Merry Christmas!

We spent a wonderful time this week celebrating Christmas with the Rosses. On Monday morning, Aunt Lauren picked us up from Gabe, Karen, & Miya's house and drove us to their place in Fairfield, CA. There we spent the week cooking, eating, playing party games, playing guitar hero, and hanging out.

On Tuesday, Uncle Chris and Aunt Lauren brought us all to Travis Air Force base, where we got to fly the C17 simulator! It is one of the newest Air Force simulators, and it was amazing to sit in its pilot seat and "fly" the airplane that Aunt Chris and Aunt Lauren fly! Aidan was fascinated by the hundreds of buttons in the cockpit of the real C17 plane that we visited (he was the only one who didn't go in the simulator), and everyone else had a great time getting a taste of what it would be like to be a pilot.

Wednesday was Christmas Eve, and we all spent the evening opening stockings, listening to Mom read "A Child's Christmas in Wales", and singing Christmas carols. We didn't have all of the copies of our Christmas carol book, so we sat around the Christmas tree with our laptops, googling different carols and reading the words from the internet!

Thursday was Christmas, and we all spent the day continuing to cook and eat delicious food (we had been doing that every day beforehand as well), opening presents, and hanging out. We also played a hilarious party game called "Apples for Apples" that Mommy and Daddy have never tried before.

On Friday, we drove into San Francisco to visit Mommy's Aunt Rachel Crawford and her family. We had lunch together, hiked up and down extremely steep San Francisco hills (a good thing given all the food we had been eating), and enjoyed catching up with Aunt Rachel and Tami, and Elwyn, Nell, and Limin. Aunt Frances got her custom ordered hat that Elwyn designed for her, and modeled it for us (so stylish!). And Aunt Rachel's dogs (Pansie and Howie) couldn't get enough of Aidan! It was nice to catch up.

On Saturday, Aidan had his first experience bowling! We all went to the Travis Air Force Base bowling alley, and Aidan played a couple of times too! His first ball was a gutter ball (though it did make it all the way to the end of the alley), but he used a "kid helper" metal guiding structure the second time (he pushed the ball from the top of a metal slide), and actually knocked down seven pins!

We had a wonderful time this week hanging out with the Rosses, and wish that we could extend the holiday for longer. Aidan is going to miss Grandma and Pop-pop (what Grandpa Ross has decided to be called), as well as his Ross aunts and uncles (Frances, Chris, Lauren, and Jon-Michael). We're already looking forward to seeing them again in July!

Cousins

Daddy spent the week at a conference in downtown San Francisco this week, while Mommy and Aidan stayed with Uncle Gabe, Aunt Karen, and cousin Miya Ruane just across the Golden Gate Bridge. Daddy had a good conference, and Aidan had a blast visiting with his cousin!

Even though Miya is a big five-year old girl, she played incredibly nicely with Aidan all week long. She played tag with him (walking directly behind him back and forth across the kitchen as they both peek at each other and giggle), rough-housed with him on the bed (monkeys jumping on the bed that fall and giggle), jumped slinkies up and down the stairs for him (which Aidan laughed uproariously about), held his hand as we walked through shopping centers, played at parks with him, cuddled with him (he snuggled up with her and she cuddled right back), and laughed and laughed together with him. It was so cute to see the cousins together!

On Wednesday, Mommy and Aidan got to go see Miya's kindergarten class put on their holiday concert. It was amazing! Miya sang at least eight songs, and looked ridiculously cute on stage. Aidan was transfixed! He watched almost without moving a muscle for at least three songs before wanting to wiggle away and walk around in the back of the gymnasium. Afterward, Aidan got to decorate a gingerbread man at her class's party, and he was thrilled to eat as many of the mini chocolate kisses off of it as he could before putting more on! Mommy can't believe that Aidan is going to have his own holiday concerts to be in not so long from now!

