Slow Motion Autumn

You know, people say that California doesn't have seasons like the east coast. This isn't really true. It's just that the seasons kind of occur in slow motion, so you don't notice them as much. For instance, right now it's what you would normally think of as fall on the east coast. The leaves are turning and falling off the trees. There's a crispness to the air. The trees and bushs are covered in nuts and berries. Here's a short photstream to give the flavor.

Birthday Celebration

Yesterday, I had an early birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese. I invited all my classmates from kindergarten as well as some old friends as well. I had 12 people at my party, and everyone had a great time.



The theme of the party was my favorite sport--baseball. We even had a really cool Oakland A's cake, and I dressed as an A's player. Best of all, I got some very cool presents including a pair of nerf micro-dart guns that Daddy really likes. What a good day.

Early Birthday

After we went on the light-up train at Sunol, we stoppped off at Chevys, my favorite restaurant. Mommy had a birthday coupon from there, so we celebrated my birthday early.



I got the big sombrero, ice cream, and everything. Daddy only had his camera-phone, so we only have silly pictures

Sad Departure

Yesterday was a very sad day. I learned that the Oakland A's traded my favorite player, Danny Haren. I cried and cried. I said to Daddy that I love Danny Haren and wish he weren't traded. The only good news is that he was traded to the Diamond Backs, who play the Giants pretty often, so I'll still get to see him pitch from time to time. I'm getting a Diamond Backs hat to root for him.

I"m also extremely angry at the A's for making this move. I'm going to punish them by rooting against them for two whole games. The winter is a very sad time. Last year, I remember the day that Frank Thomas left the A's. This year, I'll remember the day Danny Haren was traded. These will both be very sad days for me.

Star of the Week - Update

Each day, I have a different star of the week responsibility. On Tuesday, my job was to bring in a story to read. I try to pick stories that are especially likely to amuse. For example, at a recent evening reading event, I brought in the book I Stink, which is about a garbage truck. For my star of the week offering, I brought in Bats at the Beach. While I really like this book, it didn't have sufficiently many gross parts to make the audience roll on the floor lauging uncontrollably. The best parts were when the book talked about the foods the bats liked to eat during their trips to the beach. These include "salted skeeters" and "roasted big-mallows."

Teddy Bear Cholla

On Wednesday, my job was to bring in some pictures of a place I went and explain them. While Mommy suggested I bring in shots of DC, I opted for desert pictures from Arizona. I brought in pictures of saguaro and barrel cactus, as well as cholla and prickly pear. I explained each of the pictures. My friend Logan was very impressed. He said the pictures were very cool. My teacher, Miss Nelson, was also impressed. She said she learned a lot about cactus from me. In particular, she did not know that you can tell the age of a saguaro from how many arms it has

Sunol Christmas Train

This evening, Mommy set up a surprise for me. She wouldn't tell me what it was or aything about it. Reluctantly, she told me it was "Sunol", which meant nothing to me. It turned out to be a lit-up Christmas train.



Inside and out, the train was decorated with lots of lights. It had 13 cars (we counted them)---a very long train. They had all different kinds of cars: restaurant cars, sleepers, pullman cars, and so on. They were all decorated in different ways, so it was pretty neat.



The only problem was that the train took forever to get going. I was bored during that time. Still, it was a fun evening all around.

Here's a set of shots from the evening. As usual, you can download, post, remix, or order prints from these.

Daddy note: I've abandoned all the other photo services for Flickr. It's much easier to share, do nice slide shows, and embed images in the blog. In addition, for those who like to download (you know who you are), it's much better in terms of image quality and it's free---just click the "download image" link for each picture. Finally, prints are cheaper: 4x6s are 15 cents each while 8x10, my favorite format, is only $2 each. For 8x10, that's abour 50% cheaper than Shutterfly and Snapfish. I may occasionally post images elsewhere, but mostly it will be to Flickr.

Star of the Week

I have extra responsibilities this week since I'm the star of the week. I was all excited this morning. I popped out of bed, put on clothes quickly, and zipped off to eat breakfast. I did not want to be late. This promises to be the most fun week of Kindergarten ever!

Busy, busy weekend

It was a very busy weekend. On Saturday, we got up early and went to a trophy ceremony for a golf group that Daddy belongs to. It turns out that Daddy won the trophy---the "Coffee Cup" (in honor of the early morning times they play). It was great. I even kissed the trophy I was so happy.

