Some ladybugs are male.....

"That's a real cute picture of your daughter there." Yeah, I've heard that a few times in the last couple weeks since I put this picture on my laptop's desktop. I don't care. Haven't you heard of a male ladybug? There have to be male ladybugs or else ladybugs would just cease to exist, right?

Some time before Halloween Susie texted me a picture of a ladybug costume her mom had found for Cade to wear. My first reaction was "Ummmm....." But I started to think about it. If you know Cade, you know he loves any kind of bug or critter. And he definitely doesn't know that the word "lady" has any female connotations. To him a ladybug is just another cool bug. After pondering for a while I figured this could have potential to be a real winner. And guess what? It was. Cade wore this costume three times the week of Halloween and we never had to fight him to get into it. And just picking out socks can be very trying sometimes. He's very particular about what he wears.

So here's a big thanks to VeeVee for bringing that ladybug costume. Cade loved it.

One of the Halloween events I took him to was with my buddy Jason and his family. Turns out, Jason's daughter Ella was a ladybug too. Potentially awkward situation? No way! Cade liked the idea that they were dressed the same. Plus, notice that Ella has hearts on her costume. So she's definitely the female ladybug and everyone was happy.

Now that Cade's little legs are long enough, he loves to go ride his tricycle around the neighborhood. He's been very good about following directions, staying on the less busy streets, and watching for cars. Even though he can reach the pedals he prefers to push along the ground with his feet.

Since we live a few blocks from the train tracks Cade likes to ride down to the tracks and see if we can see a train. I call this one "Sunset at the Train Crossing."

Last weekend I ran the Indianapolis Monumental Half Marathon with a few buddies. I'd been training hard with Robert (second from left) and Jason (far right, and father of Cade's ladybug friend). Robert's brother Bruce drove in from South Carolina to join us. We all had a great time, and the training program we found in Runner's World really paid off. I set a PR by four minutes and Jason and I finished over two minutes under our goal time. Robert and Bruce also turned in great finishing times, especially for a couple of guys that had never run a half before. The weather was great for running, and we definitely couldn't have asked for a better day.

We all stayed in the same hotel in downtown Indy, which was a lot of fun. Here's the whole crew after the race.

You may have noticed that all the wives and kids were wearing blue hoodies. Jason does a lot of outstanding design work, so he came up with this design for a shirt for the families. Pretty talented.

Last night the three of us went to the IU volleyball game. It was some sort of family night, so they had a photographer taking family pictures for free. We had bought Cade a little IU football jersey the week before and he'd been itching to wear it. He was so excited to put it on and go to the game. So here we are all decked out in Indiana red. I'm sure my dad's side of the family (from Minnesota) would all be so proud.

Cade was doing a little bit of exploring outside today. We are taking advantage of this great fall weather. Cade chose to wear this shirt to church this morning because it was just like daddy's shirt. He was kind of being a stick in the mud when it came to getting dressed (which isn't entirely unusual), but when I came in and he saw my shirt and we suggested that he could dress just like daddy he became a little more compliant.

Can I brag on my kid a bit? Cade got this set of puzzles from his Aunt Amy and Uncle Paul. In the box there are four puzzles and they all have four pieces to them. We've played with them before, but usually it ends up with Susie or I putting the puzzles together at Cade's request. Well, today Cade was playing by himself and we looked over and he had separated the four puzzles and had put them all together! He then took them apart, mixed up the pieces, and did it a couple more times. In this picture you can see that he's almost done with the red one, he's finished the green one, the blue one is almost done, and he's set the yellow pieces off to his right to work on next. I'm obviously a very biased party, but I was incredibly impressed. Way to go, my little two-year-old engineer!