...And now I'm in my mid-thirties

I don't know how I feel about that.  In some ways it's great and in some ways it's not so great, and in most ways it doesn't matter at all.

It was a good weekend, not unlike any other weekend, but I find that's the case with most weekends with two year olds.  I am exhausted and overwhelmed and pretty much out of words, so I'm just going to put up pictures and captions today and I'll tell more stories later.

What Jayden thought was for dinner on Tuesday night: candy, cheez-its, honey and macaroni.  Healthy and balanced, just like I've taught him...

Eating cookies on the floor of the kitchen after dinner.  Carmen wasn't home Wednesday night so Jayden and I had a mommy/son night again.

Goodnight kisses for Jazzy.  It took us about eight tries to get the picture, but we got it.

7:15 am Friday morning.  Jayden decided it would be fun to be awake from 3:30 am to 5:15 am and I'd had a horrible time falling asleep Thursday night, so I spent about half of my sleeping hours on a floor, either in Jayden's room or in the hallway just outside.  Needless to say I was a little tired on Friday.
Oh, and typical boy - hand down his pants.  :)

One of my office traditions: decorate the office of the birthday person!  I got ballooned all over the place.  It was great.  And they put a little leopard/tiger figurine on my desk because I guess I'm a tiger?!?  All I know is the balloons are still up and I don't plan on taking them down until they all deflate.  

Waving to Mommy and Daddy as he belly flops off the surfboard at swim lessons in the big pool.  It was a day of "firsts" - he spoke to Ms. Stacy, for almost the first time, and he also actually swam.  It was awesome.  And he was super proud of himself, which was also really cool.

Family photo on my birthday morning.

A different family photo.  June 28, 1981.

Coolest kid on the block, obviously.  Jayden required that he and I do the same thing with our sunglasses at all times. So if he took his off, I had to take mine off.  If I put mine on top of my head, he had to put his on top of his head.  It got complicated at times, but we made it through.

And a couple cute videos:

Splashes, Sunsets and Monkeys!

That pretty much sums up our weekend: swimming pools, monkeys (at the zoo) and the sunset (on Sunday night).  Saturday we had swim lessons, as usual.  Except Ms. Stacy was out sick and somehow the swimming pool managed to not have a substitute.  Finally they found someone to take the lesson and she was great.  We've had her as a substitute before, but only in the Parent & Me class.  In the semi-private she was really great and she really worked hard with Jayden.  He was a lot more focused.  After we got home and he napped, we went back in to the swimming pool.  And multiple times he swam several strokes on his own and actually moved himself in the water, by himself.  It was so incredibly awesome.  He also LOVED jumping off the side, in what was essentially a belly flop.  It didn't seem to bother him, so he just kept doing it.

Goggles!!!

Checking out the Goofy toy underwater.  It was pretty cool that he is so comfortable that he just sticks his head underwater and is completely comfortable (and holding his breath).

Mid-belly flop!

Swimming on his own!

And finally, the full belly flop and a few strokes:

And that was pretty much our day.  We were all waterlogged by the end of it, but also exhausted in a good way.

Sunday morning we got up and played.  And then we painted a little bit, had lunch, took a nap and played some more!

I finally found his orange goggles, after we got out of the pool on Saturday night.  He was so excited that he wore them on the walk Sunday morning.  I was running, but Carmen said people kept looking at him and Jayden and smiling.  So awesome.

Some serious painting.

Then, finally, after an apparently maddening USMNT World Cup game, we were off to the zoo.  The local little zoo near us has Sunsets at the Zoo a few times during the summer.  After the zoo closes, they reopen it for an evening concert.  You can bring in a picnic or they have food and beer for purchase.  We did half and half - we brought in some snacks and some wine, and then decided to buy food there.  Next time we'll definitely pack a picnic dinner too.  We went with a friend of mine from her work, her husband, her four year old son ("Oll-wee" according to Jayden) and her friend from college.  We had a great time.  It was so relaxing, there were so many kids that the boys could run all over the place without annoying too many people.  We also could walk and check out the monkeys in the zoo.  We could have taken a ride on the choo-choo train too, but we actually ran out of time.  It was just a lovely evening.  Unfortunately we'll miss the next one (we'll be in Seattle), but we're definitely going to the next one, which also happens to be the last one of the summer.  Jayden was excited about the monkeys but also couldn't stop talking about the "zee-bwas" at the "big zoo."  So eventually we'll have to get him down to the San Diego Zoo.  It's a little overwhelming, because I know it's so big and it'll be hard for Jayden to take it all in, but we'll have to be patient and if we only make it to a few exhibits, that'll be fine.

