President Obama

Aidyn and I watched the Inaguration together a couple of weeks ago and talked a little bit about President Obama and what his job is as President of our country. I was sure at the time that she had absolutely no clue what I was talking about, but it has been my practice ever since she was born to just keep talking to her even if I felt the topic was way above her head. I have been surprised before, but this time was blog-worthy.
This afternoon while we were eating lunch, Donnie and I were discussing a newspaper article about Cuba and how it related to Obama. Aidyn, eager to join the conversation as always, piped up: "Oh, yeah, President Obama, he's the new one. What does the President do?"
Donnie said, "He is in charge of our whole country and he's our leader. He has a big job."
"Yeah," she replied. "I know. President Obama plays music for all the people."

Eyebrows

Aidyn is getting better at facial expressions and it's very cute to see her express herself that way. Today she showed that she also has a pretty good understanding of the expressions she's learning to make. I overheard:
"Look, Dad. See my eyebrows are down so I must be sad."

Flashback: thank you's

Tonight at dinner, after Aidyn asked if she could be excused from the table, I remembered how Aidyn used to think that you had to add that to any polite phrase asking for something. It wasn't long after she turned two but it kinda went like this:

"Please milk and bescused from the table."

Pray-stalling

Aidyn has turned her bed-time stall tactics spiritual. Usually its "I'm still hungry" or "I'm thirsty" One night after our bed time routine (bedtime story, feed the fish, pray, and then hugs and kisses) Aidyn grabbed my hand.
"Do like this with your hands daddy." she said, instructing me to hold my hands prayerfully.
"I just want to pray with you for a little while."

I smiled, lovingly I kissed her on her forehead, and told her goodnite.

I can handle it

Last week I took the ladies out to lunch/ early dinner at Olive Garden. When it came time for dessert I decided that I would share mine with Aidyn. So I showed Aidyn the dessert menu and asked what she wanted for dessert. She said "chocolate." (A girl after my own heart.) I showed her all the chocolate stuff they had and she picked the chocolate mousse cake (or something like that.)
So Aidyn and I started diggin in. After about half of the cake Tracy cautioned me about letting Aidyn have too much of a very rich cake. Aidyn asserted "I can handle it" and then took another big bite.

Potty training? Phhhtt!

I'm sitting here checking my facebook and Aidyn comes over to me and says "Daddy I pooped. And I have pee pee in my diaper."
"Okay", I said, "do you need a diaper change?"
"I still have some poop to do dad" she says.

So if that is any indication as to how potty training is going....yeah.

Mad-lion and the Bass

Lately I have decided to stop feeling guilty about how much tv Aidyn watches. She really doesn't just sit around watching it all day or anything, but I definitely don't always keep to the one hour or less per day guideline that I've seen for preschoolers. The fact is that she has learned more from Dora, Little Einsteins, Jack's Big Music Show, and lots of other shows than I ever expected. The other day I was flipping through channels and we saw a jazz band playing on PBS. Aidyn points at one of the band members and said, "Look! He's playing the bass!" She will often ask to be played like a guitar (strumming on her belly), or like a drum (patting her back), or a piano (tickling the ivories on her ribs), or a tambourine (shaking her all over). I think it's great that she's learning a lot of things that we don't necessarily have a lot of interaction with. She's learning to make connections between related concepts, too. She loves the book Madeline and recently the characters on the show Toot and Puddle visited Paris. She said, "Look! It's Paris, just like in Mad-lion!"

Did You Fart?

Sometimes Aidyn just cracks me up. Today she was playing with her guys and accidentally let out a little gas. So, she made one of her guys say to another one: "Did you fart?!"

Looks Like I Need a Treat

This morning Aidyn saw me unpacking some candy left over from Sno Camp this past weekend and a brilliant idea occurred to her to attempt to score some:
"Well, Mommy, " she said. "I obeyed you. Looks like I need a treat."

Chinese New Ear

Aidyn has been watching Ni Hao Kai-Lan, a show on Nick Jr., kind of like Dora, but teaching Mandarin Chinese instead of Spanish. She really loves it and it is a really cute show. Recently they did a special about the Chinese New Year and it must have really impacted Aidyn because today she said, "It's Chinese New Ear!" We tried to correct her and tell her it's Chinese New YEAR, but she would have none of it. "No! Chinese New EAR!"