New routines

On Saturday, when Aidan was getting ready to go out on a train extravaganza with Daddy (A to S to 7 to N to 4 to D to A again, just for the fun of it), Daddy pointed at the cloudy sky and told Aidan that the clouds were wet. Aidan said: "Clouds have owies!" Daddy said, "when it rains?" "Yes!" Aidan replied. Mama was very impressed later - Aidan usually says, "My crying. Eyes wet!" after he cries, so he definitely transferred this associations to the clouds. Pretty amazing!


Now that Aidan is attending daycare fulltime, we are developing a new schedule. Monday through Friday, Daddy we wake up about 6:30AM, watch a Wonderpets episode, make breakfast (usually eggs or Cheerios), play with a few toys, and then around 8:30 Daddy walks with Aidan to playschool (he usually takes his scooter). Aidan works at playschool (he especially loves music class) while Mama works from home and Daddy works from his office. Then, Mama picks him up at 4:00PM, and we either go to the playground (usually Javitts) or visit the 7 year old girl who hangs out at her parent's Chinese restaurant for about an hour (Aidan is in love with her right now: he asks about her all the time!). Afterwards, we go home, watch another Wonderpets episode or two while Mama cooks, and then have dinner. Daddy is usually home in time for us to eat together, and then clean-up time we all go to Mama and Daddy's room for either jumping on the bed, tunnels (under cover), or sock-throwing game time (it is one of the best times of the day!). Afterwards, it's bathtime, then 2 books, and then lights off and bedtime. Mama usually snuggles Aidan to sleep. The next morning, it's time to do it all over again!


On Tuesdays, Aidan helps Mama pick up our CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) veggies and fruit, and we've been getting ice cream from the ice cream truck around then since Aidan has been such a good helper. On Thursday, Daddy usually works late so he can catch up on stuff and have a chance at coming home early on Friday, and Mama and Aidan are going to start having dinner with our friend Christa (& Johnny and Oliver) when Mark works late. Weekends, we do family outings, laundry, and shopping. This weekend, Daddy took Aidan out on adventures both mornings so Mama could get some work done, which was a huge help, since dissertation deadlines are looming. We all especially appreciate the extra time we have together on the weekends now that we are all "working" full time!


Aidan came home from playschool this week with one of his amazing bits of information which he learned from playschool: he told us that: "Lemons are sour; coffee: bitter; honey: sweet; salt: salty!" Other things he's brought back include references to "mamals" and "north America and Europe", and the ability to respond to the question "how are you?" by saying "I'm fine!". We are regularly amazed!

"I wuv you!"

On Friday morning, Aidan did his normal job of being our bright and sunshiney alarm clock at about 6:30AM. After Mama walked into his room and started to cuddle with him while we both started waking up properly, I told him (like I always do), "Good morning, beautiful boy! I love you!" But, for the first time, he responded: "I wuv you, Mama!" I absolutely melted. "I love you, too, buddy!" "I wuv you, too, Mama!" he responded; and again: "I wuv you, too!" I was in heaven!


Aidan's new thing this week is playing tennis: we have a bag of assorted balls (plastic, tennis, mini-basketball, baseball, & other random ones), and we have been throwing him rounds of them from one end of the living room, while he stands at the other end of the living room and bats at them with a tennis racket that is almost as big as he is. It has been a blast! He is getting really good at it, and has been doing hard hits that sometimes ricochet balls off the ceiling!


This week, Mama and Daddy were really proud of Aidan, because it was the first time he did five full days at playschool in a row! We have been gradually working up to this (first a full week of half days, then 3 full days, then 4, and this week 5), but it is still a lot. Fortunately, Aidan's friend Rowan started attending his playschool this week too, so that helped. Next week, another one of Aidan's friends is starting up as well, so that makes the transition easier for all of them!


This Saturday, Daddy took Aidan on a long train ride (A to the D to the 4), since he has been missing his beloved train and bus rides now that he goes to daycare just a block away. Afterwards, we all went to Aidan's friend Rowan's birthday party, where Aidan loved the dulce-de-leche cake and running into the carriage-way tunnel in the park. That night, Mama and Daddy went out to see a movie while Aidan played with Laurie. On Sunday, we all took some trains to the Museum of Natural History, where we checked out dinosaur bones and saw the space exhibit at the planetarium (Aidan loved watching the animated galaxies collide!). Then Mama made an outrageously good new carmelized pear pie. We love weekends!

Superman

Aidan has come home from playschool recently telling us that he is "Superman"! This weekend, while we were visiting Grandma and Grandpa Ruane in Boston (Mama and Daddy also saw a Red Sox game), Aidan repeated that he was superman. So, Mama said:
"Aidan, can you fly?"
"No!" he said, "My [I] have hands! Birds fy [fly]. Birds: wings! My no wings. Jus[t] hands."
"Wow!" I said, "that's right! Birds have wings, so they can fly. But you don't have wings."
"Yes," said Aidan. "My [I] go in airplane: my [I] fly."
Mama was blown away! Aidan's logic skills are definitely increasing by leaps and bounds.