Chillin' in our chairs at the zoo.

A close up of our main man.  He wore his sticker to bed he was so excited.

He did not want to smile anymore.  So instead we stuck our tongues out.

He went to bed late, but he was so cheerful it wasn't a big deal.

Until this morning.  He was clearly tired when he woke up.  He didn't want to go to Juju's, he wanted to stay home, etc.  I had the day off so I felt even more guilty, but I really wanted to get to my yoga class (which I just rediscovered and I'm loving it).  I told him on Saturday that I was going to a class and he got all kinds of distressed and wanted to go wif' me.  I explained that this class was only for grown ups, but that I would see if I could find a class where he could go with me (I'd heard there were some kid yoga classes in Orange County so I wasn't totally making this up).  So this morning when I told him I was going to a class, he looked at me all hopeful and said "one I can go to also Mommy?!???"  And then I felt all kinds of guilty all over again.  Ugh.  I explained that I hadn't found that class yet but that I was still looking.

I also taught him some yoga yesterday while we were waiting to go to the zoo.  I taught him cobra, downward dog, tree and child's pose.  It was so cool.  He was so cute in downward dog and in tree pose.  He tried so hard to balance, but I finally had to place his right foot leaning against his left ankle so he had a little kickstand and then he got his arms up in the air.  He got such a kick out of it.  It's nice that the names of the poses have animals and other things that he recognizes in them - makes it a lot easier to get kids interested in it!

I tried to get him to bed early tonight, but Carmen didn't make it home until after bedtime, so I of course was late.  And then he had a hard time falling asleep, of course.  I hope he's not getting sick, but he's kind of due, so we'll see.

And now it's back to work tomorrow.  Carmen has a crazy week, which means my week will end up crazy too.  Happy Birthday week to me!!!

Totally!

I've been bad about taking pictures recently.  I finally took a few tonight, but only one really came out well:

Bubble Bath: keeping toddlers happy (and clean!) since 1806.  Or whenever.

Carmen and I were putting Jayden to bed recently and we were goofing around in his room.  One of us said something, I don't remember what, and Jayden said "toootal-weeee."  It was hilarious.  Carmen and I just looked at each other and couldn't keep a straight face.  Who knows where he learned it but now that we've laughed, we've encouraged it!

Jayden has continued to be lovely.  He's been tired this week and is starting to get a runny nose (which is standard, since Carmen is out of town today and tomorrow), but is still cheerful.  He'll have moments, but we're seriously so lucky.

Tonight I told him we might go to the zoo this weekend and he lit up.  He asked if he got to go with "his fwends?"  I asked him who he might want to go with, which friends, and he said "I wanna go wif my fwend wee," which, translated, means, "my friend Leigh."  So cute.  I do need to record him saying "wee" for "Leigh," because it's just hilarious.  He knows I have two names: Leigh Ferrin and Leigh Wallace, but it comes out "wee fehr-win" and "wee wal-wace."  He knows his name is "Jayden Wal-wace" and Daddy's name is "Cah-men Wal-wace."

We were driving home today and he saw a white SUV (a suburban type car).  He said "Mommy!  Mommy, see dat gway car?  Thas wike the car we wode in wif Gwamma!"  So he basically was able to identify the type of car and remembered that it looks like the black suburbans that we rode in after we got off the plane in New York a week ago.  So crazy.  f

Jayden also has started making up his own songs.  Today in the car ride home he started singing a song about playing race cars at Juju's, how he got the green one, Kale got the yellow one, how they shook the cars and how they raced around the track.  All to his own tune, and with some "doo-doo-doos" in there for good measure.  I tried to sing with him and he told me no, he's singing that, not me.  And then he sang it again, paused for a minute to tell me not to sing and then kept going.  There was no safe way for me to pull out my camera and get a video so you're going to have to take my word for it and use your imagination.

