Best gift EVER!

We had wanted to get more wooden tracks for Aidan's Thomas the Train set, but we couldn't find them this year.  I stumbled across a water play set, Patrick agreed it was brilliant, and Aidan ended up loving it!  he spent about 2 hours with it outside before he moved on to playing with his Iron Man figures Patrick picked up in the States.

You know what he liked almost as much as the boat set?  Any of Emma's gifts.

I don't have a lot of pictures of Aidan, he wasn't in the mood.

Pointing out what he likes

Can't wait to open gifts

Someone has inherited Erin's can't-wait-for-Christmas genes. He tried to be sly about it but Patrick caught him.

Don't bake with hyper kids

Aidan really likes the way some ingredients puff out when you blow on them.  It was funny when he did it with cinnamon a while back.  Cinnamon hangs in the air, and then he walked through it.  Lots of coughing and watery eyes but he stopped blowing into the mixing bowl.  Apparently he was feeling brave last night.  Flour was everywhere.  I thought I'd cleaned everything up and then found this the next morning.

I don't care what you've planned, I have my own ideas

We had two options: 1) a Darth Vadar costume that was pretty comfy (a nice hand-me-down from another family), or 2) shorts and the Batman shirt and cape.

Aidan chose the shirt, no cape, and just the Vadar mask.  Darth Batman was born.

Kiira came over to trick-or-treat and we ran into several families from school.  The kids had a great time.  Unfortunately some families really got into thematic decorations and the younger ones didn't really appreciate it.  After a few iffy visits (Aidan will ignore a lot for candy), the last house ended up being the last straw.  They had an animatronic witch that moved, lit up, and cackled.  It went off right as Aidan was walking by.  He spun around and took off, I couldn't even catch up with him.  Luckily Omar had moved the car to the new street and had just gotten out.  Aidan launched himself at him.  Omar calmed him down and we sat in the car while the others finished the up the street.

Riding to school with Darth Batman

Kiira's class in the Halloween Parade

Keeping citizens safe

Super Twins

Aidan thought the matching shirts were "Awesome"!

It's finally cool enough to swim

Swimming in the summer is gross unless your pool comes with a chiller, otherwise it's like swimming in bathwater.  Some beaches have a swift current and the water isn't too bad, but you really have to be careful of riptides.  The beach we like is pretty shallow and not fun to swim in between May and August.  Our neighborhood pool has a chiller, but until now it's been too hot to be outside for too long.  Nobody wants to go swim for 15 minutes and then trudge back home.  Now it's finally nice enough to enjoy the water.

He doesn't enjoy walking home in wet trunks

Pet Store Mayhem

It wasn't really mayhem, but I was nervous about all of the open cases.  Aidan really wanted to pull out a dwarf hamster.  He got a little frustrated with the turtles because they kept moving around when he was trying to look at their faces.

Backyard Fun

It's fun to play outside when it's not 109 degrees out.

The Nettles brought over their granddaughter's sand table.

Rain!  Puddles!!  Yeah!!!

Here We Go!

Wake me when we get there.

Keepin' cool...

I was organizing photos when I came across these.

Luckily the training potty hadn't
 been used at this point.

Aidan turns 4!

Aidan turned 4 today and we celebrated with a little party in the nursery.  The party had a Wreck-It Ralph theme but we had to make the decorations since they don't sell them here.  I tried to make rainbow cupcakes and sugar cookie pinwheels but they didn't turn out as well as I had hoped.  I didn't use enough food coloring for the first batch of cupcakes so you could barely tell they were colored.  I bought icing this year instead of making my own - big mistake.  It was all weird and way too sweet.  The gel food coloring I found was also very disappointing.  The Ultra Violet and Lime Green colors made for icing the color of mold or old brains.  Old zombie brains.  It wasn't pretty.  I think the cookies could have been really cool but by the time I got to them it was so hot in the kitchen that the butter in the batter was melting too much.  They were still colorful and edible, so mission accomplished.  And Aidan was happy with everything he had.

I'll hopefully be able to update this weekend with pictures from Patrick's camera.

Aidan checks out his birthday banner

He got really excited when he saw the racers on the banner

Emma was dressed as a Sugar Rush racer, but it
was too hot for the striped leggings 

Ty and Kiira declared the cookies "delicious!"

It was a good day

Out and About

Just a few quick pictures of Aidan around town.

FINALLY found a haircut place he liked

Huh.

Aidan made his own bath tonight!  He missed an important step or two in the process, but hey, he's clean.