The Many, Many Sides of Aidan

Aidan,

Your Mom and I love how complicated you are. You are into bugs and getting dirty and muddy, but you hate for your clothes to be wet (one drop of water may make you want to strip nekked, rather than be slightly wet). You love to be rough and tumbly, but are also super sensitive and love beautiful things like nail polish, girls, beautiful walking, and flowers...always flowers.

You stop to smell the roses, literally, and can be very introspective; but you are also very very silly.

Two recent memorable conversations really help illuminate some of the many sides of you.

The other day you and I had a conversation that went something like this:

Me: Aidan, how was your day at school?

Aidan: Poo-poo.

Me: Come on! How was school?

Aidan: Poo-poo.

Me: Okay okay...with NO poo-poos, how was school.

You stopped to think. A long-ish thoughtful silence. A cheeky grin emerged.

 Aidan: Pee-pee!

See? Silly, clever, and hilarious! (though your mother has trained me not to laugh too hard at such 'potty humor'...but it was a very nice loophole you found, and that deserved and got a huge laugh.)

This situation quickly turned into a crazy tickle-and-laugh festival.

But, this morning you were much more thoughtful.

I recently found this long-lost magnet under the oven and plopped it up on the dishwasher. 

It's a Picasso painting called "The Old Guitarist"...and we have it in Magnet form!

I was getting ready to leave for work for the day when you took me by the hand and said "Dad, come here! I have to show you something!" We walked hand-in-hand to the dishwasher, where you sat down and I crouched down next to you.

You pointed at the magnet and tried to collect your thoughts, which were clearly very big, as it took you a few moments to say what you wanted to say.

Aidan: "Dad, see? When you get older and older and you will play the guitar like this. You have a beard, and you look like a grandpa. And you'll play the guitar."

Pretty deep right? You weren't necessarily concerned about me being old and playing guitar, but you were definitely very pensive about it; you'd been studying this magnet for a while and wanted to show me. Even your sister's interjection (Julia: "When I get older, I'll be a skeleton!") just further complicated your thoughts... 

Aidan: "Mom will you be a skeleton too?"

But then, the deep thoughts quickly evaporated and turned into what you both wanted to be for Halloween (there was talk of ghosts, skeletons, princesses and snow monsters).

But the depth of your thoughts just amazed me.

I love how multi-faceted and darn right human you are. There are many sides to you, and I never want you to shy away from showing us any of them. You can always share your silliness and pensiveness, fragility and strength with us my son. 

But, judging from the photos I found on my phone after your 'session' with it, I don't think we have to worry about you not revealing your many, many sides any time soon.

I love your happy side, and your sad side; your silly side and your sad side. Even when I'm an old white-bearded skeleton man, I'll always be happy to sit with you- with or without guitar- and just listen to your thoughts.

I love you, my son.

Conversations...

Julia, Aidan,

 Listening to the two of talk to each other is inspiring, hilarious, heart-felt, lovely, and makes your mother and me so proud...no matter the subject area.

You are really good friends, and hearing you relate to each other verbally kinda like little grown ups is really a huge treat and hugely rewarding.

We love that you're buddies; we love that you communicate; and we love you!

Here's a loosely transcribed interlude from the other morning:

<Interior- Bathroom. Morning>

J: I am pooping.

A: Big or small?

J: Big!

Daddy: Aidan, do you need to go potty too?

A: Yes, but I have to wait my turn. You going to work?

Daddy: Yes... to earn that monay!

J: Money? That makes you sick!

A: Yeah, that makes you sick. We don’t eat it.

J: Will you tell us a story about Frozen?

A: How about Star Wars? You’ll be Luke Skywalker, and I’ll be Darth Vader

J: I wanna be the princess.

A: How about, I am Jabba the Hut, you are Jabba the Hut, and you are Jabba the Hut.

J: No I wanna be the princess only!

Daddy: What about Preston? Can he be Chewbacca?

A: Yeah! And what about Toby? 

Daddy: How about R2D2?

A: No….. he is Jabba the Hut!

Daddy: What about mommy? Can she be Han Solo?

J and A: Yeah!