Next, we went off to soccer where, annoyingly, we wore our white shirts again. You see, we have reversible white and green shirts for soccer. I much prefer the green, but our team, the Tigers, never seems to get to be green. In fact, last week I was so upset that we were white again that I protested enough that I changed teams.



After that, Daddy and I went on a hike in the Mount Diablo foothills. Here's a batch of photos from around there.

Sunday was almost as busy. I spent the afternoon working with Mommy on my star of the week poster. See, this week, I'm the STAR OF THE WEEK in Kindergarten. Pretty cool.

We also went out for sushi and saw the Amazing Race (my favorite show) tonight.

Bunker Shots

Yesterday, Daddy and I played golf in the backyard, and I discovered that I had a remarkable talent--I can effortlessly hit bunker shots. Now you may wonder how I learned this since we don't have bunkers (sand traps) in our yard. Well, we put in a bunch of new powdery dirt in our garden area. It is about the same consistency as bunker sand. I decided that it would be fun to hit some balls out of this spot. Using my baseball grip on the golf club, I easily blasted my way out of the bunker. Daddy set the ball to have some tougher lies including something called a "plug lie" where the ball is half buried in the sand. Again, no problem for me. I hit textbook blast shots out from the bunker. (For those who don't know, a blast shot is one where you hit a little bit behind the ball and use the force of the sand in part to propel the ball out of the bunker.)

What is amazing is that no one ever taught me how to hit this shot. Daddy has always been more concerned with my hitting normal shots than tough bunker shots. It just seems like something that comes naturally to me.

Photostream

You will notice a new feature to the blog---a photostream. This is a looping slideshow of pictures posted to Flickr. Many of these appear as links in blog entries. If see a picture you like in the photostream, just click on it and you'll bounce to Flickr where you can download it or order a print.

Arizona - One Last Time

This is the last of the batch of highlight photos from Arizona.

Arizona Desert Museum

Photo Safari

Yesterday, Daddy went on a photo safari---a very long hike in the Diablo Foothills in search of pictures. Here are some of his best shots (view as a slideshow for best effect):

Plants

Animals

The large bird in two of the shots is a hawk. The creature that looks like a dog is a coyote. Daddy wants me to tell you that these photos were all taken with his 70-300mm lens, which is amazing. Only with the super powers of zoom can you get pictures this close of a coyote.

Finally, here are some scenes.

All of these are downloadable or you can make prints.

Goal!

I played soccer today and scored a goal. In this league, goals are tough to come by as there are a zillion kids vying for the ball. I got the ball near the goal mouth and kicked it through.

Gooooal!

I also did well as a goalie. I only let in one goal.

Sabino Canyon

As I mentioned before, we went to a place called Sabino Canyon on your recent trip to Arizona. There used to be a tram that wouuld take you all the way to the end of the canyon, where there is a nice waterfall. Sadly, there was a flood in 2006 that washed out the top half of the road, so the tram only goes halfway up. That meant we had to walk the other half of the way.



It was a hot day and for some reason I only wore my Sunday School shoes on the trip out, so my feet got sore fast. I didn't want to go on with the hike. I would sit down in the middle of the trail and refuse to go on.



Eventually, this became sufficiently annoying to everyone that we all turned around to go back.




Still, it was a very pretty place. Here are some photo highlights.

Reid Park Zoo

These are some photos from the zoo in Arizona. I had a great time pretending to be a peacock. Here are the photo highlights.

Marble Run

This weekend we've been playing a lot with my marble run. I really enjoy filling it completely with marbles.




Daddy and I also like to do a version of mythbusters with the marble run. The latest myths we've been studying involve these two "Y" sections of the marble run, where the marbles can either go to the left or to the right. The way the marble run is formed, there's a "Y" early in the run and a "Y" later in the run. The marble has to pass through both Y's to land in the red or green bins but only the first Y to land in the yellow bin. The myth is that the marble is equally likely to land in any of the three bins. We busted that myth--a marble is more likely to land in yellow than either of the other two bins. We also checked that the Y's are "fair" in that the marble is just as likely to go left as right. So, how do you solve this mystery?

