Cassie's Rules

I like to be Cassie from Dragon Tales. Yesterday, we were playing were playing out one of my favorite Little People stories---Animal Farm. As usual, the animals had kicked all of the people out and were being led by Napoleon the Pig. However, all of the animals, and especially the dragons, were sick of Napoleon's rules, so I, Cassie, staged a coup and deposed the pigs from power. Now, it was time for me to make up my own rules. There were a lot of them, but here are some:

1. No animals should drive school buses.
2. No wandering around in the street.
3. No flying airplanes.
4. No crashing airplanes into the animals.
5. No people allowed. (This was one of Napoleon's rules that was retained from the ancien regime.)
6. No eating the other animals. (The lions didn't like this rule.)
7. No standing on the roof of the house (The birds didn't like this rule).
8. No trolleys allowed.
9. No flying helicopters.
10. No reading. (This was another one of Napoleon's rules that was retained from the ancien regime.)

Rainbow Construction Update

As you know, when I grow up, I'm going to have everything painted in the color of rainbows. In addition, I'm going to have lots of interesting rainbow stuff. Here are the current plans:

Shelter: I intend to build a 50 storey rainbow colored house. Since it will have 50 floors, it will need an elevator with lots of buttons. There will also be lots of room in the house for all the animals I intend to have.

Transportation: I'm going to have a rainbow colored car too. But my car is a special car since it also turns into an airplane for when I need to fly somewhere. It will also have a button for it to turn into a cloud with a rainbow in it for times when one needs to get around via cloud.

Everyone is invited to visit my rainbow house and drive in my rainbow car. Also, I'll need lots of help with painting. I've already asked Mommy and Daddy to help me paint my house and car, but Daddy says we'll need lots of guys to paint everything rainbow.

It's Christmas in Dragon Land

Wth the holiday season upon us, "stuffed animal fun" has turned to Christmas. It seems that every day is Christmas in Dragon Land in our stories. Max and Emmy, a little boy and girl who come to Dragon Land, are always surprised to find it's Christmas morning whenever they arive there. The dragons always offer them lotsofinteresting presents. Most of these are contained in a kind of Russian doll arrangement of boxes. Emmy will open her gift, which consists of a box. Inside is...another box. Inside that is another box and so on for 72 boxes. At the end of the opening ritual Emmy will find a toy, which is often a stuffed dragon. The dragons are also very helpful when it comes to making sure Santa is in a good position to deliver gifts. In one adventure, the dragons helped a lost Rudolph fnd his way back to the north pole just in time for Christmas night.

My hero: Petula Clark

Petula Clark sings one of the best songs ever---Downtown. I like to sing it every time I got to downtown Walnut Creek. I also like to listen to the song at bedtime. Tonight, I got to listen to "computer songs"---Daddy turned on his computer and would play whatever I asked for. Naturally, Downtown was on the list. I love downtown.

Learning the 3 r's

As many of you who I've talked to on the phone know, the letter "r" is quite a troublesome letter for me. I used to pronounce "r" in more or less that same fashion as "w" or sometimes "l". However, my "r" is evolving. Lately, I've taken to sort of swallowing my "r"s instead of turning them into another letter. Daddy says that my pronunciation is coming to approximate that of Katherine Hepburn in her many movie roles (although my voice is quite a bit higher than hers---at least in her later years). The other person that Daddy thought of (and he figured Auntie Max would also notice this) is FDR. He's trying to teach me to say:

We have nothing to fe-ah, but fe-ah itself.

So far, i'm not too interested in saying this.

Romans v Barbarians

Yesterday, Daddy and I were watching football on TV when we noticed an ad for Capital One credit cards featuring out of work barbarians. I asked Daddy about the barbarians and noted that, at times, my table manners are likened to those of a barbarian. After some discussion of barbarians and what they liked to do, we invented a new game with Little People and blocks. First, we use the blocks to build a Roman city, which is inhabited by the Little People "Romans" and their livestock. At the front of the city is a Little People castle facade featuring a trebuchet for stopping attackers.

Next, Daddy rounded up a whole bunch of Little People "barbarians". These consist mainly of boy Little People wearing various hats (barbarians always wear hats). The barbarians also have an attack rhino in the lead. Finally, the barbarians slowly march toward the town with the intent of storming it. I, as one of the Romans, man the trebuchet and try to bowl down the barbarians to repel the attack. This is lots of fun. Some of the attacks succeed and some fail, but it's really exciting as the barbarians draw near. When they get really close they shout "ladders" and start scaling the wall. The attack rhino will often punch a gap in the wall through which the other barbarians can enter the town. Daddy said his barbarians were people called the Visigoths, who he said were particularly tough barbarians.

Grr-grr-grr go the barbarians.

Compasses

Today, Daddy and I played a new game with Thomas and his friends---navigation. First, Daddy showed me how to make something called a compass using a magnet, a sewing needle, and a small piece of cork. It was very surprising how the needle kept pointing in the same direction. Next, Daddy got out his real compass, and we used it to figure out the navigation of the Thomas guys. First, Bulstrode the barge mounted the compass in the bow of the barge and managed to navigate in all sorts of directions. My favorite direction is west. Next, we got out the engines and tried to determine the headings of the various tracks that are laid out. The engine would drive a little way then stop. We would then take a compass reading and the navigator (me) would tell the engine what its heading was. While initially, we confined ourselves to north, south, east, or west, after a time we adopted more sophisticated directionsw such as northwest and southwest. Daddy even suggested that there were directions like south by southwest that further distnguished our headings. I like compasses a lot.

Cruisin'

I've discovered that my old skill at "cruising"---standing up and moving while holding onto something for balance---is especially useful with a broken leg. Yesterday's achievement: washing my hands all by myself. To accomplish this, I found my stepstool in the bathroom, moved it in front of the sink, crawled up it and then, using the sink for balance, managed to hoist myself up. From there things were easy. I was able to reach across to turn on the faucet, release some apple soap from the dispenser and wash my hands. Best of all, I managed this all by myself. Mommy was a bit concerned about the risks of falling in this process, but was impressed at the initiative and resourcefulness of my approach.

Cranky and the Foundry

I'm really moving about much better these days. This greater mobility, combined with a Thomas arrangement by Daddy and I in the shape of an "L" around the edges of the room, has led to renewed excitement for the adventures of Thomas and his friends. Over the weekend, we thought of a new adventure---the tale of Cranky and the Foundry.

One day, Thomas and his friends were going over the very long bridge through the Misty Mountains. Being a very windy and blustery day, the bridge swayed in the wind and some of the trains, including Toby, derailed and fell into the canyon below. Toby couldn't get out, so Sir Topham Hatt called on his trusty crane Cranky to pull him out. Cranky did so, but then he refused to put Toby back down onto the ground. Sir Topham Hatt grew annoyed at Cranky's stubbornness and insisted that he put Toby down.

No. No. No. I won't do it.

said Cranky. Finally, an exasperated Sir Topham indicated that he'd haul Cranky off to the foundry t be melted down for scrap if he didn't change his mind. Of course, Cranky wouldn't budge, so my big dump truck came and hauled Cranky off to the giant kiln at the foundry. (The kiln is a wicker garbage can.) There Cranky was melted down and Sir Topham ordered a new Cranky. The problem, as you can already guess, is that the new Cranky was as stubborn as the old Cranky. Well, it didn't take very long before he found himself at the foundry, only to be replaced by a Cranky that was even worse. And so on. And so on.

The Mystery of "Ya"

You may recall that some weeks ago, I had taken to saying "ya" rather than "you". Mommy and Daddy were both mystified as to where I had picked up this mannerism. We've now uncovered the secret---the Weezy character in Dragon Tales uses this expression in her speech in the show. Since Dragon Tales is currently my all-time favorite thing, I like to imitate the characters whenever possible and that includes using "ya". Weezy also uses the expression

Loooooove it!

a lot. Both Mommy and I like to use this too.

Small Milestones

With my broken leg, sometimes it's the small milestones that count. I recently figured out how to get in and out of my bed and up and down from the couch all by myself. Mommy showed me how to swing my hurt leg up on the bed or couch first. Next, I push off with my arms and the good leg and kind of climb up to the place I want to go to. I showed Daddy how I could do this all by myself---no Daddy transport services needed!

Thomas Goes to DC

We tried a new Thomas adventure this weekend---Thomas goes to Washington DC. For this adventure, we pulled out Daddy's lovely big, giant atlas and decided to run the trains across the pages of it to get from California to Washington, DC. Initially, just Thomas was going to make the trip, but he found that climbing up the Sierra was very hard work. By the time he got to Donner Pass, he called for Gordon and the others to help. They all pushed down to Lake Tahoe where they enjoyed dipping their funnels into the water. Next, it was off across Nevada. It was very dry and very hilly in Nevada. But these hills weren't so high as the Sierra. Then it came time to climb the foothills of the Wasatch range and head into Utah. Gordon thought the Great Salt Lake was the ocean, but Thomas pointed out to him that it was only a lake. Then it was on to Colorado. The Rockies are very high in Colorado. Somehow, we got a bit north of where we were planning to go and had to pass through a gap in the Laramie Range through Cheyenne, Wyoming. It was very neat to be in the snow-covered mountains. We had to get out our plows. Beyond this, it was a lot less hilly. We crossed the Platte River and headed into Nebraska. At first, Gordon liked all the farms but by the time we came into Iowa, he was pretty sick of them.

