Walking, spheres, bugs, and ... almost kissing the bear

Well, it has been a week since my last post. So much has happened since then, and some before then. Here is what's been happening:

-Jonas is walking! Let me just say, that I had not in any way been egging him on to do so. I wanted to hold him for as long as possible. I enjoyed this, and I knew I was going to be sad when it happened...but...he had been taking a few steps on his own from time to time, as he would let go of the furniture used as a way of navigation through our home. On the afternoon of the 6th he started taking a few steps toward me from the opposite side of the room, then he took a few more and a few more, and all the while a funny look was spreading across his face. When he reached me, (and after receiving a very big hug from mama and plenty of cheers from his big brother) he had the biggest six-toothed smile ever. Well, of course we wanted to see if he would do it again! Below is the only (hurry here he comes) picture that resulted. He has crawled no more than ten times since, and now, I don't think he remembers what crawling is. I could cry.

-On another lovely rainy day, when we just couldn't handle staying indoors any longer, we decided to go to a favorite rainy day woody place. The trees are so thick in this park that you can play without getting too wet. We had folded some paper boats and wanted to test them out. As soon as we got there, Eoghan and I ran down to the wee brook to set sail. As he was testing the boats out, I snapped some pictures of the process. We had a good time. That night as I was looking through the newly downloaded pictures, I found the following photo rather interesting. Now, I know it was raining, but only one of my other pictures (I took over 30 while we were in the park) had any of these little spheres of light. The other picture only had one in it, and it was the picture I took immediatly following this one. Also, if you look closely at this picture, the largest and brightest sphere on the far left hand side is moving up, not down. I have never known rain to do this. By the way, I went back the next day and took more pictures, but could not produce another picture like this one. I think I might keep trying from time to time.

-Jonas caught some sort of bug. My boy that had never been ill, had a constant fever for four days. Still today, a week later it seems he is still trying to purge the bug out, as his tummy still isn't feeling as good or as regular as it usually is.

-And last, but definetly not least: we just missed kissing a black bear full on, by inches. On the last day of the horrid fever, when we just could not resist the sun (which we had not seen in what seemed like forever), and thinking a nice soft breeze would do Jonas some good, I drug out the stroller so that we could go for a walk and do a few errands on the way. Well apparently the bears can't resist the temptation to go for a walk around town on such a beautiful day either. On our way back home, just a few feet away from a busy (for our small town) intersection because of the lovely day. When the rain stops...people go. A truck pulls up right next to us, I mean the tires were just about touching the sidewalk, and the driver looking at us jumps out. I could not figure out what was going on. The man who may have saved us from, I don't even want to think of what says, "there is a bear about to come right onto the sidewalk in front of you. From where we were walking we could not see anything, but the man in his truck had a good view into the woods as he was coming from the opposite direction. We walked very quickly around to the other side of the truck with the open door and waited. The bear came out onto the sidewalk and then wandered off into another side street, so we started to walk very quickly home. After having crossed the intersection and Eoghan handing me a grocery bag (letting me know I had dropped it in the middle of the street and not even noticed) we heard a blood-curdling scream coming from the street where the bear had wandered into. Soon after, the bear comes running out and proceeds right behind us onto the sidewalk we are on. We walked a bit faster to approach the only house on that block (and telling Eoghan if it comes any closer, meaning if we can just about kiss it, we have to run into that house as fast as we can). I know, you are not supposed to run from a bear, but being that the house was so close I knew we could make it in on time (the door was open). Luckily, the bear turned into the slough just as I was about to tell Eoghan to run for it. Eoghan did not want to go out for the rest of the day, and I couldn't really blame him. Scary. Funny thing is, the bear was probably thinking the same thing. Scary. As a side note, I did have my camera with me, and if I had been by myself I probably would have taken a picture. However, my boys were topmost on my mind.