Wine Country

Yesterday Daddy and I went to wine country together. Our official purpose was to pick up wine shipments from the two wineries that we are members of. Unofficially, the purpose was to go on a photo safari during the colorful fall season in wine country. We visited Trefethen and wandered around the barrels there. We also visited a new winery--August Briggs--up in Calistoga. Their winery is in the shape of a big barn.



We wandered around the grapevines and got a lot of nice pictures. Next, we went to Duckhorn and found a whole bunch of secret trails around the property.




I also got to take some pictures with Daddy's camera. Here is a nice one of Daddy.


We had a great time. Here's a link to all the photos (run the slideshow in fullscreen mode for best results).

It's Delicious

When I'm having foods that I like, I tend to lavish them with praise. For instance, a Kit Kat bar is "absolutely scrumptious." What I've discovered though is that if I can praise a food not just for its taste but also for its superior nutritional properties, this is even better. I like to increase the odds of getting more of my favorite stuff. My favorite is to offer a rhyming phrase:

It's delicious. It's nutritious!

This is a useful phrase for a host of foods. For instance, Oreo Cakesters are big chocolaty cakey cookies. I proudly announce,

They're delicious. They're nutritious!

No one seems to believe this though.

Sometimes I'm more successful. Chocolate milk, for instance:

It's delicious. It's nutritious!

Happily, this produces some level of agreement.

Back from Arizona

I'm just back from our trip to Arizona. It's a really neat place. I've never seen so many cactuses in my entire life. When we got off the plane at the airport, there were cactuses on the side of the road. I just kept seeing them everywhere. I asked Mommy and Daddy what would happen if a cactus suddenly grew in the middle of the road. Could cars get past it? Later, Mommy got me a book about the life of a saguaro cactus. What I learned is that it takes forever for one of these cactuses to grow.

At various restaurants and stores, I offered my perspective on cactuses:

You guys sure must like cactuses.

I suggested to various workers.



We did a lot of fun stuff in Arizona. We went to a "desert museum", which had lots of interesting plants and creatures. One of the activities at the museum was archeology. I used a duster thing to uncover a fossil of a dinosaur.



We went on a tram (and then on a hike) in Sabino Canyon. I liked the tram ride. I did not like the hike. We also went to the Tucson zoo.

Here are some pictures from the trip. Link here.

Tired

Trick or treating is very tiring. My legs were really sore this morning, and I was generally really tired today. I went to bed early. Daddy took a couple of pictures (above) of story time. One of the stories was called Mouse Paint. I got out the mouse finger puppets that go with this. I had the red one and Mommy had the blue one. You can see the blue guy (he's a bit blurry) in one of the shots. Daddy says that the cool feature of these shots is that they were done in the natural (dim) light of the house--no flash at all. Both of these photos are downloadable. Links here:

First photo

Second photo

World Series Party

This past weekend we had a World Series party. We decorated the house with lots of baseball stuff. Baseball caps lined the living room. Oakland A's bobbleheads adorned the mantle. Also, I made some cutout pictures of baseball players which we taped to the entertainment center. We invited over Roxy and her family as well as Daddy's friend Maria (who was kind enough to provide the awesome A's tickets last year).

As part of the festivities, I designed a quiz for the people between innings. It consisted of trivia questions like: How many all-star game wins does the National League have? How many World Series have the Red Sox won? I memorized the answers from Daddy.

Of course, one of the best parts of the World Series is when a team wins the trophy and all the players pour champagne on each other. Our party was on Sunday---the day the Boston Red Sox swept the series. Roxy, Daddy, and I were all jumping around and hugging each other with the Sox victory. World Series parties are fun. I can't wait to have a Super Bowl party!

Happy Halloween

Halloween is one of the best holidays. You get to dress up. You get to visit lots of people. You get candy. What's not to like? This year I dressed up as the Shadow Ranger. While most of the Power Rangers are teenagers who have been trained by the Sensei to have powerful crime fighting skills, the Shadow Ranger is a dog-like creature named Anubis "Doggie" Cruger. He retired from being a ranger but then came out of retirement to save the world from the evil General Benaag. In the picture above, I'm with my friend, Christopher, who is dressed up as Vernon Davis, a player on the 49ers.

Daddy did a photo shoot of me showing off my many crime fighting moves. Check it out here.

Campanile

Here are some fall pictures of the campanile at Daddy's work. Check them out here.

