So cute and getting so sure of himself in his body and trying new things. Like climbing up onto things not anchored to the wall…yeah, gotta fix that one.

And this picture is bittersweet. Aidan turns 3 in less than 2 weeks. (He is almost 36 months actual and 33 months if you adjust for his prematurity) But does the picture below look like a 3 year old? DH and I were blown away when I downloaded these from the camera last night. My husband said, “Geez, where did our toddler go? He looks at least 4 in that picture!”

I love you Aidan. You are my daily reminder that life is miraculous and wonderful in ways I could never have imagined before you.

On Tuesday we went to the aquarium.  Aidan was quite excited to see them and was very excited to say hi to Nathan and Preston when they arrived.  All 3 boys are not quite as enthralled with the aquarium as the zoo, but had a really good time nonetheless.

Watching these 3 little guys run around is almost surreal.  To think of how early and small they all were and how close they all came to disastrous outcomes makes me feel so grateful.  These 3 little boys are active, curious toddlers and I dare say that most people would not be able to guess how early they all were.  Almost three years ago when we had overlapping NICU time, I am not sure that Kim, Cecil, Brandon or I would have ever guessed we would be dealing with the amazingly relative normalcy that we are.  Instead of discussing apneas, bradys, vents, NG tubes and the like we are talking about when to start preschool, tantrums, and the like. 

It seems like Aidan is looking more and more like a little boy and less like a toddler every day. Brandon got him a Nike baseball cap last weekend and I was stunned at how old he looks with it on. Here is a shot with him in it and one with his favorite “grandma” Catherine. Oh…and a really cute one where he is trimming Brandon’s toenails. Too funny.

In other news, the hubby and I are getting ready to take our first weekend trip together away from Aidan. My very gracious brother and his wife are watching him for 3 days next weekend. Aidan will be great. He loves his cousins and will probably have the time of his life. Me? I haven’t been this anxious to go on a trip in a long, long time. I can’t wait to get some time alone with Brandon. We are going to Santa Barbara for a friend’s wedding and making a weekend out of it. I can’t even imagine how great it will feel to have some extended one on one time with my better half.

Life is good.  Very, very good.

Here is me leaving for the weekend.

We enjoyed a gorgeous sunny weekend in the 80’s/90’s over in central Washington.  We did a little shopping, a little (ok…a lot) of drinking and a lot of just catching up and getting to just be ourselves and forget for a while that we are moms.

Her boyfriend took us out on his boat. 

Here we are enjoying a few pina coladas.

Then we stopped for a nice dinner at a restaurant overlooking the water and had some rum barrels. 

I had a wonderfully relaxing time and I am so glad I did it!

Meanwhile…over in Seattle, my boys had their first weekend without mom.  They had a blast of course!  They went to a makeup class at Little Gym, hit golf balls, watched the Blue Angels practice and went to Red Robin.  On Sunday, they went to a Mariner’s game.  Brandon got Aidan his first baseball jersey to commemorate the event.

Aidan was in love with the sights and sounds, but got tired and decided to doze for a little bit out in the summer sun.

After the game, the Mariner’s were doing an annual event where your child can run around the bases and go out into the outfield for a bit.

Here they are out in the outfield near Ichiro’s outfield post.

He loved running around the bases!  Can you tell? He finished off by doing a huge jump onto home plate.

A wonderful weekend had by all!

Are you ready for this one?  I was foolish enough to believe that we were somehow going to get lucky and pass this all by.  People would regale me with stories of horrible behavior and screaming fits and I felt lucky.  My kid is developing wonderfully but has had the most pleasant disposition of any two year old I know.  Now, not for a moment did I believe this had anything to do with parental skill…I just believed that maybe somehow we were being spared the terrible twos after all we had been through with Aidan’s start.

