Aidan loves trains. Loves, loves, LOVES them! Let me say a bit more:
The best way I've found to wake Aidan up in the morning recently is to cuddle up with him while his eyes are still closed, and say: "Good morning, beautiful! Are you dreaming about trains? and Mommy, and Daddy and Polar Bear, all on the trains together?" Even if he is still sleeping, he'll usually turn over, pause, nod, and then start rattling of his favorites: "We take the A train to the 1 train to the 4 train to the 7 train to the 8 train to Paris!" (Have I mentioned that Aidan knows that there is no "8" train in NYC, but Daddy told him that there is one in Paris, so now he wants to go there, just so he can go on the 8 train?).
Our shower curtain is a map of the NYC subway system, so when he goes to the potty, he'll often just sit there, staring at the map for ages, telling Mama, "Take the A train - whoosh! - down to the 1 train - whoosh! - to the 4 train...." and on and on. He especially loves making sure that the route includes going to the Transit Museum.
Although his babysitter, Laurie, bought him his first model NYC subway train (I think it was the A), his fascination with trains has meant that between her and us, we've now gotten him at least nine of them (A, 1, 4, 7, C, D, J R, S). Because of our shower subway map, he knows which ones he *doesn't* have, and for a long time asked for ones we were missing, because he wanted to collect the whole set! (Thank goodness that he's stopped asking at this point - 9 trains are *plenty*!)
When he talks about colors, he organizes them by his favorite trains, rather than the rainbow: it's always blue, red, green, purple, yellow - because the order of his favorite trains are A (which is blue), 1 (red), 4 (green), 7 (purple), 8 (he's decided the 8 in Paris is yellow). So, when he gets dressed in the morning, he often decides to wear his blue superhero underwear early in the week, and then the red superhero underwear after it (because "first the [blue] A, then the [red] 1, right Mama?'). When he draws pictures, he loves to draw the colors of his favorite trains next to each other (blue / red / green / purple/ yellow). And when he plays his "number games" on the computer, he starts with putting down a set of his favorites (one line each of blue As, then red 1s, then green 4s, then purple 7s, then yellow 8s). But then, to be silly, he mixes things up, and he laughs and laughs and laughs about, for example, doing *purple* 1s or *yellow* As (because 1s are red and As are blue!) - he thinks its incredibly silly and hilarious! (This, of course, cracks us up, too!)
When he counts, he regularly stops at 8, because there is no 8 train in NYC, so "8 means 'no more', right Mama?". (Of course, he *can* and regularly does count much higher - at this point to 30 with no help and much higher with help, since he gets the pattern but doesn't always remember what comes in the next ten's place.)
And, of course, he regularly tells us about how much he LOVES the trains ("I love you, and Daddy, and Polar Bear, and Baby Beluga [what he named another stuffed polar bear we have], and the A train and the 1 train..."), and going on the trains ("I like going on the A train, Mama! And the 1 train! And..."), and wishes he could go on them more ("I want to go on the A train and .... sometime, okay, Mama?").
It's definitely an obsession! Fortunately, he has very good social skills with his friends, whether at school or at the park, and his teachers are always complementing him about polite he is and how you can talk to him about things (he usually doesn't just fuss about something - he is normally very logical, and if he is calm, will listen to persuasion!). He also loves being silly, and is highly verbal. So, we think it's okay to interpret the train obsession as amazing and cute, rather than a reason to be concerned. Given that he also started doing math this week ("2 plus 2 equals 4" and "5 and 5 are 10" on fingers), we figure it makes sense within our family!
Here are some photos of this week - reading books with Mama (and an ever-growing Kiana), playing guitar with Daddy, pouting about peanuts at
5 Guys after the Central Park Zoo this weekend with Mommy and Daddy, and swinging on the swings at Javitts park with Johnny.
