Christmas in Wyoming: William started walking for real! - Natale in Wyoming: William si e' messo a camminare per davvero!

The Kruse Family

So this how we celebrated Christmas this year: we took William to Wyoming for the first time and spent Christmas with the Kruse family. This has been our first American Christmas and William has decided to take his first steps without help. It has happened on the 23th of December at the Logan airport in Boston, while we were waiting to get on our plane going to Denver (Colorado). There, all of a sudden, my little 17 months old boy was no longer trying to grab my hand to support himself. He was instead walking away from me, ready to explore the world!

He first started walking with his arms up (hands up style), in order to keep his balance. Then, each time after that, he tried to lower his arms a bit more until at the end of our trip to Wyoming he decided to keep them at the level of his waist and confidence took over. Yes, it has happened! You can watch this video if you don't believe me.

So it is official: William now walks and goes everywhere! And without my help. Not only. This is what happened this Christmas in Wyoming, if only William could talk (not that my story would be any different. This was also my first Christmas in Wyoming!):

"I walked walked and walked everywhere and had a lot of fun in grandma and grandpa's house. I also played with some old toys they were all fascinated by (apparently, daddy, uncle Sean and aunt Susan used to play with them when they were kids!). The best thing ever was the family of bears in the Christmas outfit and Santa's hat in the entry way of the house. For some reason mama and dada did not want me to play with them. Grandma instead was grabbing the Santa hat from the bear's head to put it on my head.

William with Grandma

During the Christmas eve dinner I walked a lot in aunt Susan's house. There, there was a babau (dog) who kept jumping on me to lick my face. At first I thought he was funny but the babau kept doing it and my face was getting all sticky and smelly. At the end I thought I'd better learn to stand up and walk away from the damned thing.

William escaping from the babau's affection

Mamma and Dada, just before they sat down to have dinner with grandma, grandpa and the rest of the family, they had the bad idea of putting me to bed in a dark room on the floor with daddy's jacket as a blanket. I was not happy with that. After a good deal of crying I finally got to join the Christmas dinner in front of a colorful and shiny tree. Tasty prime American rib and a lady sat next to me who was pulling faces to make me laugh.

William with grandma

On Christmas day, grandma and grandpa gave me a brown bag with my name on it. Inside the bag, there were Santa's gifts for me. Mamma and Dada also had a brown bag with their names on it. They told me that the brown bag is a tradition for the Kruse family that grandma Bonnie started because she could not easily fit her gifts in the traditional American stocking. When mamma was not looking, I grabbed an animal cracker. Under a nicely decorated tree I could not play with (damned!) there were loads of colorful packets. Grandma Bonnie said that we had to open one packet at a time. Inside the packets there were loads of nice things: colorful stuffed animals, a red puppet talking and moving - I wonder where they found that one! -, a cell phone and a few books, one even playing songs!

How many colorful things to look at here!

Grandma and grandpa spent a lot of time playing with me. Grandpa was soo patient always making sure that I was ok and he was playing with me while he was feeding me. Grandma was wearing silly hats and silly t-shirts and was doing weird things to make me laugh. They were all treating me like a prince there!

William with grandpa

The following day they took me to another house. A nice big house for me to explore. There, I did a lot of walking but I also managed to play with a brand new kitchen and with a Christmas tree. And I got to pee like a man! Yes, sort of by myself. Mamma now understands that when I saw "pipi'", I want to pee in the toilet. Isn't that neat? Sorry, there isn't a picture to show you that. A lot of good stuff but nothing compared to the stairs of grandma and grandpa's house. I can't tell you how much I enjoyed going up and down those stairs while mamma and dada were at the movies. Uncle Sean gave up a party with his friends to stay with me that afternoon. I was so thrilled I kept repeating his yeah, yeah! One thing is clear: grandma, grandpa and the rest of the Kruse family in Wyoming adore me! Now tell me, how can Christmas get any better?"