When are these farms going to end?

Asked Gordon. Thomas told him we would have to wait until we were almost through Illinois. Somehow, we ended up taking a rest in Chicago. Everyone liked all the big buildings and, especially, the El train. As you know, I've ridden a version of the El in the Smithsonian, so I told all the trains about this adventure. Next, we cut across southern Michigan to Ohio and then on to Pennsylvania. Since we were nearby, Thomas suggested that we visit Grammy and Nainnie in Wilkes-Barre. It took a little time for us to find this on the map---plus we had to cross the Allegheny mountains---but we made it. We found a nice warm engine shed and settled there for the night.

After that, we turned south to Philadelphia, were we saw the University of Pennsylvania, where Mommy, Daddy, and my grandfather, who is in heaven, went to school. After that, it was on to Baltimore and finally Washington, DC.

Hooray, we made it. All the trains wanted to stay in DC for a long time---72 days in fact. We saw all the tall buildings and Thomas helped pull the barge on the Chesapeake & Ohio canal since the mules were tired.

It was a great adventure.

We also made a trip from California to Albuquerque. It was sort of a race. Gordon started off from Los Angeles and took the southerly route along the Rio Grande while Thomas took the northern route from San Francisco. We saw lots of neat things there. Mommy said that Daddy was "Mr. Geography" in offering us detailed descriptions of all the things was saw along the way. Gordon's favorite with the Saguaro National Forest---an entire forest consisting only of big cactus. Both Thomas and Gordon pulled into Albuquerque at the same time. It was a tie.

Driving trains on maps is almost as much fun as riding on the wooden tracks.

Medical Update

This photo is me on Daddy's birthday. See my big, green cast and the cake I made for Daddy (with Mommy's help)? The "3" is for "thirty" and then I stuck in eight other candles to make "38."

In medical news, I saw the doctor yesterday. He wanted to take more X-rays to see how things were going. Initially, I thought this was a terrible idea since the last time I had X-rays (when I first hurt myself), they were no fun at all. I was very upset at the prospect. Happily, these X-rays did not hurt a bit.

The doctor asked me how I was doing, to which I replied

I hurt my tibia.

He was very impressed with my precise description of the problem.

After looking at the X-rays, the doctor said everything is progressing as it should and he wants to see me again in six more weeks. This was not what I wanted to hear since it now looks like I'll have the cast for eight weeks. Even more annoying, the doctor suggested that, at that time, he's likely to fit me with a "boot cast" for another four weeks after that.

On the plus side, I've discovered that I can move around a bit by myself by scooting on my behind along the floor. I can't go long distances this way, but it's a lot better than being stuck on the couch and always needing Mommy or Daddy transport services.

The Trouble with G

Last night, I discovered how tenacious the letter G is. I was playing with my letter puzzle and decided to stick my thumb into the center part of the wooden letter G puzzle piece. Somehow, I got my thumb stuck inside the G. When Daddy came home from work, I inquired:

Hi Daddy. Do you know how to get my finger out of the letter G?

Of course, Daddy, not having seen the G, had no idea what I was talking about. We tried soaking my finger in ice to try to loosen the G from its grip, but to no avail. We also contemplated breaking the letter G in half, but this seemed like a painful proposition and was shelved. Finally, we used some lubricant to make both my finger and the letter G very slippery. After that, Mommy was able to slip the G off. Daddy suggested that if I were going to stick my fingers in letters in the future, I should stick to the letter L and T.

Just Guys

Yesterday was a "Mom's night out" so it was just guys at home last night. Daddy suggested that we do a "sports night" at home during Monday Night Football. First, I was very interested in the game. Daddy turned on the home theater to give a better feeling for being a part of the crowd. Also, the Green Bay Packers were playing. They have bright yellow helmets trimmed with green and they were wearing their green jerseys. I immediately decided that they're my favorite team. We also had hot dogs and popcorn and other goodies like that. I had to signal to Daddy that I wanted something by calling out,

Hey, hot dog guy, over here!

I also managed to get the lemonade guy to come to our part of the stands. It was lots of fun.

Improvements

Last night, my hurt leg ended up coming off of its usual position atop its pillow. Now, in past days, this would have been a disaster and I would have awoken immediately. Last night, I didn't even notice---I slept straight through it. I hadn't even noticed when I woke up until Daddy pointed it out to me. My answer to him was straightforward,

My leg doesn't hurt any more.

I have been moving around much better the past several days(turning on my side, scooting a little on my bottom, etc.), and I think I'm really turning the corner. It will be good to be dancing around again someday. Interestingly, in my dreams recently, my leg is not hurt.

Sunsets

I'm getting a bit braver about going out in my stroller with Daddy. I'm worred that if I go out too long, my leg will start to hurt, so I limit rides to our backyard. Fortunately, there's lots to see and do there. One evening, we went out at dusk and saw a really good sunset, which is pictured above. Since Daddy has trouble seeeing all the colors, I told him what they all were. Here are some pictures he took. Interestingly, some of the pictures were taken from atop my play structure, which offers a nice vantage point. You can see them here.

Placed on Injured Reserve

A very unhappy thing happened to me about a week ago. In the course of playing football with Daddy, I suffered a broken leg. The doctors say I suffered a spiral fracture of the mid-to-distal shaft of the right tibia. Happily, it was a non-displaced fracture, so didn't have to have any surgery to fix it. I'm now wearing a big green cast all the way up to my thigh. My toes peek out of the cast however.

While it was very painful at the time, I'm starting to feel a lot better. Yesterday was a milestone---for the first time in a week, I got down on the floor to play with the Little People.

So what do you do when you have a hurt leg? One thing that I really like that Daddy figured out was to have "Tigertime Theater" productions of many fairy tale stories. He started out with a version of The Three Bears performed by three stuffed tigers and a curious giraffe. Daddy did lots of goofy voices and we both overacted a lot, so it was really fun. One thing I like to do is to start with the story the regular way and then change around what happens during the story. For instance, in one version of the story, the curious giraffe, caught sleeping in the baby tiger's bed, is too slow to awaken and escape and ends up getting eaten by the tigers, who think that giraffe goes very well with porridge.

We also played a version of Jack and the Beanstalk. My favorite part is the bit where the boy (Jack) goes off to sell the cow at the market but ends up trading it for magic beans. In my version, I like to be the boy, and we sell Nordy for magic beans. In one iteration, we instead cooked all the magic beans and ate them for dinner thus ending the story. I have to confess that I'm a little scared of the giant in this story (especially when he's played by an enormous stuffed bunny of mine who wears a pair of my old blue socks that I've outgrown.)

Anyway, I love these animal plays. They're especially good for guys with hurt legs.

Happy Halloween from the Green Dragon!

Dragon Tales, Dragon Tales. Now it's time for Dragon Tales! I am being a friendly, flying dragon for Halloween like my friends from Dragon Tales. I am a green dragon like Zackie. I wish I were purple like Weezie. (Zackie and Weezie are brother and sister and they are two heads on the same body.) Since I am green I think that I will be Weezie dressed as Zackie! Here are some photos from trick-or-treating at Lafayette Square last Tuesday and from our family visit to Joan's Pumpkin Farm yesterday. Tonight I wear my costume again and do lots of trick-or-treating! Yea!

The Autumn Leaves

We are learning about the autumn in my school these days. At "circle time" last week, we talked about all the signs of fall---the leaves turning colors on the trees, the days getting a bit colder, and so on. One of my teachers asked why the leaves fall off the trees. After getting a few answers, I raised my hand to offer my take. She finally called on me.

"Why do the leaves fall off the trees Aidan?" she asked.

Gravity!

I announced proudly.

The other kids looked quite puzzled, but the teacher agreed this was a good answer. Daddy was especially proud to hear of my terrific scientific answer.

In other news, since Daddy has had a cold lately, we've been sorting out the germ theory of disease. Viruses and bacteria are quite interesting. Sometimes I like to pretend to be a germ myself.

Aidan the Polar Bear

When I woke up this morning, I was wearing my polar bear jammies. (I was wearing them when I went to be too.) I decided to start the morning by being a polar bear. First, I lay on the floor sleepily, as polar bears often do. Then I marched on all fours to my bedroom where I hugged the Mommy polar bear (played, as fate would have it, by my real Mommy). She stroked my soft fur and told me I was a cute polar bear. Next, I was hungry, so I crawled on the floor to the pretend stream that runs through my room and snatched up a fish that I caught in my mouth.

"I eated him!" I cried out with delight.

"Is he dead? Is he in heaven now?" I asked.

I find the circle of life an endlessly fascinating topic. Next, I went seal hunting. Well, you can probably guess how that turned out. I like being a polar bear.

When I grow up, I want to be...

When I grow up, I want to be a garbageman.

