Lightening McQueen Spotted!

According to All-Things-Disney-Expert, Steve Tanner, while the movie Cars made nearly 500 million at the box office, by summer 2007 it had grossed over 2 billion in merchandise sales! (source) We certainly can relate! We have Cars toys, clothes, sippy cups, band-aids, towel, blanket, snacks, even an ice packet to help put ice on owwies. And now, the Halloween costume! Lightening McQueen? More like Lukie McQueen with his Pit Chief! Lukie McQueen with Mommy. Now that’s one good lookin’ kid! It was fun to go Trick or Treating… starting at Grandma and Grandpa’ and then going with cousins. Luke enjoyed the walking and seeing the lights and cars at various houses. The candy wasn’t that big a deal. After thirty minutes he said he didn’t want any more candy. “Enough,” he says. We didn’t argue. So we headed over to a church outreach that had thousands of visitors. They had game rooms, live music, petting farm, food, pumpkin patch, a cake walk, and so much more. But Luke’s favorite (of course) was the cars on display! A Sheriff Hummer! (your tax dollars at work) Lukie McQueen always manages to find a cool car! No matter what we were doing, Luke…

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Another Day at the Zoo

The annual pass to Brookfield Zoo has turned out to be a good investment. Free parking. Free admission. Free soda. (good on the wallet, not so much on the waist!) Free shuttle ride. Free shows. Too bad it takes about $20 in gasoline for us to get there and back! Of course, we saw all kinds of animals! (Took the ones above from the tram!) I enjoy taking pictures of the animals – I do not enjoy smelling them! However, it is not the animals that Luke enjoys the most. Oh, sure, he likes them. He’ll look at them when we point, and can even identify several by name. But there are other “creatures” on display at the Zoo that he will run to! And he’ll spend more time with each of these “animals” studying them, than he will on anything with fur or wings or hooves. Yup, you guessed it, the Cars on display from various dealerships. Oh, yes. The cars. When we said we are going to the Zoo today, Luke’s answer is, “See Cars?” But our favorite thing about the Zoo is not the animals or the cars… it is being in a safe place where Luke…

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An aMAZEing Day!

Today was the third awesome day in a row. After Touch a Truck on Saturday, the Chicago Marathon on Sunday, and a birthday outing for my little sister today – tomorrow is looking to be quite drab when I get back to normal work life. But a good three days it was, and a great way to start my week. It was a day of thrills for little Luke today! We went to the Richardson Family Farm which boasts the World’s Largest Corn Maze! An Aerial View, though it wasn’t so green today! They have an observation tower so you can see the maze from quite high! Luke climbed and counted all ninty stairs by himself. (climbed that is, I counted for him) He enjoyed looking down as we got up high. Once at the top, the view was pretty awesome! Here is Luke with cousin Tricia. Mom didn’t want to risk her life in tall wooden structure, though she sent her husband and son just fine! While the view wasn’t a high as when Luke did the Ludington Lighthouse, it was pretty high up there. I had fun spotting people far away with my telephoto lense and yelling to…

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Touch a Truck!

Today we got to take Luke to a local event that was the perfect event for a little boy, it was called simply, “Touch a Truck” which is exactly what our little car lover dreams about at night! Luke was a little intimidated by the size of the vehicles. It actually took a little encouragement to get him to sit in the drivers seat.  He was a little overwhelmed. I don’t think he’d see trucks this big up close before. But he liked any time he saw levers or switches… fortunately they didn’t actually DO anything! The Police car was a highlight, of course, and he even got to sit in the back seat, somewhere I explained he doesn’t want to get a ride in the future! I also was happy to learn that a laptop mount in the front is not illegal. Hmmmmm… I think I even enjoyed getting to see a city snow plow up close and personal. The fact that I could climb inside the plow tells you it is BIG! And how often do you get to climb into the front containers of a garbage truck? Yes, they were very clean! (also pretty rare!) Fire trucks…

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Luke Gets a Hair Cut (actually, all of them!)

Today was the day we finally gave Luke another haircut. We love his curly hair, but when it starts getting in his eyes we know we have to cut it again. It’s a bummer because he always seems to age three months with a hair cut. We know, “It’ll grow back” – but he’s so stinkin’ cute with those curls! Too bad, today was hair cutting day! And for the past two years Sara has been cutting both boys hair to save money. (haircut prices have gotten ridiculous if you ask me!) Here he is, all smiles and read to go under the knife, er, scissors anyway. That’s one curly head! Our personal hair stylist at work! Bye, Bye Bangs! (my wife would like to ask you not look at the messy counters in the background) Oops, was that an ear lobe? Elmo helps the time go by as mommy sculpts the head. It’s a brand new boy! Is this the same boy!?!? Amazing how different he looks. But either way, the shirt is still true!

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The Adventures of “Illinois Luke”

First off, I have to say, my sister is the ultimate party planner. She puts together the most amazing themed parties for her kids (sample). Today was no exception. It was an overnight camping Indiana Jones theme where they went geo-caching for treasure and every kid got an archeologist bag, brown fedora and a whip! Due to having a two year old, we came for the morning fun. It was a beautiful forest preserve I’ll be returning to for hiking! Luke took to the trails immediately… It is right along the Fox River in Cary, so there were many water views on the hike. One funny sight (that I couldn’t take a picture of) was three guys fishing with beer bottles. A poor man’s technique perhaps. They tied fishing line to the neck of their beer, threw the line out, drank while waiting, and when then got a bite, wound the line around the beer bottle to reel it in. Yes, we saw them catch one! One of the kids caught a craw fish. Going with the theme, we just pretended it was a scorpion! I showed my son how to intimidate a small creature by returning its taunts right…

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