Hope everyone has had a good week.  And happy day after your birthday Mama/Gramma!!!

Happy Father's Day!

What a weekend.  In the best way possible.  It wasn't terribly productive, but it was relaxing and fun, and much needed!

We had some of my work friends over Saturday night for swimming, drinks and food.  I made some turkey burgers that I highly recommend - basically they were ground turkey, shredded cheddar cheese, onion, garlic, cilantro, jalapeno and lime juice and seasoned with cumin and paprika.  I highly recommend them - we got rave reviews from the two year old up to the 40 year olds, including the 4 year old, 7 and 8 year olds and the 30+ year olds all in between.  A little bit of work with the chopping, but not spicy at all (and Jayden is super sensitive to 'picy so I'd know).

Jayden and his friend Ollie ("Aw-wee") in the hot tub.

They were synchronized swimming - they'd look at each other and take off at the same time.

Floating in the pool together.  Ollie had an extra pair of floaties that we put on Jayden.  After yesterday we thought we'd buy something like what Ollie has on for him.  But then we went in the pool today without the floaties and Jayden was swimming much more scared than normal.  So we decided no more floaties - only if we absolutely had to.

Eating jello beach desserts, courtesy of Lili.  :)

Oh, and before we had people over, we had swim lessons (yes, we spent half of our waking hours yesterday in water).  Jayden had a new partner in his semi-private lesson and she was a little more brave.  Ms. Stacy took them in the big pool - the outdoor pool - and Jayden loved it.  When he was supposed to walk next to Ms. Stacy while she worked with the little girl, he tried to swim.  Ms. Stacy took him to the deep end and let them jump off this block into the deep end.  Jayden climbed right off and jumped right in, no hesitation whatsoever.  The other girl hesitated and Ms. Stacy said she gave her a "look," so she jumped off the edge.  But Jayden would've done it eighteen times in a row if he could have.

Kicking with the noodles.

Kicking back in after the jumps.  The block in the background is what Jayden jumped off of - into the "deep" end. 

One of the great things about the gathering was that everyone who came had kids, so everyone was gone by 8 pm.  We got Jayden to bed, cleaned up and I was in bed early.  It was fun, but definitely exhausting!

Today we had a few plans, but also wanted to relax.  Carmen got another workout in this morning while I took care of Jayden and the dog.  We got ready and headed out the door - first to Whole Foods to buy fancy lobster and shrimp for Carmen's Father's Day dinner and then to Nordstrom so Carmen could use his gift from his mom (which he did - it was the Men's Half-Yearly Sale, thank goodness).  Funny enough, the way I got Jayden to be excited about the store was to tell him we'd buy him socks.  We were walking and I was telling him what we were going to do that day and he tried to complain he didn't want to go to the store.  I told him that while Daddy was looking at clothes we could go look at socks for Jayden (socks was the first thing that came to my mind - don't ask me why because I don't know!).  And Jayden said "ooooooh!  Socks!  Yay, less go to the stow-re!"  So apparently socks are a big deal for him.  Who knew.  From there we headed to the waffle sandwich and beer restaurant, one of Carmen's favorites.  Jayden hit his wall towards the end and was passing out on the bench, and then woke up enough to throw a fit when Carmen tried to put him in the car.  By the time we got home he was fine and I was able to get him down for a nap relatively easily.  We spent the afternoon outside and in the pool, and then had our special seafood dinner and then it was bedtime.  Not a very eventful Father's Day, but a good one, I think.

Jayden got a balloon in the kid's department at Nordstrom.  He wanted to take it into the restaurant and I finally convinced him not to by telling him I'd take a picture of it so he could look at it.  Thank goodness (again) for smart phones!

Passed out on the bench at the restaurant.

Bubbles!

Grilling shrimp and lobster with Daddy.  "Ooooh, iss hot!"

