today was max’s birthday party.  remember baby max?  he’s the one that made that giant poo explosion the first time i met him.  well, he just turned 1, and he had a party at curiodyssey at coyote point.  when we first arrived, max started crawling toward me, and i quickly backed away.  you’d think that i would have forgotten about that first impression that he made on me (or should i say “explosion that he made near me”), but not a chance.  auntie sophie promised me that it was safe to enter, but i proceeded with caution.

it sure seems like i’ve been going to a lot of 1 year old birthday parties lately.  i think this is the third one this year.  i’m realizing that i’m too old for baby parties.  most of the kids at the party were still crawling, so there was a huge play mat set up with inflatable toys to play with.  snooze fest.  sienna had a blast though.  she crawled around, made friends, and flirted with the boys.  i didn’t get why she kept feeling one of the boys’ butts, but auntie explained that she was checking to see if he had a big wallet.  i’m telling you, my baby sister is a genius.

while sienna was making friends and screening for sugar daddies, i explored the rest of the museum.  there were a fun exhibits where you could create a vortex, make objects fly, spin gears and gadgets, and lots more.  i especially liked turning the gears to make the bell ring.  there was also a, tree filled with bees!  real live bees!  outside, there were lots of animals, too.  the bobcats were cool, and i was completely mesmerized by the river otters.  that’s right, not sea otters, but river otters.  i wanted to stay and watch the otters all day, but dada said we had to go back to the party.

by the time we went back inside, the party was over.  sienna was already on her way out.  we stayed at curiodyssey for another hour and i showed sienna all my favorite exhibits inside the museum.  then, i took her out to the animal habitats to meet the otters.  she squealed while she watched them.  i guess she liked them too.

at first, i felt bad that i didn’t spend much time with max and his friends, but then i realized that the party wasn’t really for me anyway.  sienna was max’s party guest, and i was just her chaperone.  i have a feeling that this is how it’s going to be for the rest of our lives.

i used to think that sienna was a dummy.  she doesn’t talk.  she doesn’t walk.  she doesn’t feed herself.  and she doesn’t always sleep through the night.  but i get that she is only 8 months old, so i went back to some old blog entries to see what i was doing at that age.

okay, so maybe sienna talks a little bit more than 8-month-old me.  but by the time i was her age, i had been crawling, pulling myself up to stand, and even climbing the stairs for months.  i was also sleeping ~10.5 hours at night with only one midnight feeding.  not sienna.  she can’t get around by herself, so she still needs to be carried around everywhere.  she can’t feed herself, so a grown-up has to feed her all the time.  and since she still wakes up in the middle of the night, i sometimes find her sleeping with mommy when i wake up in the morning.

and then it dawned on me…  sienna gets to be carried around, she gets to be spoon-fed, and she gets to sleep in mommy and dada’s bed sometimes?  she’s no dummy.  she’s a genius!

so for the past couple of weeks, i have been asking mommy and dada to help me eat.  i act like i’ve forgotten how to use a spoon and fork.  that works sometimes.  and i have been waking up in the middle of the night to ask “mama come sleep kyden room?”  that always works  because mommy is too tired to negotiate with me at 4am.  so far, these tricks have been working out great.  high five to my genius baby sister!

i am 2 1/2 years old. here’s what i’ve been up to these days.

daily schedule:

• 7:45am: wake up.  my wake up time varies wildly between 7:00 and 8:30am.  it depends on whether i napped the day before.
• 8:30am: 1st breakfast
• 10:45am: 2nd breakfast
• 1:00pm: lunch
• 4:30pm: mommy always tries to get me to nap, and i always protest.  mommy used to fight me for hours until i finally fell asleep — sometimes as late as 6:00pm.  lately, she lets me choose.  if i nap, i get to watch nina and star (part of my regular bedtime routine).  if i don’t want to nap, that’s okay — but no nina and star.
• 7:00pm: dinner
• 8:30pm: watch nina and star
• 8:45pm: shower
• 9:00pm: read stories and brush teeth with sienna.
• 9:15pm: lights out. bedtime songs.  dada usally puts me to bed,  but i always ask mama to come see me after she’s done putting sienna in her crib.
• 9:45pm: zzz…  (it takes me a long time to fall asleep these days because i am so chatty that my nighttime conversations with mommy and dada last forever.)

things i’m good at:

• identifying shapes
• counting to 20
• using the potty.  i can take off my pants and underwear, do my business, wipe, and flush by myself.

things i’m working on:

• telling mommy and dada when i need to go pee-pee and poo-poo.  i tell them sometimes, but they still have to remind me to go.
• pulling up my pants.  i can usually get the front and the sides, but i have trouble getting them over my butt.
• putting my shoes on the correct feet.  i get it right about 50% of the time.

