New Park Adventure

Today we went to Nicollet Commons Park in Burnsville. I've been hearing a lot of good things about it so we decided to check it out. The park is in "the heart of the city" and is designed beautifully for local business people to eat their lunches there and for younger kids to play in the shin deep water areas.

When we first got there Caden was a little hesitant to get in. Eventually with me walking around telling him how fun it was and other kids playing on these rock islands in the middle of the first pool, it looked like a good idea to him.

The best part of the park was of course how many (dangerous!) rocks there were to climb on the edges of the pools, streams, and waterfalls. He had a blast going up the tallest ones he could find!

His favorite section of the park had animals shooting streams of water out of their mouths.

After awhile Caden got serious about playing and decided he needed to take his shirt off. Of course he also wanted to take his suit and diaper off!

Caden really loved it there and we'll definitely be going back - with a picnic lunch next time! We were there for an hour and a half and I still had to wrestle him to the car kicking and screaming when it was time to go.

Back to the Blog

Okay, I haven't posted anything in a long time. The longer it is the harder it feels like it's going to be to catch up on all of the updates. So I'm not going to think about the last month I've missed and just catch you up on what's been going on this week. I think from now on my blog posts will be shorter, but hopefully more often!

Lately Caden has really liked singing with us. At bedtime I always sing a few songs to him and over the weekend he decided to join in! His favorite is ABC's and he always starts out the song with a perfect "Aaaa." During the day he takes out an alphabet book he has, carries it to me, and starts on the first letter and expects me to join in. It's really adorable the way he latches on to certain sounds or noises in songs. He always gets the "baa baa" in Baa, Baa, Black Sheep. In Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star he loves to sing the "UP!" He has such a sweet voice. I tried getting it on video today, but he wouldn't have anything to do with that. Maybe some day.

Last night Caden started saying "ball" while we were reading one of his baseball books. He seems a lot more interested in repeating words if you ask him, but he has yet to actually call things by name (or us) without a prompt from us. I'm really hoping he'll make the connections and start naming objects soon. He clearly knows what things are, he just doesn't feel like he needs to say them, I guess.

This morning we went to a kid's concert at the library called the Ten Penney Band. It was a husband and wife playing multiple instruments, many of them unusual, while the kids sang along or danced. Caden was very enthusiastic joining in with the clapping and jumping! There was one song where kids had to yell out a name over and over again and Caden just started screaming "MOM!" It was pretty cute!

The only other news is that Caden was exposed to chicken pox the other day, though we didn't know it at the time. He had the vaccine at his one year checkup so hopefully he'll be fine. Chicken pox is about the last thing we feel like dealing with right now!

Now we're getting ready for a daddy-less weekend while Greg spends some much needed time with friends at the Guster concert. I've been feeling better the last two days so maybe Caden and I will venture out to a new park tomorrow. There are so many I want to check out!

Dew Days Parade

Today we went to Farmington's Dew Days parade. This is the first year we took part in any Dew Days activities and it turned out to be a lot of fun. Last year we went to a 4th of July parade and Caden was really scared by most of the noises. Today's went a lot better, though when there was about five straight minutes of fire trucks all making a ton of noises he got pretty nervous. Fortunately that was at the beginning and as the parade went on he was enjoying everything more and more.

It didn't take Caden long to figure out that candy is the best part of a parade. Unfortunately we had large groups of aggressive kids on either side of us so we weren't able to get all that much. Enough to keep Caden busy, though!

Caden decided to follow this float and a few after it because he wanted the balloons.

It finally occurred to him that other kids would run in the street and get candy. So of course he had to join the fun and pretty much wouldn't get out of the street the rest of the parade!

Somebody finally gave Caden an ice pop. He really wanted one!

By the last few floats throwing out candy Caden would excitedly run into the street, but he'd be so picky about which pieces to choose that the other kids grabbed most of it. He was so proud of himself when he was able to save that one special piece he really wanted! Overall it was a good parade and a lot of fun watching Caden enjoy himself!

This whole past week has been a lot of fun for us. So many new things to do...

Last Saturday we went to the Joyful Noise Family Fest. It rained the entire day, but Caden did fantastic. He didn't seem bothered by the wet or the cold at all. He just had a blast hanging out with grandma and grandpa!  He was also thrilled to see his favorite band, Go Fish, perform for the first time.