It has begun.  It is like somebody flipped a switch this week.  If something can possibly be done by Aidan and I do it…hell will be raised.  “Do IT MYself!!!”  If I can’t seem to anticipate his every desire, hell will be raised.  He asked me for crackers yesterday.  I grabbed the goldfish crackers and was greeted with “AAAAAGGGGGHHHH!!!! NO!!!”  and him pointing furiously to the cabinet.  I asked what he wanted.  In an exasperated, tantruming scream he yelled, “Brown crackers!”   One other day this week, he was throwing a fit and I told him to go in his room and he could come out when he was done.  As I put chicken into a marinade for dinner, I listened to him over the baby monitor.  He was screaming and tantruming and then I heard him throw a few toys!  I was half shocked and half amused.  I am glad he didn’t see me, because I had a little smile on my face.  I am not sure why some of this is funny.  He emerged almost five minutes later, red-faced and head down.  I asked him if he was done.  He gave me a quick nod.  I asked him if he had anything to say to me.  He mumbles “I sorry.”  And it was over.  But I am quite sure this is only a precursor of what is coming.

I suddenly feel that maybe I am not cut out for this.  Do I really have the skills to parent him through this stage?

In checking with my friends, over half of them laughed and then said, “Oh, 2 wasn’t bad.  Age 3 was ridiculous!”  Why had nobody told me this?  I guess I can find comfort in the fact that my son is doing developmentally appropriate things. 

This new tyrant child has also brought quite an appetite along with him.  I am astounded at how much food this child is eating this week!  Today, I made him a ham and cheese sandwich for lunch.  Granted, only a half sandwich, but he had already had a bunch of cheese and crackers.  I left the table for 2 minutes to put laundry from the washer into the dryer and his sandwich was GONE!  Then he asked me for a cookie.  I am thinking we are about to get yet another growth spurt.  This kid is going to be so darn tall.  He is already over 40″ tall.  He is taller than every child in his Little Gym class and some of them are a good half year older than him!

I decided I am feeling a little Mama Burnout.  I have only ever had one night away from my son in his whole life.  So I am going to take a break and recoup.   I am going away next weekend to visit my oldest friend (we met freshman year in college).  It will be my first weekend of leaving my two boys home alone together.  They will have a great time, I am sure.  It will allow me to rest up, take stock of what I have accomplished in nearly 3 years of parenting, and steel myself for the test of wills.  Of course it will also allow Lisa and I to talk, reminisce, and of course do some drinking.  Don’t all old college buddies drink when they get together? 

 This is the explanation of the MPAA’s PG13 rating for movies.  After what I witnessed on Sunday, I think perhaps we should develop a new rating system to try to figure out which parents need the guidance. 

I went to see “The Dark Knight” with a friend of mine on Sunday evening.  If you like this kind of movie, it was really pretty good.  Heath Ledger’s performance was all it has been hyped to be and even better.  It is a VERY dark movie, and his portrayal of The Joker really crawled inside my head at times.  There were even a few times I leapt out of my chair a bit or turned my head for a moment.  I am a wimp.

The movie was about 3/4 of the way through when my friend and I both looked at each other at the same instant.  Had we really heard what we thought we just heard?  Yup.  The soft little yelp of a scared little girl.  My friend and I both noticed parents about 5 rows below us with two small children sitting on their laps.  The girl could not have been more than 5 and the boy 6 or 7!  Every few moments the kids would turn their heads into mom or dad’s chest during a scary moment. 

I found it difficult to enjoy the rest of the movie, because I was really concerned for these kids.  I can only imagine the nightmares these children are going to have.

I have noticed we seem to get all up in arms generally as a society when nudity is seen by our young children, but violence seems to be less of an issue.  Upon examination, if I was forced to choose between showing my young child nudity or graphic violence…well, there is no contest.  I think graphic violence shapes so much in a young child.   At least nudity is “natural” (plastic surgery aside…:-)), and someday he is likely to encounter the nude feminine form.  (A LONG, LONG time from now Aidan buddy….like 25 years or so!)