things i do that make mommy and dada angry:

• pretending that i need to use the potty to trick mama into spending time with me or to get out of bed and avoid napping
• squishing my food between my fingers like play-doh
• snatching toys from sienna

things i do that make mommy and dada forget about all the things that made them angry:

• teaching baby what she’s not allowed to play with (remote control, mommy’s laptop, etc.) by telling her “baby, no”, taking the object away, then giving her one of her toys to play with instead.
• teaching baby by example — like helping her press buttons to make my toys work or showing her how to brush her teeth.
• telling them (mostly mommy) “i love you”, unprompted.

favorite things to say:

• “kyden pee-pee potty.  mommy wait outside.  close door.”  give a kid some privacy!
• “mommy/dada/gung-gung, two hands.”  i remind everyone to use two hands to hold their drinks, just like they always tell me.
• “mommy, i love you big much.”  i tell her many times each day.
• “baby, you’re okay.”  i say this to calm sienna when she’s crying.  i keep repeating it, matching the volume of her cries, decibel for decibel.  sometimes, i end up screaming “baby, you’re okay!!!” at the top of my lungs.  i wonder why it doesn’t calm her down.
• “mommy/dada GO!”  i don’t like it when they stop at red lights.
• “kyden do it ‘self.”  i want to do everything myself.
• “no, ky-DEN.”  why do people call me things that aren’t my name?  even my stuffed dog (scout) calls me “ky”.  whenever people call me “ky”, or something else that isn’t my name, i correct them.

favorite indoor activities:

• serving fake tea for anyone who will drink it.  mommy keeps telling me that the play tea set belongs to sienna, but i say that it’s mine.  i don’t see her name on it.
• building puzzles
• helping out in the kitchen — making lattes, baking, washing dishes…

favorite outdoor activities:

• swimming.  i am so happy to be back in the pool.  i giggle and laugh with glee throughout my entire lesson.
• climbing.  i’ll climb anything.
• jumping.  actually, i’ll jump anywhere.  sometimes i jump (instead of walk) all the way down the street.

favorite book: i have lots of favorites these days, but i recently started reading “love you forever” almost every day.

favorite song: i still like “the wheels on the bus”, but at bedtime, i always ask to hear “hush little baby”.

favorite iphone apps: youtube (to watch mickey mouse club house) and “alligator game” (where’s my water?)

favorite foods that i’m only allowed one bite of: cupcakes, gummy bummies (annie’s homegrown berry patch organic fruit snacks)

favorite characters: donald duck, mickey mouse, nina and star (sprout tv hosts)

i have been to aquariums in long beach and on maui, and i’ve even been to sea world in san diego.  but i’d never seen the fishies swim right near our home.  so when matthew invited me to check out monterey bay aquarium, i was super excited!

it was raining really hard when we got to monterey.  dada dropped us off right in front, but we still got rained on while walking to the aquarium entrance.  we were all wet, just like all the fish in there.

the monterey bay aquarium is so big.  we spent hours there, and i don’t think we saw everything.  there were sharks, starfish, otters, seahorses, and lots of other really cool animals.  there was even a play area that had a slide and talking tubes for big kids like matthew and me, and a separate section with a water bed and bubble walls for babies like sienna.

when i was little, i used to be scared of sharks, whales, and other big sea creatures when they swam right up to me.  not anymore.  i think they’re cool, now.  (there was a weird fish called a scuba diver that sort of made me nervous though — it was almost human-looking.)  sienna definitely did not like it when the big sharks got right up in her face.  the starfishes and penguins were more her speed.

one of the coolest things at the aquarium is right outside the jellies area.  there are about a zillion sardines swimming laps in the ceiling.  i don’t think it’s an actual exhibit, but i was mesmerized by them.  everyone thought i was getting hypnotized, but i was actually trying to count them.  i kept losing track at 14.

after running around the aquarium for a couple of hours, we headed to a pasta place down the street for lunch.  matthew is so lucky — he got to order a whole plate of pasta with butter and french fries!  i guess he’s carbo-loading so he can bulk up.  i ate grilled chicken and veggies.  (i obviously wasn’t going to eat seafood after spending the day with all those sea creatures, right?)  boring.  next time we go out to eat together, i’m definitely sitting by matthew so i can sneak food off his plate when nobody is looking.

we had planned to go to the dennis the menace playground after lunch, but it was pouring.  so instead, we went back to the aquarium and visited more sea creatures. good thing we did because that’s when we met the alligator fish.  it’s a fish that looks like an alligator — how funny!  we also checked out the jellies experience, which ended up being my favorite part of the aquarium.  there were lots of jellyfish, of course, but there were also fun interactive things to play with that taught us about jellyfish, how they grow, and how they move.

