Geen Beens and the Flying Granny Nanny

In the midst of a busy time at work, a trip to New York for Joe and our nanny being out sick, I put in a call to what a New York Times article described as my "flying granny nanny". Grammy Julie hopped a plane from Des Moines and came to Chicago to spend some time with AJ. I love it when AJ spends time with any grandparent, because it is completely guilt-free time for me when I can get things done at work without feeling like I should be at home with him. Extra time in the evenings or weekends spent with a sitter somehow seems like time I should be spending with him, but time on the weekends spent with a grandparent is instead quality bonding time for grandson and grandparent. He's happy, the grandparents are happy, I'm happy--gotta love it. This weekend our flying granny nanny even taught the kid to like eating "geen been" (his word for green beans).

I can't believe that out of all of the walking, coloring, trip to the aquarium and visit to Millenium Park the only picture I got is this lousy one in our backyard with our one little valiant but pitiful tree. At least his jammies are cute.

My Buddy

AJ has become reaquainted lately with his buddy, J., who is 21 months old but talks like he is 21 years old. J.'s mom is a friend of mine who used to work in my office, and we have been getting together with the boys for the past couple of weeks for weekend playdates. Despite his young age, J. talks in complete sentences, can sing his ABCs and counts to 20. In short, he is a smart little dude. I love being around him because it is so much fun to hear what ideas come out of his head at his age. For example, the other day he said to his mom, "Mommy, will you take me to the intersection of Main and Maple?" (I can't remember the actual street names, but he did.) His mom asked him why he wanted to go there, and he said, "because that is where the Metra train stops." Apparently his day care had taken a field trip to see the local train station, and he remembered the intersection. Here are some pictures of the boys together. J. is giving AJ a push in the top photo, and the boys are playing in their shorts in the bottom photo after getting their t-shirts soaked with the water table.

The Sock Man

When AJ's Pops and Susan were visiting, Susan put AJ's socks on his hands one day and introduced him to the world of sock puppets, a la Lambchop from the old children's show back in the day. AJ thought wearing socks on his hands was hilarious and now constantly digs socks out of his dresser drawer and brings them up to me while pointing at his hands. He will wear the socks on his hands for extended periods of time and will even be content to wear them while turn the pages of a book, attempting to color, etc. He is even willing to dust my chairs for me while wearing the socks on his hands. In the bottom photo, AJ is wearing 4 socks but no shirt or pants. Four articles of clothing is pretty much the max that I can get him to agree to at any time.

Water Boy

AJ's Uncle Andy was visiting last week for a combination sales meeting/Lollapalooza trip and lucked out enough to get called in for tag-team emergency backup duty with AJ's Chicago grandma when our nanny was out sick one day. We don't have a lot of young kids in our family, so like me, Uncle Andy hasn't spent a lot of time around little kids before AJ. Things started off well because AJ is fascinated by Uncle Andy. My best guess is that this is because Uncle Andy has an expressive face and sings and whistles a lot, which intrigues AJ. In the mornings when Uncle Andy was here, AJ would open the door to Uncle Andy's room, peek around the corner and try to see what his "uh-CLE!" was doing.

Uncle Andy was a quick study on taking care of a little guy and discovered AJ's love of the hose and anything related to water. When I called from work to get the update, Andy summed it up in one sentence: "Uh, well luckily, that kid loves water." Uncle Andy gave AJ the hose and let him go nuts dousing himself and everything within squirting distance. From the pictures, it looks like they had a blast. (Note the Hawks jersey that Uncle Andy gave AJ for his first birthday. Let the family rivalry begin.)

My Garbage Man

This evening AJ and I were bagging up the trash and recycling together in the kitchen when I said to him wishfully "someday you will be big enough to take the trash out for mommy all by yourself." I went to use the bathroom before taking the trash to the garage, and while I was in the loo, I heard a horrible clinking of glass bottles and cans that made me fear a major catastrophe. I rushed out of the bathroom to find this:



My very own garbage man, age 13 months! AJ had already moved the recycling bag over by the back door and was headed there again with the garbage bag in tow. I let him carry the lighter recycling bag all the way to the garage by himself and then boosted him up so that he could throw the bag into the recycling bin. AJ was delighted with himself, and I have to say that I was very encouraging of this new interest in trash. Now if I can just get him to empty his own diaper pail...

Plane Spotting

One of the joys of AJ's day is looking for airplanes, or "mermanes!" as he says it. Lucky for him, we live in the flight pattern for one of Chicago's major airports, so airplanes pass overhead say, oh, 500 times a day. Each one is a delight to AJ, and he must stop what he is doing, search the sky and jab his finger up at the plane as soon as it is located. Cloudy days are a major frustration. I am surprised at how far away he can hear a plane coming (oh, to have young ears again) and how far away he can see them. He is even getting good at spotting them through the leaves on the trees when we are out for a walk. I now find myself noticing the planes and stopping to look for them even when AJ is not around, so it is definitely one of those ways that having a kid has made me appreciate the little pleasures in life again that I had stopped noticing as an adult.

Joe spent the weekend in Vegas with his brothers, so AJ and I took the opportunity to pick Joe up at the airport and see the planes close up. As we were leaving the airport, the planes had their lights on, making it even easier for AJ to spot them from far away. I could barely hear Joe's update on his trip because we were interrupted by an ecstatic "mermane! mermane! mermane!" every 30 seconds or so.