Summer vacation has officially begun and I am already officially bored! Which means lots and lots of blog entries!

True to form, I spent the first eight months of the school year maintaining a nice, steady pace with my life and the final month in complete whirlwind mode. In the last four weeks, we had hardwood floors installed in the main level of our house, which meant moving every bit of furniture to the upper and lower levels, only to put it all back and clean up less than 24 hours before my parents, my brother, my sister-in-law, and my nephew came to visit for five days. I finished report cards, piles of paperwork, put the finishing touches on the performances of the school musical that I directed, and got my hair cut. I'm tired just typing it all out.

The five days that my family visited made all of the craziness worthwhile, because my two-and-a-half year old nephew entertained us non-stop with his antics. The child is hysterical. Living so far away, I don't get to see him as much as I would like, so I thought he would be a bit shy and reserved coming into a strange house for the first time, with his crazy loud aunt behind the door, fingers poised at the ready for some serious cheek-squeezing. Nope.

He barged through the front door, demanding to see the four cats, and calling for them by number in his signature lilt:

"WHERE NUMBER ONNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNE? WANNA SEE NUMBER TWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! WHERE NUMBER THREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE? WANNA SEE NUMBER FOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUR!'

Once he had seen them all, he started cloning Emmett and The Smoosh as Numbers Five and Six, before he came to the realization that Five and Three were the same cat, as were Four and Six. This led him to begin to try to herd them all into one room, so he could point at them and greet them as only our family welcomes others. With screaming.

Alex was particularly enamored with The Smoosh, probably because she spent a good deal of time under our bed, deflecting the frightening din coming from all areas of the house at all time. Alex banished Tony from the bedroom, "TONY GET OUT NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW!" and made it his personal challenge to lure her from beneath the bed whenever possible. My brother called me from the road on Tuesday, informing me that Alex insisted, "WANNA GO SEE SMOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSH!" about an hour before they arrived back home in New York.

There was little need for toys this weekend. Alex found great entertainment placing each morsel of cat food into the water bowl, until he discovered that dumping them all at once was much more efficient. We went through two full bags of cat food that weekend. Lesson learned? When Alex comes to Aunt Dea's house, Alex is allowed to do whatever the hell Alex wants.

While the guys took a field trip to Philadelphia on Saturday, I taught Alex the joyous game called Standing on The Pool Table and Rolling Billiard Balls While Screaming Numbers in Italian. My dad taught Alex some completely made-up version of Rock, Paper, Scissors, and soon the child was picking up billiard balls, looking at the numbers, and screaming them out in Italian before slamming them down on the slate tabletop. Smartest kid ever!

In between trips to the National Zoo, a Washington Nationals Game, playground and pool adventures, and lunches and dinners out, the entire weekend was really relaxing and laid-back. It was the first time we had guests at our house for more than one night, and definitely the first time we had filled both guest rooms with people. My mom was The Towel Fairy all weekend, supplying us with clean, fluffy towels, despite our malfunctioning dryer. We ate and talked and watched episodes of Dora The Explorer (oh, god, not Berry Hunt!) while Alex giggled and marched and called out for more bluebeyyies.

While the house today is a bit quieter without my family here, there is definitely less life in it. I'm going to continue to nag them all to move down here, or at least visit again soon, because everything is a lot more fun when we get to see it for the first time through Alex's eyes.

HOW 'BOUT COME BACK SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOON!