Excavator day!

Our house reno is getting under way. This morning I awoke to some beeping and went downstairs to find Quinn entranced by a truck picking up a dumpster. More beeping. Excavator has arrived. Sheesh Quinn, which window should we look out?? Dumpster guy had to rearrange the load so we ran to the front window to watch the excavator unload. Then dumpster guy started pulling the box onto the truck and we ran to the back window. Then the truck was gone and we ran to the front window to watch the excavator again. He picked up an extra bucket and drove into our yard. Quinn was practically vibrating with excitement, giggling, and grinning from ear to ear!

Shortly after he parked, our contractor's workers, Andrew and Steve, showed up and started the excavator again, picked up the extra bucket and drove into the back yard. Quinn sat on a chair by the back window, munched on some snack and watched the old garage concrete pad get ripped up in 15 minutes flat. Quinn was particularly excited that he might use the bulldozer blade (stabilizer) to push the rubble around, which he eventually did. Another 15 minutes took care of the asphalt and deck pilings.

I had to tear myself away from the excitement to go to work, but apparently Quinn got to sit in the cab during a break, and Andrew (who also has a son, 4) sat him in his lap and let him pull the levers. Apparently Quinn was telling Andrew what all the levers did. Andrew was impressed with his knowledge.

An excavator, Quinn's favourite thing, right here in our own back yard! Quinn was in heaven, and he lapped it up all day. A day that shall be forever ensconced in Quinn's memory as Excavator Day.

A master of vacuuming

The other day I had the hand vacuum out for something. Quinn got ahold of it when I set it down. He wanted me to turn it on for me. I encouraged him to do it himself. He wanted to cover his ears though (he's very sensitive to noise). I said maybe he could put on his earmuffs (ear protection we bought for him for taking him to concerts). He liked that idea. He found his earmuffs and wanted me to put them on for him. I encouraged him to do it himself, and showed him how. Then he wanted me to turn it on. I encouraged him to try it himself, using his two thumbs to press harder on the button, which is kind of stiff.

He then proceeded to vacuum everything in sight. The couch, the ottoman, the living room floor, the kitchen floor. I even moved some furniture to take advantage this outburst of industriousness. He took his earmuffs on and off, and turned the vacuum on and off, and was quite proud of doing so all by himself, all 27 times. Then he figured out how to empty it, which was a little messy, but no matter. The battery eventually died and that was the end of that, except for him chattering about it for another half hour.

The next day I got home from work to see him with the big vacuum cleaner out, earmuffs on, vacuuming like mad. He could turn it on and off, retract the cord, empty the bin in the kitchen garbage can, put the bin back on, lining up the notch, and start vacuuming again. He vacuumed for an hour.

Every now and then I have to remind myself he's two.

He's very serious and businesslike when he's putting his earmuffs and going to work, but also has a certain air of satisfaction in going about. I wonder if maybe he's mirroring me tearing down the garage a couple weeks ago, which Quinn watched intently. It's early to say for sure, but it appears he'll have a work ethic, and also safety consciousness, both of which please me. It makes me wonder whether it's just his nature, or whether early examples can be formative lifelong. Whatever the case, he is a master of vacuuming now, and proud of it.

Weekend at Grandma's and Grandpa's

It was our anniversary this weekend. Bec's parents offered to take Quinn for the weekend. Woohoo! We've been talking about it for awhile and Quinn seemed excited about it. It's a big step - first overnight not in the care of mommy or daddy. However, I strongly suspected the step was bigger for us than for him. They picked him up Saturday morning. Bec was a little forlorn but Quinn was like "can't wave now mom and dad - I'm eating my snack". Fortunately we had stuff to do to keep us busy for the afternoon.

One of the things that changes when you have kids is you become much more efficient with your time. I thought I was pretty time-efficient before kids but now I realize how far off the mark I was. Even still, we were astounded at the amount of fun and accomplishments we crammed into the slightly more than 24 hours Quinn was away. Most refreshing was the ability to go to a nice dinner at a normal time and not have to choreograph schedule around bedtime. No wait - it was the ability to sleep in. No wait - it was getting from the door to the car in less than half an hour. No wait - it was the ability to go to the spa together and spontaneously go for ice cream on the way home.

