Happy October!

Elizabeth Grace 11 months

Elizabeth Grace loves giving herself kisses in the mirror

Elizabeth Grace is 11 months old and officially in her birthday month!  I can't believe she's going to be a year old soon!  The time has gone by so quickly with her it's unbelievable.  Elizabeth weighs 24 lbs and is just getting into 18 month clothing.  She still only has 8 teeth - 4 on top and 4 on bottom.  She crawls, she stands and she walks while holding onto furniture.  

Elizabeth has recently added grandpa to her vocabulary and is almost saying "reloj" ("watch" en Espanol).  She can give high-five and she actually talks to her dad on the phone.  I mean, literally, I put Josh on the phone with her and as soon as he starts talking she smiles big and says "dada!", babbles some and then tries to lick the phone!  Haha - I think she's trying to give him kisses.    

Elizabeth is a big people watcher.  She loves to stare and study people.  Trust me, she will check you out and up and down and sideways!  Elizabeth claps and yells "yeeeeeah!" and if I'm watching a show with an audience (like Ellen) she claps whenever the audience does!  It's so cute.  I can't believe she'll be ONE YEAR OLD!!!!  

But get this - she's going to have a super one year birthday party in, of all places, Las Vegas!  Two families, three birthdays and two mini reunions means a super awesome fun family time!  We can't wait!

Coolest kid in preschool.

Aaron has started public preschool.  Every day there is a morning struggle to get the slowest turtle ready for school and out the door.  But no matter how much of a struggle it is to get out the door, it's the same struggle to get him out of the classroom at the end of the day.  

The first day of school we had a meeting with his teacher and she told us he was already holding hands with some girl!  So we asked Aaron if he had a girlfriend and he said yes!  Josh and I were cracking up!  He told his dad secretly that they were probably going to get married.  Since then, sadly, they have broken up and he is currently back on the market.  :)  It doesn't surprise me since before preschool he said he wanted to marry Pocahontas and have five children.  And he's going to support his family by being a veterinarian.  That's not surprising either since he loves animals and won't even eat meat sometimes because of it.  Unless it's bacon, of course.  

We have been struggling with Aaron's listening and attention skills.  I think there has been a lot of changes in his short life and there are more to come.  These changes I think took a larger toll on him than we anticipated and one of them is not being the only child (and grandchild) anymore.  Not getting the same attention is hard on him.  We are trying our best but if any of you have any tips, please send them our way! 

But the kiddos are well and we're all looking forward to our trip, our visit with Grandma Tina, Elizabeth's birthday and Halloween!!!!  Aaron wants to be a mummy but the jury is still out on Elizabeth.  I was thinking a black cat.......

What's your October going to be like?

 

You're Welcome, Society.

This boy knows how to say:

"What the hell/heck?"

"Woot Woot! Holla!"

"YOUR MOMMA!"

You're welcome, society.  You're welcome.

Too Cool For School

That's my kid, in a jean jacket, headed to his first day of a preschool daycare program.  He is just too cool.  I should have popped his collar.  Aaron won't be going to this school full-time, or even part-time really.  It's more like a drop off basis type thing.  But Grandma & Grandpa were out of town for the week to celebrate Grandma Yvette's birthday (Happy Birthday Momma!) so we needed a back up.  And luckily were I live currently there is one right across the street.  They take kids from infants up to 12 years old for before and after school daycare as well as all day care that includes playtime and curriculum.  They even throw in some Spanish and Potty Training!  Woot!  Of course, by throw in I mean more like I just paid $191 for 3 full days of care.  And THAT, my friends, is WHY he won't be going full-time.  

It is a great back up and resource to have and he seemed to like it, though I'm sure he thinks of it more as play time than anything.  But it's something new for him and it gets him to socialize with other kids, keeps his brain working on new things and I'm sure (hopefully) they do a lot more activity than we do with him since on our days off we just want to relax.  But his Grandpa & Grandma take him on adventures like the story time at the library which he loves.  In fact, the teacher at the school said Aaron knew most of the stuff they were going over so he was able to join right in.  :)  Hooray for reading to him since he was a baby!  He loves his books.  In fact, he has a Blues Clues video that he watches where Blue reads Chicka Chicka Boom Boom and I kept telling him I would buy it for him once I found it.  The other day we were at "the circle market" (aka Target) and there it was!  I think Aaron saw it as soon as I did and he immediately started "Chicka Chicka Boom Boom!  Will there be enough room?".  He would not let go of the book once it was in his hands!  

This of course, doesn't bother me at all and I never consider books as toys or "gifts" in the sense that he has to ask for them as a special treat because every kid should have books!  Now toys, that's a whole other issue.  Frankly, his bedroom is more like a playroom with more toys than furniture but as the only small child in the immediate family -- it's to be expected I guess, right?  But since birthday #3 and Christmas are coming up and just wanna put this out there -- he has plenty of toys!  He does grow out of clothes constantly, however and is now wearing between a 3 and 4 Toddler.  He's also a size 9 Extra Wide in shoes.  PS - he now comes to my waist.  Granted, I'm only 5' but still.  It's a bit daunting to see your (almost) 3 year old be almost half your height already. 

Aaron is still naked potty trained for the most part, but we are practicing with underwear more often and that's still hit and miss.  On his big boy bed, well....... Being with Grandpa & Grandma for a week while Josh and I were on vacation in Myrtle Beach, SC meant that he got to sleep with Grandpa & Grandma in their bed and that put us back a notch or two.  So now we're working again on getting him to sleep on his own in his own bed again.  Having a toddler use you as a head pillow while simultaneously kicking your husband in the kidney (Ow! My pancreas!) and smacking you in the face is not a good way to sleep my friends.  Not At All.  

