Brothers

This weekend we went to Pittsburgh for Megan and Paul's baby shower. Friday's drive was long but not bad, and we loved our hotel. We got a two-room suite so that Will could have his own room. And best of all for me, I went out for coffee with Jess while Matt put the boys to bed. Well, sort of. When I got back to the hotel Matt was holding a screaming Ryan in the bathroom to minimize the chances that the crying would wake Will up. This was very unlike Ryan, who generally goes to bed peacefully and willingly, but I think his system was off from the drive and being in a strange place. Plus we put his crib as far into the closet as it would fit to give all of us some privacy, and nobody likes to sleep in a closet. So eventually we calmed him down and he went to sleep a couple of hours later than usual.

The next morning Will woke up at the stroke of 7:00 (Ryan was already up) and marched directly into our bedroom, which was just about the cutest thing I've ever experienced. I've heard parents talk about when their toddlers get out of bed on their own and come into their bedroom, but Will never leaves his bed on his own in the mornings and his bedroom is downstairs while ours is upstairs, so we've never had this experience before. It was nice, and showed us that we didn't actually have to worry about all the stuff we worried that he'd get into, like the oven, refrigerator, and garbage disposal.

So we hit the continental breakfast and continued on to Squirrel Hill to visit Robbie, Jess, and Henry. Henry is getting to be such a big kid now and is still as smiley and happy as always. We then met Megan, Paul, Lizzie, and Megan's mom for a very nice picnic at a playground, where Paul played with Will and thus proved himself to be just as cool as Will remembered. We then decided to head back for some downtime at the hotel before the shower. Ryan hadn't really napped all day and Will was fading fast. Well, napping happened for nobody, but at least we tried.

On to the shower, which was hosted by two of Megan's friends in Pittsburgh. There were two games, and I'm proud to announce that I won both of them. And I hate games, but these were pretty fun. (Plus I got to ride home the entire way on Sunday with a gorgeous hardy mum at my feet, since that was the prize for the second game.) There was dinner, which was very good, and dessert, which was awesome. And there were presents and good company, and lots of kind people who helped to entertain Will, who had a very good time. It was really a very nice shower.

The next day we hung out at Megan and Paul's place for a couple of hours before picking up Chinese food and heading back to Robbie, Jess, and Henry's house for lunch. The drive home seemed way shorter for some reason, even though I think it took almost the same amount of time.

Anyway, I didn't take a single picture over the weekend, so here's one of Will and Ryan together from a couple of weeks ago. You can see that I've relaxed a bit and now let them within two feet of each other relatively unsupervised.