So many vestiges of lifestyles gone by. The relentlessness of parenthood is particularly high at this stage of going-on-three that Quinn is at and the break was sooooo welcome. But we missed the little gaffer even still. We were both quite excited when the call came that they were inbound. Quinn apparently had a wonderful time and didn't ask about us once. As usual, sleep was the only challenge. It sounds like everyone had fun, and while the grandfolk aren't exactly clamouring to come do it again next weekend, they sounded open to doing it again soon.

As often seems to happen with a scenery change, Quinn seems to have taken a mental leap forward. His speech is even more clear, he seems to grasp a few higher concepts I don't remember him knowing, and he can now jump. Yes jump - he's been quite behind on that front but we haven't sweated it since everything else, physical skills included, seems on track, but now he can do it. He seems quite proud of it too.

A great leap forward for all of us.

Can't see me now Uncle Brucie!

Those exact words were uttered by me when I was a kid as I covered my own eyes, figuring that if I couldn't see Uncle Brucie then he couldn't see me. That logic loophole now lives on yet again in Quinn. Yes, we've hit the hide and seek stage, and it leads to much mirth. He hides in plain sight under trees and yells "I'm over here!". He hides under his table in plain sight with arms and legs sticking out and giggles. And yes, sometimes he just stands there and covers his eyes.

It started one rainy evening we'd missed our (somewhat) nightly walk around the block, so I suggested hide and seek. Bec suggested hiding on the opposite floor for added exercise for Quinn. So count I did, slowly and loudly, and Bec and Quinn raced upstairs, as fast as I've seen Quinn take them. They hid under a blanket on the bed and I loudly explored around the house. As I got closer, Quinn giggled and said "I'm under here!" to laughter all around. Then Quinn and I hid downstairs while Bec counted. In all I think we did about 8 reps that night. He got a big kick out of it.

It's taking a little coaching, but he'll actually stay quiet occasionally if you're hiding with him if you whisper to him almost constantly. And of course it's difficult for a little monkey to keep still. But he has found a couple of legitimately great hiding spots, and as the journey is often more important than the destination, we all have lots of fun hiding right there in plain sight.

Little Fixit

Quinn has a gear set. It's magnetic and resides on the fridge. A battery-powered motor drives the whole set and you can mesh the gears in various ways. It's been a great toy, and a great way to convey concepts of how things work. Quinn has played with it on and off for a long time.

Recently the battery in the electric motor has been getting a little tired and Quinn has been asking to have it fixed. Finally the other day it was obviously not working well so we decided to fix it. I gave Quinn a screwdriver and told him which screw to undo, which he did. I told him to take the battery out and remember which way the bump pointed. I gave him a new battery and told him to put it in the way the other one was when it came out. I told him to put the cap back on and fasten the screw again. Then we put the old battery in the special garbage and put the screwdriver away. He did all the physical actions all by himself, and was he ever proud!

Of course now he wants to fix everything, even the stuff that's not broken. But fortunately he doesn't appear to remember the drawer where the screwdriver lives so I think everything else with screws in it is safe (we never had to baby-proof that drawer - no idea why that drawer is different, but it always has been!). It won't be long before he's teaching me stuff.

Crazy Legs Crane

We went to a skating party today for a friend of Quinn's. In anticipation, we bought Quinn some real hockey skates, used, a junior stick, and a skate trainer (one of those chair-like things you push around when learning to skate). Today, the big day, we measured and cut off his stick and taped it up. He seemed quite keen on the whole thing, walking around the store in his skates, and keenly interested in his new stick.

As soon as his skates touched the ice his feet started going a million miles an hour, even though he was travelling zero miles an hour. A couple times I was able to get him to stand up, but the least little movement triggered ol' crazy legs again. He was game though - he had a big grin on for much of it. Bec & I had to trade off often due to the resulting back strain. He would hold his stick and whack at a hockey ball we brought while we were holding onto him. Eventually I just sat him down on his bum with his stick in his hand. We skated around him and he whacked the ball to us / near us / nowhere near us, again with huge grins.