I like reading a book called "Learn the Names of 100 Trucks." It's filled with lots of different kinds of trucks, logging trucks, construction trucks, semis, street sweepers, and so on. My favorite is the pink garbage truck. Whenever I come to that page, I tell Daddy, "When I grow up, I want to be a garbageman." I go on to tell him that I like the idea of getting to load all the interesting colored garbage cans and riding in a big pink truck. Daddy offers some alternatives: Pointing at a semi, he asks, "Wouldn't you rather be a long-haul trucker. After all, it's a great life. You get to live in your truck and eat all your meals at special restaurants called truck stops."

"No. I want to be a garbageman!" I say. (FYI- The garbage trucks where I live are especially cool since they have special mechanical arms that lift the garbage cans up and dump the trash into the truck. These are even nicer than the one in the book except that they are not pink.) When I am a garbageman, I want a rainbow-colored truck!

I also want to be a balloon salesman, operate a huge pile driver (also in my 100 Trucks book), and be a "rocket man" (astronaut) so I can go to the moon where I can jump really high owing to the lack of gravity. Preferably, I'll do all of these jobs everyday-- garbageman in the morning, balloonman in the afternoon, pile driver in the evening, and spaceman at night. Mommy says that I'm going to be very busy and asks me when I'm going to sleep. I always say that I'm never tired anyway-- who needs sleep?

The Trouble with Balloons

A new game, which I like a lot is, "Don't Let the Balloon Touch the Ground". In this game, you have to hit a balloon to keep it up in the air. It's lots of fun and I'm very good at it. I can keep a balloon up in the air more or less indefinitely although sometimes I like to intentionally let the balloon touch the ground.

The trouble with balloons comes from playing with Daddy. He seems to have bad luck when it comes to balloons. We played this game outside during the weekend and the balloon hit a sharp blade of grass and popped. We played inside yesterday and the balloon hit our textured ceiling inside the house and popped. It makes me very sad when balloons pop and I demand an immediate replacement for the fallen balloon. Last night, we were going to eat dinner when the balloon popped, so no replacement was forthcoming. This made me VERY ANGRY. I cried and complained bitterly about this unfortunate turn of events. The trouble with balloons is that they pop.

Animal Farm

Last night, Daddy and I had a fun adventure with the Little People. We gout out the farm, the house, and all the animals. Daddy said one of the pigs was named Napoleon and the other was named Snowball. They had the idea that the humans were taking away all the produce---the crops, the eggs, the milk---of the animals. It was time for the animals to not be exploited. So the animals rose up and booted the humans out. The humans, in this case, consisted of Uncle Noah, Missus Noah, and Dude Eddie. After that, the animals moved into the house and kept all the crops for themselves. Daddy said that our version of animal farm was a bit sunnier than the Orwell story of the same name. I love Animal Farm.

Marble soda...and all things Japanese

Yesterday night was a lot of fun. The whole three family went downtown for dinner and visiting shops. My first stop was the Apple Store, which is really fun. Initially all the little back balls that you sit on were occupied with other children, so I had to listen to music on iPods instead. A little later, a spot opened up and I got to play on the computers. I played a Nemo game and a preschool game that I really like.

After that, Daddy gave me several choices for where to go to dinner. I picked---what else---the sushi place. The sushi place features a really fun drink, marble soda (shown in the picture), as well as lots of other good stuff. You can read about marble soda here. I had miso soup, ikura (sushi rolls made with salmon roe), gyoza (pot stickers), tobago (an egg sushi), and lots of other good stuff.

We finished off the evening with a trip to Barnes and Noble where we played with Thomas. Along the way, we sang the Petula Clark song "Downtown" as well walked along the sidewalks under the lights.

Downtown!
Things'll be great when you're
Downtown!
Don't wait a minute more
Downtown!
Everything's waiting for you.

Golf, what else

Yesterday, Daddy and I went to the "green golf ball golf course" to play some golf. We did some chipping and some putting (I sank several three-footers). Then we went to the driving range. I love all the parts of the driving range---the machine that picks up the balls, the little baskets that carry the balls, and, of course, the balls themselves. The green golf ball golf course derives its name from the fact that all of its driving range golf balls have green lettering on them.

While usually I hit about a dozen golf balls and then let Daddy hit the rest, today I was really in the mood to hit. I whacked the whole basket full of them. What a lot of people don't know is that golf balls have their own distinct personalities. Here's how you do it. First, you find a golf ball that wants to be hit (or "putted" as I like to say). To figure this out, you listen for the golf ball saying "me, me, me" in response to the question "Do you want to be putted?". Then the golf ball boings over to the tee. Often the golf ball will say things on its way like "Grrr. I'm a grumpy golf ball." or "Yay, I'm a happy golf ball." or "I'm a little bit scared to be 'hitted.'" Then you put the ball on the tee. Then you put your hands on the club while Daddy puts his on too. Then, you have to make the all-important triangle wth your arms. Then you wind up and let the golf ball fly. I managed to hit a couple of golf balls the longest distance ever---around 40 yards---with this method.

One thing about golf balls, some are cleaner than others. There was one that was particularly dirty. I announced loudly, "This golf ball is ridiculously dirty!" This caused the woman in the driving range stall next to mine to double over in laughter. Generally, the other golfers seemed to enjoy my antics.

Golf is great!

I Knew You Were Coming So I Baked a Cake

Daddy and I celebrated Mommy's almost 37th birthday (she'll be 37 tomorrow) by making her a cake and dinner. She asked for something called a black forest cake, so, on Saturday morning, Daddy and I went off on a mission to get the ingredients. Daddy seemed to think he would find "black forest cake" cake mix, but no such thing exists. Daddy was stuck, so he quickly found a cookbook display and tried to figure out what the heck is in black forest cake. He discovered a long list of ingredients, few of which we had. We came home with baking chocolate, cocoa, whipping cream, cherries, and several other items.

Amazingly, Daddy's "solution" was to bake a cake "from scratch". This was fine with me since it entailed many more "boy jobs" than the usual cake-making with mixes. We spent all day Saturday afternoon and evening making the cake. The longest part was making the whipped cream icing, which took an eternity. Daddy and I alternated in using the mixer as our arms got tired. We frosted the cake today and had it this evening. I love cake. It was a great birthday celebration for Mommy.

By the way, Daddy and I also threw together a dinner of grilled salmon marinaded in oregano and dill, baked potatoes with sour cream and chives (from the garden) as well as salad with fresh tomoatoes from our garden. Mommy was pretty impressed with how much her two boys care about her.

After dinner and cake, I helped Mommy to open up her birthday gifts. It was the best almost birthday ever!

Thomas and the Fragile Flower School

One of my favorite Thomas adventures to play-act is "Thomas and the School Trip." For this adventure, Sir Topham Hatt tells Thomas to deliver the school children to some destination and Thomas goes there. Lately though, I've liked a variant of this adventure that Daddy came up with even better---Thomas and the Fragile Flower School. In this version, Sir Topham Hatt once again directs Thomas to take the schoolchildren to some destination; however, he cautions Thomas that the children are all "fragile flowers" and he must be very careful. Thomas then sets off on his journey and inevitably crashes in some horrible fashion. I then announce, "The fragile flower children are all broken. What are we going to do about that?"

Remarkably, the solution to this dilemma is to go back to the station, collect a new batch of coaches with a new class of fragile flower children and go off to crash again.

In addition to being fragile flowers, the Fragile Flower school kids all have funny names. Daddy says their names are all palindromes---names that are the same spelled backwards as frontwards. They include: Bob, Anna, Eve, Aviva, Nan, Ava, Elle, and Emme.

National Zoo/DC Part II

Here are the rest of my photos from DC. There are lots and lots, including more from the zoo (including naked mole rats!) and photos from museums and several boat rides. I love Washington DC!

Green and Yellow: Aftermath

I've heard your feedback loud and clear. Green and yellow is now out as a blog format. We're back to the old format.

Scooter

Today Daddy and I went for a scooter ride together. Daddy got out his Razor scooter, and he helped me build my Rallye scooter. We went to the park across the street and rode around. Mommy made sure I wore my helmet while riding my scooter. Scooter riding is fun...especially the downhill parts. The uphill bits are less fun. Here are some pictures of our adventures together.

See ya!

Lately, I've taken to saying "ya" instead of "you." Neither Mommy nor Daddy can figure out where I picked this up since neither of them talk that way. I told them that "ya" was a word I made up all by myself. Despite this considerable exercise in creativity on my part, neither of them seem to like using "ya" for "you."

Green and Yellow

Since green and yellow are my favorite colors, Daddy thought it might be fun for me to have a weblog look that is more in tune with my favorite colors. Please "vote" in the comments section for whether you like this version of the weblog or the earlier version.

Here's a New Orleans Tune

Since hearing about the flood in New Orleans, I've been quite interested in learning more about the place. One way I do this is to listen to lots of New Orleans music. Daddy has been singing me a couple of New Orleans songs I really like. They're especially good to sing along to or dance to. They are: "Iko Iko," which is a traditional Mardi Gras song, "Down at the Twist and Shout," which is a song about the zydeco group Beausoleil, and, of course, "Dixie." I asked Daddy what a "dixie" was and he told me it was a ten dollar bill in New Orleans. The "dixie" refers to "dix", the French word for ten.

Daddy has also exposed me to a Paul Simon song which refers to Clifton Chenier, the "King of the Bayou", but I don't like it very much.