But this boy, this boy is a crack up.  He as learned that saying "What the hell?" gets a funny reaction out of adults so he's been using that phrase quite a bit more often.  He still loves his singing and dancing.  He still falls asleep faster to Dave (Matthews Band) faster than mostly anything else.  He is still really into The Cars movie and practically every day asks his dad "Can we go to the circle market and get another toy?".  Right now we're on the hunt for Flo & Ramone!  And a kid friendly cd player/radio because he loves music.  And momma's gonna teach him to shake his booty!

Life with Aaron is wonderful.  


The rest of our adult life is stress and work and bills and debts and chores and everything else YOU are also going through.  And today, if I wasn't before (I totally was), I am now most definitely the 99%.  But this blog isn't about that so .......


I'll just say again life with Aaron is wonderful.  He reminds us to love, to smile, to dance to sing, to laugh.  


If you ever need a reminder, just let me know and I'll send you a picture of Aaron! 

Where does he get this stuff?!

 

Seriously, I just don't know where he gets this stuff but it's hilarious!

After taking off Josh's hat:

Dadda, you're a mess!

Watching the sun set:

The sun is sinking.

His new favorite thing to say to me whenever I walk into the room:

Momma, get back in the kitchen!

When I was holding him:

I'm a boooooy.  I'm a boy.  And you're a girl!

After hearing his belly growl:

Momma, I'm hungry.

Every day, at least once:

OW!  I have a booboo.  You've got to kiss it!

At every single meal:

Are you all done?

Anytime he falls down:

I'm okay!

 

He saw a spider web today and said:
Yucky!  That's a yucky!  I wanna take it to the trash can!

This boy, I tell you -- He's just adorable!  Everyday he says something new and funny. 

 

I'm hungry and tired but I'm doing this post, dammit.

So we finally took Aaron to the Woodland Park Zoo.  We had been talking about it and talking about it and we finally found a sunny, warm day with nothing else planned to visit the zoo.  Aaron loved it and he was in total awe of both the giraffe and the elephant but the elephant was definitely his favorite.  He cried when we left the elephants to visit another animal!  And yes, he can now say elephant. :)  We want to visit the aquarium next.


It seems since I posted that last entry with his vocabulary it's grown almost double!  It's like one day they knew a handful of words and the next day there babbling away!  A lot of new animal words and sounds and definitely more compression in general.  I just did a video yesterday but I'm to lazy to upload it here so you can see my YouTube channel and see it there.  


Recently, Aaron's taken to "playing" with the dog Ulrich, though I'm not sure Ulrich has any idea what's going on.  Aaron runs around chasing him and Ulrich just runs around in circles trying to get away from him!  If Aaron catches up to him, he kind of lightly grabs his back or smacks him gently and then laughs and laughs and runs away!  It's pretty adorable and so far there has been no negative reaction from Sir Ulrich!  

I'm also trying to teach Aaron his first chore!!  (Haha!!  It's really more for the dog and Aaron to build a relationship).  When Ulrich's food bowl is empty, I'll say "Oh-uh!  The doggie's food is all gone!  Do you want to feed the doggie more food?" and Aaron will usually answer "YES!".  So I ask him to get the bowl for me and he picks it up, brings it to me where I'm waiting by the bag of dog food, I fill it up and give it back to Aaron.  I taught Aaron to grab it with both hands and he does, then walks it over to the placemat on the floor, squats and places it in the floor.  Then I tell him what a great job he did and I call the dog over and we both show Ulrich his full food bowl.  So far it's working out well.  I figure this will teach both Aaron and Ulrich a few things.  Now if only I could teach Aaron how to vacuum!  Haha!


Now if you'll excuse me, I've got about 20 minutes of nap time I'm guessing so I'm going to make good use of it!  

18 months - My baby is a toddler!

My Aaronito is 18 months old! Today we had his 18 month check up with the doctor and he's doing great. Aaron weighs 30 lbs exactly and is 32 inches long. We went over diet & nutrition and development.

Aaron pretty much eats everything we eat and now that I've cleared it with doctor that includes shellfish, raw fish and smoked fish/meats. AWESOME! Today we tried real sushi -- he's had a cucumber roll before and he loved it! -- but he wasn't too keen on the texture of the raw fish I think. But then again, it takes most adults awhile to get used to sushi!

He does a lot of baby babble and even likes to sit and "read" his books out loud to himself but he does have a small vocabulary. Aarons' current words are:

Truck (sounds like cock)
Car (Caa -think Boston)
Yes (yesssss)
No (NO no no no no; nonono!; nnno and other various forms)
Mama (usually Mmaaama!)
Dada (DaDa!)
Gaga (we have no idea where he got this word. He uses it for binkie. WE say binkie and he knows what we're referring to, but he says gaga.)
Nina (Neena! -She does the Goodnight Show on the Sprout Network)
Hot (ot - like the H is silent)
Chicka (Caca! -- A bird that does birthdays of the day for The Sprout Network)
Juice (jewwwz)
Cracker (cacker)
Agua (wawa or a-wah. Agua=water en espanol)
Block (again, cock)
Ball (ba-al)
All done or All gone (aah gah)
Elmo (emmo)
Banana (nanana)
Apple (app)

There are a ton of other phrases Aaron uses that Josh and I can understand but aren't really clear to others and has other words that he's just starting to say. Today he said "house" just once while I was reading him a book! His vocabulary is picking up more and more. I really want to get him some flashcards!

We also let him walk a lot more on his own (he hates being in the stroller anyway of course) and today we took him in the stroller from our house to Sam's Sushi which is about 7 blocks away and on the way back he walked the entire way home!

He's definitely developing quickly now. I can't believe he'll be 2 in December! Crazy! :)

Crazy good.