Zack's Big Eyes

As I was doing some data entry yesterday, I told the boys that they could pick a movie to watch. Zack picked the Incredibles, and after he put it in he came to me.
"Mommy, the Incredibles has some scary parts..." Then Zack added, his eyes getting bigger and browner, "But I won't feel scared if we have popcorn..."

The Perfect Gift

Last week Pete had Kyle over, and we were all talking about how much Nathan likes Optimus Prime (seems to be in every conversation these days!). The next morning hanging on the front door was an Optimus Prime gift bag with a stuffed (and transformable!) Optimus Prime inside. On the bag was a note that said,
"Dear Mini Optimus Prime,
From your biggest fan, Optimus Prime.
P.S. - Transform and roll out!"
Nathan hasn't let go of his new best friend yet - little Optimus has gone everywhere. :) It seems that this winter has had a theme; our friend Kyle and just how great he is! What a blessing it is to have such amazing people in our lives.

A New Era

So I registered Zack for kindergarten yesterday. Wow. I was cuddling on the couch with him today, and we were talking about him going to school. I said, "Zack, what am I going to do when you go to school? We won't be able to cuddle."
"Don't worry mommy, I'll come back every day to cuddle with you."
*sniff*

Optimus Prime

Well, my little Nathan has an obsession. Even though he has never seen Transformers movies or anything, Nathan thinks about and talks about and pretends to be Optimus Prime. All the time. We told him that the movies and show is a little too scary for him, so he'll have to watch them when he gets bigger. He loves to play with the toy Optimus at my parents' place - it belonged to my brother when he was little! We bought him a shirt at Wal-mart with O.P. on it, and the second it comes out of the dryer he wears it until it's unbearably dirty. Then he asks me about it until I do the laundry again. Every day Nathan wakes up and tells us, "I'm Optimus Prime Nathan." He has tried to find out as much as he can about Transformers - he looks at the toys in the store, asks as many questions as possible, and we found Transformers fruit snacks. He clutched the box of fruit snacks from the aisle to the cashier, then the cashier gave it back and he hugged it all the way home. He has decided to name our family after the other Autobots. Zack is Bumblebee, daddy is Ironhide, and I'm Ratchet. We went all day today with those as our names. We were on our way to Costco, and Pete and I heard Nathan talking to himself in the back seat...
"I'm Optimus PRIME! Optimus Prime walks like this: BOOM, BOOM, BOOM! I'm going to sing an Optimus Prime song. (Pause) Optimuuus Priiiiiiiiiiiiiime our heeeero! Heeeee's a cooool robot!"

Our New Hero

So the boys now have a new hero (but still second to Kyle, of course!) and it's Kyle's brother, Tyler.

We had Kyle over one evening, and as Pete and Kyle were turning on the TV to play some Wii, there was a commercial for Monster Jam happening in Edmonton. Pete said that we'd love to take the boys to go see the monster trucks. Well, it just so happens that Kyle's brother Tyler tours with Monster Jam in the "Quad Wars" portion of the show. So Kyle told Tyler that we'd love to go, and next thing we knew Tyler showed up at our house with 4 free tickets and pit passes for all of us. Wow! So yesterday we got to go to Rexall Place, meet all the monster truck drivers and quad drivers (the boys ran right up to Tyler and hugged him - so cute!), AND see all of the monster trucks up close. Then we had a picnic lunch in the car and went back in to see the show. They had ear muffs on that Pete grabbed from work, and they were completely mesmerized by the trucks. We got to cheer for Tyler to win the quad races, and cheer for the Batman monster truck. It was great! Once our computer comes back, I'll post some pictures of the boys there!

So needless to say it was an amazing day, and what a blessing it is to have friends that treat us like their own family! Thank you Tyler!!

Nathan the Optimist

One day after a particularily harsh freakout from Zack, I saw Nathan come up to Zack on the couch. Zack's eyes were red from crying, and he was still pouting from being angry. Nathan came up close and looked into his face and said, "Zack. Don't be mad. Don't be sad. Be... Happy!"
It didn't really help Zack, but it was really cute.