After his bath tonight I was trimming his finger and toenails - which happens twice a week, I might add, ridiculous - and told him "Jayden, you have to tell me when your fingernails get so long!"  He said "but, I can't!"  So of course I asked why.  He said "because I a wittle tie-yewd."  So apparently if you're tired you can't tell that your fingernails are long.  It's good to remember things like this.

Jayden has been really tired since we got back from Florida.  Yesterday he napped about 3 hours, today another 2.  And we've been trying to get him to bed as early as possible (except last night, of course).  But he's been incredibly cheerful, with the exception of his tantrum leaving lunch today.  He is an incredibly resilient kid - but as my friend said when she was explaining why she wanted to adjust her hours to be home more with her four year old, "I don't want him to have to be resilient - I want to be there for him!"  Obviously adversity is good for anyone, to a point, but for a two year old that point comes pretty quickly.  He's a smart kid but there's still a lot that he can't process developmentally so the more that we can talk him through things the better he can be.  For instance, when he was throwing his tantrum in the car, rather than telling him to "cut it out," I talked him through it - to find out why he was so mad - and figured out what could be done to fix it.  And then he was fine.  He calmed down and was actually cheerful the whole way home.  It takes a WHOLE lot of patience on our part, but it makes for a much happier, calmer child.  And it helps him figure out how to solve his own problems too, which is really a wonderful thing.

This is not the greatest video, but he's happy and laughing in it, so it's kinda fun.

Happy Father's Day to all the dads out there.  It's a wonderful day to celebrate the influence dads have on their children and how important it is for dads to be present and involved in their kids lives.  My photo tributes to a few of the fathers in my life:

As our cousin Adam said "was this that time you rescued the hostages?"  Clearly the answer is "yes."  But I love this picture.  Especially with both boys looking in the same direction.
My thoughts were/are this: Happy Father's Day to one amazing dad.  Always ready to hold hands, throw a ball, cuddle when he's scared or catch him when he jumps off the deep end of the pool.  The challenges only get bigger and better from here.  Love you Carmen!

No words.  Just me and my poppa.  Love him so much, and wishing him rest and peace this Father's Day.  So maybe a few words.  But those that know me know that when I say "no words," I clearly mean at least a few words.

Adventures in Flying

We had quite a trip.  It was a whirlwind, including way too many hours of airplanes, but luckily our child is pretty much the greatest kid ever, as you already know.

Saturday we caught a flight at noon.  Before we left we got 23542 notifications that our flight was delayed 30 minutes.  Not a big deal, except for when you have a 45 minute connection in the Atlanta airport and are planning to check bags.  Thank goodness for Carmen's fancy Delta status (thanks to my Poppa) - they rebooked us on the later flight long before we even left for the airport so we knew we'd make it to Florida that night.  It meant a looooong day, but at least we'd get to the hotel.  We ended up landing at about 11:30 pm, which, by the time we got our bags and our car and drove to the hotel, we didn't get to bed until about 1:00 am.  We also didn't get dinner.  Also thanks to Carmen's fancy Delta status, we were able to stop in the Delta SkyLounge and get some snacks (and wine!) before our second flight.  I don't think I could have convinced Jayden to eat a meal at that point anyway, so it was probably for the best.

As my Dad said, "I thought Jayden liked white wine?!?"  And as I responded, "yes, usually, but he couldn't pass up a good Pinot."  And to anyone potentially worried, I promise the wine was for me and only me.  Jayden actually knows very well that wine is for grown ups and not for kids.

The next day we were up at a decent hour and made it to breakfast before church.  Carmen, Jayden and I have not spent a lot of time in church so I had no idea what to expect from Jayden.  But he (once again) was great.  He enjoyed the "moo-zick" and the minute he could tell the last song was ending he turned to me and asked "Mama, are we done?!???"  Luckily no one else really heard, and when we told the Pastor later on he even laughed, saying it's probably what everyone was thinking.

We spent the afternoon at Grandmother and Grandfather's apartment.  I took a few pictures of pictures so that I could have some copies.

Grandmother, Poppa, Aunt Bonnie and Grandfather.  And dogs, of course.

A drawing of a photo of Grandmother, Grandfather and the three grandkids.  I had no idea they'd had this done, but I love it.

