Month: November 2012

(Sorry for the blurry video)

Lately Theo has really gotten into the song, “I’ve Been Working on the Railroad.” I think Jay was the one who started singing it to him awhile ago as one of our rotating bedtime songs. He has heard it a bunch, as well, at the singalong with Lloyd we go to often. He requests the song a lot more these days, especially on the weekends when Jay is here for bedtime. He says, “sing I workin’ railroad!”. He has also started to sing along with us. Especially the fee fie fiddly i o! part at the end. The video doesn’t fully capture his lyrical knowledge BUT I personally enjoy his guitar/microphone combo and, certainly, his effort.

And while on the topic… one of his most beloved bedtime songs is, “Blackbird”, by the Beatles, of course. I realized that he hasn’t actually ever heard the real song. Gasp! We’ve been listening to Revolver a lot lately (and he loves “Yellow Submarine!”) but we haven’t listened to the White Album. Jay has it somewhere. Anyhow, I pulled up videos of it on You Tube, just for fun. He was tickled. Then I started pulling up all of his favorite bedtime songs on there so he could hear people with really good voices singing them. 😉 Our ever-rotating list since he was born has pretty much been: “Blackbird”, “You are my Sunshine”, “What a Wonderful World”, “For Baby”, “Hush Little Baby”, “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star”, and, most recently, we’ve gotten in the habit of always singing “Rockabye Baby” as the farewell song.

Obviously he is also a huge Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young fan at the moment. He always ask for his “bouncy” song, which means “Woodstock”. Lately he’s been getting hip to some White Magic and Bud Powell. He’s something of a music buff.

I don’t want to forget these special moments and all of his little likes and dislikes during these sweet years. Thank goodness for modern technology!

Our street actually has nice trick-or-treating for Halloween. Not that I have much experience with it. I did take Theo out briefly last year in his adorable astronaut suit, but, mostly I know just from living here for 8 years and seeing the kiddos each year. There are basically two blocks on Park Pl that do a nice job decorating their lovely brownstones and the residents sit on their stoops on Halloween Eve handing out candy to the trick-or-treaters. There are also many businesses along Vanderbilt and Washington Avenues (two main drags in Prospect Heights perpendicular to our street) that do the passing out candy thing. Kind of strange for us who grew up in suburbia where you go house-to-house, not to businesses. We visited a few last year to get the full experience.

We decided to venture out of our hood this Halloween and hang with a bunch of local friends who decided to have a get together and then go out to Clinton Hill (neighboring community) together around 5pm. Apparently they have a whole big thing… parade, stages with performers, lots of decorated homes, etc. Meeting up at Theo’s friend Waverly’s house was fun. It was all of my local parent friends and their kiddos. Many Dad’s were there (including Jay!) since many people are still not working. It was nice… food, beer, hot cider. Theo spent some time snacking on chips…

We walked over to Clinton Hill and it was just insane. So many crowds of people everywhere and lines with kids ready to fill their buckets. Don’t get me wrong, there were some great costumes and decorations, but it was a little overwhelming. For Theo, and for me. We heard some music, which honestly was Theo’s favorite I think.

As we were walking away from the music, heading back towards our place in order to try and fill Theo’s pumpkin a little more, Theo said, “probably sing one more song!” He wanted more. We walked back with some of the friends we went with and managed to get a little more candy for Theo (ehem, Mama and Dada since he could care less unless it’s a lollipop). I decided we are most definitely sticking to Park Pl next year. Theo will be so much happier walking from house to house without massive crowds of people everywhere. It was like a super-charged Halloween experience this year. Theo did have fun and eventually caught on to the whole trick-or-treating experience. Today I offered him a treat from his bucket after lunch and he picked a mini-twix (after learning there were no lollipops). He had one bite, gave a Mmmm!, and promptly didn’t want anymore. So, guess who ate it?