Davey and I went exploring at a park not far from our house yesterday.  There’s a small lake and lots of birds (and turtles we were told.  We looked, but we didn’t find any turtles).  We also noticed an area of tall trees that had been blocked off with orange fencing stuff.  A lady saw us looking and she explained to us that they were protecting an owl family.  There is a mommy, daddy and 3 baby owls living there.

We found the owls.  I tried to take a picture.  I drew the arrow in because I couldn’t zoom in the way I wanted.   (We are looking forward to buying a better zoom one of these days!)

Anyway that owl is just a couple of months old.  He seemed really big to me already.  Of course, I have no idea how fast owls grow up.  We’re going to take David over there, and we’ll bring some binoculars to get a closer look.

Similarly, I had no idea about this duck.

There were two adult Canada Geese nearby, so Davey quickly determined that this duck was their baby.  I felt that this was probably incorrect, but since I don’t really know much about black ducks, I figured I’d go with it.  Again, need better zoom – but isn’t he pretty with that white bill?  We’d not seen one like that before.

Broomfield does nature walks for preschool kids.  We’re going to go on some.  Davey needs someone knowledgeable to navigate him (us) through these things.

Of course in any exploration outing, snacks are crucial.  “Mommy!  What did you bring us?”

Yesterday it was Capri Suns (Pretty Suns as he calls them) and some M&Ms.

Davey enjoys exploring.  Yesterday he kept looking for ants.  He also told me that “mean people catch frogs”.   I don’t know where he got this.  (He also told me that coyotes eat little kids.  He apparently learned this from one of his little friends.  He was pretty casual about sharing this with me though, so I’m thinking he was not convinced that this was true.)

It is a beautiful morning, so I’m getting ready to pack us a lunch and we are going to go exploring again.   Need to avoid sandwiches though unless we want to gobble them down.  This mountain air dries out a sandwich like nothing I’ve ever seen.

Davey had his Winter/Spring show at “tumblin” yesterday.  (He’s already asked this morning if we have “tumblin'” again today!)

He had a great time.  They did a short routine as a group and then individually.  They got on the beam and the bars.

Davey has made a new friend in tumbling.  This happened last week.  He loves loves his new friend.  For the first time, when the teacher called them back to the mat, Davey was not interested.  He was playing with his new friend.

So we talked about being respectful and listening to the teacher.  Yesterday he was ready to go back and be a good listener.  Poor kid.  He did great.  I say poor kid, because he was just so torn at times.  Some of the 3 year olds still just go where the wind takes them, but he knows he can sit and listen to the teacher.  He’d be sitting as the teacher asked, but some of his friends would be running around the room willy nilly.   I could see the turmoil in Davey.  Every once in awhile he’d reach out his arm for them.  And a couple of times, he ran willy nilly with them too, but I could see him really trying!

Here he is with his medal.  He is  proudly standing by one of his new friends (I cropped most of the friend out as I didn’t get permission to put his photo up).

I’m just not quite sure what to think about this picture.  He looks like such a big grown-up kid here!

The first words I heard from Davey this morning as he walked into our room and climbed into bed were – well, I don’t actually remember because I was still half asleep,  but it had something to do  with Thor.

He can sit on his bed and spend a very long time looking at this:

It’s a Marvel poster that David has probably had for 20 years.  It’s got every possible Marvel superhero and supervillain (or every one in existence 20 years ago.  Do they add new ones periodically?)

Davey studies the poster carefully.

He finally focuses on a certain guy:

“Mommy, will you tell me a story about Captain America?”

I try.

I’m working on a superhero name for Davey.  InQuisitive Boy?  Perpetual Motion?  Mr Mayhem?

He’s already been in superhero mode with David this morning.

They built a “castle” for their guys.

They’ve decided they needed more supervillains.  And Davey’s first visit to a comic book shop.   So that’s in the plans for today.

Davey is Mr. Questions (hey there is another possibility!) these days.

“Mommy, why are rainbow sprinkles called rainbow sprinkles?”

“Daddy, what’s a kneecap?”

“Mommy, why are M&M’s called M&M’s?”

And the question of the day:  “Mommy, where do kids come from before they are kids?”

Here is his usual head tilt position  when he is asking questions.

He also gets a few words mixed up.  We referred to an ape as both an ape and a gorilla.  He got a little mixed up and calls them “grapes”.

The other day he wanted to know what “corn on the cobbler” tastes like.  (Now maybe that’s a vegetable that would tempt him.  It does me!)