Here's another amazing example, which I was fortunate enough to catch on video:

The truth of the matter is, that you both just love each other very much...

Julia puts on princess costume: Aidan, will you kiss me now?

<long silence. Aidan thinking>

Aidan: Wait a second, I think I need to get my costume.

Aidan puts on costume.

<kiss>

News from the Progeny Poop Chute

Big News delivered to me from your Mom via email today:

"Guess what? We had our first real TURD this morning! It was so small, very easy clean up ;) Also, when I went to change his pjs, I noticed that one of his feet was sobbing wet....he is eating his feet! Very cute :)"

We've been waiting for this moment, son. All those solid foods- which you continue to adore- have finall made a big difference in the diaper department, and not just subtle changes in texture, consistency or color. A turd, a real turd! I can't believe I was at work and missed this monumental moment!

Of course, it's cute that you're now starting to eat your own feet.

And of course, you had your first Rosh Hashana dinner at Mimi and Pops.

Of course, you survived a tornado striking down in Dallas (waaaaaaaay far away from our house, but scary nonetheless).

Of course you're almost crawled last night and of course we got you an awesome walker to play in and busted out the old bouncy exersaucer thing.

Of course you're now really up on your hands and knees instead of your knees and forearms.

And who can forget the great reaction when Mimi and Pops gave you a bear named "Caleb B. Beanster" dressed in jingoistic overalls and you squealed with delight!

And who can forget when

Preston licked your belly and you petted him and grabbed his leg and also squealed with delight.

And who can forget when you were so tired that you were crying as I was feeding you dinner...but only cried between bites?

But the number 1 news of the day has to be number 2 news: My big boy made a turd!

I'm so proud of you!

There are no pictures of said turd.

But, here is a great picture your Mom and you sent me one day when I was at the office (as compared to a very similar picture from when you were super tiny)...look how big you are now!

Old Faithful

Your Uncle Joe recently asked us what we did for St. Patrick's day.

I told him that your Mom and I did nothing, but that you celebrated by wearing green, peeing and pooping yourself and throwing up a lot, since that seemed to be how most people celebrate the day.

(that's funny on several levels, trust me)

But, it's the truth: you don't toss your cookies a lot, but when you do, you do it with style.

The first time I saw Old Faithful in action was before that fateful night where my t-shirt received a milk-white racing stripe. A few days before, it was my first solo effort at dressing you.

I picked out the cutest little cowboy outfit in the world, and I proceeded to spend the next 10 minutes or so getting it on you. This outfit, like most baby clothes, was terribly complicated and had more snaps than a Beatnick poetry reading (also funny, trust me). But, I finally got you all snapped and situated and dressed.

And then you started hiccupping. And then those hiccups started getting a little bass in their register and before I knew it, you'd rolled your head to the side and puked all over yourself...the shoulder, the sleeve, the shirt, everything had a fresh not-so-fresh milk coating.

But that was okay! Luckily, I picked you up and was about to start undressing and redressing you when the hiccups started again. You were laying in my arms, face up toward the sky.

Almost as if it were in slow motion, I saw you spew an impressive amount of vomit high into the sky. My catlike reflexes told me to do so, and so I quickly pulled you out of the way of the Coconut Rain that was about to splatter back in your face. With a KERSPLAT your lunch landed on the changing table, but missed you completely. (but that didn't really matter, since I had to change you anyway!)

I've never been to Yellowstone, but I have a feeling I've seen Old Faithful already.

Don't think that your Mom is immune to the Geyser either! Let's just say that as I was about to leave for work last week, I put a pacifier in your mouth (to hopefully get your mom a few more minutes of sleep), and you shot that pacifier out like a vomit-propelled bullet.

And this morning, as I was leaving for work, she was feeding you in our bed, you disconnected and ERPPP! Now we have to wash the sheets again. Clearly you have an averse reaction to me leaving.

Or maybe your little, growing tummy sometimes gets a little too full!

Either way, though, don't worry- you're still growing and gaining weight, so the food your losing with these powerful displays isn't much needed.

And, don't worry about us, either- like I said before, it's never been such a pleasure to be thrown up on!

So, keep it up son! But, honestly, it wouldn't hurt if you tried to keep some of it down as well!