Globes of Many Sorts

Some tomatoes from the garden and the market finish ripening on the windowsill.

Lately, our view has looked like this as big thunderstorms roil through. Each morning we wake up to dark skies that soon start to grumble. By afternoon, the sun is out and shining, and when we lay in bed at night, we get to watch the lightning ricocheting through the clouds. Quite the show. We love to watch the storms blow in over the water, making it dark and frothy while the rain skates over it. Absolutely beautiful! I love days like this! So it is lots of fun that almost every day is like this of late!

Here, Leif is pointin to Brazil. Grandmom sent him an old National Geographic that focused on Brazil, so we have been learning about Brazil, esp. where it is located in the world!

Here he is pointing to Cape Canaveral, where the Space Shuttle takes off. He's been rather obsessed with space ships (since we can sometimes see the launch from our house). Aunt Caryn gave him a space ship for Christmas, and he loves it.

One night, Jason hit the button on the space ship, which says, "Ground Control to Space Ship One, prepare for lift off...." then proceeds to count down with an echo."FIVE, Five fivefive, FOUR, Four fourfour, THREE, Three, threethree, TWO, Two twotwo, One, One oneone" and then makes the sound of a space ship taking off. While this is all going, Leif gets on the launchpad (the floor next to his crib), and Jason grabs him by the waist. When the countdown starts, he starts shaking Leify softly, which grows as the countdown progresses, until at the sound of the spaceship taking off, he lifts Leify straight up into the air, and then down inside his crib. Leif LOVES it, and it has now become part of his night time routine. He always gets "launched" in to his crib. He loves it when he goes really high, "I went up to the fan!" he'll say excitedly as he pulls his little blankie up to his chin. And soon after that, he is sound asleep. :)

Another cute Leify story before I get back to work:

In their daily morning routine, Jason and Leif run errands downtown (the post office!), then go on a little adventure to the airport, playground or birdwatching for a short bit (or all three), while Momma works at home doing things that can't be done with a little "Un-Do-er" on the loose.

The other day, after the post office, they were heading out to the airport when Jason spotted something rather large in the water. They pulled over, got out of the car and walked to the little bridge to take a look. At first they thought it was dolphin, but it was too fat and had different fins. Then they realized what it was: A Manatee! All excited with the realization of what it was, Jason was pointing it out to Leif, "Look, Leif, Look!" and Leif took up the excitement, pointing and shouting, "CRAB!" Sure enough, skittling along near the lumbering manatee was a blue crab. Jason laughed: here he was pointing out something he'd never seen in the wild, and Leif was ignoring it to point out something he sees (and eats) regularly. He did tell Grandmom on the phone later, though, that the manatee had a funny face. :)

Oh, and another quick story:

A while back, Jason was walking through our bedroom to go check on Leif, who was napping (supposedly). As he was uberquietly tiptoeing toward Leif's room, he heard Leif musing to himself out loud, "Is it Mommy....................or is it Daddy?"

:)

Have a happy, stormy day!