Growing up...not so fast.

Aidan, you grow and change and amaze your Mom and me every day. It's hard to keep up with sometimes, let alone write about it.

I remember being floored last week: you brought me a book to read, Dr. Seuss' "I can read with my eyes closed." You flipped it directly open to the only page in the book that you like, and you already had your fingers on your nose to act out the page: "And what to do about Owls on noses."

Then you got up, went to the book shelf and grabbed "In my tree," the only other book we have that's all about owls.

The fact that you just made that connection blew my mind. But that was already a week ago and since then you've blown my mind a few more times, made me laugh, made me frustrated, made me happy, and made me feel loved a million times each!

What a crazy journey we're on together. I'm definitely along for the ride, even though you're the one captaining it.

Here are some of the amazing/fun/awesome (or maybe even regular, day-in-day-out) awesomeness of late:

You love to drink from the faucet (and fill up your water bottle and cup there too). You figured this out all on your own, and cracked us up!



You're really (kinda) getting the hang of (kinda) feeding yourself with a spoon!




And, when not trying to eat the food for yourself, you love to feed others too!


It's gotten cooler outside, so you've been able to explore the playground for the first time since you learned to walk.

You love swinging:








And putting mulch on things:



And sliding:

And bumping into friends in the park...

and elsewhere...


And you even got to go on your very first bike ride:

So, as you can see, you've been a baby on the move. I'm not even trying to catch up any more; I'm just enjoying the heck out of the ride!

Houston-bound

Over Labor Day Weekend, we decided to go visit Uncle Dana, all your cousins and Aunt Mendi. It was a great weekend, and you had a blast playing with your cousins, especially Kat, Haley and Grayson.


You loved climbing up Uncle Dana's staircase (no video of this, as all adult hands are needed on deck when stairs are being climbed by an 18 month old),

chasing the girls around the house (or being dragged in a laundry basket),



reading with the girls,





playing in the tent room,





swimming, and watching Holden and Griffin do what ever "big boys."

And, if you can believe it, the heat in Texas broke- the consecutive days of 100 degrees were over! (temporarily)

So we did a lot of stuff outdoors: we went for a walk, went to the park, and played outside.

Between the stairs, the fun toys, the family love and the swimming, you had a really good time!

Oh, and on the drive in you even watched your first feature-length movie from start to finish: Toy Story 3. You laughed a lot and were pretty interested.

Daddy's very sensitive ever since he became a Daddy; Toy Story 3 made him cry three times. Damn Pixar.

But there were no tears (okay, so there were a few, but nothing major) at Uncle Dana's house! A fun time was had by all; and you really do love seeing your cousins!

The Dog, the Dad and the Wardrobe

The other day you followed me into the master bedroom closet as I was changing afterwork. You decided it would be a fun time to play: play with Toby, chill in the dog bed, play with the camera, make funny faces and play with shoes. I couldn't agree more!

Not to air our dirty laundry, which is literally on display in all of these video clips, but who knew so much fun could be had in the wardrobe? I had to video you playing and share it...it's just too good.





Normally when you follow us into our closet, you want to hear the music box that your Mom and I got in Paris. It plays "La vie en rose," and now you love that song! But on this day, all you wanted to do was play! You even tried to give Toby one of Mommy's shoes.

It's so wonderful to be able to imaginative play with you like this.



So, we may not have any skeletons in the closet, but we certainly did have lots of dirty laundry. But, more important than that, we had a lot of good clean fun!

Little Fish: Last Swim Class of the Summer

I was fortunate enough to use my lunch break last Tuesday to drive to Emler Swimming Academy for Human Children (or whatever it's called) and join you and your Mom for your last swim class.



Of course, I was wearing a button-down and khakis, so I couldn't join you in the pool. I wish I was wearing a swim suit though, it was hot in there and the water looked so refreshing...except for the abundance of children who probably peed in their swim diapers.



But, pee wasn't the most exciting thing in the water. You were! Of course I've seen what you can do in our inflatable pool and in Gulf and in friends' pools over the summer, but I've never witnessed the barage of swimmin' challnges and learning they throw at you (or throw you in to) in a swim class.



