Family Fuller

Bit of a hiatus there, but I’m sure all of our huge audience is off enjoying turkey weekend. But here’s a big Thanksgiving weekend post to provide grandparents and friends with their holiday Colin fix.

We spent Thanksgiving day with Jess’ Dad and the extended family. I believe the final tally was around 15, so it was a good crowd (and growing every year). Colin got plenty of time to play with his cousins, especially Jacqueline, who went out of her way to help Colin learn the finer points of dancing to her favorite CD (along with cousin Jack). As you can probably guess from the pictures, he likes Jacqueline (he always likes the older women, what can I say). Reminiscent of his wedding-like pose with another girl from this summer - watch out for this kid.

Anyway, it was a huge feast, of which Colin ate almost nothing. He was terrible while we were sitting down to eat, which meant that I got to have half of my meal with him sitting on my lap sucking his thumb. Eventually he was enticed to his own seat with the promise of a roll, and he did manage to knock that out (what a surprise). Thus he maintained his steady diet of sugars, in the form of breads, starches, and the occasional bit of candy - we’re so proud of ourselves as parents.

No trip to Grandpa’s house for Thanksgiving would be complete without a hayride of course, so several of us piled in for a ride up and down their dirt road - mostly fun, apart from the clingy smell of diesel fumes, but Colin really enjoyed it (weren’t sure that was going to be the case).

Part of the reason the crowd swelled so much this year was that Jess’ brother Ben and his girlfriend Kristen made the trip out to Michigan for the holiday. Colin is a big fan of both Ben and Kristen - with Ben, it’s the tractor connection; Colin loves them, Ben loves them (and owns various types of heavy equipment for his work), so it’s not exactly a hard sell (as you can see) to get Colin to want to spend time with them.

With Kristen, it’s the attention - she’s really great with Colin, and he always responds well to a lot of dedicated attention (what a surprise - don’t forget the older women thing either). Colin got to spend time with her up north this summer, and she literally taught him the word “Fun”, so she’ll forever be associated with it in his mind. On the way back from having breakfast with them yesterday, while we were telling him about how they were going to fly back to Pennsylvania, he got somewhat sad and mentioned that he wanted to fly there to see them. Sure it’ll happen sometime soon buddy.

All around a pretty solid holiday, but C-man and I were definitely down for the count a bit after so much running around and eating (I think I torqued my knee playing touch football - god I’m old).

Just figured I’d post this picture Jess just sent me from art class - based on the stories, Colin is hot or cold on art class depending on the day, but based on this photo it looks like he’s into today’s class. I’m guessing it’s because he gets to actually use the glue bottle.

Hopefully Jess can expound upon the subject of art class in an upcoming post, I know there have been some stories to come out of it, to which I can’t do justice.

I know, so highbrow, going to the symphony. But Colin thinks musical instruments — all musical instruments — are incredibly cool, and who’s to argue with him. The Ann Arbor symphony is kind enough to put on four kids concerts a year, so Jess got tickets for this past Sunday.

We arrived early enough for the “instrument petting zoo”, and let’s just say it didn’t look like it was going to be a fun and enjoyable day. The Michigan Theater’s lobby is long and somewhat narrow, and it was packed when we got there - the theory is Colin wasn’t ecstatic about being so hemmed in. I can only imagine what it’s like when you’re not even three feet tall and surrounded like that, so I’ll give that one to him. In any case, an attempt to let him sit and play the mini-cello they had for the kids led to a screaming fit, so we opted to just find our seats and calm down a bit.

Luckily, the effects of the traumatic ‘cello incident’ wore off, and Colin had an absolute blast. From the moment the music and singing (they had a trio of women singers there, very fun, very kid-oriented) started, Colin was hooked. He loved the songs, he loved the clapping, he was literally bouncing back and forth, trying to clap in time when the rest of the audience did so (couldn’t quite master that one, but he came close). There was one symphony-only piece, think it was Dvorak (sp?), and I’d venture that was his favorite part. He mimics the playing of a violin, and he was doing that for half the song, it was pretty entertaining.

Needless to say, from the moment it was over until he went to bed he was asking to hear more music (his pronunciation sounds like “mee-keek”), and to see more instruments. We might have created a monster (grandma will be glad to hear it).

A while back my mom had bought Colin a totally grey sweatsuit - plain grey, top and bottom. We put it on him and he looked like Hans. We joked about it all the time and then when Halloween came up we thought we might as well use what we had. I went and bought Chuck a truly ugly grey sweatsuit (which he is never allowed to wear again - although I am currently wearing the top :). Together they were Hans and Franz - they looked great and Colin could even say “Pump you up” - of course when people asked him what he was going to be for Halloween he just stared at them blankly. Whenever you say Halloween to him he says “Trick or treat - M&M’s”

Here are a couple more photos - it looks really nice and warm - but it wasn’t.

Colin and Grandpa

The full pumpkin of candy

A little help from Daddy

With his cousin Jacqueline (Wonder Woman)

We’ve been slightly remiss in getting these up here, but we have an excuse thanks to a scanner on the fritz.

So without further ado, here’s a shot of Fuller baby #2, straight from the womb. I have to say, I’m continually amazed by the advances they make with this technology, even in just a couple of years. The pictures we’re striking; people at work couldn’t believe how clearly you could distinguish the head, face, arms, etc. You’ve got a lovely little profile here, which the ultrasound tech was nice enough to post on the picture.

The other shot we have was a little wave - I honestly don’t know what all of the rest of that stuff is, Jess might be able to elaborate. But according to the tech, that’s definitely a tiny hand waving back at us - another example of how cool an ultrasound is, just look at how you can pick out the bones in the hand. Just as incredible the second time around!

Bath time is part of Colin’s nightly routine, has been since he was born. Tuesday night he was sitting in the bath, talking about anything and everything, and all of a sudden he turned to me and said “Unca Fetcha” (that’s Uncle Fletcher for those who don’t speak Colinese). Okay. My natural response was “What about Uncle Fletcher?”, to which Colin responded “Unca Fetcha drink beer.” Where it comes from, I don’t know, but that kind of thing definitely keeps bath time entertaining.

Of course he followed that by pooping (and I mean pooping) in the bath while he was ’swimming’ - despite our best efforts, he wouldn’t wait till I got him on the toilet. Basically I got his toilet seat on, dashed back to the bath and picked him up just in time for him to drop off the package in the bath. Enjoy all you parents-to-be out there!