More Fun with Uncle Matt

After we got back from Butte the sun was shining for all of 3 seconds so we decided to show Uncle Matt our favorite park. Uncle Matt did his job as Uncle well, from chasing the little guy around to pushing him on the swings and most importantly, taking over my least favorite job of teaching him where the sand does and does not go!

When we got back home, little Matt gave Uncle Matt a short break as he read to him

but then it was back to an uncle's work . . . ummm, play :-)



The next day we took Uncle Matt to "Grizzly Encounters" the less educational, more cheese-tastic wildlife education center than the one we went to with Uncle Ed. However, we had a much better view of the bears and the drive was only about 10 minutes. However, though it was cool and overcast on our side of the mountain, it was rainy, sleeting and darn cold over there. The bears didn't seem to mind:

(The blonde faced bear in the bottom left two shots is the female and the one on the right is the male)

Unlike the Grizzly and Wolf center, these bears are those who have been rescued from terrible captivity situations as compared to being relocated because they were wild bears that became human nuisances. I have far more mixed feelings about the message this center sends though I know the owner's heart is in the right place and the bottom line is that both centers are working to educate humans about bears to help avoid both pitfalls that brought the bears to them in the first place.

Little man picked up some new moves from the bears to test out on Uncle Matt that night:

(This play now somehow includes Matthew "tripping" himself on someone's legs and falling face first into the carpet and laughing hysterically while mommy's heart nearly stops!)

Followed by little Matt's favorite game - steal Uncle Matt's hat, wear Uncle Matt's hat, take the hat off as quickly as possible so mom can't get a picture. I finally thwarted step 3!

We dropped Uncle Matt off on Monday at the airport. Little man is still wandering around the house and getting into his car seat saying "Uncle? Uncle?" He certainly enjoys when his uncles visit and it's clear Uncle Matt had some great role models to help him prepare for his role:

Next visit Uncle Matt's in charge of taking the little guy out to find a fish or two!

Interestingly (and he did it after Uncle Ed visited as well) Matthew will now run up to single, young men and say "uncle, uncle!" If we could train him to do this with young, single women and say "auntie, auntie!" he's be an unstoppable uncle-matchmaking machine!