when did summer start ending in august?

we went back to work this week. i say "we" because it really is we. john may start leaving the house again on a daily basis, but here i stay learning to juggle two children again. no more 1:1 ratio or dividing & conquering. aidan has been, uh, busy (difficult), of late, hopefully he makes the transition back to just us again without any major meltdowns or broken furniture. jack is seriously the easiest thing ever created, so unless aidan unleashes his fury in jack's direction i expect him to just smile & nod through the changes.

aidanisms:
~'i really, really, really stuck mommy'--applies whenever he's even remotely caught somewhere
~post nighttime & post nap time 'MOMMY! MOM! MOMMY! WHERE ARE YOU? MOMMY! MOMMY!'--it continues loudly until i go to get him (more than 5 minutes on some occasions)
~'my sock broken mommy'--when his socks get twisted around
~'where the clouds mommy? there the clouds mommy. i want to touch the clouds mommy.' -- 'the clouds are too high aidan, we can't touch them. not even mommy can reach them' -- 'I WANT TO TOUCH THEM! WA WA WA WA WA WA' (the tantrum continued until a bird flew by and we repeated the whole conversation with a bird substituted for the clouds.
~'my do it'--means he wants to do it, but sounds very similar to 'mommy do it' (which is sometimes what he wants) ... it's led to a few tantrums when i don't know which one he is saying.
~"where's daddy aidan?" "at work mommy" "what's he doing at work" "making money, money, money" (in a high pitched voice while rubbing his thumb and forefinger together)

(it's not trick photography, jack's head really is almost as big as aidan's)

do we look bigger? older? more mature?

2

i accidentally got the candles that relight.
so cool when they first came out.
pretty confusing for a 2 year old.

his new thing "AIDAN!" to let us know
he wants to do something by himself.
he normally speaks in short sentences.
this, however, is a statement.

he was on the trampoline for a good
45 minutes of the hour we were there.
fun stuff on a 100 degree day
in a gym with no air conditioning.

tahoe

the grandma, the great-grandpa & us

a rock, the woods & me

the grandpa, the gondola & me

the jumpy-whatchacallit
the ride home

learning defensive strategies

gymnastics class

aidan saw me looking at this picture on the computer and threw a tantrum because he wanted the balls. i had to explain that they were at gymnastics, we weren't and that he was looking at a photograph. it was an interesting exchange.




half way through a somersault.








backward roll...he was very excited that everything was upside down.











please dear lord, don't let this girl let go of me.

we didn't even fight over the middle

more photos

aidan got goggles for his birthday. i think he must be trying to look at them, keep them on and talk at the same time here. we always assume he got the smart genes...this picture indicates we could be wrong.jack hanging out in the car seat at the beach. for those of you looking closely, he has flecks of sand on his face. i learned that when it's windy at the ocean, you should put babies well above ground level. it seems i missed out on the smart genes too.