Daddy was done with his conference on Friday, and Mommy and Aidan were happy to have him (and Uncle Gabe) to hang out with! On Friday, we took advantage of a break in the rain to visit the "Dark Park" (a park full of redwood trees). On Saturday, we all drove into the city to get Ghirardelli chocolate, eat at a food-court that Daddy has been raving about for years, and window-shop. And On Sunday, we all chilled, did some last minute shopping, and Aunt Karen did an "elf yourself" video of all of the cousins and Miya's cat Koda (check it out at: http://elfyourself.jibjab.com/view/OCHt8inUsvF3fX0U67tW). Aidan is going to miss Miya! On Sunday night, he refused to let go of her hands, and jumped into her arms (asking her to pick him up) over five times! He really loves his cousin!!

On Monday, Mommy, Daddy, and Aidan will say goodbye to the Ruanes and drive over to Uncle Chris and Aunt Lauren Ross' house, where we will spend the rest of the week celebrating the holidays with the Ross clan. We've had a great time with our break so far, and are looking forward to continuing it next week! Hope you all have a Merry Christmas!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

We had a whirlwind of a week this week as we tried to finish up everything we needed to do before flying to California on Friday. Daddy prepared for his upcoming conference, Mommy turned in a partial theory chapter of her dissertation and submitted it to her advisor, and Aidan played with his best friend Mosissa for the last few times before Mosissa and his family flew to Thailand. Things were hectic!

On Friday, we all got on a plane and flew to San Francisco. Aidan had a great flight (we got a free empty seat in between Mommy and Daddy, so Aidan got to sit and sleep in his own carseat), but we were happy to get off the plane and see Uncle Gabe Ruane on the other side. He drove us to Uncle Gabe, Aunt Karen, and Cousin Miya's house, where we stayed for the weekend. Uncle Matt, Aunt Devon, and Cousins Rae and Elsey all drove up from San Luis Obispo for the weekend. So, all the Ruane cousins had fun hanging out all weekend! Aidan was in awe of all the older cousins, and he had a blast following them around and playing with them! We played at parks during bouts of sunshine during a rainy weekend, played at a pizza playhouse, built a gingerbread house, opened some early Christmas presents, and enjoyed being together.

On Sunday night, Daddy left to downtown San Francisco for his weeklong conference, while Mommy and Aidan stayed Gabe/Karen/Miya's house. Daddy will be back Friday, and we miss him. But Aidan is loving hanging out with his cousin Miya (they have been running around the house giggling, playing tag, knocking down block towers, and generally being rediculously cute), and we are going to have fun until then, too.

Buh-byeeee

When Aidan first started saying "hi", he had an inverted pronunciation which our friend Solomon described as a Scottish brawl ("Ay-hhhhh! Ay-hhhhh!") This week Aidan has been working on changing that around. Now he is saying "Hi-eeeeeeeeeeeeee! Hi-eeeee!" Along the same lines, he is adding "By-eee! By-eee!" and "Buh-by-eee! Buh, buh, buh, buh by-eeeee!" He has also been saying "BOOM!" (for loud noises), and "Oh, WOW!" (because his babysitter Laurie says "wow!" about what he does a lot). He is being very cute!

Aidan's favorite new thing to do this week is to rearrange the spice cabinet. Ever since Grandpa Ruane let him take out all of the contents of a pantry cabinet in the Catskills last weekend, that is all he has wanted to do! This means he is constantly signing "please" and pointing to the spice cabinet, whereupon Mommy or Daddy can either refuse his (very nicely asked) request, or acquiesce. That means we pick him up and stand behind him as he balances on the edge of the sink and takes out each of our (at least 35) spices, passes them individually to us (so that we can put them on the counter), and then has us pass them one-by-one back to him so he can put them back into the cabinet in a slightly different order. Aidan finds this game exhilarating, but Mommy and Daddy are less than thrilled after the 40th iteration or so per day!

This Saturday Aidan had his first time being really sick. We think he got a stomach bug, and the poor baby threw up four times Saturday afternoon! Fortunately he had a decent night on Saturday night, and didn't throw up at all on Sunday, and acted pretty normal. But Mommy and Daddy felt so sorry for him! We hope he gets past all of this as quickly as possible.

