Our Week

Every other day I've been going on a rather strenuous walk with my friend Kristin from church.  She has a little boy just over 2 named Kaden and he just LOVES Hayden!  The whole time on our walk, he says, "Baaaby?  Baaaby?  Where Baaaby?  Where Baby Hayden?"  It is SO cute!  He has to be able to see Hayden on our walk or he thinks that Hayden has taken off and doesn't want to play anymore.  


I love walking with Kristin--she found this great walking path that takes you past 2 parks and has lots of green grass to run around on.  Oh and there are hills.  Aaaaand I'm out of shape, lol.  After one week, I can tell that I'm getting better at the hills, but they are not my favorite.  Oh well...it's good for me, right?


I'm sad that I didn't actually get any pictures of Kaden and Hayden playing together, but I did get a few of Hayden at the park:

These pictures might seem kind of far away.  I had to zoom in all the way to get these.  Hayden is becoming independent and is now ok with venturing off quite far from mommy at the park.  He used to only be able to be about 5 feet away from me before returning to "check in" with me.  He's getting so brave!

Look how far away my baby is!  So proud.  

He spotted me taking pictures of him...didn't really care too much!  PS...I know his shorts are HUGE!  They are 18 month. I just couldn't buy my almost 17 month old 12 month shorts.  Couldn't do it!  He does have a few 12 month shorts, but they were in the wash.  

I also couldn't find his sandals, so he went sock-less and looked like a skater!  Ha ha.

Binkie?  Check.  Good to go.

Hayden's favorite thing to do at the park is to sit on the play structures and look for pea gravel that needs to go back to the pea gravel area on the ground.  He's very fond of re-arranging and organizing.  

Oh!  I think I found a piece of gravel out of place!

The Mother load of out-of-place pea gravel.  Hayden is in heaven.

This week has been a warm one (I think it started off around 95 and is currently hovering around the low 80's).  We go to the park and take our walks around 7:30am to escape the blunt of the heat.  I still get a little tan on my arms, even at that hour.  ANYWAYS...in the afternoon, I let Hayden play on our porch area.  Our kitchen/dining room opens up to it with a HUGE glass sliding door.  I can sit at the table and blog or surf while Hayden plays.  Recently we got out his old exer-saucer and walker.  He LOVES them.  So funny to see him play with his old baby toys.

Ok, so we need to get out the shop vac and vacuum all the little pieces of debris that blow in to the porch.  Don't judge me.  Anyway, it was a hot day so I filled Hayden's miniature Radio Flyer Wagon (which I scored from Goodwill for $5) with water.  I handed him a loofah ball and a cup from Ikea and let him at it!  The water kept him busy for quite a while.  He really liked just splashing and I liked not having to worry about watching every little move he made.  There's also a little drain in the bottom of the flooring so I didn't even  need to clean up a mess afterward!  Score.

See his cute little Adidas Soccer Slides?  I am in love with them.  They have a Velcro top and then  the back has a piece of elastic so that they don't slip off.  The best part was that I got them (again, at Goodwill) for $1!  They barely look like they were ever worn.

This week has also been HUGE for Hayden's communication skills.  He's just been blossoming beautifully and I am amazed every day by what he learns.  I took a few videos to show you his latest acquisitions.

So, Hayden's new favorite word to sign is "more" because it gets him more food.  When you don't give him more food right away after he signs it, he apparently gets cranky.

So after giving him "more", i got him to touch his nose.  Progress!  I tried for "all done"...usually he says it as he signs it.  Hayden just didn't want to cooperate today.

Explanation:  Hayden was just....buggin me.  He was getting into everything of mine and just wouldn't play with his things.  So I set a box of packing peanuts down on the floor for him to throw and rip as he pleased.  he was on happy little guy!