National Zoo Part I

Here are some photos from one of the two days that Mommy and I visited the National Zoo while we were in Washington DC. We had to ride a bus and two Metro trains to get there. The travel is as good as the zoo itself! I got Mommy some free newspapers at the bus stop too! My absolute favorite zoo animals were the naked mole rats, but you will have to wait to see them a bit longer since they are not in this batch. You will see lovely animals like pandas, otters, giraffes and elephants though-- even an elephant shrew with a long, twitchy nose! (The pandas on the video screen are the Mommy Panda and the new panda cub, who was about 6 weeks old when we took the pictures. (You can read more about him, see the panda cam, and even vote for his name on the zoo web site.) The mommy and cub are being kept away from the public until the baby is older. The one eating bamboo in the color photos is the daddy.)

Sunflowers

Daddy and I did some photography experiments tonight. Using his tripod and something called a "macro setting", we took some more ultra closeup pictures of my sunflower. I took many of these photos myself. We also made something called a still life. In our still lifes, we used some of my pretend fruit, a real lemon, a real carrot, a wine glass, and my big plastic duck. We put these on our patio table. We even took a shot of our still life from underneath the table. I like our pictures. You can see them here.

Doing Laundry

While Mommy has a hurt toe, Daddy and I have been helping her out by doing the laundry. One of the highlights of laundry is sock matching, which I am an expert in. The other highlight is getting into the laundry basket with the dirty clothes. Here are some pictures that Daddy and Mommy think are exceptionally cute of my doing laundry.

In the Jungle

As you know, it's a great tradition to sing Wimoweh (The Lion Sleeps Tonight) before going to bed. As part of that tradition, I get to choose the animal in each verse that sleeps tonight. While selections vary in the first two verses---everything from dragons to zebras to otters---I'm very consistent in my selection for the last verse. For that verse, I choose the unlikeliests of bedfellows, the tiger and the polar bear, while they never meet in the wild, the often meet in my world.

A Really Useful Boy

Much like Thomas the Tank Engine, I aspire to be Really Useful too. This weekend I've been a really useful boy. Yesterday, I helped Daddy make an apple pie. I gathered the apples from our tree as Daddy tossed them down to me from his ladder. I measured out the mixture of sugar, cinnamon, flour, salt, and nutmeg to coat the apples with, I cut all the apples (using the apple cutting machine), and I put the pie in the oven to bake. Mommy said it was the best pie we've yet made together.

Today, I decided that the patio windows needed cleaning, so I took out my trusty squirt bottle, rag, and, best of all, my trusty squeegee! I love squeegeeing. Here are some pictures of me at work. I've also included some pictures of a sunflower and carrot I grew as well as some pictures taken at dinner. Of course, I played a key role in helping to cook.

Moonscapes

On Wednesday, Mommy went out with some of her other Mommy friends for the evening. This meant it was "guy night" here at home. After Daddy made dinner, we went for a walk. I noticed how nice the moon looked. I also noticed that the moon seemed to be following us. Everywhere we walked, there was the moon right over our shoulders. Daddy suggested we get out the camera and tripod and take a picture of the moon. I took some pictures and Daddy took some. Here are our "moonscapes."

When I Grow Up I Wanna Live in DC

I decided to open the front door by myself and go out there to watch for Daddy a few minutes ago. Mommy spoiled my plan and said that 3 is too young to open the front door and go out by myself. I told her that when I grow up, I'll be able to do that. I also told her, "You know, when I grow-up, I can go to Washington D.C. and Daddy will get me a job there, and I can go on THE METRO, you know! And you know, other people will keep me company on the metro..." (I remind Mom and Dad regularly that my airline of choice for my future trips to DC is JetBlue due to the individual TV screens on the back of the seats.)

It's Time to Match the Stars...

Lately, one of my favorite games is "Match Game". This involves turning over a bunch of pairs of Thomas the Tank Engine cards and then taking turns trying to find matches. When I play this game with Daddy, however, before the start of each episode there is an intro to the show.

Daddy: It's time to...
Aidan: Match the Stars!!!
Daddy: With Aidan Morgan, Piggy, Brett Somers, Charles Nelson Reilly, Richard Dawson, and Fannie Flagg...
Daddy: And your host...
Aidan: Gene Rayburn!
Daddy: Hi Stars!
Aidan: Hi Gene!

We then sing the Match Game theme song and we're ready to play. For a blast from the past, check out the theme music here.

Mining

Today I went to the Black Diamond mine. This was a coal and sand mine located in Antioch, CA during the 19th and first bit of the 20th century. I really liked seeing the railroad tracks leading into the mine. I also has a lot of fun climbing up and down a giant sandpile. Here are some pictures of my adventures. You will note several pictures of mountains. When Mommy asked me what the mountains reminded me of, I said they reminded me of the humps of camels. They are definitely "humpy", have the righ color scheme, and, with their tall, dry grasses, look sort of like the fur of a camel. At the end of the batch of pictures, you'll find a couple more engine shots from the Smithsonian, as well as a shot of a sunset walk I took with Daddy along Livorna Road. I've decided we live in a very pretty place in the shadow of "Mountain Diablo."

September playdates

Here are some photos from some recent playdates with friends at my house.

P.S. If you look back at my Sept. 1 blog, you can now see my drawing of a daisy and some grass.

First Week at Garden School

Today was my first day going to preschool without Mommy. I liked it. My preschool is Garden Montessori School, and my teachers are Troy and Carolyn (both are ladies). There is a tank of fish and two birdies (which Mommy tells me are finches).

Yesterday, Mommy and I visited my preschool for a while and found lots of interesting things to do. The first thing I chose was an activity with white plastic hard boiled eggs floating in purple water in the Practical Life area. I used tongs to pick them up out of the water, put them in a colander, and then put them in pretty egg cups with my tongs. Afterward, I used yellow playdough in a little bundt cake mold to make a cake and then slice it. Next, I used some neat purple "slime" stuff and made shapes with it and even cut it with scissors. Finally, I took a tray of colorful styrofoam nuggets and painted water on them. It turns out that they stick together when you do this! I made a flower shape. As we were leaving, I noticed that another boy had stung a necklace with Cheerios and was eating them off of it. I told Mommy that I wanted to do a necklace next time and repeat some of the other stuff I did. Troy told me that the next day Mommy would drop me off at school for a short time and that Troy would walk me into the school. I told her, "I prefer both {mommy AND me}." I also told her and Mommy that I wanted to play school at home to get used to the idea. (We did this, pretending to drive to school in my imaginary rainbow car.)

As Mommy was driving me to school this morning, I told her that I was "the Little Engine that Could," and went to school in that frame of mind. Teacher Troy walked me up the steps, I waved goodbye to Mommy and I disappeared inside in a flash. I was all smiles when Mommy picked me up a half hour later. My teacher told Mommy that I didn't understand why it was so short today since I had lots of things in mind to do. I told Mommy that I didn't get to do the necklace or the colorful styrofoam things, but I did do a tower. (Mommy guesses this was the "pink tower" from the Sensorial area.) I also mentioned a circle with a goodbye song and that there is a Jack in his class who isn't a big man! (unlike Uncle Jack)

This week is a phase in week, where I go every day for a short amount of time (Weds- 1/2 hour, Thurs-45 min, Fri-1 hr, Mon and Tues-1 1/2 hrs. Finally a week from tomorrow I go my full 2 1/2 hrs. I'll be going to school 3 days a week once the getting used to school week is done: Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays.

My Car

I've been thinking about what kind of car I'd like to have when I grow up. My current optimal specification is as follows: I'd like a rainbow colored car with white wheels. On the front it will have two windows, but on the sides of the car, it will have lots of small airplane type windows. My car will also have wings on the side so it looks like an airplane and the wheels will fold up inside. The steering wheel will also be a rainbow.

Pictures from DC

I've decided that, as there have been more pictures taken of me than days I've been alive, it's time to rebel. My usal strategy is to make a series of faces---many of which feature my tongue prominently exposed---whenever someone wants to take a picture of me. But Daddy won't be easily deterred from picture taking. Here is an album with a bunch of shots Daddy took while we were in the Smithsonian in DC. You will notice that I'm mostly absent from these shots. Despite this, somehow Daddy managed to find some fairly interesting things to shoot. Here's the link

Figure and ground

I've been experimenting with the idea of figure and ground in some of my more recent artwork. I wanted to draw a picture of a bunch of daisies to send to my friend Sophie. Since daisies have white petals, white paper won't work to give the right effect. Instead, I asked for some black construction paper and then colored it white and yellow to indicate the color of the daisies. This drawing worked out so well, I made a couple of others to give to other friends.

My Favorite Things in DC

During my trip to DC, a lot of people asked me about what my favorite parts of DC were. While I liked lots of things about DC, the vacation house, the air and space museum, the train museum, the zoo, and so on, the best part of Washington, DC is its mass transit system. To get to anywhere, we would take the blue bus to the metro train.