On Sunday we converted Caden's crib to a toddler bed. The first night was rough. He fell out around midnight and it took hours to get him to fall back to sleep. The second night I peeked in on him in the morning and he was sleeping on the floor against the wall behind his door. Every night since then I'm pretty sure he's fallen out at least once, but he just gets right back on the bed and falls back to sleep. We're hoping to switch to a twin sized bed soon, so we'll have to come up with a plan to keep him from going over the edge on that!

On Tuesday we went to a park with moms club and made father's day presents.

On Wednesday we went strawberry picking. Caden started stuffing the strawberries in his mouth immediately as I picked them. I was worried he wouldn't cooperate, but it actually went really well! We picked seven pounds in about half an hour.

On Thursday we went to Dew Day's first activity, Family Fun Day. It was a free event for children filled with games and prizes. We shared a sno-cone and got some free suckers from a few booths before Caden had had enough and we left. It'll be more fun when he's older and understands the concept of waiting in lines for things!

On Friday we checked out a new park in Rosemount that had a lot of fun play equipment and a bunch of beautiful trails to walk. We met another mom there with her nephew and son, Braydon and Aiden. We had a good laugh over all three boys' names.

It's been a busy week!

The Words Are Coming!

Exciting news - Caden can say some words! I actually hesitate to say that because it doesn't seem like I can really label him as talking when he only says a word when prompted. It seems like he should actually talk on his own free will before it's considered "real." But nonetheless, he can say a few things. I would consider his first word to be "mom" because he's been saying it a few months now, repeating it after us. He can also say "dad" which comes out sounding more like "daaa?" in a high pitched voice. It's incredibly cute. I keep trying to get a video of him, but he won't cooperate. He also likes to say "pop pop pop!" from one of the pages in Dr. Seuss's "Mr. Brown Can Moo" book. And in the last few days he's also started saying "up." He's got all of his animal noises down pat as well. Since he last saw everyone he can now also make a fish "sound," and hiss like a snake. I can't wait for him to actually start calling us mama and dada and saying words on his own. Hopefully it's just around the corner!

On Saturday we went to visit Lexi in Owatonna. We intended on mini-golfing, but it ended up raining so we went to this new Reptile and Amphibian Discovery (RAD) Zoo. Lexi loves snakes, so I thought it might be worth checking out. Everyone really enjoyed it, especially Caden! He loved watching the snakes and turtles that were moving around in their cages. We stayed to watch the show and at the end Caden got to touch his first alligator! He also ran his hands down a boa constrictor. It was definitely an interesting experience!

A few weeks ago we got two videos that I heard were really good with speech development. They're called Baby Babble. Caden's only watched them a few times, but he's mesmerized by them. I think they're working, though, because lately I catch him making a lot of the noises and doing different mouth movements that he's never done before. Even though the videos seem incredibly boring to me, I think they must be working!

Cranky Caden

It's been a pretty cranky week for Caden. I think getting four teeth at once has been catching up to him and he's been a lot more whiny than usual. Going two days without Daddy didn't help either. It's become very obvious that Greg is the fun parent and Caden does not like being stuck with me nonstop without his favorite playmate! He has been a lot better today.

Last night Caden got this whopper of a bump above his eye tripping near the stairs and hitting his head on the base of the railing. It looked a lot worse last night!

Here is Caden telling me he's hungry and very angry that I'm taking a picture instead of immediately getting him some food.

This boy has no patience. (Notice the new blue shutters on the house!)

Still angry. I gave him some snacks to put in his pocket and now he can't get them out.

Okay, I've tortured him enough. Time to enjoy some fruit snacks while swinging his legs back and forth.

Back to the update... Caden has not yet tired of his little brother Lenny. Every day they have to do a number of activities together. While Greg was gone Caden seemed to be especially attached to Lenny. He shares his drinks and snacks with him, even trying to put beans in Lenny's hand. Then we strapped Lenny in the stroller and buckled him into the car to take him to the park with us. Caden was so excited to reach over and pat Lenny's leg the entire trip. Lenny had to join us for bedtime stories that night too. It was pretty cute!

Caden is finally interested in a lot more variety in books. He's even listening to the big books now! And sadly he's tired of Sandra Boynton. His current favorites are "Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You Hear?" and "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?" He wants me to read them over and over again. In fact, after weeks of going to sleep at night without a hitch he now cries when I tell him we finally have to stop reading. Bedtime has definitely been a struggle this week.

Here's some exciting news - Caden now knows a lot of animal noises! He says moo, ah ah ah (monkey), baa, quack (sort of), neigh, and pants for a dog noise. We can't get him to say anything close to meow, but he always does the sign for cat instead. This morning it was raining and he very excitedly ran to the window and showed me the sign for rain and then ran to show Greg too. I just showed him that sign yesterday and he didn't seem too interested. I guess he was really paying attention! Anyway, I'm excited about the animal noises because I've heard that a real vocabulary should be soon to follow!