Pebble Beach

Daddy recently went to Pebble Beach for a conference. He also got to play some golf. He said it was the most beautiful golf course he'd ever seen. Here are some highlights.

The Price is Right

The newspaper is surprisingly interesting. I like to hear about the A's notebook, which tells what's going on with the Oakland A's. I also occasionally like to hear about the Raiders and the 49ers, but only to hear about the injuries. But one of my favorite parts of the newspaper is the "guess the price" game. Daddy will look at the car ads and tell me the names of two cars as well as some descriptions. My job is to figure out which costs more. For example:

New Toyota Camry versus new Toyota Prius (I know the Prius costs more)
New Camry versus new Toyota Pickup truck (I know the Camry costs more)

My favorite is the 2005 Hummer H2, which has been in the paper for the last couple of weeks. It costs more than ANY other vehicle---even more than the high end Lexus, which used to win all of these contests. Why do people pay so much for Hummers?

Weird Phrases

I've picked up a bunch of phrases, mostly from movies (none of which I've seen) that I like to say. Here are my top 5:

1. "Give me a little room to breathe" (Col. Bill Kilgore, Apocalypse Now)
2. "Brains...brains" (Night of the Living Dead)
3. "You do X like you fix roads...lousy" (Doc Hudson in Cars)
4. "It's not the worst X I've ever seen. It's not the best either." (David Feherty, Tiger Woods game)
5. "Destroy the Humanoids" (Robot words from video game Berzerk)

More Games

Daddy and I have played a bunch of games lately. I've learned some new poker variants. I like 5 card draw poker the best. It might even be better than Texas Hold 'em. I've also learned seven card stud poker with lots of crazy wild cards. My favorite variant is a game that Daddy's grandfather taught him---the wild cards are kind of a rhyme---deuces and jacks and kings with an ax. Of course, there is only one kind with an ax (the king of hearts).

We also played a game of Risk, which I won. We played the yellow team versus the green team. I was green. I managed to take over South America and stopped Daddy from taking Africa. Then I expanded into Europe and Australia and finally wiped out the last of his guys in Asia and North America. I like it when I have lots of guys. Daddy and I make tank noises as I roll across the countryside.

This Week in Sports

It was a sports filled weekend for me. On Saturday, I played tee ball. I'm getting really good at catching the ball and I'm a really fast runner. In fact, I'm almost too fast. My friend Christopher was on base in front of me, and I kept passing him as we rounded the bases towards home. I like to go into home with a big head first slide. I also like to root on my team, the Cheetahs. I started a chant:

Let's go Cheetahs. Clap, clap, clap-clap-clap

I couldn't get the other kids to go along though.

Daddy and I played a bunch more tee ball after the game. Interestingly, even though the game is called tee ball, we only hit balls out of the air rather than off a tee.

Sunday was golf day. We went to San Ramon Royal Vista (aka the "green golf ball") golf course for some practice. I hit a zillion range balls and even got a reward from daddy for hitting a ball about 50 yards into a bunker on the driving range. We also played "crazy golf" by choosing different random spots to putt from and trying to make putts. Finally, We did some chipping practice. We each had three balls and the person coming closest to the hole won. I managed to win two of the games! I still don't like to hit the normal way, but am getting more used to it. Hooray for golf.

Of course, we also engage in blocking drills almost every day. I'm getting very good at getting leverage low and keeping my feet moving forward to push the offensive line (Daddy) out of the way so I can get to the quarterback. I'm also improving in my "swim move" to get past the linemen. While I don't want to play football for real (too much chance of injury), I do like pretending.

Sox to World Series

As you know, my favorite team in the Oakland A's, but, since they were eliminated, I've decided to root for the Sox with Daddy. It was a great night last night as the Sox won and went to the World Series. Both of us were jumping up and down, high-fiving, and hugging one another at the Sox victory.

I even got out my Sox cap to help root them on. I like to do lots of cheers, so Daddy and I were hoarse from yelling

Let's go Sox. Let's go Sox!

at the TV. Mommy, of course, thinks this is all rather silly.

I also liked how the Sox got two trophies and how they poured champagne on one another. Celebrations are great. I'm really hoping they win the BIG trophy. Go Sox!