I found a way to get Jayden to nap on the floor of one of the bedrooms, which was fine until he woke up by himself in a strange room and freaked out.  I walked in and he was standing in the middle of the blanket on the floor, crying his head off.  I sat with him and reassured him and soon he was fine again, especially when he remembered he could go find Gramma!

One last picture with Gramma before bedtime.  This was Jayden's "smile."

Jayden and I went back to the hotel, got him in bed by 9:30 and me in bed by 10!  I got something like nine hours of sleep that night - unheard of.  But so necessary, especially this weekend with all the stress and emotion.  Monday was the memorial services at the church so yet another chance for Jayden to practice his whispering and patience.  And once again, he was amazing.

All dressed up, "like Daddy" in the hotel room.  Mommy, where's your tie?!?

Family photo  before heading into the services.

The ceremony was wonderful.  People had some very nice things to say about Grandfather and the person who he was really came through.  He was such a kind, caring, thoughtful person, with such a great sense of humor.  The individual who gave the eulogy (Cater) told a great story of meeting Grandfather for the first time at a dinner, where the table where they were sitting decided to go around the table and compare one of the wines they were drinking to a symphony.  Cater started to panic because he knew nothing about wine and nothing about symphonies.  My grandfather leaned over to him and said "compare the cabernet to Beethoven's sixth."  Cater was feeling good until he realized he didn't know why - and then my grandfather said "just say they both left a bad taste in your mouth!"  He just had those little jokes always ready to go, to lighten the mood and alleviate anxiety.  And he looooved to have fun.  And the services really emphasized that and really was a celebration more than anything, which was wonderful.

Holding on to Mommy's leg and Auntie's leg while we walk to dinner.  Voluntarily touching Auntie - a huge leap forward!

Tuesday was a whole other adventure.  Our first plane left at 7:20 am to fly us to New York.  We were lucky enough to be on a private jet, so we only had to arrive by 7.  Which was good, since Carmen, Jayden, Ellen and I arrived at about 7:15 or 7:20.  Somehow I couldn't get everything together as quickly as I thought.  The flight attendant offered for Jayden to see the cockpit with the pilots, but Jayden declined, sort of politely.  He did enjoy the freedom, but I don't know if he really knew the difference between a commercial flight and a private jet.  He did like the shuttle we got to take from the plane to the "terminal" in Teterboro (NJ - where we landed after being diverted from White Plains), and I explained to him that this was probably the first and last time he'd be on a private jet, if I had anything to say about it!  The whole crew laughed.

Walking with Daddy to the airplane.

Stretching out with Gramma on the airplane.

The fleet of planes at the Teterboro airport.

We drove from the airport to the church in Scarsdale, NY.  The church is beautiful and is very peaceful.

Running at the church.

Aunt Bonnie and Poppa in quiet thought after the interment.  

After the burial we visited the other family graves and then headed over to lunch.  It was the same place we ate after my Grandmother's burial.  The weirdest thing about all of this is that I kept expecting my Grandfather to be there.  I expected him to be sitting at the table with us, or waiting for us when we got back to the apartment after lunch one day, or just generally around.  And that's exactly what the pastor in Florida said - it's so hard to let go of the expectation that you'll see the person in the place you've always seen them.  For him it was the same pew in church every Sunday.  For me it's a different setting, but that's exactly my sentiment.  And honestly, I don't know when we'll next go back to Palm Beach - my grandparents were really the only reason we went.  So who knows.  Just such a weird feeling.

After lunch we made our way to the airport.  We were really early for our flight, but we decided it made sense to ensure we didn't stress out.  It turned out Jayden was exhausted (not surprisingly) and he passed out on my lap for about an hour and a half.

He woke up a little bit before it was time to get on the plane, so it was perfect timing.

