Scary

So far, there are two things Sammy is afraid of: Umbrellas and Bowling. To display the great danger these things pose to him, he screams and his whole body shakes, then he buries his face in my shoulder.

Last weekend we walked down to a neighbors house for a birthday party. It was raining but it just seemed too silly to drive two houses, so we grabbed the umbrellas and headed out. It took me a while to understand what was so terrifying, but popping it up and down confirmed it.

Then, last night Zack desperately wanted to go bowling (he pretty much always desperately wants to go bowling). We headed out after dinner for one quick game. Sammy was getting tired, but we figured that the excitement of the bowling alley would carry him through. Little did we know that seeing the ball return and the throws down the lane would be a terribly frightening scene to him!

Today as I was working in the kitchen, and Sammy was laughing at the sound of the Vita-mix (that's our very loud, industrial-strength blender), I remembered that Zack was terrified of the sound of the blender. Back then, it was a much quieter blender, even . It occurs to me that in the many, many ways my kids have been so similar to one another, this is a quirky little difference. And it inspired me to capture even this face, as part of the story:
Because once time passes, the little details are gone from my often-addled brain (I did get some strange looks from passers-by for taking this photo!)

p.s. Was that too sad a note to end on?? Here's a shot from later in the evening: