This is the recurring theme of the last few days. This must be about the age that kids’ imaginations really start to go wild. I guess it is a good sign that we are hearing lots of stuff about him being scared of monsters in the potty. At least his imagination is working. ;-)
I have seen a LOT more pretend play in Aidan lately. Last week his Fisher Price Little People farmer was milking the cow and combing the sheep’s hair. So I carried the idea onto the other farm animals. We had the farmer ride the horse and went up to get eggs from the rooster (yes…I know roosters don’t lay eggs, but he is only 2 1/2…cut the boy a break!). Then we got to the pig. I paused and chuckled to myself. What to tell him about the pig? So we did half the story…the farmer fed the pig. He doesn’t need all the details quite yet!
He is also showing every possible sign of potty training readiness except lack of fear. He has had very verbose expressions of fear about the potty over the last 2 weeks so we are just backing off and letting him decide. Last night he came running out of his bedroom crying and telling us of his bad dream about the monsters in the potty. He declared, “I scared of the potty. Monsters in the potty.”
Awww…poor little man. Time for some snuggles on Daddy. He will keep you safe, bub.
Somehow at the end of last summer, Aidan’s baseball tee got broken and we didn’t bother replacing it over the winter. I just went out this weekend and got him a new one. Not thinking he would have major league skills, we were letting him have at it inside. Check out the video. It is about 40 seconds and about midway through he really drills a couple and catches Mommy really off guard.
Oh…and do let it run until the end. In the last few seconds he can be heard saying “Love you” to me. I will keep this video forever.
You know the jingle. :-) Aidan was having an afternoon snack just now and it occurred to me that he should be able to dunk his Oreos just like we do. So I poured some of his milk from his sippy cup into a regular glass and let him at it. He was great at dunking! He did decide that one cookie deserved a full dunk!
Then something completely unplanned and unexpected happened. Aidan put both his hands around the glass and drank perfectly from it! I was so glad I had decided to take a picture of his dunking adventure and had the camera for this occasion!
I successfully stifled anything inside me that was worrying about a mess or a broken glass and just enjoyed watching him. He was actually quite masterful.
Aidan, thanks for yet another reminder of why I love being your mom.
This is one of those areas that a first time parent really questions, I think. Is my child ready to be potty trained? I think Aidan is exhibiting a lot of signs, but feel really unsure of how to proceed.
He has been able to tell us for a while now when he is going. He has been searching out a private place to have bowel movements for a while as well. In just the last week, he now goes into his room and shuts the door to do it. We stayed at a hotel for my sister’s college graduation last weekend and he seemed very fearful of the force and loudness of that particular toilet’s flushing.
He is doing LOTS of emulating Brandon. He wants his hair like Daddy, he is constantly putting on Brandon’s shoes, and last week started putting Brandon’s belt around his waist when Brandon comes home from work and changes.
So I see the opportunity, but I just don’t know how hard to push it. He has had a potty chair in his bathroom for a while but hasn’t really tried it out much. Our friend Catherine suggested that maybe if he is so into emulating Daddy, that one of those kid seats that you put on the regular toilet is a better option.
So, we now have both. This morning he wanted to try to sit on the kid seat for a few minutes, but nothing happened. He didn’t seem scared, but he just talked A LOT about the toilet. How the potty gets flushed down the hole and such.
Ok, moms…how should I handle this? Slow and easy and let him guide or try to give him more of a push toward it?
Watching Aidan’s development is absolutely fascinating to me. I had always heard that development happens in spurts but had never really witnessed it firsthand before. Aidan is currently experiencing several developmental leaps right now.
He is starting to pick up phonics. He is only 2 1/2. My husband and his mother could both read a bit at age 3, so perhaps this shouldn’t be that surprising to me. We have a couple of wonderful Leapfrog phonics toys. A Leapfrog Phonics Bus and a Word Whammer. I LOVE these toys! He has started to associate sounds with about half of his letters. It is so cute to hear him say “D says duh” and the like. Over the last couple of days he has learned to spell “MOM” and “DAD” on the Word Whammer.
Yesterday at Little Gym and today at Pump It Up, he was noticeably more engaged with the other kids. It is still normal for kids this age to do mostly parallel play, but I have really noticed him actually engaging other children more just this week. It is so much fun to watch this.
And a couple of posts ago, I spoke about him climbing. Wow! Today at Pump It Up, I turned around inside one of the inflatables, and he was climbing up the “ladder” to the top of the slide completely without me. He had no fear. When I saw him doing it by himself, I had to squelch the part of me that wanted to run up behind him and follow him up like I have always done. He climbed all the way up and came down by himself. He was so proud and started clapping. He went up and down all by himself at least 5 more times and we had a blast!
On the way home, he was asking for french fries. Normally I will stop and get him some fries at McDonalds after our Wednesday outing to Pump It Up. (I know…bad mama. He doesn’t eat fast food much at all and has never had a sip of soda! There…I feel better now. :-)) I got him a cheeseburger (I thought I’d give it a try) and took the meal home. He sat up and had almost all the fries and about 1/3 of the cheeseburger!!! Meats have been a sticking point for Aidan. He has tended not to know what to do with them so he chews and chews and then there is like a meat paste left in his mouth. But he really ate this cheeseburger! He has been doing this with more and more foods lately. Perhaps because he has all his 2 year molars?
I sat there watching him and felt a tidal wave wash over me. I didn’t even recognize what I was feeling at first.
I felt normal.
It was really the first time I can actually really remember feeling normal deep into my core in almost 3 years. Sure I have had moments of normal here and there…but never really a moment where I didn’t find myself thinking something about his preemiehood. For a while this morning I forgot he was a preemie. I just saw my son.
I loved this morning. I love feeling normal. But most of all, I love my amazing son.
Aidan has become fascinated with trying on and trying to walk in our shoes. Particularly Daddy’s size 13 shoes. It is quite a sight.
He and Daphne (the female cat of our sibling pair) are becoming quite close. She has always tolerated so much from Aidan, but she is really starting to seek him out more and more. Here they are cuddling. I can’t believe she likes him laying on her!
Aidan has been climbing EVERYTHING lately. He is climbing up onto barstool height chairs with ease, up onto windowsills, onto our very tall bed, and many others.
And this is what greeted me this morning as I heard him shouting, “Mama come look!”
After seeing Aidan’s interest in climbing growing last week while she was here visiting, my mother in law told me a story about finding my husband up on top of the refrigerator when he was only a couple of months older than Aidan is right now. I love cute little stories about the childhood antics of my husband. Really, I do. Hearing that not so funny little tale made me realize that just when I thought I could let down my guard, that Aidan’s curiosity and skills are about to give me another reason to stay vigilant.
I guess this is the dance of parenting. Your child gains independence doing something, you start to trust him and let down your guard. Then he starts trying new (sometimes dangerous) things and pulls you back in.
Much as I hate to admit it, seeing him try things like this makes me proud. Everything this kiddo has been through doesn’t stop him from exploring and trying new things. He…is…amazing.
I came home from a girlfriend’s baby shower last Sunday to find this:
My own variety of “baby” shower! We have hit the point in his toddlerhood where he does something almost everyday that makes me stop and think of how fast he is growing up. That day it was asking Daddy if he could “take a quick shower like Daddy.” So cute I wanna eat him up!
Does it sound a bit self-congratulatory to say that I think everything we have been through with Aidan’s premature beginning have made me appreciate all of his accomplishments more than I might have? I guess I can never be sure since I have no comparison. But there is a wonderful flood of pride that fills me whenever I see Aidan learning a new skill. I am humbled when I think of the odds that were stacked against him on the day he was born and where he is today.
And a great video I captured! Sorry for the proud mom screaming in the background and the shaky footage near the end! I thought I had hit stop! This video of Aidan playing with his cats was too priceless not to post! Enjoy!
It is so cliche but so true. This child is growing up so fast. I remember hearing stories from my parents that it seemed like everytime they blinked we had grown again. I am finding out this is more true than not. We had a gorgeous (out of the ordinary) spring day here Saturday where it reached 80 degrees in some spots! I decided to take Aidan down to some kiddie play fountains at a local outdoor shopping center to have the first splashy fun of the season.
As I watched him join right in with the other children, I thought about our other trips to that fountain. The first summer when he was just learning to sit well and the second when he had only been walking a few months and was very unsure of his footing.
Saturday I watched him run to the fountains with reckless abandon and begin splashing himself and playing splashing games with other kids there. When I came home I dug out the photos from his first summer (2006) and last summer (2007)to compare.
Summer 2006
Summer 2007
This Saturday (April 2008)
And yes, his resistance to leaving the fountains has grown in proportion to the rest of his growth! It was not pretty when it was time to go. I love watching him have so much fun outside. I just wish we had more days like this one.
We had a couple of beautiful spring days in Seattle last week. Wednesday and Thursday were sunny with temperatures in the high 50’s. These are the days that we Seattleites wait for earnestly for months.
I got an email on Wednesday evening from Kim, mom to Nathan and Preston, saying she was going to take the boys to the zoo the next day and wanting to know if we would join them. Nathan and Preston were across the hall from Aidan while we were in the NICU. Nathan and Preston are fraternal twins born at 30 weeks weighing in around 2lb 12 oz and 2lb 14 oz. They are about a month or so older than Aidan and are great kids.
We went to Woodland Park Zoo…just an amazing zoo! We had not been since Aidan was a little less than a year old. What an experience!!! We spent 3 hours there and all the boys had a blast! It was so amazing to see these 3 former preemies running around together, laughing, chatting…just being boys!
It was great to see the independent streak of all the boys showing itself as we walked from one animal to the next. We would put them in the strollers but not buckle them up because it wasn’t worth the hassle to unbuckle them 60 seconds later. Pretty soon the boys all figured out they weren’t buckled in and as soon as they saw the next animal exhibit coming would all bolt out of the strollers and start running toward the glass or bars.
The boys watching the hippos:
Playing on the monkey and elephant statues:
The 3 boys from behind watching the lion put on a roaring display (from left…Aidan,Nathan, Preston). It was quite something. This male lion roared for almost a minute. It was so cute to see all 3 boys so fascinated by the lion and all saying “Lion. ROAR!!!”
And finally, a picture I think I should really email to the NICU they all were in. I think they would love to see the 3 boys together having so much fun!