Once again, Jayden did a great job on the plane, reading books, playing around and eventually settling in to watch "pinguinos," also known as Happy Feet 2.  Of course our first flight was slightly delayed and of course we had a 45 minute connection so we were worried.  We ended up landing only about 5 minutes late. And then when we were deplaning people just stopped.  For no reason whatsoever that we could see.  So we're stopped in the middle of the plane, watching the minutes tick by, knowing we need to get off the plane, run upstairs to catch the train, go around three terminals, go back down to the terminal and then walk six gates to our plane.  We finally got off the plane a little after 8:55 and our next plane was supposed to leave at 9:25.  Jayden was great.  He walked/ran with me the entire time, not requesting to be carried once.  It helped that we were going up and down escalators {"es-ca-vators"} and catching a train.  Once we got off the train and down the escalator we had about 15 minutes.  We hadn't eaten dinner (again) and Jayden's pull-up had managed to completely leak and he was wet all over.  We didn't feel comfortable stopping so I convinced Jayden to run with me to the gate so we could "catch ow-eh aih-pwane!"  We got the gate and the boarding area was empty but it looked like the door was still open, thank goodness.  I ran up, probably a little more crazy than I needed to be, and said "please, please, please let us on!"  And the guy looked at me funny and said "you're fine..."  In any case, we ran on the plane, I tossed our bags in our seats and ran Jayden back to the bathroom.  Thank goodness I threw a change of clothes in his bag at the last minute.  We got him changed and were back in our seats before the last two people ran on the plane about five minutes later.  We sat down and took off and were on our way!  Jayden finally passed out on the plane towards the end and really didn't wake up again.  We got him in his bed by 11:30 pm, which was pretty good since we'd landed at 10:30 pm.  We let him sleep until 7:30 am the next day and have been trying to give him a few extra minutes here and there ever since.  Hopefully we'll get him down at a reasonable time tomorrow and let him sleep until he needs to on Saturday.

In any case, Jayden was (and IS) just an amazing kid.  Everyone was impressed with him, at church, at the services, on the airplane, etc.  And he's cheerful and having fun too, so it's not like we're having to convince him minute by minute to be patient, etc.

And now we're home and back to normal-ish.  Jayden was happy to see Jasmine on Wednesday and has been having a bunch of fun at Juju's, getting to see his friends again.  He saw kids when we were at church on Sunday and kept asking where they were when we were back there on Monday.  And he also saw kids at the church on Tuesday in New York and wanted to go where they were to play.  So I think he was having withdrawal a little bit!  He was also jammin' on the piano at the lunch after the services on Monday.  Carmen has those pictures so whenever he sends them to me I'll share them on here.

And finally, here's the picture from CarsLand at Disney's California Adventure.

Weekend o' fun

Whew.  What a weekend.  It wasn't really that crazy, but we had a whole bunch of fun.  Friday night was a normal night, nothing exciting.

Saturday we had swim lessons again, so we kept Jayden busy until it was time for to leave.  Jayden and I went for a run, where I actually ran.  I pushed a 35+ pound child riding in a 20+ lb stroller 4-1/2 miles, up hill both ways!

It wasn't pretty afterwards!

We played with the toys in the house for a bit, particularly his choo-choo trains.

And yes, he is saying "chukka-chukka choo-choo!"  Hilarious.  Apparently he heard "chukka" instead of "chugga."  I certainly wasn't going to correct him.  I figure we'll only going to get these cute little phrases for so much longer and I want to hear as many of them as I can.

Swimming was good.  Carmen put his swim trunks on to get Jayden into the pool and to get him out of the pool at the end.  He did better about swimming with his arms instead of doggy paddling, which is what he was doing last weekend, and he even got a little better about staying horizontal in the deep end.  But he still has a tendency to go vertical in the deep end, so we're working on it.  He is really comfortable in the shallow end, though.

Watch me!

At lunchtime before swimming, Jayden said "mommy?  I a wittle bit tie-yewd."  If he was telling me that before lunch, I knew he was going to be a disaster by the time swimming was over.  We made it home awake, but then I picked him up out of his carseat to go get the mail.  By the time I got back inside he was almost passed out.  I was trying to keep him awake, because Katrina was coming over and I wanted him to see her before he fell asleep.  But no such luck.  So we read one book and he was out within minutes.

Katrina was there so Carmen and I could go to a benefit for the sister legal aid organization in Orange County, Legal Aid Society of Orange County.  It was a lot of fun.