Since he has started playschool at RenVillage, Aidan has also started to be able to tell us about his emotions more. When he gets upset about something, either at playschool or with us, he will talk about it afterward in a very matter-of-fact tone of voice: he wants to discuss it, but he is able to move past his emotional state of the time. So, when Mama picks him up after playschool and asks him how his day was, a couple of times he has gone into detail about naptime:
"My [I] go sleep, all by myself at playschool. My c[r]y. Nana [his teacher, not his grandmother, confusingly enough] hold me. My go sleep!"
Or, when he has a fit at home, and finally calms down afterwards, he says something like:
"My [I] c[r]y. Eyes wet! [But] No c[r]y anymore, Mama! My [I'm] Happy!"
I always talk to him about his experience to let him know that I understand, and I'm sorry that he gets sad, but that I am proud of him for what he is doing (going to sleep by himself, calming down, etc.). It's kind of amazing to watch him work through it afterward, once he has some distance, but still wants to figure the experience out.


Last night, when I was putting Aidan to sleep, we talked about our day. Usually, I aks him if he had a good day, and he says "Yes!", but yesterday we had a long (3.5 hour) drive back from Boston, everybody got grumpy, and we even had a hard time at the park afterwards. So, I asked him if he had a good day, or a tough day.
"Tough, day!" he said.
"Yeah, we all had a tough day today." I said. "Did we drive a lot today?"
"Yes. Wanted go OUTside!"
"Yeah, I wanted to get out of the car too. We were tired of driving!" I confirmed. "But we made it home okay."
He thought a moment:
"My [I] FUStrated!" he said (I couldn't believe that he was telling me that he was frustrated!)
"You were frustrated?"
"Yes! My fustrated [with] my sneakers [his new shoes]. Wanted pull pants down. My [I] fustrated, just like girl fustrated [with] her shoes!" [There is a girl who is frustrated with tying her shoes in his "emotions" book (The Way I Feel): those pages says that it's hard and she wants to cry, and that she doesn't know whether to give it up or give it another try]
"Awe," I said, "You were frustrated with your shoes, just like the girl in the "emotions" book, huh? You wanted to take off your pants, huh?" [He had been sitting in the carseat for almost 4 hours and his pants probably made him uncomfortable.)
"Yes."
"Did you have any good things that you liked today?"
We moved on to talking about the rest of the day: he had dealt with his negative emotions, and was okay with dealing with other things, relaxing, and drifting off to sleep. He is an amazing kid & we love him!


[Thanks to Grandpa Ruane for forwarding on picts from his camera!]

My ok? You okay?

This week was a short one. Aidan went to daycare for three full days on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. Then, since Daddy's advisor told him to take some vacation, we all drove up to the Catskills at at naptime (1pm) on Thursday for the weekend. We visited Grandma and Grandpa Ruane on Saturday, and then drove back to home Monday at naptime, so we could do a Costco run (Sunday) and go to Long Beach on Long Island (Monday) (it was awesome!).


Aidan continued to do well at daycare this week, but has started having meltdowns in the morning. Daddy has been dropping him off, and Mama thinks that Aidan is worried that he will go away to Australia again, which makes the drop-offs harder. Next week, we're going to try four full days. We're hoping for the best!


A couple of notes about Aidan:


First, his language is amazing right now, and he is incredibly polite and thoughtful! He says "yes, pease [please] Mama" or "No pease, Mama" and "Thank you, Mama" all the time, without really thinking about it (which is incredibly cute). And he checks in with us a lot: if he knocks his arm or leg or something, he'll say "My ok? You okay? My okay?" (he uses "my" instead of "I") - just making sure that everyone is all right. He also includes us a lot: at dinner, he'll ask, "You want some food? You want some water? You want some cheese?" It's very sweet.


Second, I keep forgetting to write about this, but Aidan has become repeatedly interested in monsters. About a month ago, at bedtime, he pointed under his dresser and told me "Monders [monsters] in der, Mama" and asked me to turn on the lights. Since then, he's told me that there are sometimes monsters outside (at nighttime), or in other dark places. One of his Wonderpets episodes features a baby girl Monster who is mad that she accidentally knocked over a toy building, and who has to learn how to take a deep breath, count to three, and then calm down. So, that may be where the monsters are coming from. But it's tough! We tell Aidan that there are not monsters, but we also tell him to say hi to the monsters and then bye to the monsters. Now, he is less afraid of them, and he has incorporated them into our evening ritual: we jump on the bed before bathtime, and as part of this, he frequently wants to do "tunnels" (where we all hide under the blankets); he'll tell us that there are "monders!" in the tunnels, but then when we all get under there with him, he laughs, and eventually throws of the blankets and says "No monders, mama! No monders, Dada!". We are glad that he is figuring out a good way to deal with this!