Busy, Busy

Rishaan and Axel continue to have lots of play dates. Here they are in Axel's 'dog cage' last weekend.

Speaking of dogs, last weekend we visited Touis. Touis was just placed in a really nice home in Oakland with a retired couple who have taken rescued pugs for the past 28 years. They currently have 4 pugs with the addition of Touis. He has been there a month and absolutely loves his new home. Before he was placed with Ia, Touis was with the pug queen (Susan). Apparently, Susan fell in love with Touis and didn't want to give him up, but since Susan is good friends with Ia (Touis' new owner) and she has taken other rescued pugs from her in the past she finally gave Touis up after having him for a year and a half.

It was so nice to see Touis. He looks great and appears to be quite happy. Axel was in pug heaven and loved playing with them all. Our one hour visit turned into a three hour visit. It was hard for Axel and us to say goodbye, but Ia wants us to visit regularly, so we will likely see Touis a couple of times per year.

What about Louis? Well he is happy as ever, especially in Axel's 'heap of animals.'

After months of not wanting to go to the 'big park,' Axel finally decided this past Thursday that he wanted to go again. It was perfect timing because we were headed to Grandma Susan's house during nap time.

He had fun, not only with the sand, but also with the play structure. It was one of the longest times he has played on the play structure. He went down the slide almost 10 times, which is about 5 times more than usual!!!

I thought the park would wear him out so that he would sleep on the long ride to Grandma's house, but that is not what Axel had planned. He was out cold for the first 20 minutes snoring away and then was rudely awakened by me quickly breaking as I was cut off right before the red light at Mission. I thought for sure he would fall back to sleep, but he stoically looked out the window for the next 2 hours. Luckily, Grandma bought new toys for Axel, which provided for a happy, tired child when we arrived at Grandma's house.

He loved the chalk board and dry erase board combo along with the other outdoor toys. Thanks Grandma! More fun to look forward to when we return in two weeks for Shannon's Bridal shower.

The one thing Axel struggled with the most during our visit with Grandma is that he didn't want to sleep in the pack and play. He thought it was a crib and for babies. He managed to sleep Thursday night in the pack and play, but put up a fight for his nap on Friday. We compromised with the new bed that Grandma bought for Lucy (Grandpa Brian's dog). Lucy doesn't care for it because of her arthritis, but Axel loved it. He can't wait to go back and sleep on it again. :)

We managed to make it to the local park after Axel managed to make it through shopping for Auntie's shower. Axel's climbing skills continue to improve as he grows. I love the following picture because he looks older and independent climbing the "fake rope ladder".

We had the privilege of seeing the McFarren's on Saturday for lunch. It was so nice to have Sophie and Axel play together and Keith and I really enjoyed catching up with Kristi and Kris. We hope to see them again with their future trips up to see Kris's parents.

Jack looks wise and sophisticated with all of his hair. Sophie has such a calm demeanor for someone of her age. It was great to see them in action. I felt like I knew them well because of the blog that Kristi does about them, but children in person are nothing compared to what we get to enjoy in real life.

Sophie and Axel appeared to be instant friends. I really hope they get to have a good relationship as they grow up being that they are only several weeks apart in age.

Other news is Axel woke up with a cold on Sunday, but he appears to be feeling a bit better today. Daddy taught Axel how to color "between the lines" and he is doing a great job. I was extremely proud when I saw him coloring tonight. It is truly amazing how much he is growing up. We are gearing up for his birthday next month and are planning his first kid birthday party. Ok, that is it for now. Hope you enjoyed the long weekend!

Tough Boy Axel

I went to pick up Axel on Wednesday and saw this on his face.

It looked awful to me as it reminded me of road rash. How on earth could he get something like this? Well, Axel proceeded to tell me the story of how he fell going up the cement stairs into Angela's house. It is still hard for me to believe that he fell going up stairs and that was the result, but he was in such a great mood and continues to be a happy camper without a complaint. That is great news! I have a tough, big boy now!

