of-the-best, treasure item:
That is pretty much how it goes every single time we explore at the park. Love this fellah! Also, one of our trips this oncoming fall included his first time eating dirt. He had found a soft moist patch of dirt amongst all the grass and started to squish it between his fingers with glee. Well, I wasn't about to disrupt this male primeval instinct so I sat by him to watch. Then, to my horror, he put some in his mouth! I franticly employed my afore mentioned momma-ninja skills and swiped (I hope) all of it out before swallowing ensued.
He wasn't too happy that I took his new favorite snack away. This picture was taken immediately after. I call it his "My mom won't let me eat dirt!!!" face.
Antoher game that we play at the park (and everywhere else for that matter) is "I'm Gonna Getcha. I was trying to take some cute pictures on our visit, but my little explorer wouldn't sit or stand still for more than a few seconds. So....I gave in and decided to take a "photographing wildlife approach" which is what one must do in these situations. Now, when photographing wildlife you really only have two approach options. The more sophisticated approach is to spend hours letting the animal acclimate itself to your presence, perhaps crouched in a nearby bush. Then attempting to slowly creep up on it to take a picture. Now while this approach is eloquent in concept, it takes a great deal of patience. I am a mom. A happy but tired mom. I choose the less eloquent approach, even the savage approach. That is rushing at the wildlife and chasing it with great speed while attempting to get a decent shot at a high shutter-speed on your camera. This is where the game "I'm Gonna Getcha" comes in handy. I literally took this sequence of pictures while running after him exclaiming that I was, indeed, going to get him. The last shot is when I experienced success.
In addition to some "wild prey" shots I also managed to get just a couple "normal shots". Here are a few:
Another adventure highlight we had this month was the EASTERN IDAHO STATE FAIR!!! Forigive me for typing that in all caps, but I simply had too. You see, the fair is my absolute favorite day of the year with the only exception being Christmas. Even then, if it weren't for the "Christmas season" attatched to "Christmas day" the fair would totally win out. Anyway, this was baby boy's second time at the fair, but was so much more wonderful for two big reasons. 1- I wasn't nursing anymore and 2- I wasn't nursing anymore. Serously, do you have any idea how hard it is to find a semi-private place to throw on a nursing cover and take care of your baby?! Not to mention the overall dustiness and dirtiness of it all, or the restraints on your time. Don't get me wrong, nursing is totally worth it, it's just that the state fair is not the ideal place to do it. I think baby boy enjoyed the change this year as well because he even got to try some fair food. The bread and jam and Bread Barn proved an instant favorite.
In retrospect I really wish I took a picture of his sticky messy jam face. Oh well, here are his cleaned up photos:
We also had fun hanging out with dad:
Baby Boy's two favorite parts of the night were hilariously obvious. Visiting the animals came in at a solid number 2. For some reason watching new animals move around, petting them, and hearing their funny noises pulls a peal of delighted giggles from him. We enjoy it too, simply because he is so fun to watch. And, coming in at number 1 would be clapping and cheering with the crowds. We stopped to see a short magic show at the fair and everytime the performer did something even slightly astounding everyone in the crowd would clap and cheer. This resulted in baby boy getting SO SO SO excited as he joined in not only with the clapping but the cheering as well! To top it off, everytime the noise died down, there was my son still hollering and clapping until he was absolutely certain that the fun was over. Then when it all started again he would erupt in the joyful celebration once more. This happened over and over again. It was seriously the happiest I have ever seen him. The Mr. and I got a huge kick out of it.
We had so much fun that the Mr. and I went back again for a date night (without baby boy) to try more food and enjoy the deomolition derby.
Then it was goodbye fair until next year.
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