30 months

Dear Aiden,

This month flew by in a tired busy blurrrrr... It seemed like you grew out of another shoe size and almost all of your pants in such a short amount of time it's making me cringe.  I'm not cringing at your high water pants, but cringing at the idea that you are getting big enough to realize that your pants are too short.  Uh oh, mommy better get her shop on... but I tell ya it seems like most of your clothes are either too big or too small.  The pile of outgrown clothes reminds us how big you are getting, about as often as you actually tell us how big you are.

Your favorite potty activity is to "read" guitar magazines with your dad.  I think you can identify more guitar types than I realized existed.  You are getting so close to being fully potty trained.  Now that we aren't traveling (and we're not going out and bout as much with my hurt foot), I think it will get even easier.  The cutest cutie pie word that I want you to keep using even though I don't want you to have speech confusion is:  stummyache.  When you say, "Mommy my stummy hurts - I think it's a stummyache" I can't help but giggle.

Your newest prairie dog buddies Copper and Tod (from the Desert Museum in Arizona) are constantly being rescued by the Wonder Pets that swoop in on their fly boat.  You are a Wonder Pets enthusiast all of a sudden (which is a little tv treat for you) and you love to create wild scenarios where a baby something-or-other needs to be rescued.  My favorite is when the "baby toddler" needs to be rescued and you pretend to be stuck under something or trapped. You sing the teamwork song while you set out on a  rescue mission singing the Wonder Pets. "Let's save the toddler..." You claim that Ming Ming is your favorite, even though her little sung speech impediment - "This is seeeriuuus! - isn't mommy's favorite.  Your dad is surprisingly tolerant of the musical cartoon and I think he likes your little pretend play games after the show just as much as you do.

One of your favorite new books is How Are You Feeling? with veggie photos that express emotion.  You now like to pretend you have an angry face or a surprised face. When we visited Philadelphia, storytime with Gran included the Tortoise and the Hare story (complete with a new tortoise puppet and bunny), which you love to repeat and pretend to be the slooow tortoise (and you couldn't say tortoise in a cuter voice - it melts my mommy ears).

You try to create categories for things lately.  You think that Aiden, Mommy, and Daddy all fall into the same category - so our second "names" are Mommy Lauren, Daddy J, and Aiden Brennan -so you think your real name is Brennan.  You do know your full name now and it's really adorable when you say Alexander because you say it slowly.  You also started calling all adults children - We went to a get together at mommy's work and you walked in and said "hey lookat all the children"  You were quite the dancer that afternoon while the engineering professors grooved on the patio.  You also like singing and dancing to YMCA in slow motion with Rebecca lately.

This month presented a challenge when I hurt my foot.  At first you were kissing my "boo boo," looking up at me with puppy dog eyes, and saying, "Is that all better, mommy?  Now it's time to go kicking in the yard."  I think you are just as desperate as I am for it to get better, although crutches are a good distraction.  You attempt to climb them which isn't a good game, but you also pretend one is a guitar and that's pretty fun.  You think it's funny to pretend you broke your foot or your finger so you can't walk up the stairs or pick up your toys.  Then you put a big cup over them as your pretend cast, giggled, and said "I'm just kidding!"

At the beginning of the month, you started getting more control over your fingers.  You can easily hold just two up now to say how old you are.  Dad thinks it's pretty funny that you can hold up the rock symbol. I love you fingers are pretty sweet too.  You very carefully arrange the zingo tiles until the perfectly overlap by pushing it very carefully with your pointer finger.  I think it's interesting to see how hard you concentrate.

You still love to play silly running games, but when we are inside you started trying to play with doors, which we nipped in the bud.  You love having dad hide as a ball eating monster.  He hides on one side of the yard, then he jumps out and grabs the ball, tries to eat it, then kicks it to the other side of the yard while he hides again.  The soundtrack to this game sounds like a bunch of giggles and munching sounds.  You like to take mini breaks from your ball retrieving and monster scares to "play chalks" on the deck.

You surprise us by how much you remember and repeat.  You've been chanting "master! dra-gon flying!" for a while and when we try to figure out what it's from, you make up something new all the time.  It's still a mystery, but I think you learned it from Tyler.  Here are a few other funnies I recorded this month: You were standing on one leg the other day, and you giggled and said "I'm a flamingo!"  You like to pick up your play picnic glasses and say cheers!  You like to think that pirates go searching for treasure chests full of pillows!  Another funny little mannerism is when you refer to yourself in third person, like the story of you "correcting" Rebecca - Listen to Aiden, it's tepper, listen closely, "ttt - tep" Then Rebecca and you start talking with letter sounds, and you say "oh,  I forgot, it's ppp pepper!"

You ended up crashing our date day since our little photo session ended up taking so long and we still wanted to go out for a nice dinner.  You were careful not to color on the white table cloth, but I was glad they had crayons and a yummy kids menu ;)  You are pretty good about breaks in your routine, and when you woke up when Rebecca was here the other day, she said you immediately said, 

"oh, you surprised me!"  Sometimes it blows my mind that you understand what a surprise is...

The Tickle Monster was a star this month.  You loved tackling and tickle wrestling at Stella's birthday party.  You were proud of the painted card you made for her.  Tickle Monster would enter forts to tickle and he would sometimes even tickle a sleeping mommy in the morning.  You were funny when our alarm went off in the middle of the night (weird because it's not even active) and you said, " oh mommy, it's time for sleepy" like you were disappointed that I didn't understand.  

We had a trip to Philadelphia this month, and you were so excited to see your Gran and Pop.  When we finally pulled into the parking lot after a marathon drive you recognized PopPop's car immediately.  You were giddy running towards Gran in front of the restaurant.  You've taken after your Gran and you joke and then laugh at your own jokes.  If we called you silly, you liked saying, "No, I'm just a happy boy!"  I love when you use your "coloring pad" to make happy giants.  You explain to me as you draw it: "I'm making happy faces by putting two dots for eyes and a loooong smile."

You told me the other day that you're going to grow up to be "a big boy with a scratchy face and hair on my knees."  I think I nearly cried.  You then started calling out, "Hey, where's my friend mommy!?" You're allowed to grow big enough to have hair on your knees as long as you are still willing to call me your friend then, k, deal?  Got it?

Love you, Your friend mommy