Wednesdays with Leo, Season 2

The 2nd Season of "Wednesdays with Leo" has gotten off to a slow start. Actually to no start at all since not one episode has been posted.
I apologize for this tardiness and can only cite kitchen renovation details and extra, extra babysitting duties as a defense.  And I will certainly try my best to keep you all posted on a weekly basis.

Mid-summer, Leo and I watched as ground was broken for a new home on our rides to and from here.
I pointed out to Leo that we would be "seeing a new house being built" and how cool would that be? every week.
He was thrilled.
Of course, I didn't have Leo here every Wednesday this past summer so our views of the house was sporadic at best.  Still, he always remembered and always became excited when I would say, "We're almost there, Leo!  I wonder what they're doing now?" And I would express as much excitement as Leo when we passed by the house and witnessed how much progress had been made since the previous week.
But Leo, being the "he doesn't miss a trick" little boy that he is, finally called me out one day:
"Ma. You just passed by the house on your way to getting me so you KNOW the new things already.  Ha.  You're funny!"

Time passed and before we knew it, the siding was ready to go up.

I asked Leo what color did he think the owners would choose?  I suggested we both guess on a color and see who would win.   Leo chose red and I chose gray.
How excited was I one day when I drove to Leo's and told him, "The color is up!"  And, champ that he is, he didn't push to ask before he could see it himself.

When he saw the color brown chosen, Leo exclaimed, "Well, we were both wrong so that mean's we both win!"

Leo's and my time together is different from last year.  He is now in afternoon pre-school ~ and loves it ~ so that when he is here I drive him to school.  What this means is that we are now on a time schedule which has taken time to adjust to; it's more difficult to get all the activities we did last year into just a few hours.  But we always manage to play superheroes or little people, go outdoors, watch a show and color some pictures.

~ The first day I had Leo on this new schedule he was quite nervous that I would wait too long to take him.  He had his backpack swung under his arms a good 20 minutes before we had to leave :) ~

We talk a lot in the car these days but my favorite discussion was about "family night".  Leo told me (and Dad, quite enthusiastically last week) that "Fridays are family night".  The BEST part about family night? PIZZA!!!
"Sometimes we buy it from the store and cook it in the oven and sometimes Mom makes it at home and sometimes we have pepperoni - do you like pepperoni, Ma? - but every way we have it it is SO good and I LOVE family night!"  And then, "But sometimes Mom forgets."  "Yeah, sometimes she forgets."

This came up last Friday when I had Leo and Lucia together.  He, again, sooo enthusiastically said, "It's family night tonight and we're going to have PIZZA and, Ma? you and Poppi can come over and have family night with us whenever you want.  That would be so much fun and Luca and Paulie would like it, too!"

I mentioned this to Dad and I think we'll take Leo up on his invite, especially since Luca and Paulie would like it, too!

Last Friday, as I mentioned, Leo spent the day with Lucia and me.  It was all fun and games until Lucia bit him.  Leo was quite put out by this but had forgiven Lucia by the time she woke from her nap.

Miss Lucia is quite a girl... and she loves Leo to pieces.  When she wakes from her sleep, Lucia must play in her crib for a while (with you watching and horsing around with her) before she allows you to pick her up and take her out.

So last Friday Leo and I followed Lucia's routine.   At one point, Leo raced towards Lucia from the far side of the room and "scared" her when he reached her crib.  I could NOT believe what I witnessed: Lucia laughed out loud!
I couldn't believe it because I have NEVER heard Lucia laugh out loud.  Never. And yet, there she was, laughing like a crazy girl.

"Do it again, Leo. Do it again!" I begged him: I was like an addict, I couldn't get enough.

And when Leo tired of the game and chose instead to join Lucia in her crib (at which point Martha had just returned), Lucia leaned over to him and gave him a kiss.  Martha tried to get a picture of this but Lucia, like Leo, does not like to have her picture taken.  The 2 of them made the silliest faces or grunted or frowned...and then the picture op was gone.

After leaving Martha's, Leo was delighted to be able to come to my house before going back to his. Annie had taken Luca to Boston for the day and had run into lots of traffic so Leo and I had time to hang out a bit here, me with my coffee and Leo with his "people".
Coming into the house, we saw this: Dad and Johnny had been busy while we were away.

                                   Leo was quite impressed: "That's the coolest door I ever did see!"
Speaking of the kitchen renovations, Leo was proud to realize that he was usually the 1st family member to "see anything new in the kitchen" since he was here every week.  We both did a thumbs-up when I predicted that he would be the 1st to sit at the table and eat from the new kithchen :)

On the way home we took another look at "our house".  Leo is afraid that once the house is completely done we won't "recognize" it any longer.  He spoke about this the week the siding began to go up. I answered by telling him that we needed to find landmarks near the house that would point up to it, although I did say I believed we would always know which one it was.
But during our drive last Friday, Leo became even more skeptical. "I'm pretty sure we won't recognize it when it's done, Ma."

And finally, just after leaving the brown house, I spoke to Leo about how good he was with Lucia and how much Lucia loved him and that I knew he was this good with her because he was so good to Paul and Paul loved him so much.

Which brought us to Lucia's having bitten him.  The immediate frown on Leo's face told me the whole story; he didn't understand why she had done this.
 
We talked.  I told him that oftentimes babies bite but that when they did, they didn't really understand what they were doing.  "Poor babies", I said to him, "they have no idea that they're hurting by biting, at least not when they're as young as Lucia.  So that's when we teach them not to do it.  Not by getting angry at them but by saying 'No' in a way they understand."   We talked about different ways of saying "No" and Leo seemed pretty confident that if Lucia bit him again, he could handle her well.

So now I'm up to date on my weekly post.  Others won't be as long...if I keep to my weekly schedule.
And I'm hoping Leo will relent when it comes to my taking a picture of him now and then.