Daddy was away in Italy (north of Milan) for work until Thursday this week, and Grandma Ruane stayed with us from after Aidan's birthday party on Saturday until Wednesday to help with backup. She was a huge help, and dramatically improved everyone's quality of life while she was here! We went to the pool (Aidan showed off his water tricks), the Bronx Zoo (we haven't done this in ages!), and the pool again. She cooked and cleaned and played with the kids, and even mailed packages for us at the post office! By the time she left, our house had had its clutter significantly reduced, was much cleaner, and was full of much happier people than otherwise would have been the case.
We had an amazing adventure at the Zoo on Monday! We all went on the monorail (Aidan's favorite), which was pretty hum-drum (interesting, but not thrilling) the last time we went on it. However, this time, Kiana all of a sudden *noticed* the animals! I was sitting with her in the front seat (while Aidan sat with Grandma in the back seat), and she looked out, and then saw.... DEER! & She got SO excited about them! She jumped up and down and danced and pointed to the deer, and then to me (did I NOTICE these amazing things?) and back again, and danced some more! And then the monorail started moving past it, and she got very worried! She signed "where?" (Where are the deer?) and "more!" (MORE deer!). I promised her that there would be more animals soon, we just had to keep looking, and she nodded emphatically (YES! more!). She kept this up for almost *every single animal* that we saw on the monorail! (Elephants!!!! MORE elephants!!! WHERE are the elephants? More?? HIPPOS!!! MORE hippos!! Where are the hippos? More??) It was a really incredible experience!! Grandma and I were in awe. :)
Daddy came back from Italy on Thursday, and everyone was happy to see him. His next trip is two weeks from when he got back (going to Brazil), so things are feeling hectic for everyone. I have gotten almost nothing work-related done recently, and have a hard time dealing with that. I have to keep reminding myself that I *have* signed up Kiana for daycare, and that starting this week I also will have her being in combinations of babysitting/nap scheduling and Aidan in afternoon daycare time that will hopefully give me Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday 8/9-3:30PM days to work on developing my professional portfolio for jobs that are opening up. (Laurie will be babysitting mornings (9-11ish), our neighbor Cherie will be babysitting afternoons (1:30-3:30ish), and she should nap in between.) But at the moment, I just feel frustrated.
Despite this, we had a lot of good family time with Daddy this weekend: Saturday morning he took the kids down to the Central Park Zoo and Heckscher Playground in Central Park while I went to yoga (for the first time in 2 1/2 weeks!). That was awesome! That afternoon Laurie babysat Kiana while Daddy and I took Aidan out to see "Cars II" in movie theater! (Thanks, Uncle Gabe & Aunt Karen for the birthday present! It was Aidan's second movie theater experience in his life time - only after seeing Aunt Lauren's Rescue 3D movie in Washington DC.) That night we had dinner with our friends Christa/Mark/Johnny/Olliver (take-out from Dinosaur Barbeque - YUM!)
Sunday we all went to the pool together: Aidan had a blast showing off his tricks (he is now starting to do real doggy paddling!!!), and Kiana showed how she could dunk her face in the water and laugh about it! When we got home, we had very energetic Skype dates with both sides of the family (Grandma and Grandpa Ruane and all of the California Ruanes who are in California for cousin Elsey's first birthday party; and Nana and Pop-pop (Grandma and Grandpa Ross) and Uncle Jon-Michael in Hawaii). Aidan showed off his acrobatic skills with Daddy, and everyone was in a good mood.
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