Bigger Every Day.

Our little Bear has been doing so good lately. As soon as the sun came out he started advancing with leaps and bounds as far as his development goes. Yesterday and today he has grabbed books and brought them to me so I could put him in my lap and read them to him. He stayed in my lap for over a half an hour!! It's so awesome. He keeps coming back to a counting book and studying a picture of a kitten. He even pets the picture.
So much has happened I'm not sure if I can remember it all. We went to Roseburg to visit my dad and step mom and that was a blast. Three generations of Mentzer boys together and set loose. We HAD to go out for pizza because it's the official Mentzer food. Baron loooovvvveesss pizza. And so do I. We fed the ducks and geese at the duck pond, played at the park where Baron experienced uneven ground for the first time and enjoyed the company of my folks' chihuahua. It was really good for me to hang out with my son and my dad. Every summer when I was a kid we'd make the long drive to Roseburg so me and my parents could hang out with the grandparents and now I get to do the exact same thing with my son. Life is a circle.
We've played at quite a few of the parks in the Portland area in the last couple of weeks. Some are just amazing and have some great equipment to play on but he invariably ends up playing with a pine cone or tries to climb in a garbage can. He gets that from me. I took him to Clackamas Mall a few day ago so we could play in the kids area like we have before but this time he wanted nothing to do with the play area. He wanted to see what the rest of the mall was all about!! Everything was closed but their was still a strong mall-walker presence and he went from closed gate to closed gate, covered kiosk to covered kiosk talking googley talk at full volume so he could be heard throughout the entire mall and lovin' every minute of it. He had a good nap that day. I set him loose in the middle of Delta Park and he loved that too. Nothing but acres and acres of open field that he would walk giant circles in at full speed, grinnin the whole time.
But you would never in a million years guess where the coolest, funnest, most amazing park play structure is. Would you believe that it's at Sorosis Park in The Dalles? We visited my mom yesterday for her belated birthday wishes and took him up to the park to wear him out before we headed back to P-town. It is so mind blowingly fantastic! Baron's still a bit too little to really enjoy it but next year we are going to be all over that thing!!!!
I built him his first furniture fort yesterday and he loves it! I put a blanket over our table and he goes in and out, up and over and all around it. This last weekend I saw at Barnes and Nobles (One of our favorite places to visit!) that they sell these things that look like giant tinkertoys that you can make a frame with and then cover with a sheet and make into a variety of different forts. Pretty cool, but nothing beats creating new environments out of the mundane furniture that we take for granted everyday. A chair is never just a chair when a child is around
I've been researching and writing down a bunch of the fun, free activities that go on all over the Portland area. Different story times, movies in the parks, Sunday Parkways, music in the parks, guided nature walks for kids, all kinds of amazing things.
This is the best summer. Ever.