A Cerney Periodical

Holly left for Poland one week ago today. The wonderful Witkacy Theatre in Zakopane is having their 30th anniversary festival , and they loved Holly (and yes, the rest of the Trap Door company) so much that they flew them out to put on three more shows (which just ended hours ago.) This means Brock has been back on the single-daddy treatment.  Brock has been a super-resilient dude through the entire experience. He certainly misses his mom, and frequently asks for her with a pouty voice. I'll simply explain that she is in Poland (which he must either think is some super-serious version of "work" or my phone which we use to webcam). A few moments later he'll get distracted by something fun to do, and we'll be back at play. We've had tons and tons of fun, and I've documented some of it, but I've been pretty tired at night and have done a terrible job of posting. (Sorry Holly!) Well no more excuses. Prepare for a wall of stuff.  Why not start

Brock has recently gotten very into colors. He knows a few letters and a few numbers, but he's really only interested in his favorites. Brock wants to know every color. Some days he's on, and other days he keeps guessing "yellow" over and over. Red seems to stump him. (We're hoping it's youth rather than colorblindness.) Anyways, here's a clip of him firing on all cylinders and having fun while he's at it. 

Blob is perhaps Brock's most favorite game in the world. Here he is playing with mommy. 

Brock has started referring to himself in the third person. He will walk around patting himself on the belly saying, "Brock. Brock." We haven't been able to capture that particular bit of cuteness, but here's a prodded response from him.

Brock loves popcorn. Holly and I love popcorn. It works out pretty great. The only hangup is that we like our popcorn very spicy, and Brock is a toddler. The solution is quite simple: I make him a baby-sized batch of regular popcorn, and I make a super spicy batch for mommy and daddy.  Those of you with children know exactly how this works out though. Brock thinks, "Why do I have to eat this 2nd class popcorn? What is it about daddy's popcorn that makes it so special?" So he starts begging and pleading for some of ours. I tell him no. He whines. I tell him it is spicy. He pleads. I tell him he won't like it. He considers tears. Finally I decide that the best way for a man to learn is through his own experience. I hand him a kernel. Now this was no regular spicy-corn. I'd been disappointed in the tear-inducing potential of my previous batch and had stepped it up to two full habanero peppers, seeds included. This was popcorn that a thai restaurant would no

Brock' has always enjoyed sliding, but hasn't really had the physical ability to go solo. Well those days are coming to an end. Here's Brock mastering a slide near our house. This is actually his very first time starting the slide himself. (I'd previously been setting him directly on the rollers.) About twenty trips later, it was time to spice things up. And lastly, here's a video of a few weeks earlier. It might actually count as Brock's first solo slide, but it's just a super short tube. Either way, it's super cute. 

Uh. February. I know I grew up in Alaska, but February seems much more taunting with a toddler. It was 2 degrees and snowing today, we tried a walk in the morning but it ended in madness. So on the weekends the three of us seek sanctuary and space to run in the many Chicago museums and public attractions. Last week we hit the Garfield Park Conservatory. Brock is into colors and smelling now so it was a big hit. "Yuk", "Yum" and "Gross" are now common transactions in his lexicon.  It looks like a regular summer day in there! Brock being koi. We have become members of the Nature Museum. They have lots of fun stuff, but are no so huge, busy or far away as to be an all day event. They have a neat area that demonstrates industrial water features that Brock enjoys. He loves all things water to be fair, and often begs to play in the sinks.  Brock is learning animal sounds. In fact, the sounds are the names of the anima

Julie introduced us to Chris, her awesome photographer connection from work, and he was able to pencil us into his busy holiday schedule for a sitting. Although a tad chilly, the park was a great setting with good lighting. Brock is just not one to smile for the camera, but we managed to squeeze, quite literally, a few out of him. Ok, I'm no mathematician, but let me tell you that the permutations of getting six adults and three children to look forward and smile (not even smile, just not not smile) trumps Enigma. I think Chris pulled some photo shop magic here because I don't think this shot actually happened. This blog post is rather Brock heavy, audiences accounted for, but M&M&m&m are really the photo pros on both sides of the camera. They smile, look cute and just overall represent.  Ok, I guess this guy is pretty cute too. He really did love this chair and went back to it a couple of times between shoots. Brock a

Brock got very interested in looking at trading charts this evening.  "Dad, it's clearly the time to get long milk futures. BUY BUY BUY!!!"

Pigs are fun!

As many of you know, Chicago got hit with some massive amounts of frozen precipitation! Brock was only medium impressed, but I guess being immobile and cold are not popular sensations. It was also quite bright outside. This shot might give some perspective of the 19 inch patio carpet. His word of day is, no surprises here.... "snow".

Brock got invited to his friends Jackson and Jonas's 4th birthday party at a bowling alley. His first attempt resulted in frustration that the activity was so structured. Why do we have to roll the ball that way? Can't I just sit and play with it? And he cried as we dragged him away to let others have their turn.  But after watching the big kids for a while, his interest grew, and eventually he was addicted to pushing the bowling ball down the lane-dragon. He did a great job amongst the mayhem of an older kid birthday party, and was one of the only kids there who had the focus to pay attention to the ball after releasing it. What a great first bowling day. We'll get those spares next time! One more video I (Holly) am adding. Enjoy!

Last week Brock and I were hanging out in the living room, when he found his new mittens and insisted on putting them on. He also started saying "mittens," so I pulled out the camera and an adventure transpired.  He's a persuasive guy. We'd just had 20" of snow over the weekend, and he hadn't been too keen on it his first time out. Luckily the school across the street does a great job of shoveling their sidewalks. Only a recent dusting lay in our path. I thought he'd get sick of it quickly, but we strolled around until mommy was home.  On our last walk to the grocery store, Brock discovered that playing in the snow is actually great fun. He would knock over snow piles and giggle. Sadly, he wasn't really dressed for full play in wet snow and we had to drag him away to go shopping. Don't worry Brock, there are plenty of snow days left.