The metro train is absolutely the best thing. First you have to ride down a giant escalator to get to the trains. Then Mommy or Daddy have to put their card in the machine. When the doors open, I zip through as quickly as I can before they close. The trains are the best part. They have colorful seats and stop at many interesting places. Some of the stops are named after shapes like Washington Circle, McPherson Square, and Federal Triangle. A really good part is when you have to change trains. To get to the zoo, we would ride the blue or orange lines to Metro Center. There, we would change trains to the red line to go to the zoo. Two trains and a bus---each way. Wow!

I can't drive 55

We arrived back from Washington, DC, which is the greatest place ever, this past weekend. More on those adventures in the coming days, but for now I want to talk about fast cars and crazy driving.

When we went to DC, I picked out several of my Hot Wheels and Corgi cars to take with me on the trip. I especially like a Range Rover police car that Daddy got me while he was in England. During our time in DC, we spent many nights happily playing "crazy driving." We set up a ramp consisting of various books and then drove the cars over the ramp. Sometimes the cars would make the jump successfully and land on their wheels. More often, however, they would not. Sometimes the result would a a somesaulting car zooming across the room. Other times the car would simply land on its roof and slide along upside down for a ways.

When we got back from DC, Daddy and I went on a "mission" to target to get some Hot Wheels track for even more crazy driving. We got a track with a little battery powered "engine" to speed the cars along. The cars go over a loop, then do a little jump, then go almost sideways on the high-banked turns of the Hot Wheels raceway. We've discovered that some cars are better than others at negotiating this track. One of the best at this track is a fire engine with a long ladder. "Neenah, neenah," the fire engine's siren sounds as it speeds along the track to a fire. Interestingly, a milk tanker truck is also not too bad at this as well.

I love how fast the cars go on the track. They go so fast that they lok like blurs as they whiz around.

Back from Hawaii

We flew back from Maui two nights ago. I had a great time there. In fact, I enjoyed it so much that I never wanted to leave. I suggested to Mommy that we stay in Maui for "72 days" and that after Daddy was finished with his work he could join us there. On first seeing Daddy at the airport, I suggested that I liked Hawaii much better than California. Daddy seemed doubtful about this. I think he likes California a lot.

Stockens in San Francisco

My Daddy got to visit his old friends the Stockens, who were on a trip to San Francisco. In the course of that visit, he naturally took a bunch of pictures. Here are the highlights. For those interested in what the some of the Stockens (they have two older boys who didn't join them on their trip) check them out here.

Fourth of July in Danville

I had a lot of fun on the fourth of July. We went and saw a big parade in Danville, Mommy set up a big pool for me to splash around in, and I got to explode some "fireworks"---pop its and party poppers. I especially liked waving around the colored streamers from the popped party poppers. You can find photos of my adventures on the fourth of July here. Pay special attention to two photos of "tick guy"---a person dressed up as a giant tick to remind all of us of the need for bug repellent during the summer season.

A Day Out with Thomas

Last Saturday we all went to Roaring Creek for a ride on Thomas. It was great. I can't believe I actually got to ride and see Thomas the Tank Engine. Some of Thomas' friends were there including Sir Topham Hatt. I go to shake his hand. I think he quickly realized that I'm a "really useful boy." We also got to see and amazingly complex train layout with tunnels and a big ramp going down. I noticed that Toby had brakes going down the big hill, but Henry didn't. Whee, went Henry down the big hill.

I also got a Thomas tatoo on my hand (a temporary one, though I would have liked a permanent one too). I got a picture of James on my other hand from the face painters (I like pictures on my hands, but not on my face!) There was an interesting yallow caboose there and lots of other train stuff.

One thing I didn't like was posing for pictures in front of Thomas. I had an angry scowl in one picture. Mommy bought the best of the lot (since she can never resist buying these pictures, but it really wasn't one of the better shots of the "three family".)

Daddy took a whole bunch of other pictures. You can check out some of the nicest ones here.

Boring aside:
(Daddy wants me to mention that these are lightly edited, so you may want to "enhance" them in various ways on the Shutterfly site before printing. Daddy also wants me to mention that Shutterfly has improved their organization so now all my new Shutterfly photos can be found at my Shutterfly website: aidanspictures.shutterfly.com.)

End of boring aside.

Best of all, I got a Thomas whistle to take home with me. Peep! Peep!

Do You Know the Way to Monterey?

I had a fun time going to Monterey and Carmel two weeks ago with Nainnie, Mommy, and Daddy. I got to see an eel (pictured here) as well as anemones (my favorite), and lots of shaaaaarks! Here are some photos of my adventures there.

Bocce Ball

This weekend, Daddy introduced me to a new sport---Bocce Ball. We play our version of the game in the living room using my indoor balls. First, Daddy throws the target ball (a small yellow ball) to the other side of the room. Then we take turns bowling balls toward the target ball. A big part of the challenge is that the balls are all of random sizes, shapes, and weights. It's not easy to aim, for example, the soft sort of oblong baseball that makes crashing noises every time it hits the ground. The person whose ball is closest to the target gets one point and the match ends with the first person reaching five points.

I tried to teach Mommy the rules of Bocce Ball, but couldn't remember all of them. In the version I taught Mommy, we lined up all of the balls, then I had her roll the yellow target ball, and then I asked her to use my BIG yellow ball (only that ball was allowed)to doink the target ball over to the fireplace while I watched. This was a rather difficult task for her since the big bouncy ball tended to roll right OVER the target ball, hardly moving it. After lots of rolls, she finally succeeded. Game over.

Butterfly Release

Last week, we let our five butterflies (who grew up from very hungry caterpillars) go free. It took awhile for some of them to leave their happy "habitat" where they had grown up. I was sad to see them leave but understood that they wanted to have room to fly around outside. I ask about them sometimes. Some pictures should be coming soon.

72 = Infinity

When I want to suggest the largest possible number of things, I reach for my trusty largest number---72. You might wonder how I picked 72 to be the largest number possible. Well, having watched the "I Got Six" song in Multiplication Rock countless times, I noticed the following:

In the middle of the song is a "prince" dressed in a dishdasha and sporting a huge afro hairstyle. The prince has 6 diamonds rings on every finger---making 60 diamonds.

The prince goes out to check on his camels who are parked at parking meters. Each of his eleven camels is loaded down with 6 casks of oil and spice (for 66 casks). This yields to him a "princely" sum of money. In the next scene, we see that the prince has twelve wives (dressed in middle eastern garb). The singer mentions in an aside that "He better be rich" to have so many wives. Each of the wives has six kids---making 72 kids. Daddy will sometimes ask whether it would be good to have 72 Aidans in the house. I don't think this would be a good idea at all---it would be too crowded---and I tell him so.

Anyway, the idea of having to share space with 72 guys led me to think that 72 is an awfully large number, and, subsequently, I've use the number 72 as a kind of shorthand for "a lot."

To hear a clip from the "I got six" song as well as to see the complete lyrics, click here.

The Many Adventures of Aidan and Daddy

Yesterday, we went to the city of Martinez. It's about 15 miles north of us, lying right along the Carquinez Strait. The Strait is the body of water connecting San Francisco and San Pablo Bays. Anyway, our first chore was to go to Wal Mart. Interestingly, northern Californians are pretty anti Wal Mart, so that the nearest one to our house. Wal Mart was okay, but not really much of an adventure. Next, we went to Carquinez Strait regional Park for a climbing adventure--and here's where it get interesting.


While Daddy sort of hoped that by going close to the water, the temperature would be cooler, it wasn't. Its was about 94 degrees when we set off on our hike. Our goal was to make it up to the top of a 700' mountain (our elevation was about 100') so that we could get a view of both bays, the strait, and several harbors. The climb up the mountain was interesting. We walked along a dry stream bed for most of the way. There was enough water (from the stream apparently) to support a good sized forest. It was much cooler under the forest canopy than in the sun. About two-thirds of the way up, it got very steep. I got a little scared and had Daddy carry me for parts of the journey up. Finally, we made it to the top. We found a bench and Daddy snapped a couple of pictures of me relaxing.









We saw a tug boat and a big cargo ship motoring around the port. I asked Daddy to take some shots of these and here are a couple.










Finally, Daddy took a couple of shots of just me. I liked playing with gradient fields in Photoshop to make these interesting pictures. We put all of these in our growing scrapbook.





We had a lot of fun going down the mountain, becuase the path was sufficiently dusty, we could kind of "skate" down the steep places. Daddy would say "ooooooohhhhhhh" as he went down, which was very funny.

After we made it home, Mommy was astonished about how dirty and dusty her two boys were. Of course, that happens when you go on adventures. Here's a link to the photos of our adventure.

Some SF Pictures

Daddy uploaded some pictures from our trip to San Francisco. Please note that the black and white shot of me looking pensive is designed to be printed at 8x10, it does not crop nicely to smaller sizes. Here's the link.

Little Vacuum

Many of you are aware of the fact that, for the most part, I don't like vacuum cleaners. For one thing, they're too loud. Vacuum cleaners never seem to use their "inside voice" when they're busy working. However, I've found a vacuum cleaner that I like. Daddy got out a little Hoover portable vacuum to clean up crumbs after dinner. I was sort of fascinated by it, so I decided to try it. It was lots of fun. I managed to vacuum up lots of crumbs and generally liked the thrill of the hunt in vacuuming. I think vacuum cleaners might be okay after all.h

A Day in San Francisco

Yesterday, I went to San Francisco on the Bart train with Daddy. When we first arrived, we went to the ferry terminal to look at the Bay Bridge and some boats. We checked out the ferry schedule but decided it was too windy for a ferry at that time of the morning. Here is a picture of our view from the ferry terminal.

