Aaron Turns Two

We celebrated the second anniversary of the birth of our youngest son today. Aaron turned 2 today - which, not coincidentally, has become his new favorite number. We started the celebration last night with dinner at the Champps restaurant at the mall and then a screening of the new Curious George movie (very well done adaptation). Aaron loved the movie so much that he talked about it incessantly...during the movie. Mostly he wanted to make sure I was paying attention and took note of whatever fascinated him at the moment - DADDY?!?! as he was pointing at the screen.

Today we opened presents after eating the cake Becky made. Aaron got a lot of fun Playmobile toys, bath toys, and educational games and toys. He still likes to open one thing at a time and then play with it for awhile, while the rest of us were encouraging him to move on to the next gift. After a well deserved nap, we found out that Chuck E Cheese's is VERY crowded on a Saturday night. Aaron and Alex had a blast. Now we begin the Terrible Twos. As what I'm sure is a premonition of what is to come, his newest favorite word is "No." However, to his credit, his still says it very cutely.

Double Layer Chocolate Elmo Cake with Strawberry Frosting

The title says it all. Becky made this one herself for Aaron's birthday. We had a small family celebration and didn't need a a lot of extra cake sitting around. The centerpiece is an edible sticker sheet, but Becky did everything else, including baking the two layers, flavoring the icing, piping on the decorative icing and writing on it with more colored icing. have I mentioned the icing? It was delicious!

Occupations Day: Family Physician

Alex's kindergarten had a special guest today that he got to introduce - his dad! I was asked by his teacher to come and speak to the entire preschool/ kindergarten (50+ kids) about being a being a doctor during occupations month. Alex got to be my model to show them how I used some of my tools. 

Aaron's Big Boy Bed

Becky and Susan heard a thump during naptime today and found that Aaron had built up the courage to climb out of his crib. He's such climber that we knew it was only a matter of time. So before bedtime, Becky and I took the front rail of the crib of, put up a roll guard, and put a child safety gate in his doorway. He loves the change. We're still getting used to it. Our baby is growing up!

Cellphone Safety Tip Of The Day

Don't drop your cell phone down a flight of stairs while in the open position.

Field Trip to the Fire Station

Today Alex's class went to the Perrysburg, OH Fire Station. He got to meet the firefighters, hear about fire safety, and check out the vehicle in the apparatus bay. He really enjoyed it. Becky volunteered as a chaperone and took these great pictures.

Underworld: Evolution

Every once in a while I can talk Becky into seeing a vampire movie with me. I'm not sure why I like them - they're usually stylized productions with often very clear delineations between good and evil. My favorite movies tend to play with these conventions and blur that line. Underworld and its sequel that we saw today, Underworld: Evolution, do just that. As with most of these, it was gorier than Becky usually prefers. I enjoyed this one more than its precursor because it seemed more original in its style, whereas the first movie was derivative of several other movies I had seen. If you like action-packed horror movies, this one is a must see. This one is definitely not for the kids.

Playing In A Meager Snow

The forecasters called for 4-6 inches in our area, but we got less than an inch. However, we did promise the kids a romp in the snow. There wasn't too much to do other than slide down the plastic slide and throw handfuls around. It wasn't a "snowman snow" - not sticky enough to roll into balls. The kids loved it anyway.

Alex's Sunburst

Alex made this at school this week. It is a painted on white paper, then cut out and pasted to blue construction paper. It is a little larger than would fit on the scanner but this gives you the idea.

Alex's Week Ending Feb. 3, 2006

At school I made a headband and a bracelet out of connecting plastic pieces that I got to bring home. I got enough Play Points to open a new mini-game in Super Monkey Ball 2 on our GameCube. We played a new game in Music class called Cut The Cake. Grammy came to see us today. We picked her up at the airport during a snowstorm. We might make a snowman tomorrow if we have enough "snowman snow".

[This is the first of what I hope to be a weekly feature on the Evans Family Blog, similar to a Newsletter that his class does for school each week. I'm transcribing, but eventually he may type these in. -JE]

Alex's MidTerm Report Card

Ok, he really doesn't get a report card. We sat down with his teacher and reviewed his progress so far. Becky had to do the last one by herself in October because I was in Louisiana. Overall he's doing very well. He's one of the best readers in his class and had strong academic strengths all around. His biggest areas of concern were mostly with behavior issues. At times he is a follower when other kids are misbehaving. He also will do anything for a laugh and doesn't know when enough goes to too much. I'd say we've seen a general improvent in this since last year as he has gotten older and is in a smaller class. By the end of the conversation we were quite pleased overall with what we heard. The areas of improvement he has to work on were about what we expected.

This week we met with the Head of the Lower School to find out what 1st grade would be like. They actually spend 2 years in the Primary level of Lower School, correspoinding to 1st and 2nd grade. So, he'll be joining some kids who've already been there a year, many of them he'll be rejoining from when they advanced out of Kindergarten last year. This pattern continues through Middle School ("8th grade") so he'll get to know the kids in his grade level and one year in either direction. This allows older kids to help him when he needs it and for him to reinforce what he knows by helping kids younger than him. We think it's a great system. We were very satisfied after talking to the Lower School Head about what next year holds for him. We're going to start doing "homework" now several nights a week - having Alex read to us or doing a workbook page - to prepare him for what he will be doing next year.

