The many faces of Jaiden....Nov 2008

Jaiden has really been into games lately. We went to the store and picked out a couple and here is him and dad having fun learning how to play...

We have been enjoying the fall around here. We have a few trees in the backyard that dumped tons of leaves on our lawn. So, Jaiden and I used our new leaf blower to blow the leaves into a big pile and Dad put them in the yard waste bin. We didn't jump in them, due to the icky spiders around here. Can never be too careful. He was such a big help as you can see.

At daycare, Jaiden has been working on his art skills (drawing, painting, using materials to make crafts, glueing, etc...). Here are some of his recent projects for fall.

This last project was REALLY cute. They made a placemat for Thanksgiving. They read books and talked about Thanksgiving, then they took quotes from the kids and put them in the left corner. Jaiden said..."Turkey comes from inside (of what I don't know), cooks turkey with a pan, I am going to have chicken nuggets with turkey. Momma is going to cook it." What a riot!

Here are the faces he's been making of late. I don't know where he gets them! ;)

The life of Jaiden

As of late, Jaiden has been, well......, a handful. Of course, I'm sure that it is just that he is getting closer to three and his language has taken off, and that he is smarter than your average monkey... ;) Lately, he has been into putting things on his head and walking around. Last week it was his trick or treat bucket. Yesterday he was entertaining us with this....

In addition to these antics, he has been jumping on his bed and flying over his railing, much to my dismay. Jamie and I decided after this and other gymnastics that he's been trying that it was time to go to another, less risky bed. So, we went shopping today. Here's the end result... which will go nicely once we get to painting and putting up the decorations we bought for his room a couple months ago.

His Christmas present from us just got a lot smaller! :)

Halloween: Trick-o'-Treat

This Halloween season has been a lot of fun with Jaiden. He is old enough to definately have opinions about things and has actively participated in all activities that we have had for him. We finally got around to carving pumpkins tonight, after dinner, but before trick-or-treating. He was all for the drawing and the cutting of the pumpkins, BUT...forget about the cleaning them out. EEEWWWW...goooey! :)

Here is dad carving Jaiden's pumpkin. It's a one eyed, one horned, toothy pumpkin eater! :)

Then after we got done with the pumpkins, we got ready to go trick-or-treating...

Here is our little lounging monkey after we were done.

Jaiden's daycare has had some really cute activities for the kids during the last couple weeks. Here is Jaiden showing some of them off. The pumpkin hat was especially cute.

Eastern Washington Pumpkin Patch

Well, we ventured to the pumpkin patch today. What a BIG difference! The pumpkin patch was HUGE! The activities were good, but we had to pay for them. The wind was amazing! It was hard to see sometimes because of the wind whipping the sand and hay around.

All in all we had a GREAT time! We spent about 3 hours there between picking our pumpkins, doing the activities and going through the Country Mercantile store (which by the way is AWESOME)! Check out my facebook account for more pics.

Visit from the guys...

Jamie's buddies from the Tacoma area came over this weekend for a Magic Tournament. They spent all day on Saturday playing cards and hanging out. On Sunday, we got out in the sunshine and walked along the boardwalk at Howard Amon Park in Richland. Jaiden had a blast. We walked over a mile and a half. By the end, Jaiden was tuckered out and suckered the guys into carrying him. He calls each of them Uncle. They are very protective of him. It's funny to see these guys play, read and take care of him like family. On Sunday night, Jaiden requested that JP read him stories instead of mom or dad. It was CUTE! These guys have been really good friends since before Jaiden was born. We truly miss having them around on a more consistent basis. Here's the pics (left to right: Uncle Keith, Uncle Brian, Jamie, Jaiden, Uncle JP)...

1, 2, 3, 4...

Jaiden and Jamie had a little wrestling session today to work off some of Jaiden's extra energy. One of the things Jaiden likes is when Jamie bench presses him. We added the counting today...trying to get him to count to 20. He can count on his own to 14, but then repeats himself and then skips to 17. It's pretty cute. Anyway, here's the workout session... :)

Jaiden's new shirt

On Grammy's adventures for work she is getting Jaiden a new shirt or hat or something as a souvenior from her travels. Here's the latest...very appropriate for this election season.

Progress Report

Jaiden is really enjoying daycare these days. They have started an alphabet curriculum where every week they teach a letter of the alphabet, centering all the activities they do around that letter. Jaiden is learning to color inside the lines more and more everyday and even will trace letters. It's so fun watching his skills develop.

In the evenings and on weekends, we occasionally play Rock Band or Guitar Hero together. Jaiden likes holding the guitar, although he has caught on to the fact that it is not on while we are playing.

Lazy weekend...

We really didn't do much this weekend other than clean the house (which Jaiden helped with, I should have taken pictures, but of course was busy with my own chores), and play with Jaiden. We took him outside after dinner this evening and Jamie caught this cute snippet. Jaiden kept climbing onto his slide and waving at us, yelling "HI!" So we would wave back. The dogs started barking so I went out to see what they were barking at. I snuck up on him....

Flashback...

We finally got around to copying some video of Jaiden's birth on the computer. Here is a snipet of him in observation after the birth. He had passed meconium in utero and they wanted to observe him to make sure his breathing was ok. You'll notice the commentary from Jamie is pretty much non-stop. A very excited papa! That's the excuse.

Someone yelled, "FIRE!"

So, today Jamie took Ellie for her last class at Petsmart. On his way back he saw this flag flying on the side of the road, then he noticed what was holding it up there.

The local fire deptartments have a centralized office in Richland off Gage Blvd. which is just blocks from where we live. So as Jamie pulled up he noticed lots of fire trucks parked in this parking lot, with kids and parents getting tours, spraying a small fire hose, dressing up like firefighters, getting balloons, etc... He called me and I quickly got Jaiden and I dressed to go. He picked us up and we went. When we got there it was even better than we though. They had games, popcorn and cotton candy, face painting, and the kids were able to sit in the trucks. First Jaiden played mini golf.

Then got his fireman hat and sat in one of the trucks.

And then got to drive...

Then he got to get dressed up in a firefighter coat and spray the hose. First with the fireman's help and then on his own...

After that, we got some popcorn and took some pictures by the firetrucks. Below is a close up of Jaiden eating popcorn.

Overall, it was a GREAT afternoon! Jaiden couldn't stop talking about it.