Part two of Christmas takes place at Nana and Papa’s place. All the usual awesomeness of food and drink and family, more presents, and our collective first turducken. The highlight of the visit for me however – maybe the highlight of the whole holiday season – was Joe’s reaction to Pete the Cat.

When we visited Joe’s school for parent-teacher conferences last month, we asked Mr. McCoig (who needs his own blog post) what the kids are into these days. McCoig is a pretty low-key guy, and said they read Pete the Cat books a lot and the kids “seem to like them.” We gave our wonderful sister/sister-in-law Amy a heads-up, and she got some for Joe.

Christmas morning Joe pulls one out of his gift bag and loses his ish. Straight screaming like Shaun Cassidy was opening for One Direction with Ringo on drums. It was spectacular! Now we just show him a picture of Pete and he yells. It’s the first thing that’s driven him to this type of fandom. He’d hobble Pete if he met him.

Joe’s personality comes out more every day, but this Christmas it’s been in overdrive. We have a lot of great things to look forward to in 2015.