Ready for Olympic Trials

I knew the day would come when AJ would try his hand at gymnastics. In the past two weeks he has begun to scale over the couch, taken a tumble while trying to get down from the dinner table and climbs most everything. So it was really no surprise to hear that while spending the night with Jamma and Jampa he attempted a double back flip (or something equally exciting) to get out of the crib. The crib mattress there is a bit lower than ours at home so he took advantage to try out a new dismount technique that seems to have had a rough ending. Though he was left sleeping in the bed he was found by Jampa Larry, whimpering and standing in the room.

Good news is that he still stays put in the crib at home so we have a while longer. Bad news is that he has discovered that crib rails can be scaled and will probably continue to try at home until he succeeds. In the meantime, we suffer through the occasional boo-boo and bruise because he clearly is a fearless little boy.

Rain Rain Go Away

We got a brief, strong thunderstorm tonight just as I got to school to pick up AJ. When I got into his classroom, he took my hand, showed me to the window and said "Mommy, it's raining outside". I'm amazed at the 4 word observations he makes all the time now.

Life is getting better now that we speak the same language most of the time. Once in a while he throws a little Chinese in there just to keep us confused :-)

New 'Do

I finally got around to getting AJ's hair cut this afternoon. I would do this myself except there is no way he would stay still enough not to lose an ear so I choose to pay a professional. :-)

The cut was overdue so it seemed like she cut an awful lot. His summer do is pretty cute and he looks so grown up! I think he actually looks a bit like Pete in this picture.

Trip to the Neighborhood Pool

We are spoiled because we have not one but three big pools in our subdivision. One is even geared towards kids with sprayer, foutains and an end of the pool the kids can just walk in to. Very cool. We took AJ a couple of days ago and he dragged Pete through all of the water sprays.

AJ Speaks "Yoda"

I snuck into the study to print something while AJ was hanging out in the family room playing with cars. After about 3 minutes I heard "Mommy" and the sound of little bare feet running on hardwood coming towards me. I answered back "yes?" just as AJ appeared around the corner and announced, in Yoda speak, "Poopie, I got". One deep breath confirmed that yes, poopie he had!

Moon Bouncin

AJ's school had a summer kick-off party yesterday complete with sweet treats and moon bounces. Reports are the kids had a blast and napped very well after burning lots of energy on the moon bounces.

The "bouncie" was still there and open in the evening for parents to take kids out to before going home so AJ and I jumped in. AJ would stand there and flop himself down, not really jumping but more rolling around and giggling while others bounced around him. I was the only parent who kicked off my shoes and got in too and I am so glad I did because I got to giggle and bounce along with him.

Monkey in the Water Table

AJ still loves the water table we got him last year. Now he'll go between the table and the kiddie pool on the deck, splashing with the boats, buckets and plastic fish. It has been the only way to keep cool the past couple of weekends.

Noodles

Even Grandma Karen has commented recently on AJ's diction. Recently his "L" sound has gotten better and he pronounces it without sticking his tongue out like he used to. He still is cute when he says balloon - it come out a bit more like it has two "ll" syllables.

Today when I picked him up Ms. Sally said that I should try to get him to say "noodles". She was chuckling and said it was super adorable. So, I asked him to say "noodles" and he just looked at me, held up a toy bus and said "school bus". I relayed Ms. Sally's comment to Pete when he got home and the game continued. One of us would ask him to say "noodles" and he would outright ignore us or say the word of whatever he was playing with.

So, we still haven't heard "noodles" and AJ is probably wondering why we are calling cars, books and bath toys "noodles"!

Neighborhood Slip & Slide

Our backyard neighbors Vicki & AJ (yes, another 2 year old AJ!) invited AJ over to try out their homemade slip and slide. Their Dad Doug set up the kiddie pool at the bottom of their swingset slide with a sprinkler on it and the kids went nuts.

Our AJ didn't notice at first that it was any different from their normal swingset slide so he jumped on his belly and rode down fast and face first. When he landed in water he jumped up, looked startled and squealed with happiness all while dripping from his hair to his shorts.


He kept climbing up and sliding down until we finally pulled him away to eat and sleep (late of course). Watching the three of them play with such pure joy made me miss being a kid, thats for sure!

Splishin & Splashin

When the heat index reaches 105 and a little person insists on playing outside, there isn't much to do besides strip down and jump in the water.

We got a blow up pool and set it on the deck under the unbrella and AJ had a blast.

He dragged both Mommy and Daddy into the pool with him and splashed water everywhere. It wasn't so bad because that was the only way to make being outside bearable.

Congratulations Aunt Didney

We tackled air travel and made it to Chicago on Friday despite canceled flights, delays and no nap. It was a fun weekend visiting with Gramma, Grandpa, Aunt Megan and Aunt Sidney (which sometimes sounds like Didney). AJ even warmed back up to O'Malley and by the end of the visit they were old buddies again.

Graduation on Sunday was under the hot sun but we wouldn't have missed it.

Congratualtions Aunt Sydney!