He seemed keen to watch the other kids playing. It's the age old thing where a tiny little bit of watching is worth a ton of telling. I tried hard not to be too excited - it's a game I love so much and have had so much fun playing, but I don't want to pressure him into it. It felt so good to get my skates on again and it was so good to see his big smiles, but I was stressing about how to teach him and felt like I was doing it all wrong. Bec was really good with him though and made it all about having fun on the ice, which is all it should be right now. While I wouldn't rate the first experience on hockey skates as a rousing success, it was about as good as could be expected, and he perhaps shows some instinct with a stick.

We played a little hockey in the living room when we got home and I thought he got it a little more. Fun was had and we didn't overdo it, so I think there will be a next time. Que sera sera.

There's a gourd in my shoe

Quinn has taken to putting a recently acquired gourd in my shoe. It has become a running joke. Every day I say "There's a gourd in my shoe!" and look incredulous. Quinn giggles and says "How did that get there?" "I don't know", I say. "Quinn did it!" he gleefully offers. At night I leave the gourd in his shoe for the next day. One day he made me carry it to work in my sweater pocket. I forgot about it until I was getting ready to go home and it made me smile.

He's got a pretty good sense of humour. He gets a kick out of making his mother laugh. He cracks up over certain passages in books. He giggles when something is out of place. It shows good judgement, that he knows the difference between normal and abnormal. It's a handle we can use to deal with certain otherwise possibly stressful situations. It's a bridge to the important people in his life. It will serve him well his entire life I'm sure. May we continue to cultivate it. Gourds in my shoe will keep him from going out of his.

Fun at the store

We went to Canadian Tire today. Quinn was a little wound up. He was mostly good while we were shopping. He was climbing into the plastic bins we were looking at buying. Every now and then he'd bolt off with a glint in his eye, requiring some hot pursuit. Then one time he took off at full speed and just kept going. Bec went flying after him and bystanders giggled as Quinn dove full-length into a shopping cart outfitted with a "car" for kids to drive. A few minutes later they came trundling back with grins all around.

As we were heading for the checkout Quinn caught sight of the lawn tractors, much like grampa's. Nothing would do but we had to go see them. And sit on them. And daddy had to sit on the next one. We had pretend races. We made tractor sounds. At one point two employees came down the aisle and I realized they probably couldn't see Quinn. As they passed I said "I bet I looked pretty silly until you saw the two year old". "We see grownups do it all the time" they said.

Quinn can really motor now. We walked home from the neighbourhood pub after dinner tonight and Quinn ran pretty much the whole way. He had a couple of face plants, but one was on grass and the other didn't slow him down for long. He's growing up so quick it seems!

Excellence with Grampa

Grampa took Quinn to the fair today. Four hours they were gone! They took the bus there and back. Grampa fed him candy apple, mini donuts, ice cream and a beaver tail. Oh yeah, and one bite of cheese from the supper Bec sent along with them. They saw lots of animals. Quinn had his picture taken with two parrots, one on his shoulder and one in his hand. They saw lots of noisy rides and lots of people. Grampa got him Buzzy the Bee (yes, yes, it's a Stuffed Animal Moratorium Violation, but we'll make an exception for A Day At The Fair With Grampa...).

Quinn had a great day and was good as gold apparently. I think both he and grampa were pooped by the end of it, but smiles were had all around. I don't think it should be called The Fair - it should be called The Excellent.

What's bigger than big?

Why, Big Big of course. Then comes Big Big Biiiiiiiiig. After that is Huge. Then Enormous. And just tonight, we had EnormousNormousNormous.

Today, with visiting Cousin Caroline, we also had firetrucks rescuing hapless cars from the Pillow Monster's pillow-and-blanket fort. And also apparently one of Quinn's toots flew out the window, down the driveway into a puddle and was chased by some squirrels.

The imagination stage is here in spades.