Summer 2010 So Far: Mowing

The picture below with me wearing a red shirt, were taken at the Indianapolis City Market Farmer's Market last week. It is notable for two reasons: First, you will note Finnegan's crook'd finger and serious stare. You've seen the same look right before Sean Penn or Alec Baldwin takes the paparazzo's camera and busts it on the pavement. It would have been his first of what I suspect will be several such incidents over the course of his live and career. I talked the little tough guy down and fortunately for Will the cameraman, there were no fisticuffs.

Below you see the killer stare continues. The second reason is to point out this nifty ride along backpack. It has become a major piece of our summer gear.
It carried Finnegan around the 500 Festival Parade, it has hauled him around the neighborhood for short afternoon visits to watch soccer or flag football.
But most notably, it has become a part of our lawn care regimen. One day I needed to mow the lawn and was home with Finn alone and felt comfortable mowing in our backyard fenced in area, but didn't trust him to watch from the sidelines outside the fence. He has yet to truly learn to fear the street.So a lightbulb lit above my heard, which frightened and confused the tike for a second and in seconds I had loaded him on my back and started the lawn mower.

It was a revelation for the boy. He reached his arm over my left shoulder for the next thirty minutes and said "mow!" no less than 700 times. He loves it. Since then he has taken to riding a bit quieter and more relaxed. Last week, he had an open (as opposed to a sippy) cup of ice water with him for the whole front yard and I never wore it. Not a drop.It soothes him most times. If you time it right he'll go out on your back just as the clock strikes naptime. Out like the proverbial light bulb. It is one of the things I will always remember about this age.And for those of you wondering about my knee surgery, I had it on a Thursday and these photos are from mowing that Monday. So, I'll be fine. But thanks for the concern. Shh. Don't wake the kid.

Summer 2010 So Far: Racing With Pa

The rain and humidity of the early 2010 Summer not withstanding there is a lot of great fun stuff to report and I've got a backlog I need to catch up on. So here is the first installment of The Summer So Far:Lets start with racing. As previously published, our first-born is a big fan of the drag races and a while back got to be there, with proper protective gear as you can see, to stay up late and witness his Grandpa Larry win his division under the lights.
Finnegan says "Wow!" and "Loud!' a lot at the races. But mostly he just grins and giggles. claps and points at Grandpa Larry and says "Pa!"


Pa was pretty excited by the win and told Alisha as they headed for the winners' circle photos, "This doesn't happen very often. Lets get that boy up here with me."

I was home stripping furniture, more about that in a future post, and missed the whole thing and kick myself for it. In a few weeks Finnegan will be spending the weekend with Pa and Grandma in Michigan at a race and we know they will share with us great photos from that. But for now it's just fun to look at the boy at the track.