Deceptive Weather

After a morning visit to the otolaryngologist in which we discovered that Aleks needs new ear tubes (more on that, next post), Aleks really, really wanted to enjoy the sunshine and go play at the big park. I believe he thought it was warm out, and it sort of was, except there was a terrible breeze that undid whatever nice work the sun was doing warming our skin. At first, I tried to do five million other things at home, and put him off for awhile, but then there was no more doing it and I knew our library videos were nearly due anyway.

Thus, we walked to the library. On the way, enjoying the deceptive sunshine, thinking it was warm, we also saw some crocus and daffodils starting to poke up, to continue the illusion of spring.Then we remembered that we needed a gift for a birthday party, so we stopped in Big Fun to look for one, but alas could decide on nothing sufficiently inexpensive yet still fun.
Then we returned our library videos and overdue books, quickly checked out more videos (18!!!! good lord), then headed next door to The Dreaded Big Park. It seems that now that Bastian is 3-1/2 (and fast approaching 4), The Dreaded Big Park is not so dreaded anymore and might very well be reasonably dubbed simply The Big Park. We'll see when it's actually busy how well that assertion pans out.
Bastian carried a Godzilla figure the whole way there, but stuck it in my back so the Rude Dudes who work at Big Fun didn't accuse us of shoplifting. While the boys ran about the park, Godzilla and I chilled in the sun and bitter breeze, while I read The Two Towers. Jon and I recently started reading Lord of the Rings for the first time. He's already done, I'm a little more than halfway there. We've already made good use of the extended DVD set of the movies which he got for Christmas (from me, his lovely, thoughtful wife).
Then Aleks got all muddy and we had to call Papa to come pick us up, lest Aleks freeze in his wet clothes on the long walk home. Aleks demonstrated how it happened for me:
Then he fell in the mud:
Sadly, this mud did not come out in one washing, and the jeans are once again in the hamper since I didn't notice until I'd pulled them out of the dryer.
One of the movies we got at the library was Mothra vs. Godzilla since Grandma Cat had introduced the boys to Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack (actually titled Gojira, Mosura, Kingu Gidorâ: Daikaijû sôkôgeki) and they loved it (especially Bastian). That night, they fell asleep watching it, Bastian with his Godzilla doll wrapped lovingly under his arm. It reminded me of when my little sister Lillian used to fall asleep tightly hugging a rubber chicken.