The Awesomeness of Bruce

We babysat two kids the other day. I dusted off all our baby toys, and Bruce thought they were so cool since he hadn't seen them in awhile. He showed them all to the baby, who was only mildly interested in the toys and more interested in Bruce. She played on the floor with Bruce and toys for a few minutes, but then decided she'd had enough and wanted to be held. I dusted off the Baby Bjorn and she was happy again.

The other kid is a few months younger than Bruce and totally obsessed with all things Thomas (the Tank Engine, that is), so he kept busy with Bruce's battery-operated train set. At dinner, Bruce and this kid each ate an entire hot dog (which is probably normal for most kids, but is perhaps the most meat Bruce has ever eaten at once in his life - if hot dogs can really be called meat). Bruce got a little bossy with him at times. At one point he said to him, "If you need to go poop, just let me know."

As long as I'm on my Bruce-is-awesome kick, I'll let you all know that Bruce is doing exceptionally well on the potty-training front. He's been fine with peeing in the potty for awhile, but No. 2 has been a more difficult feat. He's been doing well with it this week though. Next task: doing all this in public restrooms.

And just to keep it real, here's a tid bit of Bruce's not-so-awesomeness. Last week we took dinner to a friend who'd had a baby the week before. The baby was asleep on a folded-out futon, and I told Bruce to stay off and don't touch the baby. So he went to the other side of the futon where I couldn't reach him as easily and climbed up. I told him to get down as I stood up to walk around and move him. But then when he saw me moving in, he rolled over - right on top of this adorable, sleeping week-old baby!

As we left, Bruce said, "Mommy, I promise I won't squash the baby." I hope that's a phrase I never have to hear again.

In other, probably more important, news: Scott got a training grant for next year! Whenever Scott gets all these honors, he comes up with these crazy theories about how he might have gotten them: perhaps he knows someone on the committee, maybe they accidentally sent him the acceptance letter, the committee members' brain waves were affected by the alignment of the stars, etc. Scott, face it: you earned it!