All Aboard: The Wonderland Express exhibit at the Museum of Life and Science

I believe we took Sam to this exhibit three times between Thanksgiving and Christmas. A room full of trains, all of which go through terrain dotted with North Carolina tourist attractions! It's very cool.


Trying to steer daddy in the right direction.


Sam's default pose for photos.


Sam fighting with random strangers. Instead of intervening in this little exchange, I chose to document it. Luckily, the little guy's parents were reviewing photos on their camera, so the two were left to hash it out on their own. I am especially amused by the two boys in the background: "Woah, Billy, let's not get involved in this drama."

Santapalooza 2011

As we plunge head first into 2012 with a newly mobile, cast-less Sam, a quick highlight reel of the Christmas flurry. I think he enjoyed himself. Every morning he still asks first thing where Santa and the tree are. It's going to be a long year....


Opening a gift at Mama Jane's house with a little assistance from mom.


Joining his new Rockin' Elmo in a little holiday performance for the family.


Crazy Christmas self-portrait time!
 

Christmas morning and Sam is shoulder-deep in his stocking.


Anyone sensing a theme here? This child got two microphones for Christmas. And he's not afraid to use them.


Santa brought little Sammy Warrington a train set for Christmas! Just what he asked for. Santa must have overlooked my request to put it upstairs, so it won't junk up our livingroom.

Breakfast with Santa

Sam didn't actually eat any of his breakfast, but he had a blast. Until it was time to sit with Santa and tell him what he wanted. He would only be lured up there if Daddy and Elmo went first, and if he could take his balloon sword (Thanks, balloon-animal-making-lady for making balloon swords. That wasn't annoying at all.). Sooo, this isn't exactly frame-worthy, but what are you going to do?


Santa was explaining to Sam that Elmo is actually one of Santa's elves. I thought it was clever, but Sam didn't get it.


What do you think Bruce and Santa are talking about here?


Here is Sam, not eating breakfast.

The best part of the whole morning was when Bruce convinced the balloon-animal-making-lady to let him borrow her i-phone to take pictures of Sam with Santa. Because we are just that put together. Just minutes before it was our turn in line I discovered my camera battery was either dead or dying, so Bruce sprang into action. We thought about just leaving with it as a fair trade for her giving our son a weapon, but Bruce did the right thing and returned it.

Tiny Tim

Sam broke his leg just in time for Christmas. Do I need to remind you that a nasty virus resulted in the cancellation of his second birthday party? At least Thanksgiving was free of woe. As usual, Sam is taking the "boo boo," as he calls it, in stride. Literally. He figured out how to walk in the cast, though I should point out that it is NOT A WALKING CAST. It was also reported by an alarmed Ms. Aury at daycare that Sam even tried to run in the cast. Not cool, Sam, not cool. Here's to keeping Sam as intact as possible until the cast's removal Dec. 30. And here's to keeping Sam healthy and safe in 2012. In the meantime, I am totally trying to teach him to say "God bless us, everyone."

A Musical Interlude

Long time no blog, because we've been working on getting a band together. I play the kazoo.

FA LA LA LA LA

The boy didn't so much enjoy our trip to buy the Christmas tree as endure it.


Shortly after entering the tree lot, Sam lost his Christmas spirit due to the not infrequent use of a chainsaw. You can see Bruce is trying to comfort Sam: IT'S OK SAM! SANTA'S GOT A CHAINSAW! DON'T BE SCARED!


Actually, they had quit sawing already by this shot, but Sam was editorializing on the Christmas music at this point.


And here is Sam enjoying all of the festive accessories in the Christmas shop.

Meanwhile, just next to us, three adorable tow-headed children, all dressed in matching snowflake sweaters, were having their Christmas photo made in front of a tree by their mother, using her digital SLR camera. To contrast, I took this photo of Sam, hastily stuffed into his firetruck hoodie, with my cell phone.


And, in case you didn't think Sam had the endurance to cover his ears for the ENTIRE trip to the tree lot, here's a shot of him after the tree was loaded onto the car. (Yes, that is a Target in the background. If you can't get it at Target, then I don't want it.)

Gobble, gobble!

Sam learned to say "Gobble, gobble" for Thanksgiving, and I was quite excited to show him off to Bruce's family. I had him gobbling during rehearsal for days, and he happily gobbled all the way to Virginia. Then, of course, the child did not once utter another gobble until he was safely ensconced in our car and on the way home. So much for party tricks. I have now taught him to say "Ta Da!" when I turn on the Christmas lights. But you'll just have to trust me. It's pretty cute.

I forgot to take our camera with us on the trip, so I got some shots off of Sam celebrating turkey day with my phone. Amazingly, he is blurry in nearly every shot. Because he just couldn't be bothered to slow down.


Sam, recharging on the way to Thanksgiving lunch. He was tired from all the audience-free gobbling he'd been doing in the back seat.


The cousins (Alexis and Elizabeth) pose casually as Sam blurs past. That's Uncle Paul in the background. You can see we interrupted a serious football game.


Cousin Daniel is about to get tackled. Sam is no joke, even if I dressed him up fancy.


Just try and outrun Sam.


Why is Sam so blurry? I'm starting to think he's a vampire. I'm Team Sam!


Sam and Daniel, waiting for the Ref to make the call.


And here is Sam eating something. I don't actually know who took this photo, and I can't tell what he is eating. Hopefully, it was edible.