Your Baby Dresser

Dear Bubagoo,

This is a story about your baby dresser...

When I was a baby in 1970, your Grandpa and Grandma bought this dresser (pictured below) to hold all of my baby things in. It was white with round, yellow knobs and was very sweet. We lived on California Avenue, and when I was six, your Grandpa built a new house for our family. The big move took us right across the street : ) This is where your Grandma and Grandpa still live to this very day.

Uncle Peter peeking in at me in my baby crib. 

(My baby dresser is on the right.)  

When I became a teenager, Grandpa refinished it, creating the beautiful dresser that it is today. He replaced the yellow knobs with elegant gold handles. I was growing up, and the dresser needed to grow up, too!  It stayed with me until I graduated from Burroughs High School in 1988.

Our dresser in mommy & daddy's room in 

Saline, Michigan in 2005

Then, my dresser traveled to college with me in Walnut Creek and Eureka, California. There it stayed, until I married your wonderful daddy in 1998 in Medford, Oregon. After a brief stay in Ridgecrest, it moved with us to Ann Arbor, Michigan, and then to Saline, Michigan to share our happy lives together.

In 2009, we moved to San Jose, California, and in 2010 you were born!

I am happy to say that my baby dresser is now your baby dresser! But you are not a little baby anymore, so now it is your little boy dresser! : )

Here is a precious picture of you and your Auntie Demetria in 2010.

You were only a few days old! 

Our curious little guy!

We hope that your dresser will continue to live a long and happy life with you! : ) : ) : )  And perhaps, one day, you will pass it down to your own son or daughter to be treasured.

Hugs and kisses,

Mommy

xxxooo

Bugaboo's Buddies

Lord, please surround our sweet son with friends 

and adults who point them toward you. Amen.

Romans 15:  1-7

Today I thought that it would be really fun to post some pictures of you with your friends! We have lots of little boys in our neighborhood, and one sweet little girl, too. : ) 

Here you are playing with Shawn at the water table! Shawn is our next door neighbor friend, and the two of you always have lots of fun playing in the water, and in the dirt with your favorite dump trucks. Collin is Shawn's little brother, and he likes to play with you and Shawn, too!

I love this picture of the three of you...Collin, Nathaniel and Shawn : ) So adorable!

A cute photo with you and Ariana...the two of you have been friends since you were a baby!

Ariana and Nathaniel watching Tinkerbelle 

Taking an Oreo cookie break...

...from playing dump trucks with Colby and Chase 

You and Charles, your friend from church, playing "garbage truck" with peppermint candies

All of our love to you, always and forever,

Mommy & Daddy

xxxooo

Going on a Mommy Date

Dear Bugaboo...Last week, we went on a mommy date to the Tech Museum of Innovation in San Jose. We road the train downtown, and when we got there we were happy to find that there were lots of fun activities for four-year-olds to do there! There was so much to see that it kept us busy all day!

Here you are playing with the cutest robot ever! It spelled out words using little toy blocks with a big robotic hand that picked them up and put them back down again. All we had to do was type in a word, and it would move the blocks around. You played with it again and again, and it even spelled out your name for you! 

Playing chase is one of your favorite games, and you loved the next exhibit the best! When you walked on the floor, colored dots would appear, and followed you around wherever you went! You had a blast running back and forth, and trying to outrun the dots that chased you!

 Here you are building with life sized blocks, and stacking magnetic tubes together. 

At the end of the day, we visited the gift shop and bought you the cutest little stuffed animal whale. You held it close to you all the way home, and you even wanted to sleep with it that night. : )

Thanks for our Mommy date, big guy!!  I had such a nice time with you today!

All of our love to you, always and forever,

Mommy & Daddy

xxxooo

A Family Day at the San Jose History Park

Dear Bugaboo...Last Saturday we visited the San Jose History Park, a wonderful place for children and grown-ups to learn about our local history!  There is a cute little old-fashioned soda fountain shop with ice cream and candy, an early century print shop, Portugeese, Greek and Chinese museums, an old-fashioned gas station, an heirloom garden with an old water pump, a train museum with a working trolley, and a covered wagon, just to name a few of the many sites to see.  Since you are so crazy about trains, we couldn't miss out on the train museum!  Our other favorite was the covered wagon, and once you discovered what wagon trains were, you were all ears! We discussed the similarities and differences between steam trains and wagon trains, and talked about how on steam trains there were train engineers and motormen, and on covered wagon trains there were pioneers. We talked about how trains have an engine and how covered wagon trains were pulled by oxen. And, we checked out a wonderful book from the library called "Covered Wagons, Bumpy Trails" to learn even more about covered wagons.  

We had lots of fun playing and pretending! You kept on asking your daddy to come with you to check to see if there was enough food and water to feed the pretend horses. And, you wanted me to stay behind in the wagon to watch over them to make sure that they stayed safe.  : ) 

Of course, we couldn't miss the train museum with its cable cars, trolley cars, streetcars and steam locomotives. You thought this was just great and wanted to spend most of your time here!

Little Buttercup was our favorite train, even though there is nothing little about it!  It is a beautiful piece of machinery, a truly majestic steam locomotive. 

There is something so amazing about standing in front of a gigantic steam locomotive!

You loved this little model train (on the left) and I took a picture of this huge drill for Grandpa Dibble (on the right.)  He has a similar, smaller one in his garage, and so I thought that he would enjoy seeing it!  

Here you are ringing the bell on a pretend trolley, and then boarding a real life one!

We are so excited to ride!  

Waiting patiently...

Ding-ding!  

The motorman was so kind!  He even took some extra time to take a few pictures with us.

He gave you a special riding tolken

You were mesmerized by his every word

Here we are in the old fashioned print shop learning about how advertisements and newspapers were once made. 

You said that this old beat up pick-up truck looked just like Mater from the movie "Cars."  

We had such a fun family day, and it was very educational, too.  We will definitely be back to the History Park, a hidden gem here in San Jose!

All of our love to you always an forever,

Mommy & Daddy

xxxooo