Level Up! & Legoland

Okay first Bunky leveled up. For you non-geeks that means he went through a developmental leap (or is still kind of going through it). He is so much more like a boy than a baby. His speech is more complex, he has 59/64 pages memorized of a long book (not to mention all the other books), he is starting to (but not quite) make the connection between letters and sounds vs. letters and their shapes (upper & lower case). Reading by 3.5 for sure... Anyway, he's just more mature all around, and it's fascinating to see this change in his behavior and play and needs and so on. Yay!

Now for the Legoland part. It's been there some 12 years or so and I've never been. Yes, me, the legomaniac who would die and go to heaven to be a master builder (or even to have the time to build), the obsessive collector who doesn't open boxes but must have must have must have.

Anyway, the Nanny had a doctor appointment on a Friday so Mark was going to take the day off and stay home / work from home, and so on Thursday I pretty much decided I would too, and then Friday morning we pretty spontaneously decided to go. We got there around noon and by 4:00 had hit every ride he was qualified for. There were no lines, no crowds, no waiting. What took the longest was getting him off the roller coasters without a fuss. So much to see! It wasn't until about 4:30 that afternoon that I got to do a blitz through Miniland seeing the amazing intricate mind-blowing displays. I love that stuff. I can't wait to have a Lego studio of my own to set up my movie studio (though mine will be mini-fig scale). Too bad they close at 5.

Anyway, this is about Fintan, not me and my Lego OCD, so here are some photos.

Airplanes that go up and down!

Yes that Triceratops is entirely lego. Amazing.

Daddy & Bunky on Safari. This was a pretty kewl little ride, better than Jungle cruise with all the animatronic Lego animals. However, it was pretty much African except for the out-of-place pandas. I might have bought into it if they had been last, but they were second to last, just before the pride of lions.

After a fairytale cruise. I was surprised at how many fairy tale characters I could name, even though I don't know most of the stories. It was modernized; the prince had a cell phone.

My two heroes! Well, one hero and one replica.

Another view on that airplane ride.

Up up up in da 'ky! Faster faster!

A bouncy thing... I was surprised he liked it. Since there was no ride, we rode like 4 times in a row.

A different airplane ride. Mama was ready to bust out the blackberry and do email and work on this ride ;) But he clearly liked it.

An amazingly huge all-brick Thomas the Tank Engine.

Daddy has the photos of me & Bunk with R2D2 &Darth Vader.

Photos - we love photos!

Some recent photos of my "little man"...

All Hallow's Eve

Ahoy, mates! Another night of spirits roaming between the Earth and the Netherworld - and collecting loot from strangers!!! We had a great time! Woohoo!

Arrrr! The things I be puttin' up with fer candy!

I grabs me a beautiful pirate wench to accompany me!

And me daddy comes along too, arrr!

That scary ghoul don't scare this here pirate!

Say cheese, wench!

New York New Yoooooork!

In October we went to NYC. We go upstate to Warwick and go apple picking. I missed out on that part this year, but the boys had some fun. I don't have daddy's apple photo yet but it's a doozy (slathered with cuteness).

Daddy & Bunky in the city.

Bunky rides the subway. "F for Fintan!" F is the train to the Island.

At the Transportation Museum... sitting in an ancient subway car.

Don't let the toddler drive the bus!

How many tickets would you like?

I think Fin really enjoyed the turnstyles and the hands-on aspect of the Transportation Museum. He loves riding the subway, holding on, directing me to sit down, stand up, hold on. (He's getting really good at giving orders. At home now we only take orders from him if he's wearing his pirate hat. Bring that one up in therapy in a few years!! :P Aaarrr!!! )

RED ALERT!

I upgraded my blog and lost all the links to everyone else's blogs. Please help! Rori, Jenny, Dean... ack!!!

More photos coming!

Mark just pointed out that all this time i have had a card reader built in to my laptop. *sigh* No more excuses to be lazy and not download images. :)

Here are a few to start with... click to enlarge!

He's as much a cat as our other four cats...

He loves to ride the swing ride!

Replacement tire: $13.42

Kid's helmet: $26.27

Toddler bike seat attachment: $182.34

Finally finding something Bunky and Mommy can do together: Priceless

Rrrooooooaaar!

Mom is away on another business trip so here I am trying to provide updates to the blog. Unfortunately, the network is acting up a bit so I'm not sure if I'll be able to add any pictures.

Since Comic*con, Bunky has pretty much mastered the use of his potty. We still put a diaper on him every night, but that's mostly just a precaution - I think he's only used a diaper once in the past few weeks. Of course, this makes outings slightly more problematic since he doesn't quite have timing down yet. If it's time to poop, it's time to poop NOW and there better be a bathroom nearby. He also doesn't like the look of certain public restrooms and will refuse to use some of them, instead claiming that he just wants to wash his hands.

His reading has also improved alot, or at least his interest in books and his memorization. He got hooked on a PBS show called SuperWhy and since then he's been much more interested in his books. He's memorized "Goodnight Moon" and will read it to us at night, along with 3 or 4 others. Sometimes he'll start reciting a book we didn't know he had memorized and it's causes a bit of a double take.

He's also taken a renewed interest in hockey and skating and will drag me out to the front of the house to play a bit of ball hockey a coupel times a week. We took him back to the rink last week and he actually SKATED for nearly an hour and a half. He's beginning to get his balance better and not hang on us nearly as much, and didn't even visit any of the arcade games that normally attract his attention for most of our trips to the rink.


Grandpa and Grandma just came to visit and give me a hand while Mom's away, and also left lots of food so we won't starve. :) It was a shorter trip than usual, as they stopped in on the way to somewhere else so we didn't get many pictures. Which is to say, I didn't take any, and the few that Grandpa took are still in his camera. But here's a portrait from their last visit.

Bunky goes to SD Comic*Con

In the world of Geekitude, Bunky is a rising star. Today we took a day-trip to the expo floor of Comic*Con, the world's (I think) biggest convention for comics, movies, tv shows, fan stuff, more comics, etc. etc. [these shots are all from my Blackberry.] We saw lots of famous people but... yeah whatever. The exciting part was the trolley ride and the Dalek (below).

Here's a random shot of the floor... this isn't even the interesting area.

Oooh my favorite!!!

Apparently it's Bunky's favorite area too.

NO WAY! A life-size gold Dalek!!! Bunky is absolutely THRILLED!!!

Now, i expect most of you don't have a clue what a Dalek is, but Bunky does, and that just proves his superiority over you non-geek mortal types!!! :D

We had fun, got exhausted, took the trolley (electric train) from a remote parking spot to the convention center and back, and an Amtrak/Surfrider went by (full size double decker train) just 10 feet away and blew its horn!!! All that stuff was pretty exciting :D