La La La La, Ethan's world...

Remember when Saturday mornings were about sleeping in, steaming cups of Starbucks coffee and bad Saturday morning TV like a Real World or America's Next Top Model marathon? Doing as much of the crossword puzzle as you can on your own, and then admitting intellectual defeat and enlisting the help of your partner for those last "few" tricky ones? Oh, how I loved those days.

These days, we roll out of bed early, mutter a few words to each other, shower, corral and dress the beast, suck back a quick cup of coffee and then head to the local convention center to watch a bunch of "not quite living the dream" dancers dressed up as Big Bird, Bert, Ernie, Abby Cadabby (who IS she???!!), and Elmo perform Sesame Street Live: Elmo's Green Thumb.

That's how we roll these days. On Sesame Street.

I bought the tickets the other day, but we didn't tell Ethan about about it until this morning. We learned that lesson. About a month before his birthday, I foolishly told him we were having at the Playroom and every. single. day. for the next 30 days, I heard, "Is it my birthday at the Playroom?!" There is still a Sarah's head shaped dent in the wall from me banging my head against it, thinking, "whywhywhy did I tell him so soooooon?!"

So this morning, as we piled into the car, we told him we had a surprise for him and we'd tell him what it was when we got to the Coffee Bean. While we sat at our table waiting for our coffee, Ethan pointed across the street at the random shops and said, "Is that my surprise?!" I don't know if he thought we'd bought him a hair salon and a tuxedo rental shop, or what. Kids are just weird. We assured him that no, the hair salon and tuxedo rental shop were in fact NOT his surprise, and for a second he actually almost seemed a little disappointed. Who knew his life long dream was to be a retail and/or service shop owner?

We told him that actually we were going to see ELMO!!! AT HIS HOUSE!!! ISN'T THAT EXCITING?! We got a big smile out of him (probably more a reaction to our over-zealous enthusiasm at our announcement than anything else), but overall, his reaction was somewhere between a luke-warm "cool" and an equally luke-warm, "really? neat." I think he was disappointed that the hair salon just wasn't in the cards (perhaps it's because he desperately needs a hair cut, but we keep putting it off because his long hair is so stinking cute).

The "we're way more jazzed about this than you" theme continued when we got to the theater lobby. Don't get me wrong, Ethan was excited, but I think our anticipation about his excitement sent us into a sort of parental "we're such great parents" frenzy. We got in line at the merchandise stand and loaded up on programs and another one of those absurd twirly light toys. I hate those things, by the way and cringe every time I think of how freaking rich whoever invented it is, thanks in large part, to me.

Our seats were good and Ethan got genuinely excited when we got into the theater itself. "Is this Elmo's house?!" and "Where's Elmo?!" He was, however, a bit disturbed by the fact that Grover was going to be there---for some reason? Not a fan of Grover. Where do they come up with this stuff?

When the lights went down and the show started, the mesmerization set in. Big Bird, Bert, Ernie, Elmo, Abby Cadabby, Rosita, Grover, Cookie Monster--they were all there. And dude, they could dance. Even in those ginormous costumes, they got down like a boy band. Even Ethan was inspired to shimmy his shoulders while sitting in Husband's lap. He was clapping, singing, calling back responses to Elmo. All very super cute.

There was a bit of a creepy factor, though. At one part of the show, Elmo and his friends meet a couple of beetles. Telly is afraid of beetles, so they had to make them seem a little scary. Which, I guess if you're a kid, they did. But if you are an adult, they really just looked like the police man guy from the Village People. I was a little taken aback by the S&M cop looking thing they had going on, but all in all, Ethan was digging it.

After the intermission, though, the shine had pretty much worn off. The standard, "I want to go home"'s, and the giant open-mouthed yawns started to set in. The stupid spinning light toy was more intriguing than the entire "Nature is so beautiful, let's find the perfect place to plant this flower!" thing unfolding in front of us on stage.

All in all, it was a good experience for us. We were hesitant about the whole dark room, loud music, thongs of screaming people thing, but Ethan handled himself really well. Poor girl behind us flipped the hell out during the second 1/2 and they had to leave. I'm glad we were able to see the whole thing.

Trying to get Ethan as hyped up about this damn Elmo show as we were...

My favorite picture of the day--nailed in the head by mama's purse.

See how much happier Husband looks than Ethan?

Ah, there's the smile. Stupid, spiny light toy, thank you for making my child smile.

So mesmerizing...

There are the New Kids, uh, I mean the Sesame Street gang...

more fascination with the stupid spiny light toy.

Dueling stupid spiny light toys...