North Carolina

On Thanksgiving Day, we drove the five hours from Aiken (SC) to Durham (NC) to spend the remainder of our trip with Leif's Cousin Vivian, Uncle Erik, and Aunt Tami (a.k.a. Viv, Uncle Eck, and Aunt T). You'll notice similar themes in the photos below as in the South Carolina blog entry -- entertaining toddlers seems to be all about zoos and children's museums! The Museum of Life and Science in Durham was a big hit, as well.

Leif and Vivian hard at play in Erik and Tami's living room


Riding the nifty train at the Museum of Life and Science


Aaron and Leif getting their cars on in the "Go Zone" at Marbles (the children's museum in Raleigh)


A breakthrough for Leif: While at Marbles, he voluntarily put a hat on his own head for the first time EVER! And he proceeded to walk around with it on for at least five minutes before getting tired of it -- this from the kid who would not keep a hat on for two seconds all summer. We were stunned. Guess next summer we will just have to get him a big, plastic fire fighter helmet and we will be all set.


Tami, Erik, and Vivian -- what a nice family picture, and what a nice family!


On the last full day of our trip, we drove to Asheboro, about an hour and a half from Durham, and spent several hours with Erik and Vivian at the North Carolina Zoo. Aaron, Leif, and I then proceeded to Charlotte to catch our flight home (the next morning), while Erik and Vivian drove back to Durham. A good time was had by all at the zoo, and the rain we had been fearing might dampen our fun thoughtfully waited to begin in earnest until the very moment we were pulling out of the parking lot.

Communing with the plastic animals at the zoo






Erik later reported Vivian's take on our visit (which she declared while they were still in the parking lot at the zoo, just after we had left): "I'm afraid Aaron, Amy, and Leif will have to come visit us in North Carolina every day!" Fortunately, it's only a few weeks until we will be seeing each other again...albeit in Minnesota!

South Carolina

We spent Thanksgiving week plus a couple days on a relaxing vacation to the Carolinas to visit Leif's cousins and their parents. For the first half of the trip, we were warmly welcomed in Aiken, SC, by Leif's Aunt Jessica, Uncle Mitch, and Cousin Rachel -- known in Leif-speak as Auntie Ess, Uncle Itch, and Ach ("H"). We relished the temperatures in the 70s and 80s while we were there, particularly since we had gotten our first winter snowfall in Minnesota the day before we left on our trip. Below are a few photos showing highlights from our time in SC.

Leif had brought a handful of his own Matchbox cars along on the trip, but he was happy to see Rachel had more (and was willing to let him play with them!).


The cousins hard at work on puzzles


Rachel's most common response when I asked her to smile for the camera was either to look away or to stick her tongue out, but I did catch a few nice smiles now and then :-) .


On Tuesday and Wednesday of Thanksgiving week, we drove up to Columbia (SC) to visit several of their kid-friendly attractions, the Riverbanks Zoo and the EdVenture Children's Museum. Rachel seemed pretty enthused about having her car seat installed right next to Leif's and was very generous in sharing her Wheat Thins with him. With a bit of coaching, Leif quickly got the hang of saying "Thanks, Ach!" after each cracker gift.


Riverbanks Zoo


EdVenture




Back at Mitch and Jessica's house in Aiken, Rachel and Leif had a great time hanging out on the living room sofa, especially if Aaron was there to read books to them. There was a big basket of Rachel's books in the corner of the living room, but she always seemed more interested in checking out the books Leif had brought along on the trip. "Good Night, Little Bear" and "The Runaway Bunny" were particular hits.


Leif's other favorite activity at Jessica and Mitch's house was going for "rides" on the back of their very, very patient and tolerant golden retriever, Hunter. This activity (conceived by Aaron) consisted of Aaron holding Leif under the armpits to keep him more or less on Hunter's back for 5-10 seconds as Hunter tried to run away. As soon as each ride ended, Leif would immediately pipe up, "Ride dog again, please!" Hunter was an amazingly good sport about all this. Perhaps he felt he owed us after all the time Aaron and I spent petting him and scratching his ears each evening.


Thank you to Jessica, Mitch, Rachel, and Hunter for their hospitality. We had a great time!

Halloween

Aaron and I are not really into Halloween, so on October 31st this year, we continued our long-standing tradition of turning the lights off and pretending we were not home. However, we did invite the G. and B. clans over for a little Halloween Eve dinner on October 30th, giving Leif an opportunity to try on the snazzy Tigger costume I had picked up for him from the Babies R Us clearance rack the week before. My first attempt to entice him to put it on was an utter failure, however; getting a costume on Leif turned out to be a two-person job. Auntie Sarah and I made a second attempt after dinner and this time were (sort of) successful -- he kept the costume on for at least four minutes! Just enough time for me, Grandma B., and Granny G. to snap a few pictures....

Drooly Tigger


Checking out Grandma B.'s camera


Getting frustrated...need some reassurance from Dad


"Off! Off!" Off!" :( Poor Leif -- guess costume time is over until next year.

Van Cleve Park

Leif's Uncle Erik and Cousin Vivian (now known to Leif as "Viv," which is within reach of his current pronunciation skills) were in town recently to look for a place to live when they and Aunt Tami move back to Minnesota (!!!!!!!!) in December. Actually, for Vivian it will be a move *to* Minnesota, not a move *back to* Minnesota; at nearly 3 1/2, she is a North Carolinian born and raised! In any case, we are all very excited to have them (back) in town.

After the first day's house-hunting appointments were done, Leif and I were able to meet up with Erik and Vivian at Van Cleve Park, a great park located in the Como neighborhood just north of Dinkytown. Erik and I swapped kids for a little while, which meant that Erik got to join Leif in running back and forth across a wooden bridge shouting "Eeeeeeeeee!", while I got to assist Vivian in preparing for some kind of important (imaginary) ceremony and "sweeping out the courtyard" (because "that is a job that grown-ups can do"). Leif also enjoyed playing on the large rock and crawling under/through the interesting bike rack that you see in the pictures below.

We are already looking forward to next spring and many more fun play dates with Erik, Tami, and Vivian at Van Cleve Park!

Legos

Ah, for the days -- could it really be just a few weeks ago?! -- when Leif could play in the back porch in shorts and a t-shirt. Now, increasingly often, I have to tell him it's too cold to play out there...a message he is not very receptive to. He seems to take after his dad and is impervious to the cold.

As you'll see in the video, his lego stacking skills are coming along nicely!

Front entryway

If Leif is ever getting a little stir crazy but I don't want to take him outside for whatever reason (raining, almost nap time, etc.), I just open the door to the front entryway and I can pretty much count on another 10-15 minutes of happy, independent play. Not that there is much space out there, or much of anything in the space that seems all that interesting (at least not to an adult). But Leif still gets inordinate pleasure from playing with the shoes on the shoe rack, trying to pull out the sticky drawers of the storage bench, and now also playing with the lawn furniture cushions that we are temporarily storing there. I will be very sad when the weather gets too cold for him to play out there!

Bath time fun

Leif LOVES bath time, and recently he especially loves to throw all of his bath toys, foam letters, numbers, and "splash cards" (flash cards made of foam that stick to the tub wall when wet) out onto the floor while exclaiming, "Bye, five! Bye, N! Bye, duck!", etc. We didn't manage to capture his most enthusiastic moments of doing this on video, but the following two clips will give you the flavor of bath time with Leif.