Axel continues to amaze me at how smart he is. He figured out his magnetic balls and sticks, stick to his trains. He was extremely proud of the long "choo-choo train" he made. He just wasn't happy I was trying to take a picture of it :)

Speaking of smart and thoughtful, today while on our morning Burley ride Axel told me, "Mommy, be careful", "Mommy, go slowly", after I descended a small twisty roller. I thought it was really funny because in the past he has wanted Keith or I to pull him fast, in circles or in squiggly lines riding side to side.

Axel is learning to be a charmer. Daddy insists on teaching him to tell me I am pretty or that I look nice. Well, last night, as I closed the door to his room, he said, "Mommy I like your shirt." What! I am wearing a plain pajama top, I thought! "Thank you Axel, good night Axel," is what I said. I had a big smile on my face as I walked down the hallway. How on earth did he come up with that, at this time of the day?

Axel still has this fascination with pretending to be a doggy. Last night we received a box that has now become his dog cage. Here Axel is in his dog cage.

We spent all morning today playing in his dog cage. Axel also likes to play fetch. He uses a plastic top to one of his containers as his "frisbee" and asks me to throw it for him. Sometimes during snack time if he is eating pretzels I throw them for him and he picks it up with his mouth. I don't want to necessarily encourage the behavior, but at the same time I don't want to ruin his imagination.

The big news of the week is that Axel has all four of his 2nd molars coming in or in. He has really been biting on "Bunny" the past month or two. My suspicion was that he was teething. Yesterday, I finally took a look and saw the right bottom one completely in and the other three over half way in. It is hard to believe he now has all of his teeth and that in just a couple of years from now he will begin losing them and getting his permanent teeth.

Axel is absolutely a blast. I wish you could all experience him first hand. He is funny, sweet, loving, charming and incredibly smart. I will leave you with a clip of his funny/crazy side. Sorry if the clip is side ways!

Oakland Zoo and more

This post is going to be a long one with lots of photos because again, time has gotten the best of us. We have been busy, busy and trying to enjoy as much of the busy as we can.

I will start a couple weeks back. We had a play date/dinner with Rishaan and his parents. Hema made delicious enchiladas and Axel enjoyed fish sticks in a tortilla while Rishaan ate his usual dinner.

The boys continue to play well together. The fights and competition for the same toy is almost entirely gone. I feel like they are both maturing as their interactions with each other are becoming more sophisticated. They are almost always engaged in the same play and hardly play next to each other. The first few times they played together, over 50% of the time was side by side play. Now they want to interact with each other the entire time. This past Friday, a couple of days ago, Axel had a huge break through. He said, "I am ready to share my toys with Rishaan. Can Rishaan come over here and play tonight?" Typically Axel does great at Rishaan's house, but takes over with the bossiness and control at home. On Friday, I could hardly tell there was two almost 3 year olds in the house. They even managed to do a couple of puzzles together without any competition or fighting. I was so happy and proud.

Axel continues to have a love/hate relationship with Louis. He mostly loves him as you can see above, but every now and then when Louis is getting "too much" attention from mommy or daddy he gets jealous and says he doesn't like Louis.

Axel absolutely loves the park across the street from our house. The sand is still his favorite part. His imagination is blossoming and recently we built a big mountain and "train tracks" for his trucks (pretend trains). It is often hard for us to leave the park because he doesn't want anyone to ruin his creations, but I remind him that we can always recreate it another day.

Axel is much more into independent time and play. I have really noticed a big difference over the past month. Instead of getting upset that mommy or daddy are unavailable he chooses to entertain himself. The picture above is showing him a few nights ago while Keith and I were eating dinner. Axel finished early and was bugging me to read him the new books we found on his bookshelf. I told him once I was done eating I would be happy to read to him. Well, he sat down and proceeded to go through all of the Magic Bus books in the box. He entertained himself for 45 minutes. It was really nice to talk with Keith and I was so excited he was into the books I didn't want to interrupt him. Of course, I had to eventually interrupt him for bed time, but he was excited to finally read "what the picture said".

We received a gift card to Crate and Barrel for Christmas so we decided to head over to the local store and see what we could buy. We hardly ever go shopping. Axel was thrilled to go up and down the escalator several times as well as see all of the cool kitchen supplies and furniture. He told us he found his new bed and wanted to take the above bed home with him.

