Driving Mr. Riley

Driving Riley to school has become one of my favorite times of day. There is no shortness of entertainment. After he is buckled into his seat and I am safely buckled into mine, he will point to the stereo and say "Usic" (as in "music"). When the music has been turned on, he will put his hands in the air and wave them around and clap and chair dance until he grows tired of it. Usually this is right about the time that he notices a bird. Then he tucks one little hand into his armpit and flaps his arm around and says "tweet tweet". Shortly after that, he usually spots a garbage truck, school bus, bicycle or some other delightful mode of transportation as we are still driving through our neighborhood. He is obsessed with all such items and will point to it, tell you what it is, and then either tell you that it goes "round and round" or "beep beep". He would do this all five minutes of our drive to school if we didn't happen to pass the Ronald McDonald House on the way. But we do, so he has to point out each and every morning that Ronald, in fact, is still sitting on the bench out front. "Hi Ronald" is what I hear from the backseat. (I swear I only told him once who Ronald was, but they apparently became very close friends quickly.) He continues to talk about either Ronald or the flags that we've passed until we spot another exciting vehicle -- the ambulance. There is a parking lot full of them on our way to school, and he shouts "am-boo-lance" from the backseat before he can even see them. He then proceeds to tell me how they say "whe ooo". Luckily, we come across a stop light shortly thereafter and then he repeats "light" over and over and over until we arrive at school.

I suspect there will be a day when I find his constant chatter and enthusiasm from the back seat a bit irritating, but for now, I couldn't think of a better way to spend 5 minutes in the car.