Pinterest FAIL!

Alex has the chickenpox. Thus, we found ourselves wth some extra time today.

According to Pinterest this would be a total "FAIL". But... my kid dipped, licked, sprinkled, licked, squeezed, licked and then tasted. In his and my definition, this was a total success!

Boys!

At the zoo ("Zolli") on Saturday, Alex and Juli were exchanging gifts: flowers and rocks.  The flowers were... short lived gifts and the rocks were... tasted!  They were really speaking each others' language! Fun times!

Queen Anne's Lace ~ a gift!

Hot Daze

We had some super scorchers days this week.  I was a bit disgusted by it.  Yes, it was too hot.

I love air-conditioning on days (and nights) like these 'cuz I just feel like a gross lump otherwise.  But hanging out at the local mall all day has it's downsides... i.e. the heat-wave shock when they force you out the doors kicking and screaming for the night.  I had to find a way to keep us cool somehow.

I thought of the big public wading pools but then thought against the tram, the direct sun... and literally, stuck to the shade on our hot little balcony.  We got the little wading pool set-up, some watermelon and freezies.  Ahhhhh nice!! I moved as little as possible after filling the pool and as a reward got a "pedicure" from a very willing little boy.  YEP, he watered my feet for 2.5 hours! He also practiced his aim with a water shooter.  He's getting pretty good at it! He only came out of the water when his toes and fingers were properly shriveled. :)

Krokodile, krokodile!

Alex has another favorite animal. The crocodile.

His hand puppet friend eats without mercy, just about everything. Alex's hands, puzzles, feet, other toys... Ruthless.

Well at the zoo recently, we found the crocodile right against the window. It was a very interesting and freaky experience. Alex stared at it for a long time.

We found a place to press buttons to view videos, of course Alex pushed them all. Each leads to a short clip on the crocodile correlating to the body of the animal. He happened to push the mouth button last leading to a clip of the crocodile eating. Ahem. Quite quickly it became a very graphic capture of a Gisele or some hoofed animal innocently taking a sip of water and having his neck chomped off. Alex saw the whole thing. "Wow! What a hungry crocodile!" We exclaimed while hightailing it out of there. Whoops!!

Alex asked to go back to say goodbye to it before we left the enclosure. I think the crocodile is moving up the favorite list faster than we anticipated!

Here's a photo of his Lego zoo. He did this without any prompting.

Happy Scccarrrry Halloween!

Scary Hedgehog

This was the best I could do before his Kinderkrippe this morning.

Alex insisted on putting his new shoes on, so he was distracted.  

Then he refused to keep the hood on.  However, he liked it on me and kissed the nose. 

We'll try to get some more pics later.

Walking & Updates

An extremely proud and happy boy!

Alex walked today!!! He took 5 steps then a quick sit then got back up and walked along the whole hallway!

Amazing! I started crying! For a fluke, I had my phone in my hand and recorded the whole thing! I sensed he was going to walk - he'd been pushing furniture every which way up until then, he grabbed his walking crocodile and away he went! The crocodile had such an overwhelming day that now he is broken. I hope wood glue will keep him together for some more abuse!

We are very proud of Alex today!

On another note, his first molars one in top and one on the bottom broke the surface recently. He has been moody to put it mildly...

We are in our new apartment and my cell has unpredictable service. We should have a tel# in about 10 days. And email too...

Wild about animals!

We went to a petting zoo near our place today. "Erlen Animal Park" 


Alex spent the whole time pointing and "heeh hehh"'ing at all the animals. Especially the donkeys, monkeys and pigs. He didn't seem to care much for the Lynx, which was my favourite. 

What fun!! We are going to the big zoo on Sunday. He'll probably go crazy there!

Going Solo

Caught in action (blurry):
One mini side step without any support! 
Walking will happen soon!!

Simply Alexander

Things I love about Alexander:
- locks himself in the play pen when he wants to play alone
- pretends to drink from a toy cup. He blows air into it as if he's dusting it first.
- helps me with laundry: taking things out of the machine as I put them in. Or taking them off the rack after I've hung them.
- lies in heaps of clothing, blankets or pillows or simply rests his head on the floor to be adorable!
-unilaterally decides something is garbage and puts it in the bin i.e. socks from the drying rack (above).
- plays hide-and-go-seek really well. That's right! Not peek-a-boo! (well that too).
- likes to race towards us (in his foot-propelled car) and crash into a hug.
- talks to me
- listens to me (sometimes)
- he smiles a lot!
- when he sneaks up and tickles my foot, my leg or my side.


Things I don't love, but deal with as lovingly as possible:
- where does all that booger come from?
- helps clean the floor: eating crumbs, sock lint and dust what-have-its from the floor
- reaches up and arches his back when he doesn't want to be held as it makes him slippery.
- he slaps, scratches and bites
- throws a violent and vicious tantrum! Who said terrible two's? I think Alex is advanced by a year. Either that or I 'ain't seen nothing yet'
- when he rolls around on the change table at any given stage of being cleaned.

Fun in the snow!

We had a nice day hiking and tobogganing today. Monika, E, Alex and I took a gondola up Kandersteg in southern Switzerland. Early in the tobogganing adventure the combination of walking slowly along a diagonal slope and the lack of weight on the tobbogn (Alex) meant Alex took a tip onto his side. Fortunately, he was mostly startled and not hurt. Thank goodness! Anyway, he was really cool when we tobogganed down the hill at (controlled) higher speeds. We had an easy hike (while pulling Alex along) to a cabin by an iced-over lake called Oeschinensee. There, we stopped for a nice cosy lunch.

After lunch we walked on the lake avoiding the abandoned ice-fishing holes. Meanwhile, Alex completely passed out for almost an hour in the toboggan!!! We mummified his head to keep his face warm.

We trekked back - mostly uphill, to our starting point where we enjoyed some end-of-day-sunshine, with tea and chocolate before leaving.

It was excellent to get out on such a beautiful, mild and sunny day. I thought, "The sky can't be this blue, even with a polarizer!!!" By the time we were leaving Alex's feet were a bit cold but he was a happy chatter box in the warm car in traffic on the way home.