Katie Loves Rambo... and I do too!

Two Christmases ago, John was trying to think of something totally awesome he could give to me 

(his wonderful, sweet, fabulous wife). 

I was at a point where I didn't want more stuff to clutter up the house and I didn't really need anything so, as you can imagine, finding something for me (his wonderful, sweet, fabulous wife) was the teeniest bit tough.

Until... I spotted it.  There, at the end of a long aisle, in a quiet section of the store, was the thing I wanted for most for Christmas...

An official Red Ryder BB rifle!*  I would have bought it too, except John kept telling me I would shoot my eye out.  I was a little huffy for awhile until I saw the thing I wanted almost as bad...

A ROOMBA!

It was awesome... blue and black with a snazzy remote.  I was in love!

John declared that he would not buy me a vacuum cleaner for my Christmas gift was hesitant.  He didn't want to purchase such a gift for me because he thought that I (his wonderful, sweet, fabulous wife) deserved jewels and clothing... and probably a trip to some tropical location, but after much prodding and reassurance (and maybe some threats and a reminder that *this* was actually in our budget) he realized that this was the *perfect* gift for me and he caved.  And I had my Roomba!

We got home and opened the box to charge it up (no, I couldn't wait for Christmas!) and while me and Katie were staring at the new addition to our home, John was reading the manual.  Out loud.  I suppose he wanted me to know how to clean it out or something... but it was so hard for me to focus because I was so giddy over our Roomba that his words were just background noise.

Until he read "The Rambo..." and my attention snapped back to him.  And I think my first thought was "That is SO COOL!  They give them names... like Cabbage Patch dolls have names!"  (Remember those?)  

And then I realized that the Roomba people *probably* don't have the time to name each of the machines they lovingly put together.  At least, probably not enough time to update each of the manuals (but I'm sure they give them pet names while they are making their way through the Roomba factory).

I was right about those Roomba people.  They didn't name my Roomba.  But we did, or rather, JOHN did!

After John called him Rambo, we stuck with it.  Mostly because Katie picked up on it (at 2 years old) and she really thought that was his name.

Now tonight, we pulled Rambo out again (he had been in storage while we repurposed the dining room into Katie's room) and Katie was thrilled!  I put him under the TV and told Katie that when the light was green, we could watch him work.

She immediately laid down in front of Rambo and started watching the light.  I needed to go do laundry downstairs and told her she could come with if she wanted to (because a whole 10 minutes before, she was super excited to accompany me on the trip to the basement and would have been sad if I hadn't included her in the "excitement" that is laundry) but, without looking, she said "That's okay Mommy.  I watchin' Rambo" and as I wiped the tears from my eyes and headed downstairs I heard her say "I love you, Rambo.  I love you so much!"

*Sigh*

Oh, but then?  A little later?  Katie was talking to me and she decided that "Rambo" should become "Rainbow".

Rambo finally charged a bit... Katie was watching and told us the instant the light changed to green... so I pulled him out and set him to work.

The kids were funny... Jake kept staring at Rambo and following him slowly while Katie made a game of tapping and running away.  

Here's Jake's first Rambo sighting... notice how he's close to the couch in case he needs to escape to higher ground?

Oh... yeah.  There's a piece of paper on his head.  Katie was giving each of us a "ticket" and Jake must not have wanted to take his.  So she put it on his head.  It was funny when she came around to collect them.  She reached out for Jake's head, he moved away and gave her a funny look.  Silly.  

Jake's showing us where Rambo is:

Here's Jake again, getting a little more daring:

(Oh, and I realize that Katie is missing from these pics. The kid wouldn't stay still so she was running out of every one of the three pictures I took tonight!)

Watching the kids was pretty entertaining AND it helped me to remember one of the reasons we thought Rambo was an awesome Christmas present (even if he is a vacuum) -- kid entertainment!  The battery lasts about an hour and for that hour there are no shouts over who's toy belongs to who, or calls for a sippy refill, or really any need for me or John to step in and mediate between the kids!

So really John bought me an hour of peace for every full battery charge.  This goes down in the history of gifts as the best gift he's every gotten me.  And I'll even let him take half the credit!

*I'm kidding about this.  Really.

