November 14 - A Good Day

Sub-heading: The end of it
The sub-heading can only be added because I'm typing this 5 days after our November 14 Good Day occurred. I will reveal "the end of it" at the end of this post.

Saturday, November 14th started off like most mornings...7am, hearing Zach pad quietly into our room, and Wyatt calling out for DaU to come get him. However, by miracle of miracles, it was really 7:40, not 7am! Yea! Perhaps taking the boys swimming last night wore them out plenty. Since Wyatt woke up so early, we thought - hey, he'll go down late for a nap - so we decdided to head over to "basketball" playground next to "lazyboy swing" playground. We played until about 10am and then came home to put Wyatt down for a nap. He was having none of it. We left him in there for about 45 minutes, but never did go down for a nap. We decided we'd eat an early lunch and head over to the sculpture park by the river. It was a GORGEOUS day out! Just light jackets for all. We wanted to be out as much as possible b/c of the bad weather coming. We parked by the put-in for a summer canoe/kayak company. We were getting ready to walk across the river when Zachary saw something amazing: A CAR TOWER


Pretty crazy, all those cars stacked on top of each other (this is at a towing/wreckage place). Zach was of course entralled. Then we notice that we are parked near a dog park, so instead of crossing the river to the sculpture park, we make our way down the opposite side of the river towards the dog park, thinking that the boys would love to see the dogs running around. However, we had to make a quick stop at the canoe/kayak dock to throw rocks into the gross water. HUGE FUN for the boys. Wyatt threw a nice, massive, tantrum when we left. We watched the dogs at the park for a bit, which was not as enjoyable for the boys as I thought. Wyatt did do some good barking, and one dog stopped in his antics to come check out the strange dog. We kept walking to a playground in the distance. Turned out the playground was a bit old for the boys, but there was something else there that captivated them: a mini skate park. They stopped playing and running and just sat for a good 10+ minutes watching several boys, some w/ skateboards, some w/ bikes, doing tricks.

The boys sitting together, happily.

Our boys watching other boys at play.

Zach and Wyatt were so still, staring intently at all the tricks. Art and I just sat on a nearby park bench and chatted. So relaxing! We finally had to tear them away so they could go take a nap. Exhausted Wyatt, with no morning nap, fell asleep in the car, and Zach right away when we got home. Art and I also took a good afternoon nap!

After dinner, we were pretty tired, and decided to skip swimming and opted for the 1st Bi-Monthly Chicago-Counts Family Movie Night. We got the boys ready for bed, then popped in Cars for them to watch for an hour or so b/f bed. Before we started the movie, Zach found some Nascar on tv and wanted to watch a bit of "real car racing". Wyatt was intrigued.

Z & W wearing matching pjs - thanks Nana!

Family movie night on the Round Chair.

Check out those giant feet!!

For Wyatt, family movie night did not last long before he got bored. He's really still too young (17 mon) to be watching tv. So he just played nicely in the front room while the rest of us watched the movie. When Wyatt started fading, I went and put him to bed and let Zach watch for another 15 minutes while I worked on the computer. During those 15 minutes, Art fell asleep watching the movie. Zach heard Art snore, looked at me, and said "MOMMY! Is DaU asleep?", "How did he do that??". So I put Zach into bed, worked on the computer for another hour, and Art finally woke up around 9:15, only to retire again around 10:30.

Good day.

Sub-heading explanation: Little did we know it, but today's nap refusal by Wyatt was the end of his morning naps. As I write this over a week later, Wyatt has totally given up his morning nap. If he happens to be in the car around 11-12, he will fall asleep for a catnap, otherwise, he's done, and takes a long afternoon nap like Zachary. So this Saturday was The End Of It, meaning, the end of Wy's morning naps. He stopped nearly a full year before Zach stopped his.