a new song learned

we dropped aidan off at preschool today a little later than usual and the kids were gathered around the teacher, getting ready to listen to a story.

teacher said, "aidan's here! should we sing to aidan?"

this is what they sang:

if aidan's here today, clap your hands [clap, clap]

if aidan'a here today, clap your hands [clap, clap]

if aidan's here today, raise your hands and say "hurray!" [all the kids cheer, "hurray!"]

if aidan's here today, clap your hands [clap,clap]


it made for a smooth, fun dropoff. paul and i joked that we should sing it at our next morning meeting at work.

Omama!

last week, aidan saw barack obama on tv, which spurred this conversation:

aidan: what's obama?

mama: obama is our president.

aidan:  our prezdent?

mama: yes. president obama.

aidan: obama? that's obama?

mama: yes.

aidan:  obama. ooobama. omama!

mama: no, Obama.

aidan:  omama! obama! omama! obama!

"obama-omama" is now aidan's favorite funny thing to say. 

sleep, sweet sleep

i am happy to report that we are now back to our regular sleeping schedule. okay, he wakes up at least once during the night, but goes back to sleep. and, he sleeps until 5-5:30 a.m. that may sound early to you, but it is just fine by us.

no one wins in a standoff with a toddler

here is the winning recipe to ensure you and  your spouse will not get any sleep for two consecutive days:

1. 1 toddler, 2 months shy of his three year birthday
2. same toddler, moved to preschool and shorted the usual transition time between the current and new room due to snow storm. just before the holidays, no less.
3. the holidays. nuff said.
4. two nights with nana and papa
5. getting back to the old routine
6. toddler learns how to turn a door knob and open their bedroom door (natch!)

stir together, simmer and get one ornery toddler who refuses to go to sleep and/or sleep through the night, effectively rendering parents into zombie like state for next day of work.

on tuesday night, aidan sat up in his bed after storytime and announced "i'm not going sleep." eventually, he laid down. but, once mama got up to leave, he stood and screamed and cried for "my mama!" door closes, end of story. oops-- not so fast. where did he learn to turn the door knob? why is he coming out of his room and coming downstairs?! doesn't he know that 9-10 is mama and daddy's time to unwind?!? nooooo!  almost two hours are spent escorting aidan back to his bed, hearing him cry and having him come out. he finally gives up and goes to sleep-- only to wake up at 4 a.m. ugh.

wednesday night. the worst night ever. aidan refuses to go to bed. thus begins a 2-hour stand off where we no longer close the door (which ticks him off.) after telling him it is night-night time and he must go to bed, we spend the next two hours escorting him back to his bed, helping him climb into in, patting his head and leaving (all without saying one word.) he is furious. paul and i sit on our bed and wait for him to come out of his room to begin the entire process again. we tag team and takes turns escorting him back and forth.

after an hour and a half of this, aidan is showing signs of wear. he no longer walks down the hall between our rooms. instead, he walks to a nearby stool a couple of feet from his doorway and rest his head on the stool. we escort him back to bed, he struggles to climb up, he seems to settle for sleep, but yelps when he sees we aren't going to stay by his side all night.

10 minutes later, i've removed the stool. he now walks to the coffee table and rests his head on it. 

at the two hour mark, after paul has escorted him to bed and we hear him scream in protest. he stops suddenly. we peek outside our door to find aidan sound asleep in his doorway. game over. he's safe, sound and we aren't going to attempt to move him to his bed.

two hours later, he awakens. i quickly get him into bed and he falls back to sleep.

one hour later. guess who's up and ready for more? ugh.

paul has me go downstairs to get some sleep. i have to go to the basement because the pitter patter or footsteps, followed by paul's bigger footsteps and the accompanying carrying on are too much. i set my alarm for an hour so i can relieve paul.

the hour goes by too fast. i head upstairs and find that the game continues. it is  5 a.m. paul is inclined to keep this up until our alarm goes off. i say, cut our losses-- let's go to bed and heck, if aidan wants to come to bed with us, so be it. we've been telling him all along he can come to our bed in the morning. when i tell him this, he gleefully says "okay!" and jumps into our bed. 

