Asher loves “outer space” He memorized the planets a few months ago and can tell you Venus is the hot one and Jupiter is the really big one. He knows that Saturn is the one with the rings but Uranus has them too. He will tell you that Pluto is a DWARF planet. Thank you very much.
We examine the moon on a daily basis. His favorite is the crescent but he can get pretty excited over any phase. I’m thinking this is a must for his birthday list.
He has some constellation stickers and is a big fan of both pegasus (the horse!) and leo (the lion!)
We have a few general space books and another on the Apollo 11 but its pretty advanced for him so we’ve only read it once or twice. Apparently he pays attention because this was our convo tonight after reading Olivia
Asher: What’s Olivia’s brothers name?
Me: Ian
Asher: Ian like Ian Armstrong!
Me: uh…who is Ian Armstrong?
Asher: He’s from…he’s from space! He drives rocket ships and he goes to the moooooon!
Me: I think you mean NEIL Armstrong
Asher (clasps his had to his mouth): NEIL ARMSTRONG!!!!
I bumped into my friend Lisa on the way back to the doctor on Wednesday and we made plans for today after naps since she doesn’t work on Fridays. She’s in my moms group and they live on our corner but we don’t see her and her daughter Enna Rae nearly as much as we should anymore.
It was kind of nice out today so she suggested playground, I countered with a walk in the park and she countered with finding puddles to jump in and I was sold. Just hours before I had to drag Asher out of a puddle in his sneakers so I knew he’d be into it.
We ended up doing a little of each but the kids had a blast and we had a nice low key walk in the park with time to catch up.
Asher is really into Valentine’s Day this year. I blame school and also this blues clues Valentine’s Day book we received in a huge box of secondhand books when he was born.
In the book (which is awful by the way) Blue makes cookies for her friends to show them how much she loves them so guess what Asher wanted to do for his friends?
I wasn’t gonna get into all that but Matthew was up for it. With Asher’s love of cooking we thought it would be fun to bake cookies for his class- since Valentine’s Day happens to fall on a Tuesday/school day. Not knowing if we’d really feel like doing it in the end, last week I made one of his art projects Valentines because I am a genius always in need of a back up plan.
We had these blank cards so I cut them in half and then cut random heart shapes out of index cards while he was playing with his trains. I stuck tape to the back then Asher stuck all the hearts onto the cards himself.
I laid out red, white and pink paints and he went to town with his little valentine making factory.
He painted every inch of every card and I did that thing where you peel away the heart and it leaves a blank heart underneath. I love how every one came out differently because of all his random paint mixing.
They were really cute! I popped each cookie into a bag and tied the card onto it.
The best part was the fun we had making them and no, I’m not even kidding. I got to do the part I like and Matthew did the part he likes. Asher got to do it all AND give them out. It was a pretty fun way to introduce a fun little holiday. Happy Valentine’s Day!
8:23 Wide awake and screaming hysterically so I go in. He is fine. He wants to go into the LR. I explain that is not happening and hug him. He screams and carries on so I leave
8:25-8:35 Screaming but I was in the shower. Still screaming when I got out but for “Daddy” who is on a work trip (lucky) I go in soaking wet in a towel and tell him Daddy isn’t home, try to get him to lay down. Tell him I’m going to put jammies on and he freaks out
8:36-8:44 Standing in his room calming him down by telling him what we are doing this week while he complains that my wet hair is dripping on his pillow. He is under the covers and cozy when I walk out
8:51- 8:56 making crazy weird noises, possibly when you put your pointer finger over your lips and move it up and down while humming very loudly
9:17 Wiggles medley consisting of “Hot Potato” straight into “Fruit Salad”, Itsy Bitsy spider in its entirety, ” Jackie? Jackie!”
9:18 Silence
9:19 “Mommy?”
9:20 crying
9:21-9:23 Silence
9:24 Sad ass crying/moaning
9:26 Weird cry-whine where he goes from low notes to high notes up and down the scale.
