Desmond likes to jump! and boy can that boy jump!  Check out his awesomeness jumping for the camera last night. Ohh and guess what, this is post #501. Pretty crazy.

One of my favorites. Plus iheartfaces website is doing a contest for kisses, for Valentines Day. I like this one a lot. I thought I would give it an entry.

The fair was a few weeks ago, and for the 1st time ever I was excited to go to it. Usually I just do not like crowds and hate fighting to get in and out of anywhere. However this year we just had to do it. We drove by it every day for weeks as they set it up. And everyday Desmond would see the giant wheel and ask “WASS DATT!!” Thats the fair buddy! So everyday he would said “hey fair” as we drove by. We went the 2nd day it was open and just had one of the best times ever. Desmond was on his best behavoir and just soaked it all up! Everynight as we drive by the fair on the way home he would look and say “hey fair, i love you fair”. It was very sweet. He would also get right in your face and look at you and say “FAAAIR?” Very funny.

I also entered some photos in the fair this year. I did last year and took home 3rd place. This year I was able to take home two 2nd place awards. I was very excited about that. One picture I took was in Dubai on my trip at the fish market. I never took much attention to the photo itself, but everyone always commented on it when they saw it. The more I studied it the more I feel in love with it. It is now one of my favorites. The other was of the cropduster that Desmond loves so much. I am framing thisone and it will hang in his room.

I am so looking forward to next years fair.

Desmond with a death grip on Bert!

We won some tickets to go see Sesame Street Live from the Credit Union and some radio station last week. Last night we picked up our tickets and found our way to the Centraplex to see the show. We had to get there an hour early because we also had won tickets to go back stage and meet some of the characters, and have pizza with them. We were a little worried how Desmond might do, as he is not into Sesame Street yet, and sitting still is not something he is into these days. We decided to give it a try, it was free to us so what did we have to lose.

With that being said Jackie and I both agreed it was a very wise decision to go after all, he LOVED IT! At the pre-party we all had to line up to meet “Bert and Ernie” we let a few of the older kids go first, and one by one smiles turned to melt downs. I guess the pressure was too much, some kids freak out when they see a larger then life puppet coming to get them. That was not the case with Desmond, I set him on the ground and he went running towards them. He has no idea who Bert and Ernie are, but he did not want to let go of them, he gave them “high-fives” grabbed onto them and just had a face of pure excitement on it. It was “wow” and “yaaay!” and claps all around from him. When they left we looked around at us, and says ” see it?” and pointed to the door they just went into to go back to the dressing rooms. Seconds later he is running towards the door like a crazed fan storming backstage. I was able to wrestle him to the ground, and we moved our way up to our seats.

We handed our tickets to the lady who was helping people to their seats, she looked at our seat numbers and did not know where to seat us, those seat numbers did not exist. She went off and asked someone else, she comes back and tells us to head down front. It turns out we are up front and center, best seats in the house! we couldn’t have been any closer. This was perfect, because again, Mr. Desmond does not sit in seats for more then half a nano-second. Once the show started he was hooked, the lights, the singing, dancing, giant stuffed animals running around stage, he was fixed on it, and I was fixed on him.

Its pretty wild how much enjoyment you can get out of watching your child enjoy something new. It was a new rush of feelings for me. I have experienced enjoyment of seeing his eyes light up before. But this was new and different. When it comes to being goofy in public with strangers I tend to shy on the side of “im too cool to do that, and I hope no one is looking at me” but last night, who cares, every parent in the complex was being a kid again and acting the fool with their children, the adults ate it up just as much as the kids. That was fun to me, Jackie and I caught ourselves looking at each other a few times and smiling at how much he was loving this. The characters ran out into the crowed lots of times during the show, and each time we were always right their to get a handshake, elmo came and saw us, and yes Desmond can now say “elmo”, actually its more like “eammmo”.

So there you have it, our first experience with something on that big of a scale with a small child. Thank you Credit Union and Light Rock Z90 whatever the heck station you are for the free tickets. We enjoyed them!

(nonyoutubelink)

Today was Desmond’s last day for his ISR swim lessons. It has been a long road for the little guy, and his mom too. I have to say I am so proud of them for sticking with it. The results have just been so amazing, and I am so very proud of him. Yesterday he was to swim fully clothed, diaper, shoes the works! And he did awesome! Standing ovation awesome! Below are some pictures from that. To celebrate his big day, we went to firehouse subs! He got his 1st very own kids meal! Fire Hat included. He had a blast, and chomped down his grilled cheese and Oreo cookies.

I was able to get some video of today, and show all that he has learned. Some things I want to point out from this video, as I am sure I will get search hits from the ISR references. the idea of ISR is to teach children how to rescue themselves. It is not a swimming lesson for fun. It is designed to teach them to act calm when they fall into the water and float, breath, and get to the side of the pool. This whole process has taken over 6 weeks. The 1st part of the video shows Desmond getting to the steps, he stands up, and loses his balance, falling in backwards. This is a perfect example of how it happens. The instructor let him fall, and he recovered himself nicely. This is what it is all about. I highly recommend this program. You can learn more at www.infantswim.com

One of the best things I remember about growing up was that my parents were always taking us somewhere new each weekend. Ireland may not be very big, but there is something to see every 2 miles. In the 12 years I spent there, I got to see a lot of it. It felt like every weekend we were heading somewhere new, it was a new adventure every time. Those are some of my favorite memories, and now it was my turn to make some for Desmond.

Recently, Jackie and I have been getting more adventurous on getting out with Desmond. He is getting old enough now were he cares about what he see’s. I realized this the other morning when I caught him peeking out the front door window. He was standing on his tippy toes looking out the window at the water sprinklers as they soaked the front yard, he just kept saying….woaaaaw! He would look back at me, point, and again say woaaaw! So Jackie had the great idea of Callaway Gardens. We have been wanting to go for months. We kept putting it off, making excuses like, its too far, hes not old enough, it will be too exhausting. Well we almost did that again Friday, but we didn’t, and headed off Saturday morning.

We had an absolute blast, the weather was perfect, the flowers were blooming, and he just soaked it all up. It was woaaw this and wooaaw that with Desmond all day. He saw turtles and got to feed the fish, he even ate a little fish food himself, I was not surprised. We planned on doing bike rides, but did not. We will definitely plan on this next time, because we are for sure going back. Here are some of my favorite pictures from the day. Enjoy!

So the Easter Bunny came and went, and he did not let us down. Desmond had a blast! He knew right away that easter eggs are for picking up and throwing any direction his arm chooses. Usually they ended up being thrown up over and behind his head. It also did not take him long to figure out that you put an egg in a basket, and that there was also something sweet inside the eggs! Enjoy all the photos, as you can see he had a big time!