Next, we started walking along the Embarcadero, passing a whole bunch of piers towards on the way to Fisherman's Wharf. It is a long walk, but Daddy and I have lots of energy. Plus, Daddy promised that we'd see all sorts of different boats along the way. After not too long, we came across the biggest boat I've ever seen---the cargo ship Lihue. It has a giant anchor too.

At the next set of piers, we came across a tug boat named Delta Deanna. I like tug boats a lot, and it was very exciting to see one in person. One of my favorite books I'm Mighty is all about a tug boat. I especially like the bumpers on the front and sides of the tug boat.

Finally, we came to Fisherman's Wharf. We saw a giant cruise ship in one of the piers. We also saw a Japanese navy training boat called the Nippon Maru as well. Nippon Maru has tall masts and lots of sails. We saw several of the sailors on the ship wandering around the docks.

Next, we went to the aquarium. I really liked riding on the conveyor belt to look at the tunnel of fishies. I especially liked the jellyfish and even made a jellyfish of my own in the little art center at the aquarium.


Can you tell which is the real jellyfish and which is the one I made?

We of course also got to ride the double-decker merry go round. I chose to ride in the "tippy chair" which was a lot of fun. After all this, I was quite tired. We rode the Muni train back.
The Muni train is a wooden train built in the mid 1920s in Milan. It was orange. Then we rode the BART back to Walnut Creek, and I took my nap.

After I got up, I made a scrapbook of all my adventures using construction paper and pictures that Daddy took along our journey. What a wonderful day.

Crazy Golf

Crazy golf features two of my favorite things, golf and Kipper. Crazy golf is apparently what they call miniature golf in England. Kipper (the dog) and his friends set up a backyard crazy golf course in one episode of the show, and it made me quite interested in setting up my own crazy golf courses. Anyway, we had out the blocks this morning and I had the idea of setting up a crazy golf course with blocks. This involved setting up a block arrangement and then rolling a golf ball through the myriad obstacles to knock down the "flag" which is an upright block. In my most complicated arrangement, you had to roll a golf ball down a block ramp, it then had to roll along a narrow block "beam" and under a block tunnel. From there, it had to roll up another ramp to jump over an obstacle and then knock down the flag. It took Daddy many tries to succeed at this crazy golf hole.

Fore!

5 Very Hungry Caterpillars

On June 27th, a surprise package arrived for me. It was a very tiny box. When we opened it, I found 5 very tiny painted lady butterfly caterpillars. They have grown an amazing amount each day. Some time in the next week, they should make their chrysallises. Then we'll wait about another 10 days for them to come out as butterflies! This will be very exciting! I love butterflies!

(P.s. Thank you to cousin Molly for the this kit and butterfly habitat that she gave me! We saved it and just sent away for the caterpillars this month.)

Train Day

On Sunday, Mommy took me to Train Day at the old Danville Depot. There was a trackless train that took kids on rides around the parking lot. I loved it! There were also some electric train layouts and some old classic cars. A man let me get into his Ford Coupe and blow the horn. I did this many times.. AAOOGAH! AAOOGAH! There were also fire engines, a regular one and an old one with a big bell that I rang LOUDLY! The firemen gave me a firefighter's hat, a badge sticker and some neat fire engine shaped pencil erasers. I had ice cream too. What a great morning! (Photos were taken with Mommy's old fashioned FILM camera so they are not posted.)

Classic Cars

Last night on our walk around the neighborhood, we met a gentleman named Jerry. He was washing his BMW and had two other cars in his garage both under car covers. I asked Daddy what cars were under the covers, and he suggested that we go ask the gentleman directly. We did and he showed us a 1970s era Mercedes convertible, which was nice, and a Ford Model A from the 1920s, which was amazing. I got to crawl in and pretend to drive the car. I especially liked sitting in the back seat. Jerry offered to give us a ride in the Model A if we were around on the weekend. I can't wait.

Mountain Climbing

Lately, Daddy and I have taken a different outing our walks then the usual one. Instead of going to a park, Daddy and I have been climbing up a very high mountain near where we live. This climb involves a trip up the endless staircase---a set of stairs that rises about four storeys---followed by a hike up a giant mountain. From the top, we have a great view of all the places where we live. I especially like Mount Diablo (pictured here). It reminds me of a dormant volcano in Maui. I asked Daddy if the Mount Diablo volcano was asleep, but he told me that Mount Diablo was not volcanic. I also like to look at the San Ramon valley and the Berkeley Hills in the sunset.

Aidan the Dancer

One of the things I might like to be when I grow up is a dancer. Here is a link demonstrating my many dancing skills while on the Sugar Cane Train in Maui. They were playing some Hawaiian music over the PA system, so I decided to dance. The other people in the train car were clearly amused and impressed.

Here's a shot of the sugar cane train going around on the turntable.

(Be aware, Geocities has some restrictive data transfer policies, so you might have to wait to preview the links.)

Big Wings

One of the highlights of my trip to Hawaii was sitting looking out on the wing of the plane and disconvering that the wing becomes bigger and smaller. On takeoff, Daddy pointed out that the pilot extended the wing surface to create more lift. Once we're in the air, the wing gets smaller again. Finally, on landing, the wings are extended to their maximum length. I enjoyed watching all of it. Airplanes are neat!

Blue Hawaii

We're just back from Maui. I had a great time. I got to build sand castles. I also built some sand bridges and sand tunnels for the sand railroad to drive on. I made some sand cakes and sand pancakes too. I got to see a whole bunch of fishies in a submarine and in an aquarium. I liked the sharks and especially the crabs. Crabs were a source of endless fascination (and some trepidation) during the trip since the holes they dig are all over the beach. I also got to swim in a waterfall on the Mommy boat and the Daddy boat. (The Aidan boat is not very seaworthy so far so I rely on others.)

Here are some pictures of my adventures in Blue Hawaii. Here's a better link with more description.

Actually...

I've been sprinkling lots of new and interesting phrases into my conversations. One of my favorites is "Actually..." Actually is a great start to any sentence, but is especially good in trying to move the conversation toward an outcome that I view as better for me. For example:

Mommy: Would you like milk or water with dinner.

Aidan: Actually, I'd like juice.

Mommy: But you've already had enough juice today.

Aidan: Actually, I haven't had that much juice, and I'm thirsty for juice and not milk or water.

You get the idea. Actually, I didn't get any juice as a result of these negotiations but it was worth a shot.

Another good lead-in is "in the meantime" or "in the meanwhile". For example:

Daddy: Do you want French toast for breakfast?

Aidan: Yes! In the meantime, I'd actually like to have a little cereal while the French toast is cooking.

Sky Ride

Mommy and I went to the zoo today. This is always fun, but I added a new adventure by going on the Sky Ride for the first time today. I loved it! We had good views of some animals that can be difficult to see from the ground, and I got to fly like my friends from Dragon Tales! Can't wait 'til I get to do this again!

Aidan the soldier

For two days in a row, I told my mommy that after I was a boy, I was going to be a soldier. This really got mommy wondering since she does not promote soldiering for her son. I was very matter-of-fact about this each time, and today we talked more about it. Mommy asked me where I heard the word "soldier" and asked me to tell her what a soldier is. I replied something to the effect, "After I'm a boy, I will be a soldier and then I will be a man." Now, while this may sound exactly like something a recruiter would say, Mommy quickly deduced the word I actually meant from our past (non-military related)conversations about growing up. I meant "teenager"! I must have heard something about soldiers on TV an gotten mixed up! We have often spoken about how I used to be a baby but now I am a boy and someday I will be a very big boy called a teenager before I am a grown-up man. Mommy told me that soldiers do very dangerous work and fight to protect our country. They can get hurt very badly and some of them die. I think that I'll go back to my original career choice-- dancer!

Graduation

My Daddy went to graduation this past Sunday. The best part about graduation is the costumes! We dressed up for a photo shoot outside. Daddy dressed as "the professor" while I dressed as Pooh. Here are some photos of our dress-up as well as pictures from our adventures in the "tunnel park" earlier in the day. Check them out here.

Day Trip to San Francisco

Yesterday, I went to San Francisco with my Mommy and Daddy. Here are some photos. It was a sunny, clear day and we took a bay cruise. I really liked all the boats. Boats were always pretty good, but since one of my current favorite books is I'm Mighty, about a small but strong tugboat, boats are even more interesting now. (I definitely could have done without the wind and the noisy loudspeaker during our boat ride, however!).

We also rode the Pier 39 double-decker carousel again-- my favorite thing in San Francisco! I named my horse "Tony" after the song "Tony the Pony," a song that was a favorite of my mommy's as a child that she has since taught me. (I am yelling, "Tony!" during the very smiley carousel photo.)