9:26:30 Silence
9:27 Belted out cry-scream mad/upset thingy. Very Loud. kind of cry-whining going on until…
9:31 Crazy scream continuing into cry-whine where it sounds kind of like he’s talking but not with words. More screaming and more of that up and down scaling which I have grown to almost enjoy.
9:35 Silence
9:36 Crying scales
9:38 Full on screaming as loud as possible. I go in. 1 of his 4 precious blankets is on the floor and he is pointing to it furiously. I feel terrible and hand it to him. He throws it into the crib and continues to scream. He tells me he wants to go into the living room again. I feel less terrible and try to calm him for a while by telling him the following stories, all upon request:
-when he was a little boy and went on an airplane (how timely)
-when he was a little boy and he met Otto (I met his mom for coffee, it wasn’t super long or exciting)
-when he met Mommy (slightly tricky and also now he has babies in his tummy, fyi)
9:51 I walk out saying goodnight
9:51:02 He starts crying hysterically again
10:00 Still carrying on
10:05 Crying really hard and screaming my name so I go in to calm him down. He wants me to stay in there so I talk to him until his breathing is back to normal
10:11 I convince him that if I lay in my bed and he’s in his bed with the doors open its just like me standing in his room
Asher’s been in preschool since Sept and although he is only there a whopping 6 hours a week it has really been amazing for him. Lucky for us, he was not one of those kids that hates school. I was a little nervous because for over 2 years he was home either with us or with Jackie but ever since day 1 he has run into the classroom and ignored us when we try to say goodbye. 5 or 6 other kids could be crying and he doesn’t even want to throw me a pity wave. It was shocking but frankly, I think he needs time away from me as much as I need time away from him.
His class is made up of 13 2 year olds, the cut off is Sept 1 so he is among the youngest but it doesn’t seem to matter. There are 3 teachers and they are all warm and fabulous. His head teacher sends out a monthy curriculum outlining what they will do every day. Its so handy because according to Asher what happens in preschool stays in preschool. Until very recently he wouldn’t really talk about it.
Unsurprisingly they pack a lot of adorable activities into 6 hours a week. On the agenda for last class was:
Making snow covered spruce trees for our winter season mural
How do we know it’s winter?
Fun with flubber - making animals that hibernate
Yoga with Jennifer
I mean, its pretty freakin cute. Yoga every week? I wish I got to yoga every week. And I totally had to google flubber. Considering if he was home with me during that time we’d probably be doing “build a train track, do the caillou puzzle again” its great that he is there learning about weather and seasons and holidays and all kinds of other crap. They always have a few play stations set up in the morning and he walks right over to the art project every single time. A few weeks ago I was hanging up his coat and checking his cubby for notes and by the time I turned around he was on the floor getting his body traced
The next time we went to school the same thing happened. I walked over to check his cubby and when I turned around he had a smock on and his teacher Sophia was asking him what color his hair was.
“Yellow!”
(these other kids were washing babies because that week they were talking about bodies. get it?)
I’m talking 30 seconds to hang up his backpack and he already has a paintbrush in his hand. I was shunned on my way out and when I dropped him off last week I noticed these on the walls.
I’m sure it will be rolled up by his cubby for us to bring home tomorrow. Last month they had a show and tell and I was completely stumped on what he could bring. He got pretty excited about this little plane I brought him from a work trip so off they went.
This is what Asher said about his plane: “A white airplane – LOOK! It makes noise and its going to an airport. I show my friends. Look!! My friends!!”
They sent all the parents a list of what the kids said and if only I could be a fly on the wall. Julian’s mom sent me an email saying they were laughing about Asher’s show and tell days later. “Look! my friends!” She actually said it again to me the other day. I think it stuck.
Tomorrow is another show and tell day and luckily I had the brainstorm to send his guitar (aka the thing he wont leave the house without) so I can only assume there will be comedy gold. Considering he ends every song with “THANK YOU BROOKLYN WE LOVE YOU!” I am thinking of planting a video camera in between the pom poms and the popsicle sticks.