After Aidan had a nice long nap on Sunday afternoon, Mommy and Daddy and Aidan took the train downtown for a little adventure. We saw the Christmas tree at Rockefeller Center, saw a light show of snowflakes that was synchronized with music on the building beside the tree, looked at holiday window displays (one took up half a block and told a story about the first snowflake to be unique!), ate dinner at Grand Central Station, and saw a kaleidoscope light show projected in the grand hall. We had a great time!

Happy Thanksgiving!

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving in the Catskills this week! We drove up Wednesday night for a long weekend, and didn't have to go back till Sunday - it was great! We spent most of the time eating delicious food and playing with Aidan. This year Daddy's brothers and their families couldn't make it, so it was a smaller gathering. But it was still a wonderful weekend! Aidan loved playing hand-slapping games with Daddy's cousin Kevin, and getting chased around the house ("I'm gonna get you!!") by Kevin's wife Sarah, and was thrilled to death with Grandpa's sillyness - from squeaking good morning from under the bed covers in the morning, to letting Aidan take out all of the glass sauce containers in the kitchen, to watching Aidan sit and play in a dry bathtub just for fun! Aidan also loved patting the doggies and jumping on the bed ("10 little monkeys jumping on the bed.."). And everytime someone (frequently Alex, Tim, or Uncle Bob) started playing the piano, he dropped whatever he was doing to toddle over and climb up next to them on the bench and chime in with a couple notes of his own!

The cutest thing Aidan has developed this week is kissing: he's starting to kiss a lot! On Tuesday, he kissed mommy's guitar goodnight (which we just started letting him play, and which he is head-over-heels in love with!). And early in the weekend, he walked over to Grandpa (without any instigation) just to give him a kiss! And by the end of the weekend, he was kissing Mommy and Daddy when we asked him to. He even kissed Ulrike! Mommy and Daddy love this new cuddly kissing stage!

Chaperoning

We had a lot of fun visiting with people this week, although we've had to bundle up and play mostly inside (it's been COLD!). On Tuesday night and Wednesday morning we hung out with Uncle Gabe, Aunt Karen and cousin Miya, who were in town for work. Daddy and Aidan took them to the Natural History Museum on Wednesday morning, and Miya and Aidan loved the African Mammals, Primates, and Dinosaurs exhibits. Mommy and Daddy loved catching up and seeing how big Miya has gotten since we last saw her!

Later in the week we had playdates with local friends. On Wednesday, Mosissa came over to our house, and he and Aidan had fun playing in the ball pit and sitting on Daddy's chair while spinning round and round. On Thursday, Aidan's friend Grace and her mommy Sara came over to visit, and Aidan and Grace ended up hugging and kissing and laughing about it! (There is a reason why we call Grace "the kissing bandit"!!! ) And on Friday, we went over to a playdate at Mosissa's house, where Aidan commandeered Ignacio's push toy, ate lots of cookies, and played with Mosissa, Sebastian, and Ignacio. (Check out the videos for the week's highlights!)

Aidan is using a whole new set of sounds this week - he is now talking to himself by repeating over and over "dub, dub, dub, dub". Mommy thinks it is hilarious! It sounds kind of like the Flintstones ("yaba daba doo!"), and it makes Mommy laugh. The first time she heard Aidan say it, she laughed for a couple of minutes, and then used signs and words to ask "more, please?" - Aidan got all embarrassed and shook his head, no. But then, after a minute, he repeated "dub, dub, duba, duba", and Mommy clapped and said "yeah!" and we kept that up for at least 10 minutes! Now he is saying it all the time, but it still makes Mommy smile.

This week Laurie babysat Aidan twice (Tuesday and Friday), and on Friday, she said that Aidan didn't cry at all! They got a pastry at Gideon's and then played with Aidan's toys in the house while avoiding the vacuum cleaner the rest of the time, and everything went well! (Aidan has become obsessed with the vacuum cleaner and throws a fit when he wants to take it out, because he wants to push it around the house - !!!) Mommy is so happy that Aidan is getting used to Laurie!

