Aiko takes the phone.

While at Old Faithful, I let Aiko take my phone to take "peekuturs."

I love her little perspective.

This might be her first selfie ever.

Twos

Lately, the husband and I been discussing our parenting skills.  Are we doing okay, are we creating a monster?  Are we doing enough?  Is she eating something that makes her crazy?  Are we disciplining her correctly?

She's as stubborn as she is short, and she's super short people.  Her shortness seems to make her inhumanly strong.  I mean, I know that she is two.  She's only been on this earth for a short 27 months, but she sure knows how to rock our world upside down.  Don't get me wrong, I love the little stinker, but she's starting to worry me.  We've started time-outs, giving choices and then giving consequences.  

Does she get it though?  I mean on one hand, she is two and then on the other, she IS two.  I've been reading parenting books and they don't seem to have much more than a couple paragraphs on two year olds.   We need help people.

I need help on how to handle the tantrums, the fits, the bi-polar personality. What suggestions do you have for my little two year old. 

Must hold and carry all things.

Auntie Hannah has this saying for Aiko, "Must hold and carry ALL things."

It's so true.  She has to have at least two of everything, or something for both hands. I feel her, it's hard to be unbalanced. 

I was picking some black caps the other day at Auntie Mitsie's house and needed something for Aiko to do.  See, these black caps are extremely vicious.  While the plants produce lovely and wonderful berries, the thorns will rip you to shreds.  We can't have this for little mullet-heads skin.

So I gave my little girl the job of picking up all the apples...rotten ones anyway.  I don't think she realized they were fruit.  Good thing too, otherwise I'm sure she would have eaten them. 

When she was done picking apples off the ground, she went to her favorite outside toy. 

"Chairs!" In her ever raspy getting higher by the moment voice. 

My aunties keep telling me how I never post about little brother, it's because he's such a chill baby, he just likes to sit and stare at bright things all day.  Although, he has been laughing and cooing lately!

The "Must hold and carry all things" gets kind of tough when you are so little.  Especially when you have two chairs that just won't cooperate.

Mama had to step in and save her, because obviously, she was in deep despair.  By the way, see her profile?  It's the exact same as her great grams.  All cheeks, no nose.  Although, grams didn't have a mullet. 

In the end, it all worked out well.  I'm glad we can make happy memories in the same place I grew up.

Cherry picking

Trouble.

It's a good thing she doesn't realize that she is in fact a tiny child. 

In the words of my best friend Anne "She's like a giant baby."  Which if you don't think of her as a toddler....

This was moments right before I fell.  See how high I was?  My mama intuition was going crazy.  We kept taking Aiko down and then she would crawl up.  Oh the things one does for delicious fruits. 

Watching Dad Mow the Lawn

This little lady loves all things pertaining to her dad. We take her little chair and place it outside while he's mowing the lawn.  

She likes to critique his work while enjoy a summer smoothie. 

Having inherited some of his OCDness, she is always cleaning off things before setting herself down.   Funny little lady.

I've had these photos for a while.

To post or not to post. 

To post. 

Aikoisms

I feel that this accurately portrays my little raptor baby.  (Previous Raptor Post Here.)  She's kind of crazy as of late.  I put her amber necklace again to see if it helped with her teeth.  Yesterday, I noticed she had two teeth coming in on the bottom.  Later, she screamed, rolled around on the floor and was decidedly unruly.  

Next day, we go to the store.  She doesn't want to get in the cart.  I had my moby on so I thought well, she technically could still fit.  So I put my tiny 19 month old child in the wrap.  All is going well.

Until she gets bored and then starts scratching at my chest and neck with her claws.  She gets distracted by some kids so I pull her out to walk around.  She's kind of learned to run too.  Why, oh why do we play that game of "I'm gonna get you, in gonna catch you?"  Obviously, we teach them to run away.  Then she starts picking up bags of things, jabbering the whole way.  I take one item only to take another from her.  Finally, I'm done with this game, so I pick her up.  On our way to the check-out she rips down a display of glow in the dark stars.  They all fall to the floor, one breaks open, and now we have 30 stars that I somehow have to pick up...and pay for.

 

As I pick up the stars, all the while Aiko helping, I realize that we are going to have to purchase these stupid things.  Thinking they were a dollar I felt okay, until I looked at the display and found they were three bucks.  That's just irritating.  

Throwing the child back into the moby we head for the check out.  All the while she has taken to screaming and flailing.  
Check out was long, I only had five items.  And of course, I had to "wait for assistance" at the self check out.  I played it cool and calm, all the while staring down people watching my crazy-toothing-angry-raptor-like-toddler.  

I know, I know, this is just the beginning.  She's not even 2 years old yet, I'm sure there will be more and more fits to come.  In the mean time, we'll probably only go to the store when she isn't teething or when her dad is home.

Dark helmet

I know, I know, it looks like she's holding on for dear life.  She really was having fun.

 

I don't really like this show...but she totally reminded me of Dark Helmet.  She's so little...with that giant helmet.  I mean, it was hilarious. Plus, she makes these weird throat noises all the time.  She may have to be Dark Helmet for Halloween or something.

 I never understood why kids named their favorite stuffed animals "dog," or "monkey."  I always felt they were very uncreative children, how wrong I was.  It's the parents.  Now, I understand.

Let's not forget him.

Yes, she really is this little, with this slightly large head. 

Even though the helmet left her slightly off balance, it actually made me feel better when she tripped.  Head protected right?

We actually didn't get to try out the trailer with a bike...we were missing one piece, the one vital piece that connects the trailer to the bike.  A slightly important piece.  Luckily, Amazon saved the day.  I plan on making this a regular thing this summer.