We had a little parent teacher conference which I mocked up until we went there to sit on the tiny chairs and talk to Lindsay. I thought they would be like “oh he plays nicely, he can follow directions when he feels like it” but it was waaay more than that. She went through 10 or so different milestones and gave personal anecdotes about Asher, like she was actually paying attention to him. Hmm. Ok awesome. His report was great, they love him. He’s doing well as far as speech, language, gross and fine motor skills, and all that stuff. he knows how to use a crayon properly and can walk up and down stairs holding a railing. Isn’t that nice? At home we have a big, big problem with transitions but she made a point to tell me how GREAT he is with transitions and especially with cleaning up. OF COURSE HE IS. (wtf?) He also tells other kids not to play with toys when its circle time. What a nerd.
We found out last week that we got our 1st choice in classes for next year. He will be going 5 full days - really 5 days until 230 – but still. I am so excited for him, he is going to have a blast. I am also excited for me. I think 3 years being home with him has earned me the odd day off to live my dream…a few hours in my house ALONE. Preschool FTW!
Asher and I got into a bit of a routine in October and every day when Jackie left around 5 we would play outside on the stoop for a while. It started because he likes to watch her ride away on her bike but then he realized we could hang out and say hi to people, wave to dogs and count the airplanes. I liked it because 5-6 is TV time and if he wants to play outside instead that is fine by me. Then all of a sudden the leaves started to fall so we got out his little broom to sweep up the leaves which turned into flopping into the leaves which turned into throwing the leaves.
He loved it.
The weather got cold, then colder but today it was warm again. I think a high of 70. I had the morning off so we spent a few hours in the backyard sweeping leaves into bags for the winter and counting the worms, broom at the ready. Its probably the last of the days we can hang outside without a jacket. So sad!
A while back I heard that somewhere in PA you can ride on Thomas the train and after some investigation I realized its a tour and they swing into our area 2-3 times a year. Last week we decided to look into tickets for this past weekend and that was that.
We told Asher that Thomas was coming from Sodor and he was going to be in this place called Pennsylvania so Friday after art class we were going to go there. We kept it pretty casual and besides finding a hotel with a pool we didn’t make too many plans.
Friday afternoon Asher and Matthew took a dip then we met my old work friend Jamie and her family for dinner. We probably haven’t seen each other in 8 years but we’ve kept in touch via the internets so when we decided to go I emailed and we made plans for our (semi) blind date. They live in the area and have a 2 year old who digs trains so we got to hang with them on Saturday too.
I like Jamie because it was barely 10am when I busted her eating cheese fries and she just laughed. That’s my kind of peeps.
As you can see its a very glamorous place.
They tell you to get there an hour before your train ride and we were like whatever but then we had to park a mile away and walk over through mud so yeah, get there a little early. The good part is that we didn’t have to wait on line. The bad part is that Asher was Very Rushed and Asher does not like to be Very Rushed so he was a grump for the first hour. Also, Matthew had to run while holding his coffee. (sad trombone)
He warmed up a bit on the ride. Since we were “not early” he didn’t really know we were riding on Thomas until we got off and walked to the front.
As you can tell by our 17 different views of Thomas we basically spent the entire time watching the trains pull in and out of the station (vu den?) The Thomas train ran every 30 minutes but they also had what Asher refers to as “Big Black Steam Engine” for obvious reasons.
Luckily Big Black Steam Engine was fairly exciting in its own right, what with a coal tender and all. There was a bunch of other stuff to do, both Thomas related and not. We poked into the music tent, the storytime tent, the train table tent and our favorite part – this ride on a small train I referred to as the Hayride Train. because that’s basically what it looked like.
They also had teeny tiny donuts. Too bad the kids didn’t like them.
The Strasburg Railroad is actually a really cool place we didn’t get to see all that much of. They also have a railway museum and there’s tons of stuff around there for kids. We saw cows, horses and goats from the car and Asher was almost as excited about that as he was the trains. I think we’ll head back when the weather is nicer and do some more exploring. We didn’t even get to pick up any jam!