Yesterday we headed up North to go to the Oakland Zoo with Auntie and Ry Ry. Everyone had a blast.

Uncle Ry Ry and Axel are such a cute duo. I love how much Axel loves to hang out with Auntie and Uncle.

We saw energetic monkeys, gorillas, tigers, bears, snakes, turtles, reptiles, elephants, giraffes, walliroos (sp?), ostriches, ect.

Axel played on almost all of the structures in the children's section of the zoo. Here is Auntie and Axel on the turtle.

Axel and me on the red frog.

Axel in the turtle.

Ry Ry and Axel having fun.

Axel coming out of the reptile building through the little door.

Axel willing and without coaxing or asking climbed up the tree slide by himself.

And played with Auntie inside the fake big tree trunk.

He bravely stepped on the frog lily pads with the assistance of Auntie.

The highlight of the day was the train ride. The 4 of us squished into the second row as Axel loves to be near the train whistle.

After the zoo we went to Ick's sandwich shop. There Axel had his first lollipop. As you can tell it didn't take him long to get the hang of licking it.

Here Axel is relaxing while enjoying his apple caramel lollipop.

We had so much fun. We can't wait to go back. Next time we will definitely stay longer to make sure we get to enjoy the carnival rides as well as see all of the animals.

Ok, time to watch the superbowl. Go Patriots!

Big Boy Axel

We have great news family and friends......Axel is officially over all of his food allergies. The ironic thing about the testing that we did today showed that he developed a slight sensitivity towards peanuts. The doctor said that there is a high false positive on these tests. Our plan is to not completely avoid peanuts, but to reduce Axel's exposure and monitor him. In this same way we are suppose to slowly add dairy and soy back into his diet. Well, I am not much of one for moderation and so to celebrate Axel's great news we had my favorite childhood food for lunch, macaroni and cheese.

Although we are super excited that Axel can now eat almost all foods, we did find out he is just like his father and allergic to many environmental allergens. He is allergic to grass, weed, trees, mold, etc. The good thing is now I know his break outs are do to the environment and not food. We are going to have so much fun seeing him enjoy the foods that we enjoy. I will also have a lot easier time preparing food. :)

Axel asked for a hair cut on Saturday night. He was incredibly cute. It was about 8:30pm and I was stressed about him getting to bed when he said, "mommy I need a hair cut now." I told him to ask me tomorrow. While I was out riding he asked daddy and daddy said, "you have to wait until mommy gets home." Well, sure enough he remembered when I got home and we cut his hair. He told me exactly what I could cut, how much and what I was not allowed to cut. Daddy helped me finish his hair cut after a couple hour break because Axel cracked and wouldn't let me cut the other side of his hair. It looked pretty funny until daddy came to the rescue!

As you can see Axel likes the back a little longer and he likes his bangs on the shorter side. I get a kick at watching him look at himself and do really cute things in the mirror and then crack up at what he just saw himself do.

Axel truly is a funny man. He continues to love to make funny faces, or sounds or laugh boisterously to get attention. It is true. Some people are just born funny and funny is my favorite little boy!

Axel continues to love chocolate and sweets. We often have to bribe him with sweet incentives. This is not something that we are proud of or want to continue to do, but sometimes it is nice to know that a little chocolate proves a little cooperation!

Today we found out that Axel weighs 25 lbs with shoes and clothes on and is 36 inches with shoes on. The medical assistant documented his height as 35 inches because of his shoes, but didn't subtract weight for his shoes and clothes. Why is that? Why do they care about the height being more accurate than weight? That totally bugs me. Good news is he is growing.....slowly but surely!!!!! I am secretly hoping he will have a huge growth spurt now that he will be getting more fat and protein from dairy and less sugar from all of the non dairy, non soy foods.

We are off to another play date with Rishaan. Have a great weekend and lets hope for another good weekend of football. Go Patriots and 49ers!

California Winter

The days are passing quicker than I can keep up with so I apologize for the delay in posts. We have been busy with playing and socializing. Axel loves having picnics for lunch. He makes phone calls to Auntie and Annika with his cashier station check out gun.