Hanging out with wine glass necklaces.  The greatest invention that we now can use while chasing our two year old and having a glass of wine in the backyard.  Wonderful.

We made it home in time for dinner time and bed time, which made Jayden happy.  It turns out him waking up to Katrina actually wasn't so terrible.  I guess he actually talked to her, they played outside with the flying pig (thanks Gramma!) and generally had a whole bunch of fun.  We're trying to use Katrina more often, so that we get moments alone and so that Jayden gets more used to her.  So far, so good.  She'll be back in a couple weeks for PLC's dinner and hopefully a couple weeks after that for my birthday!

THEN. Sunday, we braved Disneyland.  Thanks to my awesome co-worker whose boyfriend works for Disney, we had free park hopper passes, AND Jayden is free until he's three.  We still managed to spend about $100 on food, snacks and stuff, but it still was a really cheap day, as far as Disneyland is concerned.  Even better than that, we had a wonderful time.  We hit about 7 rides in 9 hours, but that was plenty.  We started in California Adventure because we wanted to take Jayden to CarsLand.  That was everyone else's plan too, I guess.  We rode the caterpillar "choo-choo train" on the way there, which was pretty fun.  It was a take on the book the "Hungry Hungry Caterpillar," and you ride the caterpillar train through an apple, a watermelon, a cupcake, a bunch of candy, etc.  Jayden had a great time.

On the shuttle bus from the parking lot to Disney.  This was a pretty good "ride" too, as far as Jayden was concerned.

Starting the day off right, with a smoothie in California Adventure.

On the caterpillar choo choo train!

From there it was off to CarsLand.  We were all excited to go on the Cars ride, but got there and it was a two hour wait.  We clearly couldn't do that, and were debating FastPass, but then were approached by another guy.  He told us to make sure Jayden was tall enough (the requirement was 40" and apparently Jayden is about 41"!  Who knew?!?) and asked if it was his first time.  We said "yes," and the guy handed us three fast passes that expired in minutes.  We ran down the fast pass lane and were on the ride within 15 minutes.  Amazing.  The ride was a tame roller coaster, but definitely the most wild ride Jayden has been on.  He was grabbing Carmen and burying his head in his side, but at the end wanted to go again.  And we made sure to eat lunch near the ride so that we could watch the cars "race."  It was a great ride, and I highly recommend it to anyone who is even a little bit a fan of Cars.  You go to Radiator Springs, you either get a paint job or a tire rotation, you go past the waterfall that Lightning and Sally race to, you "speed" by the Sheriff and knock over tractors with Mater, and then you race another car (also with riders in it), over hills, around corners, through a tunnel and past a finish line.  It was great.  And I have a great picture from the ride but Disney is fighting me and I can't download it at the moment.  I'll post it as soon as Disney stops being annoying.

As a sidenote, I managed to leave my phone in the cup holder on top of the stroller during the entire time we were debating about Cars, measuring Jayden, walking through the FastPass, waiting in the line, riding the ride, buying our photo and walking back to the stroller.  In total, it was probably 40 minutes.  And lo and behold, my phone was still there when we got back.  Nothing short of a miracle.  We're guessing most parents didn't even notice, or if they did, just assumed I did it on purpose.  Amazing.

As Carmen said "ka-chow!"  Watching Lightning drive through Radiator Springs while we ate lunch.

Flo's Drive in, where we ate lunch and Guido and Luigi's tire store.  I'm telling you, it's a real Radiator Springs - it's awesome!

Jayden and Mommy with Lightning.  We waited in line for about 15 minutes with Jayden asking when it was his turn and telling me he wanted to touch Lightning and as soon as we got within two feet of Lightning, Jayden freaked out and wanted to run away.  We managed to hang out long enough to get a picture.  

Jayden with one of the tractors.  He's thoroughly impressed, obviously.

After this we went on Ariel's adventure in a slow-moving clamshell.  It was okay, although somewhat dark, which is what scares Jayden.  We walked around for a bit, watching the giant roller coaster and checking out the fountain.  We found a spot where the roller coaster stops where we could see it and the announcer counts: "5 - 4 - 3 - 2 - 1 - GO!" so Jayden and I stood there and counted down about 15 times before he was willing to move on.  Soon it was naptime and Carmen and I decided it was time to "hop" parks.  We made it over to Disneyland easily, getting a nice shot of Goofy along the way.

