Sweet and Sour

At 2.5 years old, Aiden can be the sweetest little angel in one moment and then turn into a handful unpleasant toddler next moment. Daddy is out on business trip to Chicago this whole week. Aiden was really sweet and nice last night. First we ate dinner and then he started to play his 24-pieces of Thomas train puzzle on his own while Mom was cleaning up. He did two sets of 24-pieces of puzzle all by himself. He did another set with Mommy watching him but no help. Then Mom and Aiden played Mr. Potato head for a little bit. Then we were off to his room to play Thomas trains on train table. Mommy fell asleep on Aiden's bed while Aiden was playing train and felt Aiden covered Mommy with a corner of his blanket and said "Good night, Mommy". So sweet!! Then Aiden had bath and book reading and off to bed. There was a small hitch during book reading since Daddy wanted to talk to Aiden on the phone. Daddy mentioned he wished he was there to tuck him in bed and thought Aiden wouldn't understand it but he did and immediately he was sad with tons of tears. So Mom had to distract him with Thomas book and had to sing quite a few songs before bed. But it was still lovely evening. Then this morning, he woke up with nice mood and wanted to watch Thomas while Mom was getting ready. So he did, then he wanted to do puzzle again, but Mom told him no and we would do it in the evening since we had to leave for daycare and work. Then he immediately got mad, stomped his feet hard on the floor, had fist and meanwhile said "I don't like that!!" very madly. But Mom still had to take him to bathroom getting tooth brushed and face washed (he hates both!!) and he got really mad and started throwing more tantrum so Mom had to leave him in the corner for time out. He wouldn't stay still at first, then started screaming. Mom told him she was leaving and asked him to say sorry. So he finally did, got in the car and got on the carseat and started reading his Thomas yearbook happily during the ride. What a difference compared to last night? Sunny one moment and stormy next moment. Typical toddler.

Sunday Morning at Children's Museum

We went to children's museum this morning since there was a new frog exhibit. As always, Aiden loves Thomas train table even though he already has one at home. He found some new trains though such as his favorite blue train - Gordon. He also likes to look for the frogs even though some were really difficult to find due to the color protection. Mr. potato head is one of his activities there too. The only disappointment is the carousel was not in operation due to annual maintenance. But he did play a big dinosaur puzzle with Mommy and Daddy's help.

Concentrate on Mr. potato head

Aiden's New Soccer Session - Cottontail

We signed up Aiden for soccer in Thumper group (2-3) this summer. He was doing good when it came to activities he liked such as kicking balls, building cone towers, chasing bubbles etc. But when it came to warm up, he didn't really follow the instructions quite well. I decided to sign him up in cottontail group (2.5-3.5) for the fall session since I saw they had much more ball activities than the Thumper group and he might do better with older kids around and was hoping he would follow instructions better after seeing older kids. Today was his first class and we even got the whole soccer outfits. He was definitely one of the few youngest kids in that group and luckily we found Zach from his daycare room was in the same group even though they weren't really interacting with each other. Aiden actually did fairly well in this group since there were more challenging activities and he could kick the ball more than previous group. He did have a few moments when he just wandered off but overall it was better session for him.

Yummy Cookie

Aiden has sweet teeth just like Dad. He loves the cookie with icing on it and he usually licks off the icing first before he takes bite of cookie. He even sang the happy birthday song today when he saw the cookie and when daddy was trying to take pictures of his after-cookie face, he said cheese on his own.

Apple Picking

After a HOT Saturday (98 F) and warm Sunday, we finally have a cool Monday for Labor Day weekend. We found a farm and orchard close to home and decided to take Aiden to his 3rd apple picking. Once we got there, he couldn't wait to get those delicious apples off the tree. But after he pulled off a couple, he found a bug on one and then kept saying yucky! We still picked up about 6lbs apples including honey crisp, Molly delicious, swiss gourmet and gingergold.

1. Checking out the orchard


2. I got two apples


3. Is this apple good?



4. Look at all those delicious apples


5. Mom, look at what I got


6. Put the apple in the bag


7. Just hanging out



8. On the playground in the orchard

$50 Thomas Train Set Fun

Daddy got a really good deal from Goodwill. It was Thomas and friends wooden train set with train table for $50. It comes with so many tracks and decorations including trees, hospital, service center, carousel, Sodor Honey Bee Station) and two Thomas trains, Percy, boat, fuel truck, coal cart, milk truck and some caboose. Aiden has so much fun with the train set and keeps saying "Happy Birthday". I guess this is the coolest gift ever. Daddy was taking some pictures of train set and Aiden said "cheese" and probably thought Daddy was going to take his picture as well.
1. Accessories


2. Aiden with new train set, very happy


3. Aiden plays with new train set

Fireman

Aiden got a plastic fireman hat from Indiana State Fair and he's been having fun putting on his and Daddy's head.

