[Nicolas] Cooker Baby

You may recall a recent post where we ate at Baru - a great little Columbian tapas restaurant near Nicolas' school, with excellent food and a bongo in the bathroom to boot. Well, we went back this past Friday, and not only did the friendly wait staff remember Nicolas, they had a great time talking to him. They even got a kick out of him yelling "i have to go poopie!" at the top of his lungs after dinner. we think it was just a (funny and admittedly slightly embarrassing) ploy to get to the bongo in the bathroom, because once he realized it wasn't in there he was less motivated to actually go poopie, and much more ready to go look for that bongo. not only did we find it outside (the staff had brought it out on the sidewalk for him to play - I assume for the tables outside and the people waiting for a table), they asked him to play it. which he did, and really well too. when we asked where they bought the bongo and explained we were looking for one for Nicolas' birt...

Nicolas and I spent the late afternoon of St. Patrick's Day in beautiful City Park. It was a gorgeous day, and we were able to get in some swinging, some tree climbing, and some good ol' City Park duck and goose feeding. we even got a nice visit from one of the City Park swans: what a great way to spend St. Patrick's Day in New Orleans!

lately we've been taking advantage of the extra hour or two of daylight, the gorgeous spring weather here in New Orleans and our close proximity to City Park as much as we possibly can. earlier this week we spent a late afternoon in the park feeding the geese, ducks, and even one of the huge swans - look for a post on that later this week. and this morning we headed over there for a school fair. nicolas wasn't too thrilled about going in the museum to talk about schools, but he totally enjoyed the inflatable jumpy thing outside. he had so much fun jumping and running back and forth in there. it even had a very steep slide that he tried a couple times. after we got out he spotted one of the Saints' mascots - Sir Saint. He had gotten totally freaked out by him earlier when he walked by the jumpy thing, but he kept asking about him too. When we saw him out on the park lawn, Nicolas couldn't stay away.Can you blame him? Look at this thing: we followed sir saint around for a...

ah, if it were only that easy. upon finishing his 3rd consecutive round of antibiotics to combat a persistent ear infection, Nicolas ended up with a cold yesterday. we know, it's all part of the deal when you're a kid in day care, but i'm so frustrated by this antibiotic bandwagon that pediatricians seem unable to abandon. is that really the best we can do? kill ALL the bacteria, including all the good ones, and hope that the bad ones you have aren't drug resistant? so far the bad ones are 2 for 2 in the resistant category - at least in one ear. we'll see how they fared after this last round. unless of course this cold he just caught leads to yet another, brand new ear infection. and then i guess we'll start all over again. on the lighter side of things, he kicked a 103+ fever that he had last Thursday and Friday, and despite his cold is feeling pretty chipper. he was even chipper during most of his current ear infection, as evidenced by this clip from a couple ...

not only does new orleans have some of the best restaurants in the world, the one we went to last night after picking nicolas up from school has a bongo [!] in the bathroom! we were rocking out in there. then we headed over to an art show preview at our good friend jonathan ferrara's gallery. the art was really amazing, but the gallery was a little too loud for nicolas, so we didn't stay too long. we'll go back later in the month when it's a little quieter so nicolas can enjoy the art.

beautiful weather, equally-beautiful (and nearby) city park lured us away from the costumed crowds in the French Quarter. We played on the playground, ate some lunch, and took in the scenery.

nicolas and i went to the monthly totally vegan potluck yesterday, and fortunately every third home in new orleans seems to belong to a musician. so nicolas got to play some real live bongos! and some congas, and a banjo, some guitars, a fancy washtub bass, and a ukelele. thanks mike and michelle (and woodes) for being such awesome (and musical) hosts!