Comings and Goings

What a day! The President gave his State of the Union address today and the state of our union is...wait for it...strong. The Oscar nominees were named and were populated by a bunch of movies we haven't seen. Samuel Alito was confirmed as Supreme Court Justice, likely tipping the Court to the right. Coretta Scott King died today at 78. Alan Greenspan stepped down after 18 years as Chairman of the Federal Reserve. Twins were born in my practice today and my oldest patient died a peaceful but sudden death at 103. She was on virtually no medicine and got out of the house everyday. She always had a smile on her face and made my day every time I saw her. All of this will take a few days to sink in.

Our New Nephew

Manning Bryce Evans was born to my brother Mark and his wife Melinda today. He was 8# 2 oz. and 19 inches long. Mom, baby, and the rest of the family are doing well. Welcome, Manning!

Aaron's New Words

Aaron has been saying several new words lately after a drought that seemed at times intentional. Including today's "toe", his latest are "no", "yoyo", "home", and "two".

Will Rogers Follies

Last Sunday Becky and I saw The Will Rogers Follies as a part of the Broadway series at the local Stranahan theater. It was a musical Ziegfield Follies-style production of Will Rogers' life. Growing up in Oklahoma, I had learned a lot about Will Rogers growing up. I went to Will Rogers Elementary through the 4th grade. We went on field trips to the Will Rogers Museum in Claremore. I didn't really realize until the musical what a big radio, movie and newspaper columnist star he was. I linked him in my head to Mark Twain, I guess because of all the wonderful quotes that they produced, though they really worked in different media. It wasn't the best show we've seen this season, but it was fun and had several memorable tunes. A must see for any Will Rogers fans, this won the Tony for Best Musical over Miss Saigon in 1991. It looks like its playing in Oklahoma with Larry Gatlin (a different cast than the one we saw) for a couple of weeks if you're interested.

Sitting at the Big Table

I'd like to take a moment to bid adieu to the high chair that has been a part of our lives for 6 years. There was about 1 year in between the boy where it took a hiatus. But both boys are sitting at the big table now and the high chair is in a children's resale shop. We will not miss tripping over it, but Aaron will miss using it as a jungle gym.

Halloween 2005 - Buzz & Rex - Take 2

We went to Portrait Innovations at the end of the year last year and took some more pictures in the kids Halloween costumes. They were too cute to wear just once I guess. Alex would wear his every day if we let him.

A Pirate Adventure

Last night we went to see Dora Live! A Pirate Adventure - a live action stage show of one of the kids favorite shows. We tugged in booster seats to make it easier for them to see, but Aaron still spent much of the show in my lap. There were chances to yell back at the performers and dance in front of our seats. Alex enjoyed it but didn't participate much. Aaron was amazed to see the performers singing his favorite Dora the Explorer and Go, Diego, Go! songs. They got Dora lights and fun memories for souvenirs.

Embracing Paper

I love paper. I never thought I’d be saying something like this. It seems I have always been trying to go more and more digital. My 1st handheld computer was a Velo 1 which I upgraded to an HP Jornada 680 until I realized that I kept advising everyone who asked me to get a Palm PDA, which of course I did too. In addition I digitally record TV, listen to digital music on my iPod, get weather maps on my digital phone and read email from Becky on my digital pager. With all this, I was baffled as to how I could be so digitally enhanced and so disorganized. My latest handheld Palm OS PDA, a Sony Clie TJ-35, has a calendar, address book, and to do list, so why wasn’t I getting anything done? The Palm OS is the simplest, most intuitive handheld platform on the market, but to enter a To Do item I still had to pull it out, turn it on, pull out the stylus, navigate to the To Do section, pick New To Do Item from a menu, and then either type it in on a tiny onscreen keyboard or use Grafiti – special 1-2 stroke gestures I learned to write on the screen for it to recognize them as letters – to enter the item. It took a minute or two, but often I was so busy that I wouldn’t do it. I’d either try to juggle it in my head or I’d jot it on a scrap of paper and shove it in my pocket to either remind me about the To Do item or enter into my Clie when I had time.

A few months ago I stumbled onto a reference online to the Hipster PDA. I built my own from scratch at home for less than $1 and it changed my life. The Hipster is a stack of 3x5” note cards and a binder clip. That, plus a pen, has helped me get more things done in the last few months than all of my digital sources combined. I have one card with a To Do list (write it down, cross it off), one card that just list the next action I need to take to complete something on my To Do list, Project cards for items that have multiple steps, monthly calendar cards where I can jot events down quickly and retrieve them at a glance, a shopping cards for things I want to get for myself or others, a Someday/Maybe card for bigger ideas that I want to ruminate on, and a few blank cards for whatever else I need. I still use my PDA all the time. It is great for storing and searching databases like my Epocrates medication reference or my address book (though I do keep a card in the Hipster with frequently called numbers on it).

My latest paper acquisition is a Moleskine pocket journal. It is slightly larger than my Hipster, with creamy pages bound beautifully in a hard cover that closes with an integrated elastic band. It has a woven ribbon to mark what page I was on. Its almost too beautiful to write in...almost. I’m using it for more permanent thoughts – short term goals, a journal entry, a record of Aaron’s first words so far. I have a larger journal I have been filling for 3 years now, but it is too big to carry around routinely, so I hope to do more writing because I can carry it easier. Think about adding a little bit of useful paper to your life, too.

Happy New Year 2006

We hope your New Year is full of Joy and Peace.