GOOFY!  (for Jayden's benefit since he was sleeping and missed out)

Jayden slept for an hour or so and woke up in time to go on It's a Small World, which he enjoyed much more than before.  He didn't want to be on a boat on our way in to the ride (it appeared to be dark), but by the time we were done, he'd had so much fun seeing the animals ("pinguinos!") and looking at all the "people," that he didn't want to get out of the boat. It was very cool.  Jayden and I rode another choo-choo train (this time we were locked in the monkey cage on a circus train) and then rode Autopia.  I am not a fan of Autopia, and Carmen was smart to sit that one out.  My legs were killing me, so Carmen might not have been able to walk afterwards if he tried to ride it.  Disneyland is not made for people over six feet.

In the monkey cage, lookin' cool with his sunglasses.

Mommy and Jayden in Autopia, in the yellow car!

We tried to watch Captain EO, thinking Jayden might enjoy the music, but that movie is much too scary for a two year old, especially Jayden.  He and I left in the middle and waited until Carmen came out at the end.  We finished up our day in the Tiki Room, which was also a lot of fun for Jayden this time.  He was clapping and singing and pointing.  Thanks to Islands he knows what "Tiki guys" are, so he kept asking about them and when they were going to sing.  We ate dinner and headed to the exits.

Carmen and I had found a hat we wanted to buy Jayden but knew better than to buy anything without him seeing it first.  We showed it to him and as expected he said no.  He said he wanted a hate, so we looked at every hat available and he said no to all of them.  So I said maybe we should wait until another day and Jayden said "yeah, we wait 'til 'nother day."  So he is better than both Carmen and I who were having strong internal debates about what souvenirs we wanted to buy.  We eventually both acted like grown ups like Jayden and left without anything.  Leave it to our two year old to curb our spending!

Twenty feet from the gate there was a Mickey and Minnie spotting. I wasn't going to stop but Jayden said he wanted to see Minnie and he wanted a picture with her.  I didn't believe him, but he'd been so awesome all day long, we decided to say okay.  We waited in line for a few minutes, with me asking him every two minutes or so "are you sure"  do you really want to meet Minnie?  are you sure you want a picture with Minnie?" and he kept saying "yes."  So finally it was our turn and he walked right up to her by himself.  She gave him a hug, he didn't freak out, and he even stood there for a picture with her!  It was awesome, he waved goodbye to her and was definitely happy.

Hugs!

Almost touching.

Cute photo!  We tried to get Carmen to participate, but he said no.

We finally made it out of the park, back on the shuttle and to our car.  During the car ride home Jayden said "Mommy?  I a wot tie-yewd.  Are you a wot tie-yewd?"  I told him I was and he said "No!  I a wot tie-yewd, you a wittle tie-yewd."  Jayden believes that nobody can be the same as him.  So if he says he likes green, I cannot also say I like green.  I must pick a different color, like blue or purple.  Today on the car ride home we saw a blue garbage truck and a green garbage truck and he decided he liked the green garbage truck better.  He asked me if I liked green, and I said sure, I like green.  He said "NO!  You wike bwuuueeee garbage twucks!"  So I agreed.  Not worth fighting that one.

In any case, Disney was awesome.  Completely exhausting and not the greatest idea to do it on a Sunday, but still a lot of fun.  If annual passes weren't as much as my monthly salary I might consider getting one.

Yesterday was back to work, just making it through the week.

When we got home Monday, Jayden went to play outside with Jasmine while I made dinner. I looked outside and saw him just sitting in his chair taking in the sights.

A closer up view of him relaxing.

AND Jayden is now in a "big chair."  No more high chair!  He was just too big for it so I converted it to a big boy chair. I was afraid he'd fight me, but he's actually pretty pleased to be able to eat at the table.  And he can't climb out easily, once I push him in to the table, so we're safe there too.  Pretty exciting!