Daddy, Mommy and I also had lunch at Bubba Gump's, where they make excellent Kraft Macaroni and Cheese. Afterward, we went to The World's Greatest Chocolate Store, where I investagated all of the chocolate items looking for regular chocolate (no nuts, fillings, etc.) and we bought some yummy chocolate Golden Gate Bridges. I ate one of them as we drove home across the Bay Bridge (also a suspension bridge in part much like my chocolates).

Butterflies

I love butterflies. I have read many butterfly picture books over and over with Mommy and Daddy (i.e.,The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle, Waiting for Wings by Lois Ehlert) as well as Caterpillar Spring, Butterfly Summer. (The butterfly pops out in 3-D at the end of this one!) I also have a butterfly hat that Nainnie bought me at Yosemite Park last July. Anyway, one of my favorite games on the couch is pretending to be a caterpillar building a chrysallis around himself (couch pillows) and then emerging from the chrysallis to dry his wings, fly and search for nectar. Many, many butterflies test their wings in our family room.

I highly recommend any books by Eric Carle or Lois Ehlert. They are great!

I lost my poor meatball

When we go to Kindergym, they always have some sort of children's music playing in the background. I immediately start grooving and have a reputation as a dancer. In fact, there is currently one raised mat area that I use as my "stage." Sometimes, Mommy and I act out the songs. A favorite game of mine at Kindergym is pretending to be the bear from "The Bear Went Over the Mountain." I climb up and over an arch-shaped piece of equipment and then hide under the arch after moving stuff over to make a door for the cave where I hibernate. This week, the song, "On Top of Spaghetti" was playing. Mommy sang along, and then I decided to be the meatball in the song.

Anyway, being a meatball involved stacking big, black tire tubes six high to be the bowl. Then Aidan the Meatball would climb out of the bowl, jump onto Mommy, roll across the floor, and hide under a giant, green pillow-like thing (an item that kids generally land on when they jump off of other things). I liked being a meatball so much that I played this game for most of the time we were at Kindergym. I even played a version for a while at the playground outside before shifting to chef mode and serving spinach souffle and pancakes. After I finished "cooking," Mommy and I played in the sand, where I became a scoop truck (front loader) by positioning a very long shovel between my knees as I walked around. Imagination is a wonderful thing.

Electric guitars in need of a plumber

Mommy and I ate dinner at Taco Bell last night at my request. (Daddy is in Chicago for a short trip.) Anyway, we were grooving to the music playing in the background until a song came on that began with heavy electric guitars. Those electric guitars sounded funny to me. I exclaimed, "Their music player sounds a little bit clogged!" Mommy had to agree in this case!

Mother's Day Photos

I had a lot of fun going to the restaurant and playing chess on Mother's Day. Here are some photos from that day.

Chess

Following our Mother's Day brunch, we visited a couple of stores in the shopping place where the restaurant, the Blackhawk Grill, was. In one of these stores was a table with a large chess set on top of it. Daddy told me it was a game and suggested we play. We had a great time with chess, and I was even more delighted to discover that Daddy had a chess set at home too so we could play there. In the days following, we've played lots of chess. I especially like the pawns, which I like to call "boys" since, compared to the other chess men, they're boy-sized like me. One of my favorite versions of chess is to build a castle consisting of rooks at the four corners and pawns forming the walls of the castle. Daddy opens the doors and then calls for the type of piece that is allowed to go in.

"White knights can now enter!" he says.

I march the white knights up to the gate to gain entry. Sometimes, the chessmen are disobedient and the wrong guys try to enter. It seems that the bishops are the most unruly chessmen.

Floats or sinks

Inspired by the science fair, we decided to run a number of experiments at home this weekend. MY favorite one was "floats or sinks". We got a bucket of water and tried a variety of different items to determine whether they float or not. This was a more systematic extension of our earlier experiments with Little People. First, we ran some replications of our earlier work. Little People do indeed float. We tried a number of other plastic people related to Little People and found that these floated as well. We then tried several other items. Here is the list:

Item: Result
Rubber bands: sink
Koosh balls: sink

which led us to conjecture that rubber items sink. But this is wrong since

Rubber balls: float

Candles: float

which led Mommy to conjecture that wax things float. But this too is wrong since

Crayons: sink

We also thought that plastic floats from our earlier Little People trials. We got some confirmation of this:

Plastic spoons: float

But this "plastic hypothesis" is wrong too since

Tony Hawk: sinks

We thought that heavy things sink and by and large this is true since

Rocks: sink
Golf balls: sink
Metal spoons: sink

Bottom line: The properties of objects that lead to floating or sinking are quite complex. More study is required.

In other experiments, we tested whether big balls or small balls fall faster. We seemed to determine from dropping them at equal heights and then checking which hit the ground first that they fall at about the same rate. Feathers, however, fall more slowly than balls of any size.

I like experiments quite a lot.

Science Fair

Today, we went to a Science Fair in Lafayette. It featured a lot of interesting things like magnetism, how batteries work, "lava" from a volcano and rockets powered by baking soda and vinegar. I loved the fair and even got to take home a new pet---a worm that turned the compost in the school where the fair took place into nice soil. I put the worm into our garden in hopes that he could duplicate that feat.

Later in the afternoon, we went hunting for Mother's Day gifts and cards for Mommy. Initially, I wanted to go to a bunch of stores (notably the Thomas store [Barnes and Noble] and the Apple Store) to play. Daddy noted that we had to "work" first to find Mommy's gift. While that seemed interesting enough intially, I soon tired of "work" and wanted to go right to play. Work is a lot harder than play. I noted that both Mommy and Daddy seemed to work very hard, but that, happily, Aidan didn't have to work much at all. It would be nice if this situation were always the case. Anyway, we picked out some nice things and I nice card for Mommy and came home. We worked efficiently enough that there was some time for playing too.

When we came home, I remembered the "experiments" in the science fair and wanted to run some of my own. Daddy seems to really like experiments. We tried several experiments in whether things float or sink. We determined that corks float and Little People (TM) float. Quarters, however, sink.

Cow Quest

A Map of Our Walk 

Daddy and I went out for a walk in one of the many open space parks near our house. We were on a quest for cows. Since the grass is currently all green from the rains, the cows like to eat in many of the open space areas. This is a fun way to get up close and personal with cows. In fact, you can lay in the pasture with them if they're in the right kind of mood. Anyway, Daddy and I set out yesterday on our cow quest. I've marked the route on the map (which is a lot easier to read if you clikc on it to make it big). We started at the "X" labeled "Car Here" and made a big loop. It was my longest walk ever---covering about 2.5 miles. We finally spotted the cows near Benham Court (which you'll find at the circled "T" on the map about halfway around the loop). Along the way, we saw a swamp (fancifully named "Bullfrog Pond", a whole bunch of birds and squirrels, some hawks, lots of flowers (I like the yellow ones), and some of our neighbors. They were impressed with my strong legs. It was a great walk. At the end of it, I didn't want to go back. I asked Daddy if we could stay outside forever. He pointed out that we lacked a tent, as well as sufficient food and water, so things would not be much fun. That was enough to convince me to come home for lunch.

The Longest Train Layout Ever

For the first time in several weeks, Daddy was home, and we were able to spend the whole day together doing guy things. We went to the tunnel park (twice), vistied the Apple store, visited Barnes and Noble, ate at McDonald's (where have a new favorite sandwich---cheeseburger, hold the burger), and picked some spinach for a salad. (By the way, this is the first time I had a really big taste of a spinach leaf from our garden mixed with salad dressing. I don't really like it.)

But best of all was that Daddy and I made up lots of Thomas adventures. As part of this, we made the longest train layout ever.


The Best Layout Ever! 

We started in the kitchen and then snaked tracks all the way through the living room. At the edge of the living room, the train divided with one line going into the hall and the other into the dining room. Daddy thought up some amusing names for all the landmarks. The station in the kitchen was Enbourne station. Then you have to travel up Gordon's hill. Next it's on to the Misty Mountains and then the foothills.


Climbing over the Misty Mountains and the Foothills 

If you proceed east (through the hall) you come to the main port of the Island of Sodor---Sodor Bay---after passing over the massive Sodor Bay Bridge.


The View from Sodor Bay 

Going west takes you onto the long curving bridge over the River Avon and down into the valley where Ffarquharr station (home of Mavis---and loosely modeled on Bath) is located. Along the way, there are, of course, many obstacles, broken track, snow, landslides, slow trains, and so on. I loved it!

Up up and Away at the Zoo

I went to the zoo with my friend Sophie on Wednesday and decided to pull the bar on the airplane ride and take it up high for the first time. Cool!

I was also happy to see the tiger and the bear briefly wake up. They sure do nap a lot! The camels were giving each other springtime "hugs." For some reason, this caused quite a bit of giggling among the grown-ups...

Thomas and His Many Adventures

Lately, I've been very interested in Thomas. My current favorite Thomas game is "Thomas and his Many Adventures." The usual format of the game is for Thomas to start out at the station with Sir Topham Hatt. Sir Topham then gives Thomas some sort of a mission such as delivering schoolchildren to the zoo, taking coal to the coaling station, or delivering some barrels. Then Thomas sets off. Sometimes these missions are uneventful, but most of the time there is some obstacle to Thomas' completing his work. One time the low lying area between two bridges was flooded. Thomas got stuck and the water doused the fire in his boiler. He needed his friend Mavis, the diesel engine to help push him out. Another time there was a rockslide from the misty mountains that blocked the track. The "rocks" consisted of Lego blocks. Since Thomas is very strong, he was able to push his way through the rocks and complete his deliveries.