Axel and Rishaan have lots of play dates. They are becoming best friends quickly. It is such a joy to see how much they like each other and how well they get along. I have been noticing that Axel is somewhat of the boss and Rishaan is extremely good at going along with Axel's games. Hopefully, this will balance out more over the years.

One of Axel's favorite things to do is play in the leaves. This was our last racking since our trees are officially barren.

I had planned on adding to this post, but since it has already been a week I will start another post. Boy, does time fly!

Merry Christmas #2

We had a great Christmas this year. We weren't sure what to expect, but as always the Lord provided us with good company and fun times. We went over to a friend's house for dinner on Christmas Eve. Axel was a champ. He wasn't able to sleep during his nap because he was so excited that Santa was coming. He spent almost the entire hour and fifteen minutes he was lying in bed singing at the top of his lungs, "Santa is coming to town!". It probably didn't help that we had him open a gift on Christmas Eve morning. We were hoping the classic Christmas movies would entertain him while we were at dinner. The only problem was that we couldn't say no to Axel watching one movie in the morning. He watched "Santa is coming to town", if you couldn't guess by his singing and chanting at nap time. He absolutely loved to learn about good old Kris Kringle and how he started delivering toys to children.

We attempted to go to church as a family, but Axel's lack of sleep resulted in a total melt down about half way through the service. The place was way too packed to deal with a screaming child so we decided to leave. We stopped by the house to pick up the pack n play as well as Axel's pillow and blanket thinking he might want to crash early at our friend's house. We were pleasantly surprised by Axel's angelic behavior that lasted until 10:30pm! We told ourselves that we would leave as soon as he started to melt down, but it never came. It was such a blessing to be able to share a nice meal and time with friends without having to worry about Axel.

Axel did struggle to get to sleep, but I do believe he was in dream land just about 11pm. He woke just after 7am, which was a bit early for him considering he went to bed so late. Here is Axel on Christmas morning. It took him a few minutes to become his happy self. He was excited to see Mark, his elf, on the Christmas tree, and the plate of cookies for Santa empty. He knew that Santa had come and that Mark would be going back to the North pole until next year.

Axel was a great little helper as he climbed under the Christmas tree to reach the presents that were deep underneath.

Axel opened Santa's gifts first. He loved the train tracks that Santa sent him so much that we had to bargain with him to continue to open his other gifts.

We did give him amble time between gifts, but we realized the little guy really only needs a couple of presents. The difficult thing about that is he is loved so much by all of his family that EVERYONE sends him gifts. Hopefully our house will not be overtaken by toys. I already stored a few toys in the attic to make more room :)

To back track. On the Thursday before Christmas Axel was able to have another play date with our neighbor Rishaan. They just happen to both wear Mickey Mouse t-shirts that day. They are the cutest kids ever. One game they played for almost an hour was the sleeping game. They would run into Rishaan's room, lie in his bed, pull the covers up and giggle. They would then run out of the bedroom into the living room and repeat x 100 times. Hema was able to grab a picture of them as we opened the door quickly and caught them lying still giggling. I will have to post that once she forwards it to me. I only managed to get one photo on my phone. It is not very good, but you can see the Mickey Mouse shirts and how much taller Rishaan is than Axel.

On Christmas Eve morning, Axel and I raked the front yard and played in the leaves. Axel loves leaves.

He played in the leaves over the weekend when daddy and him raked as well. He actually told me that we needed to rake because there was too many leaves in the front yard. Here are a couple of pictures and yes, he likes to go into the yard waste bin. What can I say, boys will be boys!

Axel continues to amaze us and we feel so blessed to have such a wonderful child. He seems to be growing as he feels heavier and he looks taller compared to the dining room table. He loves to sing at the top of his lungs, no matter where we are. I really need to get a video of him singing, but he tends to claim up when he knows I am recording him. He loves to help and do what mommy and daddy are doing. He rather help do chores than play on his own. He is becoming more and more articulate and smarter by the minute. He loves to extend his bedtime and naptime in whatever way he can. He loves to fix things and take care of others if they are injured. For example, today he got a bandaid for me when I scraped my knuckle on the corner of a cabinet. He put it on me and said, "are you all better mommy?" I will leave you with a picture of Axel "fixing" his bike.