I felt really disturbed when I saw these kids at the movie.  The little girl, so obviously scared…that image will be with me for a while.   For those of you that have seen this movie…is there any way you would take a child of 5 or 6 years to see it?  Am I the one losing my mind?

So I had a feeling that staying down for a nap might be a bit of a challenge yesterday.  I laid down next to him in his bed and tried to get him to drift off.  I thought he was getting close and closed my own eyes pretending to be asleep in hopes of reinforcing the nap.

Suddenly, I felt a soft little hand on my cheek rubbing it ever so slightly.  I opened my eyes and Aidan was staring at me with his sweet little face only inches from mine.  I smiled and he rubbed my cheek again and said, “I love you.”  Then he closed his eyes and drifted off.

I laid there for about five minutes before I got up and attended to all the naptime chores calling me.  I had tears of joy streaked across my face.  This is the kind of moment that I know will be with me forever.  It is a moment when I know that being his mom is the best thing I’ve ever done. 

I love you too, bub.  More than anything.

My dear husband was there to help me.  He took a sick day at work and told me he was going to let me rest and try to beat whatever had hit me and he would spend the day with Aidan.  What a great hubby!  It was a gorgeous day here yesterday.  Sunny, not a cloud in the sky and highs in the upper 70’s. 

A couple of months ago I bought a membership to Woodland Park Zoo because Aidan is in love with going to the zoo right now.  Brandon hadn’t been to the zoo with Aidan since the summer of 2006. 

Brandon decided that if he was going to hang out with his son and “play hooky” from work, then he might as well do something fun.  So he and Aidan took off for the zoo. 

They had a wonderful time…as evidenced by the great pictures and my son’s nonstop descriptions of everything they did. 

Aidan and I have somehow always missed the giraffe’s feeding time.  For about an hour each morning, you can pay $5 to go up to an elevated platform and feed the giraffes leaves.  Aidan could NOT stop talking about this.  Brandon said he was not at all scared and was in fact smiling from ear to ear and giggling as the giraffe’s long tongue would wrap around his fingers and take the leaves.

Brandon came in around 1:30 or so with Aidan passed out on him and laid him down for his nap.  Then Brandon came in and excitedly told me about everything they had done and how Aidan knew the name and noise for every animal they saw.  Then he told me about Aidan climbing up a spiral ladder inside a play area of the zoo called Zoomanium.  Brandon said Aidan took off, and he went running after him certain that the ladder would be too difficult for a child under 3.  But Aidan did it all by himself.  He came whizzing down the slide saying “I did it” and he was so proud of himself.  It was then that I noticed my husband had a tear of pride in the corner of his eye.  My husband is the best.  I got teary eyed too.  Aidan woke up a couple of hours later filled with stories about the day. 

What a great sick day. 

Is it obvious he had fun?

And lastly, a lovely picture of him quietly taking it all in.

His language is expanding in crazy fashion every day.  There are now several books that he knows so well, he can sit down and tell us the story.  He has a discriminating eye for things.  He can actually tell the difference between a picture of a hippopotamus and a rhinoceros. 

Here he is a couple of weeks ago making cookies with Dad.  He loves being our helper.  He has also entered the phase where he wants to do as much as humanly possible “by himself”. 

This next picture was something I should have expected with his adventurous nature and climbing ability, but I really didn’t see it coming. I was in the kitchen getting him a snack and he was talking about the pictures on the wall. I turned around to see this:

Yeah. Up on the table. Didn’t think a thing of it. Too funny.

And lastly, tonight’s bath was just so much fun. He is coming out of his week long stomach flu and was in a great mood tonight. I caught these photos in the bath. So beautiful. Sorry, I know I have NO objectivity.

So we had really strict rules about Aidan’s exposure.  He was on oxygen from when he came home to mid May.  He was receiving monthly shots of Synagis to help him weather the effects of RSV a little better if he contracted it.  This vaccine was not a preventative vaccine, but rather one that hopefully minimizes the ill effects of RSV.  The only places I think I took Aidan for his first few months of life were his pediatrician for check-ups and Synagis shots, his pulmonologist a couple of times, and physical therapy. 

