Bouncing Baby Boy ... Literally

So this afternoon we had the pleasure of going to Miss Avery's second birthday party. It was the second year in a row Cayden and I made the trip sans Daddy, because this same weekend each of the past two years has been a Daddy get-away to visit college friends.

Last year Cayden wasn't yet known as such at Avery's birthday party, and he was still an inside baby. This year I loaded him into the Ergo (love, love, LOVE our new baby carrier, by the way -- goes up to 40 pounds and puts most of Chicken's weight on my hips, so my back isn't killing me anymore!), completely expecting him to be too young to take advantage of all the little-kid fun Paramount has to offer.

I have never been so excited to be wrong.

Cayden LOVED Paramount! As soon as I put him down he started off, speed-crawling across the endless expanse of soft bouncy floors.

Surely, I thought, he's too young for the trampoline floors. But he was dying to get on them to see what they were.

And he got a kick out of the smooth surface.

And so I jumped ever-so-gently, to see what his reaction was to a little bouncing.

He absolutely loved it. Smiles, giggles, drool and all. And in no time, other Mamas of littler littles took their babies out for a little bum-bouncing on the trampolines.

And before you knew it, our bum bouncing turned into all-out tummy bouncing, and Max had a ball bouncing Cayden into the air. (That's Miss Avery in the background, dressed all too adorably in a pink gymnastics bodysuit.) And while Cayden couldn't have been happier being bounced all around, I did step in before the bouncing giggle-fest continued for too, too long, because I was a little concerned about the repeated whip-lash effect on Cayden's little neck.

So then we moved...

to the ball-pit!

Where Cayden stared deliberately at all the other kids and further wore himself out kicking his legs deeper and deeper into the endless pit of balls.

And we ended the wonderful afternoon party with a dinner of macaroni salad, cantalope, cheese, blueberries and a hot dog. As in an entire freakin hot dog, sucked down in minutes. And then my baby glutton tried to steal the hot dog of the little girl sitting next to him. But all he got was a swipe of ketchup, as the little girl and I both stepped in right-quick to rescue her dinner from over-stuffed porky pig.

To top it all off, just before we left, Cayden and Miss Avery loved on each other, pointing out ears (Avery, delicately), grabbing noses (Cayden, a little rougher than I would have liked) and hugging like true pals. Don't tell Brett and Lynn, but I see a future romance in the cards.

To be honest, I was kind of dreading keeping my little guy entertained at this party, but it ended up being a lot of fun for both of us. So I was really, really happy this afternoon to be proven wrong.

Oh, and I have a feeling we'll be taking the Daddy to Paramount before too much longer, so he can see first-hand all the fun that can be had there.