damn.  that's what he wanted all along.

so, we sleep. i sleep through the alarm and paul has to wake me up. aidan is asleep. we have breakfast. he sleeps. we get ready for work. he continues to sleep. paul gets him dressed and he's half awake. by the time i get dressed, i assume they've gone downstairs. but i look over at our bed and aidan is still asleep, but fully dressed. we finally get out the door to head for preschool and work. coffee is no longer a nicety-- is is a necessity.

it is thursday, 9:57 p.m. the kid is asleep! and instead of catching Z's, i'm blogging. 

good night. sweet dreams!

"that's poops!" and other aidanisms

here is the latest batch of aidanisms to kick off 2009:

poops: used as a filler word to describe a sentiment (usually something he doesn't like or agree with). example: "no! that's poops!" or used as a comedic device. example: "santa poops is coming to town... hahaha!"

that's not  working so much. said when, well, something isn't working.

i don't like that! pretty self explanatory, no?

mama, daddy, can i have a cookie now? pretty much when we get home, before dinner. at least he asks each of us if we want a cookie and he will give us one. he sure knows how to share.

mama, daddy, can we watch movers and mickey now? our after dinner, pre-night time ritual. 

what happened? what's happening? what he says when my dad is trying to figure out how to turn on the tv and cable to find aidan's shows (see previous aidanism)

i don't watch super goo! it's scary! aidan loves watching imagination movers, but for some reason, the episode called "super goo" where mover rich and mover smitty get stuck together with mover's dave's sticky invention didn't sit well with him. it was, well, scary. 

oopsie! his version of oops. he's usually dropped or spilled something when he says this.

no, daddy, no-- stop dancing! what aidan always says when paul starts bustin' a move to the theme song of imagination movers.

that makes me mad...  GRRRR!  aidan scowls and growls. his eyebrows furl. he reminds me of my dad when he's pissed. :)

that makes you happy!  what he says after he pinches/kicks/hits you and you say you're sad. he then gives you a kiss and says "i'm sorry!"

i want hangerber and stir fries!  translation: "hamburger and french fries"

the christmas that kept going, and going, and going

merry christmas!

sure, it's january 8, 2009, but we have a belated, rescheduled christmas eve gathering to go this sunday due to the white christmas of 2008. so, for now, it is still kinda christmas.

we had planned to begin our own little family traditions of waking up christmas morning in our house instead of at a grandparents' house. we had planned to have breakfast, open our christmas stockings and ooh and aah over the gifts to each other.

but that blasted snow cancelled all our eve gatherings and we ended up spending the night at one grandparents' home and then another. but it was a low key, relaxing christmas and 2008 marked the year that aidan finally "got" christmas. he learned all the names of santa's reindeer. he learned to sing "jingle bells" and "santa claus is coming to town." (he still sings it and we're well into january.) he"got" that santa brings presents to good boys and girls and puts them under the tree. every day. (we had to tell him it was only one day a year.)

aidan still has to learn about opening presents-- that is, that you keep going until all the presents are opened. of course, the kid got tons of toys from adoring uncles, aunts, and grandparents. but, once he opened one present, he had to be strongly encouraged to keep going. as far as he was concerned, he already had a toy to play with-- why were we interrupting him with this opening present stuff?

he still has another present at my parent's house to open. a little something from a surrogate lola and lolo who are good friends with my folks.

aidan's new toys are still in the box we put them in when we finally returned home. the tree is still up, as well as the lights on the house. we got some work  to do this weekend.

we celebrated a "new york new year's eve" at the gruender's house. we celebrated 2009 with a countdown john found on cable tv. it was a nice way to ring in the new year with friends. usually, we stay home and watch movies. correction-- paul watches movies and i fall asleep around mid-way into the 2nd movie. aidan and kohl had a great time putting on their hats and tooting their horns. they also had fun playing with kohl's trains and wrestling and running. my baby has turned into a boy.

i'm hoping for a happy, healthy and hopeful 2009 and wish the same for you and all of your loved ones.