Zoo Lights

Dad:  Myles, do you see any Christmas lights?
Myles:  I see ONE!
Mom:  Oh really?  What color is it?
Myles:  It's BLACK!

We had a great time at the zoo lights this year, but sometimes I wonder about my son.

Santa

Myles fully gets the Santa guy and was thrilled to meet him in person.

Holiday dance

Myles loved the rockin tunes at the Express store at the mall. He
started to dance and his dad joined him at his invitation.

Happy Halloween!

Last weekend, we went to the Railroad Museum for a ride on the Trick or Treat Train. We brought Myles's friend Ella Grace along, and had a blast! It was the first of a number of trick-or-treating opportunities for Myles, and he really seemed to dig it.
It was the first time I had seen a real steam locomotive in motion, and I'd say it's pretty impressive.

Myles gets to conduct his own train:

And then yesterday we went to "Boo at the Zoo". Myles took his role as dragon quite seriously, growling at patrons of the hot dog stand for quite some time.
It was a beautiful day, and maybe about 1/3 as busy as last year--I'm thinking a lot of people were scared off by the lingering snow.



...and yes, of course that was his Superman uniform underneath. Nobody would have ever suspected Superman of disguising himself as a dragon for Halloween, now, would they?

party

Myles admires Grandma Rebecca's masterpiece- a homemade Thomas cake.
Daddy takes half a day off to take Myles to the aquarium
Birthday doughnut.
Mason redesigned and built up our train table for the more sophisticated demands of a 2 year old.
Myles loved his birthday.

Two

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This week Myles turns two and I am definitely feeling celebratory and sentimental. This last weekend started off birthday week with a trip to the pumpkin patch, a visit to Grandpa Dick's and Grandma Coleen's to meet the new family member Bubba and visit Myles's favorite cat Morocco. We also spent some time grooming the ghosts and ghouls from the front lawn.

flea market

In The Dark

Since the days have been getting shorter, Myles has been getting an opportunity to see it get dark out before going to bed. He was a lot younger the last time it was warm enough to go outside comfortably in the dark, so there has been a lot of novelty in it for him.

Last night, he was really excited to go outside and see the moon! Allyson and I were perhaps a little too blase about the whole idea, so Myles came up with an ingenious way to get our spirits up and lure us to the front door as well. Once we figured out what was going on, we caught a little footage:

I had been thinking that he was merely trying to entertain us, but I'm beginning to wonder if he envisioned himself as an invisible voice, beckoning us to the door, intoning "Outside. Outside!"

...And unfortunately there was no evidence of a moon once we got outside. So after Myles cleverly referenced Madagascar (a current favorite) by pointing to the brightest star and declaring "Helicopter!", he did some pontificating:

Sometimes it seems as if he has a pre-existing language and is struggling to translate it into English, making effort to get the structure and vocabulary just right. And who knows, maybe he is?

One thing's for sure, though. I'm gonna make sure we get outside to look for the moon until we find that darn thing!

Chopsticks and Friends

To celebrate a warm fuzzy Mason got a work the other day we went out to dinner. Myles was not going to be left out of the chop stick adventure.


Also, for those who have asked, below is a link of the picture blog I keep for Willa and Lilah, the two girls I watch part-time. This blog is mainly for their family, but there are lots of pictures of Myles in there too!
http://mylesandlilah.blogspot.com/

Myles

Myles is one of the best people I know. I feel pretty lucky as a mom getting to say that. He has had a really tough time lately. His dad had shoulder surgery. Even thought Mason has been amazing at staying super-connected, his limitations have really changed our lifestyle at home.

He said goodbye to Ella, his playmate for over a year and first true friend, and has started with a new friend, too. I have learned so much about my son as we have navigated these rough waters together. Sometimes from struggle comes our finest growth.

Cool kid

One of our favorite adventures last weekend was a bike ride to the train tracks to see if we could catch any trains going past.
We didn't actually see any, but the tracks themselves were really cool, and we stopped for dinner at a nearby restaurant that had tons of toys and a number of kids to play with. It was a blast!

Here's Myles lookin' cool after riding the bike to the restaurant:



And then after our weekend of adventures (and long hours of hard train table time), he felt the need to unwind a little before bed.

Here he is rockin' out to Mommy's iPod.


You'd think he'd been studying how to do it or something!

Yup. He's a stud alright.