Theatrical musician

A new superhero identity emerges

Liam got the idea of a 'superhero' from Veggie Tales' Larry Boy and is persistently wearing masks and capes which can be pretty interesting when you go to Lowes with a child in yellow rainboots, a blanket around their necks like a cape and a mardi gras mask. Luckily, BUCKETHEAD hasn't asked to go to the store yet, but its worth keeping a photo of it around.

Pedaling around on a sunny day

Liam doesn't go a day without asking to go out for a ride on his fire engine, but he really hasn't been very concerned with learning to pedal it. He would get tired of trying to get it going forward - since it's apparently easier to pedal backwards - and would eventually put his feet down and pull himself along that way. Then a few days ago I took him in a bicycle shop where he found a bike his size and it was just what he wanted. He tried and tried to ride it, but of course he couldn't pedal it well enough to keep himself going forward; he kept braking. I told he he had to learn to pedal his fire engine before we could get a bike - a perfect encouragement to learn to pedal, apparently.

A footballer takes the field

Getting enough sleep

UPPER MARLBORO, Md. -- Liam has not been getting the best naps lately, with a few days of short naps because of Mother's Day and the musical Heather is working on.

Over the past two days he's been catching up a bit and yesterday after playing soccer all morning, taking a 3 hour nap in the afternoon and going out for more play before a bath and bed ... he got caught up. This of course prompted him to wake up at 4:30 a.m. and come to our bed, where he proceeded to toss and turn for the next two hours until I finally had to get up with him.

So far this morning he's eaten breakfast, asked to watch Sesame Street four times, Jonah and the Big Fish 6 times and has been a pirate, complete with headscarf, and a bag piper complete with kilt, sporran and a chanter. I believe I now hear the sounds of a firefighter coming from his room. Maybe today will be good for a nap on the way to the Eastern Shore for Annie rehearsals.

We have 31 days before the Big Adventure begins, so I packed about eight boxes yesterday and am about to attack Liam's room and my closet before we head out for the day. At this rate we'll be living out of boxes in a couple of weeks, but the house will be ready for sale by the time we leave for vacation.

Summer ... perfect time for long johns

Liam has chosen the approach of summer to decide he needs to wear pajamas, and to fill that task, he has begun putting on his long johns to sleep in. Of course, since I spend half my day in pajama pants myself, he comes in from outside and automatically goes to his room to change into his long johns. We think he would pretty well go without any other clothes if we would let him.

Ode to the bubbles

Discovering catepillars

Taking the fire engine out for a spin

For most of the time he has had his fire engine, Liam has played with it indoors, riding around our living room. With the weather and traffic around the house, we haven't really managed to get it out too many times, but yesterday he was extremely excited to get it out and take it for a ride. Of course with his unexplainable style, he decided to forgo wearing his firefighting helmet to pin on a blanket as his "superhero" cape, though he did wear his yellow 'firefighter' boots ... with shorts mind you.

We're trying to decide if we can take this on our cross country trip.

Checking out the tires

All this Work and Not getting paid for it

UPPER MARLBORO, Md. -- Since we are going to be moving for Heather to go to school sometime this next year, we have decided to go ahead and put our house on the market when we leave for our extended summer vacation.
We figure either we will return to an unsold - but clean - house, or we'll be completely free and already packed so we can move to the school and start the next phase of our lives. This of course requires that over the next six weeks we have to pack everything as I am finishing details on the wood floor we put down last summer and railings on the porch I put up about the same time.

Stay tuned for adventures in dishwasher hookup, tile repair, woodtrim, sorting and packing. I'll also try to get the pictures of Liam in his fire engine posted soon.

Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival

Ellicott City, Md. -- Sunday we took Liam, MorMor and PopPop to the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival to peruse the many skeins of wool yarn, piles of wool socks, and of course to pet the sheep.

What at first appeared to be a rather meager turnout of vendors quickly changed as we discovered about six barns of wool, from raw piles of straight-off-the-sheep wool to some fantastic textiles - including some $400 shirts. As it turned out, I found a fitting present for Heather as Mother's Day approaches and Liam got a healthy dose of sheep petting, as well as a visit with the Alpacas and Lamas.

Unfortunately, I left the camera at home, so there were no photos of the outing, but I'm sure he'll tell you all about it when he sees you next.