Daddy seems to be able to come up with lots of adventures for Thomas but, just in case he is running out, this morning I picked up a whole bunch of adventures in my hand and gave them to him to put in his pocket so there will be plenty of Thomas adventures for the next time we play.

Cubist

Last night, Daddy and I made cubes of various sizes out of my blocks. I really like cubes in general and big cubes most of all. We starte out by making a 2 x 2 x 2 cube, which I correctly pointed out consisted of 8 blocks. Next, we made a 3 x 3 x 3 cube. While I knew there were nine blocks in each layer, the total number of blocks was elusive (and not terribly interesting to me either). Finally, we made a BIG cube: 4 x 4 x 4. Daddy says that it takes 64 blocks to make a cube this big. It is a lot of work, but well worth it to make a really nice, big cube.

Easter with Grammy

Click here for pictures from Easter weekend and then read on!

On the Saturday before Easter, I went to the Eggstravaganza at Oak Hill Park in Danville. This was a much better Easter egg hunt than the one I attended last year in Lafayette since they divided the hunt up into age groups. This was much more fun since older children were not knocking me over to get eggs, and I collected lots of eggs (more than my official allotment of 6, actually) with little prizes inside (like rings, stickers, and a pirate eye patch). Mommy walked around and made sure that the other kids also had a good number of eggs, and we “hid” 2 of mine for another boy, before going off to enjoy my stash. The Eggstravaganza also included balloons, and I got a yellow one, but it had a very slippery, iridescent ribbon that untied as soon as we tied it on my wrist and it flew away. This made me very sad, but happily I we were able to get another one with a more obedient ribbon. There were also fun crafts to make, and a big, white Easter bunny walked around meeting children. I did want to see the bunny, but I did not want to touch him, so mommy took my picture with me at a comfortable distance away from him. (Interestingly, the Easter bunnies at the local malls here were both brown bunnies, much like Peter Rabbit. Mommy tells me that the East Coast malls seem to favor white bunnies. I like them all—from a distance!)

The best part of the Eggstravaganza was that Grammy arrived from the airport in time to see the eggs I’d collected and to play with me at the park! Hooray! Then she stayed with us for a week. She gave me a big, yellow dancing Boobah toy for Easter. (Boobahs are somewhat egg-shaped furry creatures seen on PBS.) In addition to my basket from the Easter Bunny, I also found a soft, furry, talking Easter bunny basket from Nainnie on Easter morning, which I used to collect my backyard Easter eggs. (Thanks, Nainnie! Thanks for the candy too!) Grammy and I repeated Easter egg hunts together all week inside the house. I find that shoes make an excellent place for hiding plastic eggs!

Other fun things we did during Grammy’s visit were going to the park and visiting the Oakland Zoo. At the zoo, I rode lots of the kiddie rides outside the gates. It was really, really crowded that day even though it was a weekday, requiring a major hike from the car (parked on the entrance hill rather than the parking lot!) Even so, I had fun and I decided to ride the airplane ride for the first time. I rode several times, making sure to ride when I could have a plane to myself since I am not yet ready to pull the bar to take the plane up higher and I did not want my co-pilot to do this either! I do like going around and round though!

Grammy, Mommy and I also took the BART train and a cable car to San Francisco’s Pier 39 one day. We did the BART since I am always begging to ride it, and the cable car since neither I nor Grammy had ridden one before. I loved the BART, but I did not care for the wind on the cable car. I did enjoy looking at the boats and the sea lions and the double-decker carousel though. It was a clear, beautiful day. We also rode the “F,” and electric train/bus back to a different BART station.

I was sad to see Grammy go home, and have asked Mommy numerous times if she misses her mommy. I am planning her next trip in my mind as well as a trip on the plane for me. Mommy and Daddy think that it will be a while before my imagined trips actually occur, however. (Daddy returned home on the day that Grammy went back to PA. He had been at a conference in Princeton. At least it was a day of returns as well as leave-taking.)

Go fly a kite

On Saturday, the whole family went out to a nearby park (which I call the "tunnel park" since there is one sliding board in the shape of a tunnel) to fly kites. We brought with us two kites, one with Elmo's picture on it, the other with Grover. While the wind was not quite as nice as it might be, there was still enough of a breeze to get the kites flying. I had a great time running around while holding the kite string and making it fly. Kite flying is great!

How does your garden grow

I really like gardening. Yesterday, we added more plants to the garden and checked on how the ones planted earlier are doing. Here's the status report:

1. The tendrils on the pea plants have successfully curled around the lattice in the graden and are growing up nicely. The first pea blossom has appeared as well. I'm quite fascinated at the notion of tendrils and inquire about which plants have them and which do not at every opportunity.

2. Our onions (grown from seeds) are all coming up quickly. They're still pretty small. I wanted to pick a couple but Daddy suggested that we wait until they're a bit bigger.

3. Our grapvine is thriving. It's go lots of new growth. It still hasn't managed to climb its way onto the lattice set out for it yet.

4. We added a pumpkin plant to a dirt-filled area in the front yard. I'm hoping that we can grow our own Jack-O-Lanterns for Halloween.

5. In the back, we added pole beans (and an interesting pole for them to climb on) as well as fancy lettuce and cucumbers. We're already doing a fine job with the spinach we planted earlier, which is producing delightful leave for salads.

6. Our broccoli is getting very big. I can't wait for it to be ready.

7. All of our tomato plants have blossoms. Tomatoes are coming!

Attack of the Clones: Post-script

Actually, I omitted an Eddie. There are six Eddies: regular, dude, Easter, Christmas, mechanic, and skateboarder. As for the personalities of the Little People, the guys with the edgiest personalities seem to be the two "Bunny guys". They are always very demanding about everything. The Daddy character is also not exactly sweetness and light either. He's constantly either talking on his cell phone, driving to and from work, or busy foreclosing on a property. He's foreclosed Farmer Jed's farm on several occasions leaving poor Jed with only his beat-up blue Ford F-150 pickup truck as an asset.

Apple cookies

Lately I've been really interested in playing with Play Doh. One of my favorite things to do with this stuff is to use my rolling pin to roll it out flat and then use my apple shaped cookie cutter to make apple cookies of various colors. I stakc my apple cookies neatly to the side of the dough rolling area so that they will stay nice. Sometimes, I cut out an apple cookie where the cookie cutter just misses the edge of the dough. This results in an apple cookie with a bit taken out of it.

"Who bitted it?" I ask.

I kind of like the idea of people biting my cookies. The other fun thing to do with these cookies is to count them. I'm getting very good at counting and even did some rudimentary addition yesterday with Daddy. I had three purple cookies and three white cookies. Daddy asked me how many cookies of all types I had. I was able to count them all out together to obtain a figure of six cookies. Yay for Aidan! Daddy was quite pleased with this feat.

First Harvest

We had out first harvest from the garden: Spinach leaves. Our spinach plants have been growing really well, so we picked some last night for salads for all of us. Yay spinach. In other news: We have baby strawberries now growing. I can't wait for them to be ready. Our basil plant, however, is not feeling well.

Little People: Attack of the Clones

It's interesting that there are many duplicates of each of the Little People characters. Often they're dressed a bit differently or are carrying something different, but it's still the same character in multiple outfits. Last night, Daddy (just back from a trip to Atlanta) and I played with the "clone" game with the Little People. This involves both counting and social pleasantries. First, the counting part: Sorting through the little people, we have to pick out all the clones of each type of Little Person.

The largest number of clones are of the Eddie character. They consist of Regular Eddie, Dude Eddie, Christmas Eddie, Easter Eddie, and Mechanic Eddie. Finishing in second is the Sonya Lee character. Her clones consist of: Money Sonya Lee, Apple Sonya Lee, and Zookeeper Sonya Lee. Tied for third is the Mommy character, which consists of two absolutely identical Mommies (Mommy 1 and Mommy 2).

On to the social pleasantries: Once the clones are gathered together, they introduce themselves to one another. A typical conversation goes like this:

Regular Eddie: Pleased to meet you. I'm Eddie
Dude Eddie: Dude! Awesome. I'm Eddie, great to meet you Eddie.
Easter Eddie: Eddie...Eddie
Christmas Eddie: Funny, I'm named Eddie too. Good to meet you Eddie.

And on and on.

Easter Egg Hunts

One of my favorite Easter traditions is the easter egg hunt. I went on a number of "official" egg hunts this season however, I like to improvide my own egg hunts. To do an egg hunt, someone (either Aidan, Mommy, Daddy, or Gammy) has to hide their eyes while another person scatters eggs around the house. Then it's time to open your eyes and go in seach of Easter eggs. When I'm the person hiding the easter eggs, I like to give hints to the person searching so it's not too hard to find the eggs. Some of my most creative hiding spots were putting eggs in Daddy's shoes and putting eggs in the faucet for my bathtub. These were extremely hard to find.

Of course, I like when things are turned around as well and I'm the person searching for the eggs that the other person has hidden. Easter egg hunts are fantastic.