Great to have a friend

It has been so cute lately to watch Daniel and Rylie play. They are truly best friends. Even as I type they are both on my lap playing with one another. Rylie follows Daniel wherever he goes and they just love to play outside, with all our preschool toys, etc... It is so fun to see them grow closer all the time.


As a disclaimer, I realize that in most of our pictures or videos Daniel is always partially dressed. I promise that everyday he starts out completely clothed, but always mid-way through the day he takes off his shorts to go potty and they are never seen again. Also, by the time we are ready to go to bed, it is just too hot for them to have much on, so thus the diaper only look.

Daniel loves preschool

Daniel has been thrilled the last 3 weeks to have preschool back. M, T, Th and F-- Daniel is able to join a group of 3 or 4 year olds for the morning and has just thrived with having friends over everyday and doing such cool, fun, and engaging projects. Here is a video of him trying to recreate his own preschool later in the afternoon. At this pace, he will know more than me in just a few years.

An architect at 3

So, I was wondering, is it normal for a 3 year old to be able to create these type of structures with blocks? Daniel has completely surpassed my creative genes. Darin claims he created structures like this at Daniel's age, but I'm amazed at how cool this is. Daniel built the entire structure on the right. On the left is the updated version of when Darin came to play with him too.

Rylie cheer

We finally got a new camera. Camera's have sure come a long way in 5 years. We decided on a Sony this time and fortunately don't have that obnoxious 3 second delay between pushing the button and the picture taking like we had with our previous Canon.

Rylie starting doing this cheer one day, I'm not sure where she learned it but it sounds like WooHoo!! She put both hands in the air and said WooHoo! over and over.

So of course we all had to join in. I don't know what we were cheering for but it was fun.

Computer wizes

I would have had pictures of this but our camera is broken and we haven't been able to get a new one yet.

Daniel has learned to play games on the computer almost completely by himself. We get him to the games site then from there he knows how to move the mouse and click. The site is animated, educational and fully audio. He can listen to what they are saying, click on the pictures or words and make things happen. Any word you click on will be pronounced for you. It's great. He can't read yet but they make it so simple and color coordinated that it's pretty intuitive even for a 3 year old.

The first time I saw him playing I was totally blown away. Not just because he was interacting with the game site on his own but it took an incredible amount of focus and concentration on his part. He spends 20 minute sessions just playing these educational games several times a day. At the end of one lesson they played a song and we all danced to it including Rylie. Daniel enjoyed that so much he played it again like 15 more times until we finally convinced him to move on.

He will get frustrated if he gets stuck. So I have to teach him not to throw the mouse or hit the keyboard. We're working on the "ask for help" part.

Rylie does whatever Daniel is doing, or tries to. She can't interact with the computer but she certainly knows that the thing you move around with your hand on the table makes stuff happen on the computer screen.

After Daniel got down she climbed up on the chair and was moving the mouse around with her right hand while completely focused on the monitor, watching the little cursor move around the screen.

It won't be long before I have two free network administrators in the home.

Kitchen sleep

This picture was from a few weeks ago. It was a night that Daniel was being obstinate and not wanting to go to bed. Heidi had put him down to bed but he kept coming downstairs for various reasons. Instead of getting angry she decided to just ignore him. He started throwing a tantrum on the kitchen floor but Heidi just ignored it and kept doing the dishes. After a while Heidi realized that he had been quiet for several minutes and when she looked around the island this is what she saw:



He had exhausted himself and finally fallen asleep right there on the floor. I guess Daniel proves again that he can fall asleep just about anywhere.

Danielisms

Daniel woke up in the middle of the night last night. I guess he had a nightmare of some sort, anyway he was upset. Nothing would calm him down until I suggested he sleep in our room. He liked that and calmed down. All he wanted was his blue blanket. He went in and laid down on the love seat. We even turned the bathroom light on for him so it wouldn't be so dark. Then

Heidi asked him: are you ok now?

And he meekly said: yes.

She said: is there anything else I can get you?

And he said: go to the store, get me a popsicle.

To which Heidi replied: goodnight.

Then to me: He's just fine, he's Daniel.

Good morning

This morning I woke up to the sound of this:

MOOOOOOMM!!!! RYLIE IS AWAAAKE!!! MOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMM!!!!!

Thanks Daniel, now the rest of us are too.

I got my car back!

When Heidi went to Utah with the kids we switched cars so Heidi could use the one with cruise control. That left me with the stick shift and cassette tape player. Admittedly at first I was disappointed because, well, it's a tape player. But then I remembered I still had an old cassette tape collection of mine somewhere from like 20 years ago.

I dusted it off and have been rocking out to these goldies:
Boston 3rd stage
Triumph Thunder Seven
Europe - The Final Countdown (why am I not listening to this song every morning when I wake up???)
Queensryche Empire
Phil Collins
...But Seriously
Serious Hits Live!
Rush
Van Halen
The Doors

Tell me you're not jealous.

My tape collection isn't that extensive anymore and I got tired of repeating albums. (I listened to Phil Collins two days in a row).

Then traffic started getting to me again. People drive 15-20 mph over the posted speed limit, tailgate and get mad at me because I won't speed up or move over to accommodate their recklessness. Is it any wonder that Arizona has the highest death rate by vehicle manslaughter (next to maybe Argentina where stopping at intersections is merely a suggestion) accompanied by the highest car insurance premiums in the world? I'm digressing.

I can't wait to have audio cd's again. 45 minutes of story time bliss twice a day. It takes my mind off of maniacs who value getting to their next destination 2 minutes faster more than their own lives, or other people's lives for that matter.

And it lowers my blood pressure.