Dean has one heck of a sense of humor...
On Sunday afternoon after a morning in the house Lisa and I packed the kids and the dogs into her fresco green vw passat wagon and headed down the road to take a hike at Great Falls on the Maryland side. As we headed down MacArthur Blvd Dean requested his Cheerio hat. Well, we have never been clear what his "cheerio hat" is, but we asume that it is an old navy baseball cap that we lost some time ago. I was wearing a baseball cap and he wanted to wear a baseball cap too. I offered him mine, he refused, then I offered him lisa's. he took it and put it on backwards and smiled. the drive continued and time passed, topics went from t-rexes, to spiderman, to itsy bitsy spiders, and so on. then dean asked for his hat. i did not know where it had gone. I checked the floor and the seat beside him. the hat was no where to be found. I looked around trying to find the hat before dean got frustrated. Then I noticed that the hat had fallen off his head and was pressed between his back and his car seat. I pointed this out to him. Dean turned and looked behind himself and grabbed his hat. We laughed. Dean had one of those moments that we all have...."where are my glasses?"..."they are on your head." Dean put his hat on and smiled widely.
We each laughed a deep laugh, deep within the gut, a natural laugh, nothing forced. Things subsided to normal and some time passed. Then Dean asked..."where is my hat?" I turned around and Dean had removed his hat from his head and put his hat behind his head and neck on his chair. He pretended to look around for his hat, raising his arms out to the side gesturing "I do not know." We each pretended not to know where his hat was and then we had the pleasure of repeating that deep laughter when he found the hat again. I was greatly over joyed with Dean's ability to create situational humor, and Dean was pretty pleased with himself as well.
On that hike with Grant in backpack, the dogs ran leashless to who knows where chasing this and chasing that, Dean learned another game. He learned to hide behind a tree and leap out and say "BOO!"
There were certain subtlies that he missed about this trick, but he loved it just the same.
It was a great little hike. Dean loved hiking an unfamiliar trail and covered at least three miles at an adult pace. This evening was topped off with a little sea kayaking down river at sunset. We drove from Great Falls on the Maryland side down to Belle Haven Marina just north of Mount Vernon in Virginia where we met up with Steve and his wife Holley and their new born baby girl Nellie and Bennet and Elsa with their 2.5 year old boy Diego. We all had our dogs and it was a great way to end the weekend. The dogs all swam as we all took turns paddling about the marshes in the orange glow of the summer sun. There should be more days like that. I must make a note to myself for us to do that again some time soon.
On Sunday afternoon after a morning in the house Lisa and I packed the kids and the dogs into her fresco green vw passat wagon and headed down the road to take a hike at Great Falls on the Maryland side. As we headed down MacArthur Blvd Dean requested his Cheerio hat. Well, we have never been clear what his "cheerio hat" is, but we asume that it is an old navy baseball cap that we lost some time ago. I was wearing a baseball cap and he wanted to wear a baseball cap too. I offered him mine, he refused, then I offered him lisa's. he took it and put it on backwards and smiled. the drive continued and time passed, topics went from t-rexes, to spiderman, to itsy bitsy spiders, and so on. then dean asked for his hat. i did not know where it had gone. I checked the floor and the seat beside him. the hat was no where to be found. I looked around trying to find the hat before dean got frustrated. Then I noticed that the hat had fallen off his head and was pressed between his back and his car seat. I pointed this out to him. Dean turned and looked behind himself and grabbed his hat. We laughed. Dean had one of those moments that we all have...."where are my glasses?"..."they are on your head." Dean put his hat on and smiled widely.
We each laughed a deep laugh, deep within the gut, a natural laugh, nothing forced. Things subsided to normal and some time passed. Then Dean asked..."where is my hat?" I turned around and Dean had removed his hat from his head and put his hat behind his head and neck on his chair. He pretended to look around for his hat, raising his arms out to the side gesturing "I do not know." We each pretended not to know where his hat was and then we had the pleasure of repeating that deep laughter when he found the hat again. I was greatly over joyed with Dean's ability to create situational humor, and Dean was pretty pleased with himself as well.
On that hike with Grant in backpack, the dogs ran leashless to who knows where chasing this and chasing that, Dean learned another game. He learned to hide behind a tree and leap out and say "BOO!"
There were certain subtlies that he missed about this trick, but he loved it just the same.
It was a great little hike. Dean loved hiking an unfamiliar trail and covered at least three miles at an adult pace. This evening was topped off with a little sea kayaking down river at sunset. We drove from Great Falls on the Maryland side down to Belle Haven Marina just north of Mount Vernon in Virginia where we met up with Steve and his wife Holley and their new born baby girl Nellie and Bennet and Elsa with their 2.5 year old boy Diego. We all had our dogs and it was a great way to end the weekend. The dogs all swam as we all took turns paddling about the marshes in the orange glow of the summer sun. There should be more days like that. I must make a note to myself for us to do that again some time soon.