Conversation with Ryder

I had a funny conversation with Ryder over Mem Day weekend that I forgot to include in my post. To fully appreciate the sweetness of this story, I'll give you some background info. Many of you have heard me say that Ryder is an extremely sweet kid. He was a very, very good baby and the mild manneredness has just continued. Not only is he well behaved, he is extremely loving and thoughtful and unselfish - in a way that I think is quite unusual for a 3-year-old. He's going to be a heck of a man some day! One way in which his sweetness is often displayed is in his caring for his little bro. He just loves Beau and they are seriously best friends. Ryder is always making sure that Beau is not left out of anything. This has been going on for ages. I've been talking to Ryder on the phone for a long time...since he could only babble. As soon as he knew a few words (and Beau was just a bitty baby), I would call and say hi and somewhere in the conversation he was bound to blurt out, "Beau's here!", as if to say, "yo, Su-Su, any good aunt would say hi to BOTH her nephews"! Or, when I called before I made my trip in May I would tell him all the fun things we were going to do and he would say "and Beau?", just to make sure Beau was going to get to come with us. Ryder just loves to include his little brother. (I should add here that I LOVE Beau, too, and talk to him quite a bit on the phone now as well and, of course, he's always included in the fun activities!).

Okay, so that brings us to the day I took the boys to Bounce-U. Ryder has been to birthday parties at a similar place in Dallas called Pumped It Up. On the way out there, I had both boys in the back seat and Ryder kept talking about Pump it Up, which resulted in us having the same conversation about 3 times. It went something like this:

Ryder: We're going to Pump it Up!
Susan: Actually, it's a place LIKE Pump it Up, but it's not the same. This one is called Bounce-U! (I wanted to clarify to him because I was afraid that if we got there and it wasn't what he expected he would be disappointed).
Ryder: Bounce-you??
Susan: Yep, Bounce-U!
Ryder: Bounce-Me??
Susan: hmm, hmmm (not knowing how to explain the concept of the name to a 3-year-old)
Ryder: But....what about Beau?

This is probably the only 3-year-old in the world who would've chosen not to go himself if his little brother wasn't going to get to bounce, too! I could probably learn a thing or two from him.