"Our City Brings All The Kids To The Yard...

... and they're like 'Come play in our cars!'"

Or, you know, vehicles and machines and stuff.

Each year our city holds an open house in the city yard. This is like heaven for little boys, especially boys like Jack Jack who are obsessed with boy things like heavy machinery and other kinds of city vehicles... firetrucks, lawnmowers, buses, trash trucks, cranes, cherry pickers, bulldozers, police cars... this list goes on and on! We went last year (a trip that went unblogged), and Jack had such a great time that I wanted to make sure that we would go again this year! I was thrilled when it turned out that Dave had that day off and could go with us this time, and Jack was absolutely thrilled as well! He had quite a skip in his step as he walked hand-in-hand with his daddy on the way to the yard!

We walked into the yard and met up with my parents, my sister and Luke, and Steve, Eve, Savannah, Serena, and Sadie (three of my goddaughters). And the first vehicle we stopped at? The fire engine! Jack is no stranger to playing on firetrucks and he had fun showing it to Luke, too!

We went from vehicle to vehicle, machine to machine. Jack was in heaven with all of these fun toys to play with! He was such a good boy, too, waiting in line and taking turns. I was so proud of him.

He was so excited to get to sit on a police motorcycle, both because it was a motorcycle, and because of the lights and sirens! He even got to push the button to turn on the siren!

One of the things that Jack was most excited about, though, were the giant lawnmowers that we see at the park! Whenever he sees them he has such a hard time tearing his eyes away from them, and he was stoked that he got to 'drive' them!

Jack also really enjoyed the trash trucks. Why? Because the kids were allowed to honk the horn! Jack hopped right in, and no sooner had he sat in the seat when he asked "Okay daddy, what do I pull to make the noise?!" Once Dave showed him, he pulled it. Twice!

This thing was cool, too. I don't know what it is, but right after Jack's turn was over the guy hopped in and did a pretty cool demonstration for the news cameras!

This kid has the best imagination, and as he sat and 'drove' each vehicle, I could see his imagination going crazy! The best evidence of that was when we got to this piece of heavy machinery (I'd call it by name, but I never remember the difference between all of the -dozers and -loaders and -haulers)...

If his face didn't say it all, then he sure did, just after I took this photo:

Are you amazed that he cooperated for that shot? I mean, not only sitting where I asked him to sit, but looking at the camera and smiling, too? I was amazed, also! But as soon as he got back up I figured out why, because he looked at me and said with such awe in his voice "Mom, it was going to pick me up!" I love this kid!

And my favorite part? That Dave was able to come. Because this is what it's like when they're together:

Did you melt just now? Yeah, I did, too.

And after we were done with the city yard we went out to lunch... and I melted again.

Only for Jack would Dave ever let me take that photo!