Oh, the places we've been... Part 2 (otherwise titled "Yes! We were *that* busy!"

So here it is... Part 2.  Normally I would just put everything into one post and call it a day but that would have been too much, even for me!

So, without further ado!

Wednesday was Katie's first pre-school field trip.  I'll post about that soon (like in the next week... unless something comes up and I get too busy and I normally wouldn't say that because usually?  I hear crickets when I start to talk about our social lives but this week was actually VERY busy and I didn't really get to do much else but keep my head above water in a very fun, splashy, water-up-the-nose kind of way).  So, um, yes.  Soon

In the meantime, here's a picture of the big girl... (oh, something was funny with the camera resolution so it's a little blurry):

Wednesday evening was the city carnival.  We (me, the kids, Grandpa and Grandma, Grammy and Grampy) had fun watching the kids.  The ride tickets were $1 each and I bought 3 for Katie.  Even that was hard.  I'm all about avoiding germs and I could just imagine them all over the surface of EVERY ride.

But I decided *long sigh* that I would let go of the germ thing for the evening.  Because if I hadn't, the kids would have been wearing gloves fashioned out of the wipies in Jake's diaper bag.  I probably could have unravelled a string from my pants hem and used a pine needle to stitch them up. 

But, like I said, I was letting go of the whole, "icky germs can make you sick" theme for the night. 

And I'm glad I did.  The kids loved it.  

Jake wanted to run wildly from one stand to the next and had more than one fall after tripping over the huge cables meander sedately to all of the stands and didn't want anyone to hold his hand.  Katie wanted to go on the rides but when she got close to one, she wanted to back off.  But after her first ride (big bears you can sit in and spin... I went on this with her and it was FUN! I remember the teacups of my youth and these bears were the same ride, only... bears, and not teacups) she was ready to climb aboard the other stuff. 

Now remember how we only had 3 tickets?  Well, because Grandma (yes, you mom!) is a big softie, both kids had enough tickets to ride pretty much all of the rides they wanted to go on. 

Oh, and Grampy shared a bag of hot mini-donuts.  Do I even need to say "Yum"?  Because I think that's pretty much implied when someone says "hot mini-donuts".  My mouth is watering as I type this late in the day.  And I just did the 30 Day Shred workout.  But still.  Yum.

Finally it was time to go home.  The kids did really well on the way out.  No crying because they wanted another ride, no longing glances at the mini-donut stand (um, that one's for me.  Yay me!), and generally just a happy mood.

Oh, on the way out, Katie climbed onto a tall ledge and Jake saw that and of course thought it looked like the funnest thing EVER so he climbed onto a bench and from there, onto the same ledge.  I was trying to keep up with him so he wouldn't plummet the 4 feet to the hard cement ground helping him, so that was fine... except he was walking away from the parking lot and back toward the carnival.  Not good.  He wasn't happy to be "redirected" and ended up getting a little feisty.

Thursday was the city parade.  Grammy and Grampy, Grandma and Grandpa came over for dinner.  We had hot dogs and beans and the most delicious dessert ever.  Rhubarb crunch.  (And I had to wait till AFTER the parade to eat it... but it was worth the wait.)

Walked over to the parade and settled in. 

The kids were great!

I expected that Katie would be fine and have fun watching everything.  And she was... after eating about 10 pieces of candy.  I slowed her down after that because I didn't know what the sugar would do to her!  This is pretty much the only time (aside from Easter and Halloween) that she gets candy in bulk.  Otherwise I store it in the cupboard and end up tossing it when I find it the next year in the same place I was planning to stash the *new* bag of candy.

Jake did pay attention to the bands and the candy and the floats and, well, pretty much everything else about the parade!  But after that first hour, he started loosing interest and started to run around.  We were sitting at the end of a driveway and knew the people.  So the fact that Jake did a lot of running (into their yard, up their front steps, up to them to pet their dog) was kind of okay.  Funny to see my dad running after him.  But you didn't hear that from me.

Oh, a highlight for Jake: He had his first sucker at the parade... he loved it (but that's pretty much a given) and it was very messy.  But it did keep him still for a bit while Grandma held him.

Friday was packing day for a weekend at the lake!

So, yes, a very busy week!