Pixieland

After church, we went to Pixieland. It's about at the end of the season and Pixieland is only open on weekends. After October, it won't be open at all. I really enjoyed driving in the cars. I try to time myself in line so that I get the yellow one. The shot up above is using something called a "panning" technique. Daddy sets a slow shutter speed and follows me with the camera as a drive in the car. The result is a motion effect.

I also "won" a new stuffy---a cute white bear. I love him very much. It's the lead photo in the "highlight reel" entry below. Daddy intends to put one of these up in his office.

Mommy Joins a Church

Today Mommy officially joined the United Methodist church in our area. She had to go to a special class to join. She also got a cool magnetic pin with her name on it. After the service, Daddy and I went exploring up and down the stairs of the church complex. We took some pictures of Mommy looking down from a little balcony that we found. Daddy also took some nice pictures of Mommy and me at a table after I had some cake and juice. Daddy thinks these are some of the best Mommy and Aidan pics in a while.

Trefethen Harvest Festival

It's harvest time in wine country. The leaves are strarting to turn---even the leaves on the grapevines. We got to visit our friends at Trefethen last weekend. I carved some pumpkins, got a whole bunch of corks, and generally had a good time visiting all the niftiest spots in the winery. I also got to visit with my friend Shannon. It was lots of fun.

Hawk Hunt

Two weeks ago, Daddy and I went on a hawk hunt. At first, it was looking like a pretty unsuccessful one as we only saw one hawk. But, in the end, we saw 6 hawks, a couple of ducks, a whole bunch of bulfrogs, and a bunch of squirrels. I also liked trying to figure out the types of trees by looking at the leave and the seeds and comparing them to Daddy's tree book. We saw a bunch of oak trees and couple of other kinds like manzanilla as well.

Photo Extravaganza

Daddy's been taking lots of photos. Here's a full sized slideshow highlight reel for those in a hurry.

For those with more time or if you're looking to make some prints, here are some Shutterfly collections:

Aidan putting on jammies

Harvest Festival

Church Membership

Pixieland

Note: Shutterfly now has a full screen mode for slide shows. This is a huge improvement in judging the quality of prints. you lose a lot of the detail at the small size slide shows that Shutterfly used to have. You should check this out to see the pics in all there pixel glory. There are a number of really great shots in this mix. The shots of me with my friend white bear are highlights. Also, several of the shots of Mommy and me (particularly IMG_7200.JPG) are also really good. For Mommy fans, the solo shot of Mommy is super crisp.

Mommy's Plant

Daddy liked this photo so much, he wanted me to make an entry just for it. Here's a picture of one of Mommy's plants in the evening light. Click on the image to see a full-size version. Order prints (if you wish) here.

Flying Solo

Today was my first "solo flight" at homework. As you know, each week, we have to memorize a poem about the letter of the week. This week's letter was "R". Normally, I have my friend Christopher do the poem with me in case I forget anything, but Christopher was away from school on a trip today, so I was flying solo.

At breakfast, I recited the poem for Mommy and Daddy and totally nailed it, so I was pretty confident. I recited the poem in school all by myself and I got...starry eyes---the highest grade. Hooray for me!

Bedtime

I like to prolong bedtime as long as possible. I've decided that staying up is lots of fun, while getting up for school the next day is less fun. Making bedtime last fulfills both goals. One way to stay up late is through comedy. Check out these funny poses.



Aidan at night

Writing

I've been adding a lot of writing to my cards and other things I make for Mommy and Daddy. What I like to do is to figure out the first letter in each word I want to say and then write this on the card---sort of like texting. For some words, I add a couple of letters. Here's an example:

T hdr
F Aidan
D u n ur n 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 ...

Translation:

To Heather
From Aidan
Do you know your numbers? 1, 2, 3, ...

Writing seems pretty useful.

The Letter of the Week

This week's letter is "r". We get a preview of the letter of the week on Friday and then get our homework the following Monday. The main part of the homework is a poem using the letter of the week. Over the weekend, Daddy and I speculated about what this poem would be. We came up with

R R for Rodney Rat
Rooting through rubbish
Rotting rubbery
Radishes. Rusting
Roadster
RRRR for Rodney Rat

The poem is of a specific form---the first line is always the letter twice repeated followed by the name of the animal. Then there are four words starting with the letter. Followed by one more word. Then the animal again.

Urban Planner

I've been making lots of urban planning pictures. I like to make pictures of towns, cities, farms, and even baseball stadiums. You can see my latest collection here.