AAH HA AND OH NO!

This has been an interesting week. Aidan had a few snow days last week so we got out of town. We took off in Adam's truck for a road trip, just the 4 of us, not much in the way of music, no DVD players, just family, and it was fun! We stopped at the Routte 66 Dianasaur museum, which was a bit of a let down for the adults, but great fun for the kids! We talked, read stories, told stories, did our best to entertain the 2 year old that hates being strapped into anything, and talked some more. We are in the midst of some major life changing decisions, one of which is where to move, so the general purpose of this trip was to look at some different law schools. On the way home, Sunday morning we were cruising along the freeway and the truck just decided to stop running. We were about 100 miles from the next decent sized town, so we were lucky that it drove at all, but had to go about 30 that whole way. We made it into Albequerque and found out that all the service shops were closed until Monday. I told my sob story to a nice guy at the hilton that was right off the freeway, and he gave me an unbelievable rate, so we planned to stay the night and get the truck fixed first thing in the morning. We settled in to our room, raced down to the swimming pool, which we were so excited about because not only was it indoor, but it had a water slide! Great fun for all boys! Unfortunatly we got to the pool only to find out that the slide is only open during the summer, but that didn't stop my boyz, Adam and Aidan figured out that if Aidan climbed up the slide and Adam stayed at the bottom and splashed it over and over, Aidan could slide down pretty well. He slid in every manner possible, on his butt, on his Knees, on his stomach, on his back.... the last thing he tried was crouching and standing up when the "tube" part of the slide was over... that didn't work so well, but he laughed alot!

On Monday we found out that they needed an extra day to get the parts, so we were stuck for another night :(

The truck breaking down was the major Oh No! moment of the week... it cost way more than I care to talk about to fix, plus the 2 nights in a hotel.... Yikes, Christmas plans changed just a bit!



I had a few AAH HA moments to..... you know those times when something happens and it just clicks in your brain. One of these was with Zander, he is such a funny boy, he is 2 1/2 and a fabulous talker. He can say anthing you ask him to, and he knows what most of it means. He talks in short sentances, and he actually makes sense, which is nice with a 2 year old. He can also count, which amazes me. He can get to 15 on an almost regular basis, and everyone is always asking me how I taught him to count so well at such a young age. I can't remember What Aidan did at what ages, so I really don't know if he is as awesome as he seems, but most people seem impressed. Well while we were at the hotel we all went down to the workout room. Adam was running, Aidan was running backwards, I did my 30 minutes on the treadmill (I won't lie and say I was actually running) then I got on the floor to do my other excercises. I was doing crunches and Zander ran over and got on my legs, like he always does when he see's me on the floor, and I kept doing my crunches, counting quietly to myself. He immediatly started counting for me, since he didn't think I was, and it was then that I relized that THAT is where he learned to count! I do crunches often, and he is almost always on my legs, so we count together. He has learned enough now that he can actually count items!

Another moment was when I relized that Zander gives hugs just like Aiden Tanner used to when he was little. He was always the best hugger! He still is, but he is a 9 year old boy now so he is a little more reserved than a 2 year old. My only other experiance with toddlers was Aidan, and from the ages of 2-4 Aidan had a stepbrother (one of his dad's wives) who had pretty severe autism, so Aidan displayed alot of autistic tendencies at those ages. I think he just did what he saw from his stepbrother, but he sure was not a cuddler. In fact he went through a stage when if anyone touched him at all he would throw himself on the floor and scream. It was sad, and hurtful, my stepson hugged me with much more gusto and frequency than my own son. Now I have a genuine cuddler for a son, and it is just great! There is nothing Zander loves more than to lay on the couch with either me or dad and just snuggle. In fact he often asks out of nowhere " mom can I snuggle you?" Now how do you resist that one!!!

So, that is a summary of our week..... now we are on to Christmas prep... fun fun!