Transition to EPS II

Monday is Aiden's first day in early preschool II room (2.5 to 3 years old). The dropoff wasn't easy after 3 days weekend with Mom and Daddy plus a lot of fun in the state fair. As soon as I opened the door, he saw new teachers and he immediately turned to me and wanted to be picked up. So I picked him up and he hid his face on my shoulder and grasped me really tight. Then I handed him over to the teacher and from there, he went to a full-force crying and kicking and trying to get off her. So I gave him a hug and told him I would pick him up later, but he just wasn't listening, instead he regrasped me and cried "Mommy, Mommy" with so many tears on his face. It was quite hard for me to walk out. During the pick-up, I asked the teacher how long he cried and she told me he cried for 45 minutes. That is all-time record long. Teacher said he finally calmed down after his best friend David came in and after that, he was completely fine, playing good, nap for a LONG time (2.5 hours, probably exhausted from crying) and potty during every change of diaper.
Update: today is second day in new room. When we walked past his old room, he stopped and pointed at the door and told me "this way". But I told him that he needed to go to next door and he started whining. I opened the new room door and his whining got worse and then changed to cry after I hung his bag and ready to leave. The teacher who was playing puppet show took him and put him on her lap and he was still crying. After a brief goodbye, I walked out and peeked at him and he stopped crying after a few minutes. So quite a bit improvement in terms of duration of crying compared to yesterday. I think his mind has been set that he belongs to previous room and he has got so comfortable with his previous two teachers after 10 months. Hopefully he will make new friends soon and stop crying soon.
Wednesday update: went straight to his room, a little clingy to my legs, but then sat down for circle time and no crying. Whoohoo!

Aiden's Songs

Lately, Aiden has been really enjoying singing songs he has learned. He can sing five songs now: ABC song, Twinkle Twinkle little star, Bah Bah Black Sheep, Are You Sleeping Brother John and Happy Birthday. I wish I could record them, but most of time, he sings them during the car ride between home and daycare. For ABC song, he pretty much can sing the whole thing except the last part, he does "next time .... sing with me" and will follow the tune for the parts he doesn't know the words to make it sound like he knows them. And his all-time favoriate is also ABC song. Just recently, if you try to sing along with him, he will tell you "No, it is Aiden's turn". He also likes to sing along during the cartoon show like Mickey mouse clubhouse, wonder pets etc and if he really likes the music, he will move his head up and down or from side to side for his version of dance.

Indiana State Fair

We finally made it to the last day of Indiana State Fair. This is Aiden's third year to the state fair even though he is only 2.5 years old. But this is definitely the year he enjoyed the fair most. He liked to ride all kinds of machines - firetruck, tractors, lawn mower, Bobcat jeep. He liked to watch the dog show especially when the dog got on the teeter totter. He liked to ride on the carousel and the horse he rode even went up and down. He told Dad to find his own horse to ride since he didn't want Dad to hold him on his side. We were going to do the car ride but big storm was approaching and we had to leave the fair. And of course he liked to play with water since it was really warm day. Next year, we will have to do more rides as he showed so much interest for the rides this year.

1. Ride on the old firetruck


2. Not so much into the hat though


3. Mommy, take me away from the big pumpkin


4. Tractor ride



5. Lawn mower ride


6. Bobcat jeep ride


7. Play with tractor



8. Waiting in line for carousel ride


9. Riding the carousel

Chocolate Cookie Face

After the soccer practice, we stopped by Carmel farmer market to look around and we bought some homemade delicious chocolate cookie. Aiden ate the whole cookie and he definitely loved it. Check out his chocolate cookie face.

1. Saying "Cheese"


2. Looks like a cat

Waiting for Beach Time in Hotel Room

Grandma Zeigler sent me a good picture of Aiden taken in the hotel room. He was so ready to go to beach with his new "Cars" backpack and very excited about it as you can see from the picture. It is not that easy to get a picture of Aiden with a big smile on his face.

Last Day of Beach Vacation

We were planning to visit Grand Haven, Michigan for the last day of vacation. But the weather wasn't doing us a favor. We woke up with rain so we just drove around the town of Grand Haven and beach. Then we headed to Lake Mall to kill some time. It turned out to be a good morning for Aiden. He rode the train and played in the playland inside the mall. After that, we headed back to hotel for nap time. When he woke up from nap, the sun started breaking through the clouds and of course we couldn't miss the beach for the last day!
1. ride the train

2. crawl out of the light house

3. cross the bridge

4. More beach time

Playing Sand and Water

We got Aiden a Thomas train beach playset for his first b-day, but we never really had chance to play with them. Aiden didn' know what those trains were used for. But this time, he enjoyed so much making sand trains with the mold. Sometimes he didn't really know he needed wet sand to make train, instead he filled his mold with dry sand and of course when he tried to put it down, everything fell apart and he kept asking "what happened". Mom asked him to use bucket to bring some water to wet the sand so that we could make more trains. Aiden made so many trains on the sand and had a lot of fun. He also loved to kick the beach ball.
1. Digging sand

2. First sand train

3. Fill mold with sand using shovel

4. Pat the sand

5. Turn the train mold

6. Aiden's work (with some help from Mom)

7. Pour water into the sand castle

8. Run away from wave

9. Just look around

10. Beach Soccer