Sunday, September 12, 2010

Fly-In

Last week we had an amazing visit from Papou who flew out from Chicago. On his way here he brought with him a rather unusual co-pilot. A 53" bear for Mette. It was pretty exciting picking him up at the airport. Mette calls the bear "Papou Bear" and both kids seem to really love tackling him. If it takes some of the pressure off them always wanting to tackle eric and I, I am all for it!


While Papou was visiting we went to see the home opener for the mens soccer at Bucnell. Ever since the World Cup this summer Otto has been a bit obsessed with soccer. All he wants to wear are soccer jerseys. On eric's last visit to New York I made him pick up a few more since him only having one was making the pressure on laundry a bit intense for me. He now has three but since he wears the 24/7 I still need to be on my "A" game. He will only wear pants he deems soccer pants as well. Luckily he has a few jammy pants and sweats with stripes on the side which we have been able to convince him are soccer pants. We have been waiting for the season to start so we could take him to a game and it proved to be quite a good idea. Both kids we transfixed and seem to like all the excitement. Otto wore his Netherlands jersey which happens to look like the Bucknell home jersey so he fit right in. About 30 seconds before the end of the first half Bucknell scored the first goal of the season. Otto went nuts. Crazy. It was show stopping. He immediately took off his jersey and starting running up and down the side lines shouting "GOAL!!!!". The undergrad girls who were watching thought it was the cutest thing they had ever seen. He could have had his pick of girls. Bucky Bison came over go give him a high five, it was possibly one of the greatest things I have ever seen. Of course we didn't have a camera and were laughing far too hard to capture anything anyway so you will just have to imagine it for yourself. Needless to say, the game was a big hit and we will be going to many more. In fact, just a few nights ago we went to a girls soccer game and this morning we went to a men's water polo game. Both kids seem to really love watching the games. I think it will open up a great range of activities during the winter months when it becomes hard to find things to do on weekends or evenings.

Otto is so into soccer right now we signed him up for Soccer Shots. Every Monday night starting next week he will have soccer class. It sounds like good program where the kids have fun and get to learn some soccer skills while they are at it. Regardless, watching a group of 3-4 year olds play soccer should be good entertainment. Just wait until Otto's new soccer shoes arrive soon, he won't want to take them off either!

In addition to Papou being here last week, eric's brother, Uncle Matt came for the weekend. Everyone should have an Uncle Matt. He is amazing. The kids adore him and he is so wonderful with them. How he manages to have the energy to chase and play with them amazes me. When he has children someday we will have some serious make-up childcare duties to fulfill!


Otto and Uncle Matt were playing soccer in the back yard. You can see he scored a goal since he has taken off his shirt and is running around yelling.


While Matt and Papou were here we went to the cabin. Watkin's Glen was hosting a Ferrari weekend and we had to go! Otto went exploring in the back of Matt's car and found hockey gloves.


One night while we were cleaning up from dinner I gave the kids a plate of watermelon and sent them out to the porch steps so my mom and I could do the dishes. It worked amazingly well, they sat there for a while talking to each other and eating watermelon. It was so cute.


We went to the track for the day on Saturday to check out all the new Ferrari's. Otto decided that this would be a good time to take up posing for the camera.


Here we are all watching a race. Apparently Matt is the only one who knew Papou was taking a picture :)


Somehow every time we go to Watkins Glen, despite us telling him it won't happen this time, Otto gets to sit in a race car. This time some Italian driver picked him up and put him in his 430. He was so excited and kept saying, "see mom, I told you I could sit in a race car". Thanks Mr. Italian Racecar Driver.


We were also some of the first people in the States to see the new Ferrari Italia. Lucky for us it didn't burst into flames.


It is easy to see we had an excellent week and visit with family. I should note that all of the pictures were kindly taken with either eric's, matt's or roger's cell phones as our camera is missing in the depths of the cabin. I am so sad and annoyed about losing the camera I have not accepted it as true yet.

More to come soon, Otto starts preschool on Tuesday!!!!

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