Bus Ride

Last year on our trip to New York Evan took his first subway ride, so this year he took his first bus ride:

(The second picture is obviously not very good, and redundant.  I just thought it looked cool.)

I'm not sure what we'll do next year... he's already taken his first ferry trip in Seattle, and there have been plenty of airplane rides.  Maybe we'll need to do something in a hot air balloon, or possibly a horse-drawn carriage.

Stair Master

Evan was able to walk down the stairs in my Mom & Dad's coop all by himself (it helps that there are only 2 stairs):

Thanksgiving

We made the annual trip back east for Thanksgiving like always, again to my cousins' house in Columbus, OH.  Here's Evan the day of in his as-close-to-formal-wear-as-he-gets (which is not that close) outfit:


The weather was nicer this year than last, but we still didn't make it outside.  We again spent a disproportionate amount of our time playing Wii games, this year mostly Guitar Hero.  I was able to beat the devil in the final duel, though, so it wasn't entirely wasted time. ;-)  Anyway, here are Evan and Steph investigating the assortment of baby toys available while others are rocking out to the game:


Evan had an especially good time playing with this tricycle thingy (you can here the serenade of the video game in background):

In addition to playing with his cousin Lauren's foreign toys Evan was also fascinated by my cousin Josh's huge aquarium, which will make his uncle Brian (a pescaphyle) very happy:


Sticking with Metz family tradition the kids put on a play for the adults one night.  This year the play was based on Spider Man (a couple of the little cousins are pretty much obsessed with Spider Man), and Evan was cast as Baby Spider Man:


Also sticking with Metz family tradition Evan opted out of actually performing, preferring to stay off stage right where he could play with his legos.

Mohawk

We tried out a new hairstyle for Evan in the bath today:


He looks fairly happy with it there, but he started making a pouty face pretty quickly. We couldn't catch it on film, but here's my best approximation:

Under/Over

Evan's vocabulary is constantly growing, and fast!  He's recently started to understand several sets of opposites like in/out, up/down, and over/under:

Who Came to Gym Today?

We take Evan to a class at the YMCA a few times a week called "1-2-3 Grow."  (When I say "we" I mostly mean Steph, but I get to take him on my off Fridays.)  The kids all sit around in a circle gorging themselves on hot dogs and mac 'n cheese and then concentrate as hard as they can on being taller.  OK, I'm obviously kidding about that, although I think I read somewhere that Fox Reality is working on a show based around the same idea.  "1-2-3 Grow" is actually a toddler class where the kids play with a variety of balls, blocks, scooters, hula hoops and jungle gyms, and learn to sing songs and stuff like that.

They sing most of the little kid stand-byes ("The Itsy Bitsy Spider," "The Wheels on the Bus," "If You're Happy and You Know It," etc.), but Evan's favorite is the very first song of the class, "Who Came to Gym Today?":

Toddler Sleepover

It was time for our friend Dan's birthday again, and because of all the kids that were going to be in attendance anyway they decided to turn the party into a toddler sleepover of sorts.  Dan and Michelle have a plethora of Pak 'N' Plays (I'm not sure how having twins results in four Pak 'N' Plays -- there's some type of weird multiplier in play -- but it is fortunate in such situations), so they turned all the bedrooms of their house into a short-term baby hotel (or more like a hostel, really).  That way the adults could continue to have a pleasant evening doing adult things (eating, drinking, conversing with other adults, etc.) past 7 o'clock.  All-in-all a pretty good idea.

Guess what, though... pictures of adults talking (or at least just adults) aren't nearly as interesting as pictures of toddlers playing, so we only have pictures of the first part of the evening.  I doubt you'll mind.

Anyway, here's Evan trying to play with 3 different kinds of toys at the same time:

The feature linking these 3 disparate toys together, of course, is that they are the best kind of toy possible -- someone else's.

Here he is experimenting with using someone else's baby cell phone:

I don't remember what the conversation he was having was about.  I think it looks like he's trying to work a movie deal of some kind, but you should feel free to make up your own backstory.

Penguin Dance

As I'm sure you'll agree, one of the most important aspects of pulling off a costume is being able to dance the part. To that end here's Evan doing his best interpretation of a penguin dance:

Penguin Librarian

Evan certainly loves to read (or at least be read to), but what he enjoys even more is unshelving all his books until he finds just the right one:

Now, why was he in his penguin costume for this? Why not?

Halloween

I mentioned a few posts ago that there would be more pictures of Evan in his Halloween costume forthcoming, and I'm a man of my word.

We tried to stick with the penguin theme and incorporate the fish from his fishbowl toy, but all of the shots with him holding it didn't turn out so well. You can see it on the coffee table behind him here, though:

I suppose if we were truly committed to the penguin photo theme this picture would have included a bowl of fish, or at least scrimp, but we already had the candy prepared. Besides, we didn't plan this shot, it's just the kind of thing kids do this time of year:

Last year we didn't even leave the house on Halloween, but since Evan can walk now it seemed like a shame not to show him off a bit. Here are he and Steph while we're out trick-or-treating:

And last, here is a shot of our little family after making the rounds at our neighbors' houses: