Children's Museum

We finally decided to check out the Portland Children's Museum today since it is pretty rainy out. Tyler had a ball and definitely could have played in the Dig Pit and Vroom Vroom Room all day long if we let him.

The Dig Pit is full of fake dirt made out of recycled rubber. Way better than messy sand! Tyler mostly used shovels to fill up the dump truck. He tried to use a bulldozer to load dirt into the dump truck because he is used to seeing backhoes helping with the loading in his truck books.

In the play grocery store Tyler went straight for the carbs!

The bus dashboard includes lots of cool knobs and levers. The driver's seat in the bus and the ambulance were a hot spot for all the little boys coming through the Vroom Vroom Room.

Budding transportation engineer?

Checking out the Curious George exhibit. Tyler was very excited by the giant blow-up of Curious George on top of the museum.

The Hard Way

This morning we were trying to cajole Tyler into brushing his teeth and getting dressed so I could get him to his Little Gym class on time. Michael said, "Tyler, do you want to do this the easy way or the hard way?" Tyler grinned and said, "The hard way!"

Dinosaur Train

Tyler has gone to the dark side! After getting a taste of cartoons last week while he was sick he has been asking daily to watch Dinosaur Train, a cartoon on PBS. Our goal was to hold off on Tyler watching TV (except for important things like Aggie football) until he was 2 and we made it! So now we will let Tyler watch some TV in moderation. I have only seen Dinosaur Train a few times with Tyler but today at work I could not get its catchy theme song out of my head!

Sunglasses

Snack? Check! Beverage? Check! Blankie? Check! Patches the Dog? Check! Sunglasses? Check! Now that spring is approaching we are starting to see more sunshine. Yay! And since Michael and I have been wearing our sunglasses Tyler wants to wear his too. This is definitely a change from last year when Tyler took the glasses off every time I put them on him. Granted, he takes the glasses on and off in the car and either misses his ears or puts them on upside down. Then Tyler wants help but I can't help him until we are parked at our next destination.

Lil' Aggie Part 2

Tyler definitely associates maroon with Texas A&M. Today I made him a triple berry smoothie, which he has had before, and I guess it looked maroonish through the white plastic cup. Tyler exclaimed, "Aggie juice!"

Mall Adventures

We went to the mall today to run some errands. Everything is always an adventure with a 2-year old. We intentionally left the stroller in the car because lately Tyler has been clingy and wants us to carry him around. He is much too old and too heavy for that! Several times Tyler defiantly sat or lay on the ground and cried when we wouldn’t carry him. We continually encouraged (and sometimes bribed) him with enticements such as riding escalators and waving to the animated bears outside Build-a-Bear. Ultimately the promise of cookies at the end of our trip proved the most effective!

Our shoe-loving guy stopped and stared in awe at all the kids’ shoes in Stride Rite without any prompting from us. We went in briefly to look at socks and he excitedly pointed out all kinds of shoes.

We eventually stopped at the play area. In the partially washed-out video below shot from Michael’s mobile phone, Tyler is the one standing on top of the ladybug. We knew it was only a matter of time before he started jumping off of stuff. I just hope this doesn’t extend to furniture in the house! He jumped off the ladybug repeatedly and was not thrilled when it was time to go home for a nap.

Lil' Aggie

Our awesome lil' future Aggie (Fightin' Texas Aggie Class of 2031) recognizes the Texas A&M logo! When Michael changed into an Aggie t-shirt today Tyler pointed at it and said "Aggie shirt". Whoop!