You were great! Obstacles that used to bother you and make you cry only made you happy! A child screaming bloody murder didn't make you lose your swimming cool at all. You went down the slide (with glee) and did humpty dumpty (with slight resistance) and held your breath for 8 seconds (a class record!!!).



You still did not seem to like floating on your back. In fact, you hated it. I did not take video of that.



But, all in all, swim class was a success, and a fun experience for you and your Mommy. I'm so glad I got to be a tiny part of it and be the creepy guy in khakis and a button-down filming a swimming pool full of children with his phone!

La La Land

Your first trip out of the state of Texas was to a place far far away where palm trees grow right out of the ground, where city, beach, sand, tar rest gently upon a fault in the Earth's tectonic plates and where your Aunt Rebekka and Uncle Ross live: Los Angeles, California.

It was an amazing trip, full of long walks on the beach, great food, and good laughs (sounds kind of like a cheesy intro to an online dating profile). But it's completely true!

You got to meet your Great Aunt Anita and Great Uncle David (Pops' big brother!) They really liked you and even brought you some cool toy cars to play with, which you demanded that we open immediately so that you could let gravity put them gently on the floor.

You also got to meet (and re-meet) a few of Mommy's and Daddy's college friends: Big Mike and Evelyn (and their significant others: Lauren and Joe, respectively). While we were at dinner with them, we witnessed a shoot for a movie (or, more likely, a cell phone commercial). We could even be unwitting extras in this movie, since the shoot was taking place right outside the restaurant where we ate!
But, most of the time in LA was devoted to being spent with Daddy's sister, you're Aunt Rebekka, and Uncle Ross.

We did all sorts of fun things together, including a trip to a Roman Villa-remake called the Getty Villa. They even let you draw on an old Roman vase (made of dry-erase material).

(Are you sure I can draw on this?)

We went to the LACMA and saw an exhibit on Tim Burton's art! (You don't know who Tim Burton is yet, but I should steer you away from his remake of "Planet of the Apes" and more towards "Nightmare before Christmas")
And outside the museum, we played in the lamp posts!
But, what really interested you about the museum was their uncanny exhibit on how to put pebbles on a stone bench and watch them slide off. This provided almost an hour of entertainment!





We also went to the LaBrea Tar Pits, where prehistoric dummy animals got caught in tar, and then prehistoric dummy predators tried to eat that easy prey and also got caught in tar. And then thousands of years later, we can look at their bones and see what dummies look like.

Here we are recreating such an incident:
No one can save Uncle Ross now!

We finally got to go to one of Aunt Rebekka's Music Together classes. She gave us the CDs and we sing the songs and play them all the time. But we've never been to a class! Before the other kiddo showed up, you had the place to yourself and took serious advantage, exploring the big mirror and piano!






But then when class started, you thought it was awesome! You were such a good participant. And then came the bells:


You loved the bells so much that you didn't want to give them up, and proceeded to throw a fit for almost the rest of the entire class.


You kept going to the plastic bin where Aunt Rebekka had them stored, and when we wouldn't let you get the bells, you were upset. The saving grace from the bell crisis was the introduction to the plastic bin full of drums. This is a bit like trying to get rid of your rattlesnake infestation by getting a lot of coyotes.

So, once the drums were gone, you were still a bit bent out of shape, but, you know what? we still had a super fun time! And you loved Aunt Rebekka's class!

In fact, music was a big part of our trip! We played guitars...
And a trombone...
and sang (and laughed) a lot...



Daddy's guitar at home is always out, but I must admit, I didn't know how much you liked it until our trip to LA. Rebekka helped me realize that most of the songs you like are the same 3 chords, so I play a lot more at home now. A funny thing happened in LA, though: you requested a song!

I had the guitar in my lap and you came up to me and did your "twinkle twinkle" hands! So, you wanted to hear that song! Request granted (after all, it's the same 3 chords as the other songs!)

We went on a lot of walks, up and down Venice Beach...


We went shopping in stores that had dogs (not for sale)...
and stores that had Books and Cookies!




We hung and swung around...






And just hung out at home...in case anyone called.



It was a great vacation together in La La Land. It was so tough to leave, but there's always next time!

ps. There was some projectile vomiting too. Remind me to tell you about that sometime.