Why I Oughta...

I swear we've done nothing different between the three kids in regards to sports and balls.  But The King of the Ball Tossers is really living up to his name:  he's drawn, almost magically, to sports balls of all kind.  Here he is, strapped into his car seat with his ball and bat.  He wouldn't let me take it out of his hands!

Leave it to Aurelio's Pizza to introduce the King of the Ball Tossers to the wonderful world of lollipops.  Who doesn't deserve a DumDum after they eat that tasty pizza?!?! There's no turning back now with these things I'm guessing.  We go to Aurelio's often enough that I'm wondering if he'll remember where the lollipop came from?  They have them in a big basket right on the check-in counter and his two older sisters go up there and stuff their pockets with them.  He'll soon be joining them I'm sure.

For a certain segment of our house (welp...it really is the entire household but me), this is a big deal:  These Crunchy Rice Rollers from Bamboo Lane are back at Costco.  I took the King of the Ball Tossers to the Melrose Park Costco over the weekend and we stocked up.  I think he ate three on the way home.

This weekend, we went over to Wannemaker's for their annual Christmas season Open House with all three kids and Nat's folks.  This is the second year in a row we've gone and it was a totally lovely experience.  Last year, we got their early in the day and waited for a long time to get to meet Santa and pet his reindeer. This year, we arrived pretty late.  I think it went from 10 am to 3 pm.  We arrived about 230 pm and walked right in.  They switched things up this year.  Last year, it was meet Santa...and THEN...go meet his reindeer.  This year, they put the reindeer part first.  They were allowing groups in two at a time to pet each of the reindeer.  The girls got up close and person with one of them (in the photo above). After that, you went around to the Santa line.  There, they had some cute coloring pages for the kids set up with crayons.  Really great way to keep the kids occupied and give them something fun to do while other kids were meeting with the 'Big G

I've written about my experience with Google Express before here on the blog .  I really like it.  Especially for Costco purchases.  For example, we were having a first birthday party for The Beef over this past weekend at our* house and after doing a proper inventory, we discovered that we were covered with disposable plates and forks/knives/spoons, we didn't have any of those big party dinner napkins.  You know... this kind .  So...I added those to my cart and threw in a big party container of cashews and I hit the $15 minimum order for free delivery. 12 hours later....they arrived and we were ready for the party. But...to get started with buying on Costco via Google Express wasn't super easy.  It required a visit to our local Costco store and a request of a new Costco card.  That's because....Google Express requires that the name on your credit card that you are using to purchase stuff match EXACTLY the name on your Costco account. So...that top card is my *n

Over the weekend, we gathered friends and family and celebrated our little guy's first birthday.   There's more over on the family blog, but if you've been to a first birthday party, you know the best part of the entire thing is watching what the baby will do (or not do) with his own cake.  Some kids smash their face/fists in.  Some kids don't do a thing.  Some kids just wail and push it off their table.   Mine?  He picked up the whole thing and ate his cake like a boss.  

Our local Target in Villa Park has a Chewbacca standup display set up right when you walk in the door, so when I was there with my Boy (The King of the Ball Tossers), I couldn't *NOT* go take a photo of him doing his 'Chewie roar', right?

Getting him started right with the Good Guys on the South Side - as any good Dad would do, right? He'll have no memory of this night we spent together, but I will never forget it.

I probably should have put 'reading' in quotation marks.  But...here's the Bird giving The King of The Ball Tossers a lesson in how cats can cross the road.  He seemed to be into it.