thanks for a fun day out, matthew!  next time, we’ll definitely hit the dennis the menace playground.  and i call dibs on the seat next to you at lunch

i love gym class.  i have been taking classes at the little gym in milpitas since before i could walk.  that’s a long time.  but something bad happened last week.  my gym closed!  i’m going to miss the teachers that i’ve gotten to know so well over the past 3.5 sessions when i was a bird… then a bird again…. then a beast… then a beast again.

i had a choice of two gyms to transfer to.  they are a similar distance from our house, so i planned to do a trial class at each to check out the teachers and test out the equipment.  last week, i went to the little gym of stevens creek.  it’s a brand new facility, bigger than my old gym.  i am supposed to be in the beast class (19 – 30 months) but for the trial, i went to a super beast class (2.5 – 3 years).  and guess who was there — my buddy matthew!  SOLD!  i immediately confirmed my transfer to that gym and switched to the super beasts class.  i’m going to be 2.5 in a few days anyway, so it’s a perfect time to move up.

tonight was my first official class as a super beast at my new gym. my new gym is super!  the best part is that it has a water cooler in the lobby where i can get water all by myself, anytime i want.  i need to get some of those things for home — one for milk and one for apple juice.  the only thing that i don’t like about my new class is that there are so many of kids (~16 yesterday).  maybe everyone heard about the awesome water cooler in the lobby.  i think i’ll stay at my new gym, though.  after all, i get to see matthew in class every week!  i convinced logan to join our class too — i told him that it’s where all the cool kids are, and he couldn’t argue with that

i think that DLE day (that’s dada’s, logan’s, and edison’s birthday) might be my new favorite holiday. okay, so i didn’t get any presents, but mommy says that it’s better to give than receive.  i dunno about that.  but, i got to eat fried chicken, pizza (two days in a row!), and three different kids of cupcakes.  don’t worry, i burned off all those extra calories at back-to-back gym parties.  what a fun weekend

on saturday, we went to lunch for dada’s birthday.  a couple of months ago, dada won a fantasy football pool (he’s so smart!) sponsored by bon chon chicken, so we went there to collect his prize.  (the prize was chicken.  duh.)  dada invited a few of his friends to help eat his winnings and to help celebrate his birthday.  mommy made cupcakes in dada’s favorite flavor — boston creme pie.  YUM!  cupcakes are my new favorite food.

saturday evening was logan’s party at my new gym.  (more about my new gym in a later post.)  it was sort of like gym class — all the equipment was familiar, and my old gym teacher was there leading the party — but we didn’t have to do any skills.  we just played games and went on “rides”.  how cool is that?  the parachute ride was my favorite.  it was so much fun that i wanted to take sienna on it, but dada said no.  something about her being too little and flying off.   umm, that’s the funnest part!  anyway, after playing in the gym, we went to the party room for pizza.  i heard there was ice cream cake too, but i didn’t get any.  dada ate some though.  he also ate mommy’s piece.  and sienna’s.  and mine.

on sunday, we went to edison’s party at the california kids sports center.  edison had brought me there last year, so i sort of knew my way around.  he has some friends and cousins that are really old (6?) and some that are babies, so there weren’t a whole lot of organized activities.  we mostly just had free time to play, which was fun because sienna got to join in, too   after playtime, we had pizza and cupcakes (three different kinds!).  mama let me try one bite of each cupcake flavor, and then i kept asking for more and more and more.  i told you that cupcakes are my favorite food.

three parties in one weekend!  whew.  i can’t wait until DLE weekend next year.

today is the birthday of two of my best buds, logan and edison.  and every year, logan and edison coordinate their parties to make sure that they don’t schedule them at the same time.  dada gets mad that nobody asks him about when he wants to celebrate his birthday.  he’s so silly.  doesn’t he know that he is too old to have a party?

so even though this is going to be a busy weekend celebrating with my friends, we wanted him to know that we didn’t forget about him.  happy birthday dada.  i love you big much!

sienna started crawling today.  not just army crawling, but real up-on-all-fours crawling.  she is still pretty slow, but i know that she’s only going to get faster and faster.  soon, she will be too quick for me to snatch my toys away from her.

sienna drives my car, reads my books, and plays with my favorite toys.  (toys that i haven’t been interested in for years become my favorites as soon as sienna starts playing with them.)  mommy and dada tell me that i have to share with sienna, and i do… sometimes.  but it’s not fair because she doesn’t have much to share with me.  most of “her” toys are my old ones and all of her clothes are too small for me.