Some people reading this may be really wondering about how germ crazy we were.  I know it sounds nuts to those that have not been there.  But in all seriousness, we were told in no uncertain terms that babies like Aidan can be put back on a ventilator or possibly die from RSV.  Exposure to other children in these times was out of the question.  Kids simply carry way too many germs, and the ones they do carry are usually more virulent than ones adults carry.

We didn’t go to anybody else’s house and anybody that came to ours had to be germ free for at least 7-10 days and nobody in their house could currently be ill.  Then, upon arrival, they were greeted and taken to the sink to wash their hands.  Hand sanitizer was in abundance and our guests (for the most part) seemed understanding about our restrictions.

In the summer, we could be more relaxed.  Kind of.  Aidan got his first bad cold in June of that year and had been off oxygen for about a month.  Here we were, in summer, and it was bad.  A couple of ER trips, some breathing treatments, and eventually a few day hospital stay with some oral steroids and oxygen.  At this point his pediatrician put Aidan on Flovent to “keep his lungs in check” and help him be better able to weather a cold without steroids and oxygen.  It worked.  Aidan got a couple of colds that summer and needed some breathing treatments, but no oral steroids, no hospital visits, and no oxygen.

Then in October of 2006 we went on lockdown again.  Aidan’s birthweight, gestation at birth, and lungs meant one more winter of Synagis and one more winter of being a little isolationist.  Aidan did get several colds that winter, but managed them all pretty well.

By May of 2007, I was really tired of being isolated and Aidan’s pulmonologist had discharged us!  I could hardly believe it.  She said Aidan’s lungs look “great” and she had no reason to see us.  She said his growth had helped him tremendously.  We had been expecting to see her for at least a couple more years.  Finally we got the OK to join a playgroup.  Aidan got lots of colds from this, but I figured it was par for the course since he had not had much germ exposure.  We have continued in the gym style playgroup to this day.  This winter I added an inflatable play place to the repertoire, so that we are doing social things with kids his age at least twice a week.

 The double edged sword is this.  The very behavior that kept Aidan and his lungs protected is what is doing us in now.  He is getting a lot of germ exposure that other kids his age already have degrees of immunity to.  So he is in this mode where he will be sick for a few days, well for a few days or a week or two, and then get something again.

 This time it’s a doozy of a stomach bug.  He is going on 5 days of runny you-know-what.  Actually runny is being complimentary.  I’d say “gushing” is more apt.  The poor little bug has a constant fever cycling between about 101 at good points in the day to 103-104 at the bad ones.  He is handling it like a champ though.  If I had spent the last few days sweating through my pajamas and having….err…no control, I would be in a foul mood.  But he just seems interested in being loved and getting cuddles. 

He is taking his first nap in 5 days where he is not attached to me.  I feel like I have temporarily shed my tumor. 

The positive things I take from all of this?

1.  Aidan is really strong now.  Sure he gets some illnesses, but he bounces back like a champ.  It is wonderful to see his immune system doing its job!

2.  I get a break from chasing him! 

3.  This doesn’t rattle me anymore.  That is seriously a great feeling.  It doesn’t rattle me to see him get sick.  Sure, I don’t like it.  But I don’t feel that crazy, gnawing fear in the pit of my stomach anymore. 

In fact, dare I say, I have become downright relaxed.  About 3 weeks ago, we all went to a local pizza place.  THE best pizza EVER!  There was a play table with a lego train set on it and a Fisher Price garage.  Do you know that Aidan was playing with that thing for over 10 minutes before my husband complimented me on how relaxed I was about the (probably never cleaned off) toys.  And you know what?  I hadn’t thought about it!  Maybe that makes me crazy.  Or maybe I am finally getting some sanity and peace.