California and Idiosyncracies

This weekend, Mommy, Daddy, and Aidan all flew to Los Angeles for a long weekend so Mommy could go to her friend Julia's bridal shower. Aidan was a trooper on both sets of flights, and had a blast playing with Julia's dogs (Guinness and Leroy) and exploring local malls. Mommy was thrilled that she could be there, and had fun going to pilates class, helping with wedding invitations, and hanging out with the girls at Julia's shower. We all got a rare chance to dip our toes in the Pacific Ocean on Sunday, and that was wonderful! Aidan was thrilled to chase the whitewash on the beach, although when he finally got splashed by a slightly bigger wave, he walked determinedly but calmly in a bee-line back toward the car! Mommy is really glad that we were able to go.

In other highlights: here are some things that are really cute about Aidan right now:

1) After dinner time, Aidan now regularly points to framed pictures of Daddy, and when Mommy gets them down for him, he kisses them! It's sad that he misses Daddy at night, but it's also very cute!

2) Mommy thinks Aidan is developing empathy. A couple of weeks ago, she was reading Aidan The Very Hungry Caterpillar, when something amazing happened. We got to the page where the caterpiller ate too much junk food (including sausages and ice cream), and Mommy read the line: "that night, the very hungry caterpiller had a stomach-ache"; and she pointed at her tummy and said, "he had an owie in his tummy - too much yucky food!" In response, Aidan started pointing feverishly at the picture of the caterpiller in the book and looking at Mommy in concern and crying! He was upset that the caterpillar had a tummy-ache! Mommy tried to turn the page and point out that the next day, the caterpiller was fine because he ate a nice green leaf, but Aidan just turned the page backwards to the "sick" page, and kept pointing and crying! Eventually, Mommy had to hide the book ("bye-bye, hungry caterpillar") and distract Aidan with an episode of the Wonder Pets to get him to stop thinking about that sad, sick, poor, hungry caterpillar! It was pretty amazing.

3) Aidan is making really silly faces right now. One of them is an exaggerated guffaw of relief that he does when he is really happy to see someone: when Mommy or Daddy come home or when we are playing a game of hide-and-seek and then show up, sometimes he will tilt his head back, open his mouth wide, close his eyes, with a giant smile of relief and exhiliaration that we are back! Another one is a scrunched up face that he does when he is being silly: he'll close his eyes, scrunch up his face, and toddle forward, cracking his eyes open every once in a while if he bumps into something or thinks he might bump into something. It is so silly! Mommy and Daddy aren't sure where the closed-eye silly faces come from, but we are amazed at how silly and funny Aidan can be.

Changes

Some big changes happened this week, both for Aidan and the world.

On Monday Aidan had his first experience being baby-sat by Laurie, who Mommy and Daddy hope will become a regular babysitter for him. Recently Mommy and Daddy have been looking into finding a regular babysitter starting seriously in the spring, when Daddy's conference circuit gets going again. Mommy wants to have someone to babysit Aidan during the mornings (about 8:30-11:30AM) while Daddy is away at conferences (he has five planned between December 2008 and August 2009), so that she can still get a partial work week in, even with Daddy gone. We think that Laurie is going to be the person who can help us with this.

Laurie is a recently retired nurse with straight, iron-gray hair and a delightful crinkly-eyed smile, who absolutely ADORES babies. When we first moved to New York last fall, Laurie saw Aidan on the playground and walked up with a gigantic smile, tickled his chin, and said to Mommy: "He is so YUMMY! Don't you just want to bite him sometimes? He is DELICIOUS!" Since then, Mommy has noticed Laurie at the playgrounds regularly with different kids, and she is always exceptionally good with kids and thrilled to be with them.