so today, i insisted on using baby’s crib for my nap.  mommy didn’t think i was actually going to nap in there, but i curled up, closed my eyes, and tricked her into believing that i had fallen asleep.  i never really intended on sleeping, but the crib did feel very comfortable and strangely familiar…

after mommy left the room, the fun began.  i jumped up and down on the mattress like a trampoline.  then i tried to wind up the mobile to play music for myself, but i ended up breaking it.  i knew i was going to be in trouble, so i had to escape.  i looked around and spotted a nearby bookshelf.  i knew that if i could get onto the bookshelf, i could safely climb down from there.  i knocked the monitor off the shelf to clear my path.  just as i was climbing out of the crib (one foot already on the bookshelf), mommy walked in and caught me.  busted.

i bet that’s the last time mommy lets me fake-sleep in sienna’s crib.  hmmm…  what else does she have that she can share with  me?  i know — hair accessories!

i went into full potty training mode two weeks ago.  since then, i’ve learned a lot and i want to pass on this tidbit on to my younger friends:  mommies and daddies will do just about anything to get you to sit on the potty.  take advantage of this opportunity to play with your parents’ phones, eat junk food, watch TV, and basically take any bribe that you can think of.  imagine the possibilities!  and the best part — you can get out of doing anything and get your mommy’s undivided attention just by saying that you have to pee.

if you want more detail about all my potty-training stages, read on.

days 1-6 were really exciting and frustrating at the same time.  it was super exciting to pee in the potty and i was so proud of myself.  mommy and dada were proud of me too, of course.  but it was so frustrating to have someone asking me if i had to go potty every 5 minutes.  okay, maybe it wasn’t really that often, but it sure felt like it.  i got so annoyed by all the nagging that i would sometimes say that i didn’t need to pee, then immediately run to another room and pee in my underwear.

during days 7-11, i got better at telling someone when i needed to go.  i used the toilet when we were out and about (friend’s house, park, even gym class!), and i even had an accident-free day.  this is when i started use this potty training thing to my advantage.  if i didn’t want to eat my vegetables, “mommy, pee-pee potty?”.  i’d be excused from the dinner table, mommy would stop feeding sienna to bring me to the bathroom, and i’d get to play “alligator game” (where’s my water?) on mommy’s iphone.  sometimes, i’d just pretend that i had to go just so i could play games for 20+ minutes.  there were days when mommy spent hours (literally) sitting by the bathroom waiting for me to go.  mwahahahaha!

day 12 was a turning point.  i wanted to wear my underwear all the time — even during my nap.  but mommy said no.  and just as she was putting me down for my nap, i told her that i had to pee.  she thought i was just trying to avoid napping, so she called my bluff and told me to go by myself.  so i did.  by the time mommy realized that i wasn’t bluffing, i had made it to the bathroom, pulled down by pants, removed my diaper, peed in the potty, poured my pee into the toilet, and flushed.  mommy was stunned.

on days 13 and 14, i wore underwear during my nap and stayed dry!  and i got to use the special toilet seat that mommy installed for me.  it has a hide-away kiddie toilet seat that i can pull down by myself.  now i can use the big toilet instead of my potty.  COOL!  (definitely writing a product review about this.)

i’m getting the hang of this potty-training thing.  i still have accidents, but mommy is happy not to be doing laundry every day anymore.

there are a couple of things that i just don’t get, though.

1. now, i wear a diaper at night when i sleep.  will i  have to wear a diaper forever?  how will i know to go pee in the toilet when i’m sleeping?
2. why do grown-ups tell me to sit on the potty when i pee?  everyone knows that boys pee standing up.  and if i sit, i can’t watch the pee come out of me!

over the weekend, si-nano and i brought mommy and dada to allie’s 1st birthday party.   it used to be that i was  always one of the youngest kids at a birthday party, but today i was one of the oldest.  i guess i should have known that one year-olds hang out with other one year-olds.

we don’t know allie very well.  we only met her one time before at a wedding.  (i guess it’s true what they say about weddings being a great place to meet girls!)  but it was nice to see her again and i liked all the food that her daddy made   i don’t really know any of allie’s friends, either.  the only people i recognized at the party were logan and his baby mason.  no, we are not party crashers — dada and uncle john (allie’s daddy) are friends from grade school.

allie’s party was at gill memorial park.  the park is pretty close to our house, but i had never been there before.  how could i not have known about this place?  the playground was so fun!  not only do they have a zip bar, but also suspension bridges, and a kyden-sized rock climbing wall!  (and the facilities there are shockingly clean.  well, for a park bathroom, anyway.)

remember how i used to dislike unstable surfaces like jumpy houses and  suspension bridges?  those days are long gone.  as soon as i saw that bridge, i jumped onto it and all the way across it.  and when i got to the other side, i turned around and did it again.  and again.

thanks for introducing us to a fun park, allie.  i hope you had a fun first birthday.  and when you get older, i hope we can meet for playdates at that park!