Jammin' Play Date

Dex and T collaborated on some music-making.

They had a blast and made some decent sounds, too!

Grampy's Puzzle

Dex sent both of his grandfathers special Father's Day cards this year. He drew a vehicle and then cut it into pieces so they could put together the puzzle.  Both grandfathers really enjoyed doing the puzzles.  A couple of weeks later, Dex received a package in the mail - it was a puzzle that Grampy made for him!  Dex loved putting it together and reading the note from Grampy (doing both of these things mostly all by himself).

First Selfie

Dex takes many, many, many pictures of the structures and vehicles he builds every day. The other day, he turned the camera towards himself and took a selfie. Hopefully, it's both his first and last selfie.

Sparklers!

After dinner (and hamburger cake), we wrapped up our Fourth of July with sparklers in the backyard.

Dex was initially very cautious...

 Then very excited!

 Dex had the idea that we run around the yard propelled by our "rockets" (sparklers)

It was a happy 4th of July!

Bringing Back the Hamburger Cake

Ben and I spent our first Fourth of July together at an Improv Comdey performance in which he was playing guitar. On our way to the performance, we stopped at the grocery store and I saw, for the first time in my life, a hamburger cake!  I had to have it. I sat through the improv with the hamburger cake on my lap and we ate it in the middle of the night when we got home. The hamburger cake was always an inside joke for Ben and me but this year, when we saw it at the grocery store we decided to introduce Dexter to the hamburger cake. 

Dex was not impressed. "This hamburger cake is dry and doesn't taste very good." I know. But get used to it - now it's tradition.

Patriotic Fourth of July

My back was wrecked by standing and watching the parade that Ben was not in so the next day, on July 4th, Ben took Dex to Cantigny Park.

Dex (not quite fearlessly but enthusiastically) climbed on old army vehicles with a bunch of other kids.

 Only once did he need help to get back down.

And he ran around in the lush grounds.

Where's Daddy?

Dex and I found a prime spot for parade-watching and saw the 2 hour parade from start to finish. Highlights included all kinds of emergency vehicles with sirens blaring, 

 Shriners driving tiny cars (one broke down in front of us and had to be towed behind a regular sized car),

 A huge chicken handing out coupons,

And Uncle Sam on stilts handing out high-fives.









Throughout the parade, Dex would tell the other parade-watchers that his Daddy is playing banjo on the back of a flat-bed tow-truck. But as the last bit of the parade passed us by and we never saw Daddy, I knew something had happened. 

Dex and I headed back to the parking lot where we had dropped Daddy off a few hours earlier only to find that the tow-truck had never arrived, the other musicians left, and Ben spent most of that time playing banjo by himself in the empty parking lot. Poor Dex and Daddy - they both were so disappointed. Luckily, Dex had lots of other fun memories of the parade. Ben not so much.