Recently we found out that she does occasional babysitting, and has babysat for several of Aidan's friends, all of whom have had good experiences with her. So, Mommy talked to her about the random weeks of babysitting starting in the spring, and asked if she could start earlier with once-per-week babysitting before, so that Aidan could have some time to get used to her. Fortunately, she said that the plan should work out for her. So, we started our once-a-week babysitting sessions this Monday morning.
That morning, Daddy hung out with Laurie and Aidan for a while at the playground before saying goodbye and going to work, but Aidan was pretty upset when he left! Unfortunately, only one of his friends from his normal informal playgroup was at the playground (it was a wet, miserable day), and so he didn't have much distraction to help. However, Laurie took him on a walk in Fort Tryon and sang about the leaves and the bushes, and he eventually calmed down. Then he passed out for a very early nap, and ended up sleeping for four solid hours! Mommy picked him up after 40 minutes, when Laurie's shift was over, but was amazed at the super-sized nap! (Aidan normally only sleeps for 1 to 1.5 hours!) We know that Aidan loves hanging out with Mommy and Daddy, but we think he is going to be happy with Laurie, and that things will get easier the more they hang out. Daddy is looking forward to having a few extra hours once-a-week to work on the extra consulting job he just picked up, and Mommy is happy to ease into the transition and to have someone who fits so perfectly with us. We think it is going to work out really well!
The other major change this week was the election on Tuesday! Daddy took Aidan to the polls with him in the morning, and Aidan helped pull the lever in the voting booth, which ended up helping Barack Obama become the first African American president of the United States! Mommy and Daddy are excited that Aidan got to be part of such a historic moment.
Other than that, things went on pretty normally. Aidan is still throwing lots of temper tantrums and his teeth really hurt him, so that is not fun. But he is particularly loving being outside, and the weather has been unseasonably warm, so that has been nice this week. This weekend we drove up to the Catskills and enjoyed some time with Grandpa and Grandma Ruane. It will be the last time we are up here until Thanksgiving, and it was great to have some down time! It is amazing that the holidays are sneaking up on us already - they will be here before we know it!

Happy Halloween!

We had a lot of fun with Halloween festivities this week. Aidan dressed up in his lion costume for playgroup on Thursday and then again for Halloween on Friday. At playgroup on Thursday, the kids painted pumpkins, decorated trick-n-treat bags with stickers, and trick-n-treated from a long line of goodies that the parents brought (Aidan brought frosted mini-wheats, which were a hit!). On Friday, we went to a party at our friend Jeanie's house, and afterwards joined a neighborhood parade of about 1,000 people who dressed up, carried lit pumpkins, and paraded around Bennett Park. We had a lot of fun, and loved seeing the kids all dressed up in their costumes! Aidan's friends costumes (from what we can remember) were a 3-eyed monster (Jack), Frankenstein (Tyler, Nate), a dragon (Dillon, Mira), a bat (Mosissa), a skeleton (Johnny), a dalmatian (Dakota), a bumblebee (Sebastian), a Viking (Gus), a panda bear (Jacob), another lion (Mina), a fairy (Grace), a medieval witch (Catherine), a mermaid (Yuxin), and a pumpkin (Lily). They were so cute! Mommy wishes we could dress them up every day!

On Saturday, Mommy and Daddy and Aidan went out to dinner for Ethiopian food (at Awash restaurant) with Aidan's friend Mosissa and his family (his grandfather Solomon, and his mom and dad, Galani and Casati). Solomon and Casati, who are both from Ethiopia, did a great job of introducing us to the delicious food, and we enjoyed having a chance to hang out all together before their family moves away in December. Aidan is really going to miss Mosissa!

During the rest of the week, things were a little bit more hectic. Within the last week, Aidan has morphed dramatically into being a toddler, and now has at least 1-3 temper tantrums every single day! It is an amazing switch from our previously very happy baby! In an effort to figure out what is going on, Mommy hosted a play-date on Wednesday to watch "Happiest Toddler on the Block" and has been reading Child of Mine: Feeding with Love and Good Sense. Both have been very helpful. Mommy and Daddy are learning how to use empathic listening and "Toddler-ese" to talk with Aidan (using 1-3 word sentences recognizing what he wants and emotionally and physically mirroring him), which is helping cut short at least some of the tantrums. And we are learning that Aidan likes having structured snacks as well as meals, and that we are responsible for feeding him a variety of healthy food and he is responsible for whether and how much to eat. Both of these principles are helping us all be happier, as we navigate through this new, high-emotion (both joys and sorrows and frustrations), high intensity stage. It's always an adventure!