He’s outside watching David weed-eat and mow.

Here he’s safely perched on the porch.  I gave him some gummy bears to pass the time while he watched (It kept him safely on the porch as well).

I was trying to get him to smile for me.

I just went out to check on him.

“Mommy, would you like to look for bugs with me?”

Davey’s moving around fine today.  Cast?  What cast?

He’s doing a little cooking.

Then he thought of a new game called “Mommy Take a Picture of Me”.

“Mommy Take a Picture of me!”  and then he runs away as fast as he can.

“Mommy Take a Picture of Me!”

Thankfully he is more interested in doing sitting down activities (superheroes, tinker toys and race track), but he’s moving around some too.

And for me, I am knitting a little this morning.

I think it was on Friday when I posted my shawl was going well.  The slightly superstitious part of me knew that I should not make this claim.  And I didn’t even add a single “knock on wood” in that post.

So then my shawl almost became a huge disaster.  I tinked back 100 stitches and then I didn’t have enough stitches on my row and ugh…I was getting worried. But thankfully there was this stitch sequence of “slip 1, k2tog, and psso”  So I could find where these were in my row which helped me find my mistakes. I found where I’d dropped a couple of yarnovers and the green markers were where I needed to get them back.

The reason I think I almost had a disaster was because my stitches were so bunched up on my needles (and of course the fact that I made the mistake of talking about how well I was progressing on the shawl).  Some slid off at one point, and I couldn’t spread them out to see what I was doing.  So before I attempted to make this fix, I bought some 40 inch circular needles.  I should have been using them in the first place (I had 32 inch).

Lesson well learned.

Yesterday, we went to a enrollment party at the Little Gym.  Davey was having a great time.  They were doing some group activities, and each time they did a new one, they’d call all the kids to the mat.  Well, Davey always runs pell-mell just as fast as his little legs will carry him when the instructor calls. This time he tripped on the mat and went down.  He came up holding his ankle.  Poor thing, it really hurt him.

His ankle didn’t swell.  It didn’t bruise, but Davey could not put any weight on it.  We decided to watch it last night to see how it looked in the morning.

This morning, we decided we’d better have him checked out.

Davey had told us that it only hurt when he walked on it.  I could rotate it around.  I could put some pressure on the side.  “It only hurts when I walk on it Mommy.”

So we were in with the doctor.

He asked Davey several questions. Davey always had the same reply.

Doctor: “Does it hurt when I touch here?”

Davey:  “It only hurts when I walk on it.”

Doctor: “Does it hurt when I move it like this?”

Davey:  “It only hurts when I walk on it.”

Doctor: “Does it hurt when I move your toes?”

Davey: “It only hurts when I walk on it.”

You get the idea.  Davey patiently answered “It only hurts when I walk on it.” to every question.

We went to x-ray.  The doctor didn’t really think they’d find anything, but he wanted to be sure.

Unfortunately they did.  Davey has a buckle fracture on his tibia.

He’s now sporting a black cast.

He’s taken it all quite well.

His only request?  “Smarties and M&Ms”.

So he’s had some Smarties.

And some more Smarties.

And when I asked him for a smile, he was back to his goofy self.

He has to wear the cast for 3 weeks.

I just heard him ask David, “Daddy, when I can I take this thing off?”

Poor thing.  Superboy has been temporarily grounded.

First thing this morning:  Davey is already going great guns with his superheroes.

David and I were trying to wake up.

Every few minutes we’d hear:

“Daddy. Is Hulk a good guy OR WHAT?”

Then quiet…well actually more of a more quiet running commentary from the superhero camp.

And then again: “Daddy. Is The Thing a good guy OR WHAT?”

This morning they got out David’s Heroclix.

These are little superhero and supervillain guys.  There is a game with rules that goes along with the clix.  Davey is not too interested.  He likes to set them up with Daddy and then they just have the little guys “clobber” each other.

Superheroes make Davey grin.

Ok and here is what is making me grin.  My seaside shawlette is really coming along. I hesitate to say that as I made a small error yesterday.  I think I fixed it, but I haven’t gotten back to it yet to make sure.

It’s so hard for me to take pictures of my bunched up lace, but I took a couple to kinda show the emerging patterns.

This is the shawl’s center pattern.

And now I am working on the outer part of the shawl.

I’m hoping to complete this shawl soon.  Today is a rainy gray day.  It would be a nice day to knit.  We’ll have to see what the little superhero thinks!