Caden helped Greg weed the garden for a few minutes today. He sure loves imitating absolutely everything we do. He spent about ten minutes putting on makeup this morning. In stores now I have to give him my library card or something so he can "pay" on the credit card machine. He swipes the card over and over across the screen and then grabs the pen and tries to scribble on it. Then he looks at me with a gigantic smile. It really is amazing watching a child learn so much on a daily basis.

Tonight we're going to the neighbors for another bonfire. In case I didn't mention it, we went last week and Caden had an absolute blast playing with the older kids. He's definitely made some friends! On Wednesday we spent three hours at Crea's house playing with everyone. In the afternoon she set up sprinklers and a water table to play in and everyone wore their swimsuits. Caden didn't pay any attention to the sprinkler, but he LOVED the water table. He refused to take his shirt and shoes off, though. So he ended up soaking everything. It was a fun time, though. Pretty soon I'm going to have to set up his swimming pool. There have been some hot days lately!

Well, that's it for now. It's time to start getting ready for our mini vacation coming up this week. We're all looking forward to staying in La Crosse at a hotel with a kids' waterpark indoors. I'm hoping it won't be busy and Caden can loosen up and enjoy the water a little. At any rate, we know Caden is going to have a fun sleepover with Grandma and Grandpa on Friday! :)

A Dreary Week

It's been another very long, cold, rainy week in Farmington. We haven't been able to spend any time outside and Caden and I are about to drive each other nuts! I'm hoping for a non-rainy day tomorrow so we can at least step out of the house. There's no rain in the forecast, but then again, it wasn't supposed to rain today either and it poured all day!

On Wednesday I decided to let Caden help me make chex mix. He wasn't too interested in pouring the cereal from the measuring cup, but he loved stirring! He was helping himself to plenty of cereal too. When I poured the sauce on and started stirring with my own spatula he got very mad at me! Always Mr. Independent.

I just discovered that Caden can do most of the song "Head and Shoulders, Knees, and Toes." They do it on some of the Baby Einstein videos and now he's really excited to do it with me. We have to do it pretty slow, though, for him to catch up. And he never seems to get his shoulders, but at least he's trying!

Yesterday we went back to the Apple Valley open gym time for preschoolers. What a difference a few months makes! Caden had an absolute blast. From the minute we walked in the door he just took off running crazy. He mostly wanted to make baskets (I got quite a workout lifting him up so many times!), but he enjoyed playing on the mats too. He even went up to a few other boys with his hands out hoping they'd throw him a ball, but none of them wanted to share. It was a fun time. At least three days a week that's always an option when the weather is bad.

Wednesday afternoon I took out a coloring book and some crayons hoping that would keep him busy for awhile. It held his attention for all of thirty seconds. I think he made two scribbles on the page and then just wanted to put the crayons away. He was pretty angry that I wouldn't give up the crayon I was using. It's looking like I have a son that's never going to enjoy artsy things. :(

This morning Caden's mouth was bleeding and I realized he has another tooth coming through! It's on the bottom right in the only open space available. It looks like the one on the left isn't far behind.

Here's a picture of Caden wearing the new shirt that Sarah bought him in Spain. Pretty cute!

Our Second Mother's Day Together

Happy Mother's Day! I hope everyone had a great day! Ours was very nice and relaxing.

My day started with Greg and Caden bringing me breakfast in bed. I had chocolate donuts and strawberries. Caden was pretty excited about the donuts and made a gigantic crumb mess. It was definitely worth it, though. :)

We had a nice lunch at home of grilled hot dogs and avocados. Nothing fancy, but I always appreciate not having to make a meal!

After lunch we made an impulsive decision to check out a park in Lakeville I've always been curious about. It was actually really cool. They had a large beach area with crystal clear water, a playground right on the shore, and plenty of trees and picnic areas. We'll definitely be going back again. Today it was fun to have a little photo shoot and then walk along the water. Caden seemed to be fascinated by the lake. I guess it's been a long time since he's seen one!

After the park we came home and all took naps. Then Greg and Caden took a walk while I read in the house. Then we all played outside for awhile. For dinner we ordered pizza and wings - a very special treat! Then more playing with Caden by chasing him with Lenny around the house, which he found hilarious. And then I put him to sleep! Overall it was a very sweet day. I love being a mommy!