I bought tickets for the circus at least two months ago, but I didn’t mention it until the day before. Truth be told, he wouldn’t have had any idea what I was talking about, because I really didn’t have any concept of what the circus was like in person. It more than blew me away, and judging by his reaction throughout the day, I think it blew his mind too. I’ll do my best to piece the day together…
The show was in Oakland, and it started at 11am, so we left the house at 9:30. It’s about a 30 - 45 minute drive depending on traffic. I had both of our good cameras charged and ready for the show, but as we were walking up to the gate there was an announcement saying no cameras allowed. I took them back to the car only to find that the rule was not enforced at all.
The path leading up to the entrance was lined with souvenir stands. I breathed a sigh of relief when we made it through without having to buy anything, only to find that the entire concourse inside was full of them too. In fact, they were pretty much everywhere. Sawyer found a clown car that he wanted so I paid for it, relieved that it only cost $12.
The three of us went inside the arena to have a seat, and soon saw that the floor was open for everyone to come down and see various performances up close. Sawyer and I went ahead as Abby tried to capture the massive scene. Watch:
Sawyer was so confused by these guys:
He got to sit on one of the motorcycles:
He even got a temporary tattoo on his hand:
But he quickly wanted it taken off:
There was a commotion at the other end of the floor, and sure enough it was an elephant catching things with her trunk. We made our way down there as quickly as we could. Watch:
Yes, that elephant painted a picture. Of a horse. And it was good too. Sawyer was in awe. When he wasn’t playing with his car:
More pachyderm painting. Her tail wags the entire time. Watch:
Sawyer’s day was pretty much made at this point:
What’s amazing is that the show still hasn’t started! But the beginning had him wiggling in his seat. Motorcycles! Trains! Things with wheels! Guys with long legs! Watch:
Here’s the rest of the opening act, including Sawyer’s favorite part: the elephants! Watch:
The intensity didn’t let up until intermission, and the entire show stayed like that until the end (well, we left after about two hours, just missing the last 20 or so minutes). There were a few times that Sawyer had to walk out to catch his breath, and of course he had to drive his new car around on the floor for a bit, but he otherwise did very well.
We got home around 2pm, an hour after his normal nap time, and he didn’t fall asleep until almost 3pm. Once down, he slept almost four hours! I even zonked out on his bed for a couple of hours. When I finally woke him up, he ate a little bit of leftover pizza, but I could tell he was completely spent from all of the excitement earlier in the day:
I gotta say, it wore me out too. And all of our clothes smelled like elephant when we got home. Gross.
My favorite part of the day: watching and listening to Sawyer tell his stuffed animal elephant how he saw some other elephants earlier at the circus. He held him up to his face as he did it, every bit as excited as he was in the moment earlier.
I don’t know that I need to go again anytime soon, but it definitely was worth an afternoon to see his face light up so often. I wish I would have smuggled in the better cameras, but I hope you can get a sense of the excitement and amazement in his eyes.
The three of us spent a good chunk of this past weekend apartment hunting. We went back to take a second look at a place not too far from home on Sunday night, and just so happened to park in front of his favorite park. I promised to take him there if he went to the apartment first. He did not forget our deal.
Once inside of the park fence, Sawyer ran for the swings, went down the slides a couple of times, and rolled around in the sandpit. He then decided that he had to play soccer on the playground. I had no idea he’d be so excited to do so. Watch:
He ran nonstop for a good 10 minutes, kicking and chasing the ball all over the playground. I’m most pleased with his celebration after scoring that goal at the end. GOOOOOOOOOAAAAALLLLLL!
Good one, Sawyer. I guess you really did learn something from watching the World Cup with Dada all those mornings when you really just wanted to watch Dora. And maybe those three sessions of Soccertots weren’t such a lost cause after all.
I can’t wait for warmer weather.
Thursday morning was an eventful one for Sawyer. First, he went to his very first dentist appointment. Abby said he did well, but that he didn’t want to sit in the chair alone, so she held him while Dr. Nancy worked her magic. He received three stickers for his patience, found a car in the goodie box, and wore a big smile through his next task: Abby’s baby checkup. All is well.
After that, the two of them came to eat lunch with me in the park. It’s impossible to eat on the picnic tables now that Sawyer feels free enough to roam, so we crammed ourselves into a table at our favorite burrito shop. He was reasonably calm, given all the things he had to do that morning, but clearly wanted to get some time in the park. He practically ran to the slide when we left. You can see he was bursting with energy:
And yes, that’s a new trick. How ‘bout those new (now not so) orange shoes? Can you believe how easily he can scale those steps to the top?
Sadly, this is probably as good as he’s felt since then. Hopefully he’s turned the corner.
Trucks go up and down our street all of the time, so it wasn’t completely out of the ordinary to see the one on the left stop to pick up some junk. However, it was incredibly bizarre to see a garbage truck back up to it seconds later. And then when the driver of the first truck pushed a couch out of the back and into the garbage truck, well, all bets are off. Neither Abby not I have never seen anything so ridiculous — it really bothered Sawyer too! Watch:
All that aside, doesn’t he look great in his new truck pajamas?
Yes, the title of this post pretty much covers the content of this first video. It’s a good one too:
And then he actually sits down — at the dinner table, no less — to eat his quesadilla in the second one:
How fast can you say your ABCs?
He’s been a bit rough on me and Abby lately, usually when one or both of us are too tired to give him our complete devotion. But when he’s engaged with one of us, and especially when it involves knocking something over, he’s an absolute joy. Watch:
Nice haircut, kid. Looking sharp!
Well, Sawyer does in fact clean up his books. It takes him a while, but he does it. Previous to the temper tantrum, he was watching Ni Hao, Kai Lan. One of the characters gets really angry and hits his friend. Apparently Sawyer decided that life should imitate art. Watch:
Can you reach it, Sawyer? No.
I thought I took some video of the destruction of this tower, but evidently I did not. You’ll just have to relive the previous tower toppling from a few weeks ago.
After the cleanup, Sawyer took an interest in the picture of a bench and tree on the outside of his LEGO bin. He wanted to make one tree, which Abby helped him do, and then he wanted to make ten trees, which I helped him do. Watch him count them out:
Then for reasons not entirely clear, Sawyer proceeded to pack each and every one of those ten trees into his school bus:
Which was no small feat:
Such concentration:
And what joy:
These pictures are grainy and poorly lit, but his expressions are enough to make them shine. Thanks for a fun night, Sawyer. It didn’t start that way — stop throwing food! — but it sure ended well.
And it’s a good one too. He just spilled his drink all over his plate and tray, and was doing his best to clean it up by, well, watch:
And you wonder why Abby and I are exhausted at the end of the day.
I think there’s a picture of these steps somewhere on the blog, but after 523 posts I can’t keep anything straight. Can’t wait for baby number two to get me back on track…
After climbing through the big tree, Sawyer made a beeline to the top of the crazy steps, stopping only to collect a few rocks on the way up:
Abby and I were able to see his last 20 minutes at preschool today. I saw him climb up a fairly challenging ladder to get to the slide, which is something he’s never done with me before. It’s clear that his ability and desire to explore have grown immensely since he started school. I feel like Abby and I have done well to give him the confidence, and now he has the opportunity to use it much more often than before. Awesome.
He’s growing up so fast, but he’s still my little monkey!