Busy weekend! Back to school night, Irvine Global Village Festival, and LB Aquarium of the Pacific!

Whew! The title of this week's post says it all. We had quite a jam packed weekend of fun, so be prepared for a lot of pictures!

The weekend started out Friday night with our daycare's Back to School Night. It started out with dinner being served on the main playground with parents and kids from the whole school (they go from infant up to pre-k). There were so many kids running around! Tyler loved the meatballs (dinner was spaghetti) and insisted on feeding himself (extremely messy!). Afterwards we went back to the toddler room and got to see Tyler and his friends do what they do everyday - storytime, paint (a pumpkin), play (with safe-if-ingested playdough) and read. It was so cute watching Tyler run around with his friends!

Here's Tyler during story/singing time. Whenever we pick up Tyler when they're doing story/singing time, he's always right in the front, super attentive to the teacher, and swaying back and forth if they're singing. He gets impatient in between songs!

Whenever we get a chance, we like to join singing time. Tyler likes to sit in our laps and sing with his friends!
Painting pumpkins! I was worried Tyler was going to get super messy, but the paint came right off when I wiped it with a baby wipe!
Here's Tyler with one of the teachers in his class, Carly. How cute are they!
I heard from the teachers that this is the age where the kids start biting. Ack! Luckily, Tyler hasn't started that ... yet... (knock on wood). Here's a group shot of all the teachers and (some of) the kids in the toddler room. I love this picture! The teachers are all so wonderful!
Saturday was Irvine's Global Village Festival. I can not even begin to explain how huge this event was. There were literally 3 fields full of vendors, tables, stages, and activities. It was really awesome seeing so many people come together and all the different booths (restaurants, vendors, religious/cultural organizations, and kids activities). Here's Tyler checking out a dragon head at one of the booths. I got some information about Irvine's Chinese school - enrollment starts at age 5!
Near the same booth they had Chinese yo-yos lying around for people to try. Tyler loved it! He played with that thing for quite a while.
The festival had a lot of live performances (3 different stages!) and really loud music. Tyler is always swaying to music, and this event was no different! In this video, it's almost as if Tyler is listening to the music to decide if he likes it or not - then decides that he likes it and starts moving to the beat! :)

We went to the festival with a good mommy friend of mine (Julie) and her family. Her son Vincent is one of Tyler's first friends! Check out this link for one of their early pictures at school! They had a fun time riding this little airplane at the park where the festival was being held.
Here's myself, Tyler, Julie and Vince! We had so much fun that day and am totally looking forward to hanging out with them more. Next stop hopefully - visiting a pumpkin patch! Ooh, I found another picture of Tyler and Vince - Tyler was only 12 weeks old! It is going to be so fun watching them grow up together!
Sunday we headed to Long Beach's Aquarium of the Pacific. Are we insane? Yes! Actually, I have a really hard time passing up freebies - this past week was 'Boeing Appreciation Week' at the aquarium and Boeing employees + 1 guest were free! I only found out about it on Friday, and it ended on Sunday. So we had to go! We had gone back in March with a group, but I think this time Tyler was much more aware of what was going on (and walking too!).

I think this picture is so hilarious. This is Tyler walking to the Aquarium entrance. Look how excited he is!
Tyler definitely had his own opinions on what he wanted to see and not see. He would pause for a while at one exhibit and race right past another one. Here's a video of Tyler at one of the exhibits looking around.

Here's Will and Tyler at the petting pool (no petting occurred though). Strangely, I think Tyler most enjoyed the pigeons outside. He kept following this pigeon around, and the bird didn't even mind or fly away! Look! This seal is waving "Hi!" to Tyler!By the end of our trip, Tyler was tired and getting grumpy. He was back in his stroller and when we asked him if he wanted to get out and take a picture, he actually shook his head No! We wanted to get a shot in front of the jellyfish to match the one we got last time though - look how grumpy Tyler is!All in all, it was a fun trip to the Aquarium - especially because it was free!
What a full weekend! I think we learned this weekend that we shouldn't pack our weekends so full - they get really tiring! But at the same time, Tyler loves being out and about, so we'll have to find a good balance.

Ooh, another event that took place - Mojo's first hair (fur?) cut! We probably should have done this earlier (beginning of summer?) but since he's an indoor cat he'll be nice and warm regardless. We took Mojo to a groomer and he got the Lion's cut! That's where the cat is pretty much shaved everywhere except his head/end of tail/paws. It is really going to help us cut down on the amount of fur that he sheds all over. The groomer actually said Mojo was really good and calm! Will and I were amazed to see how skinny Mojo really is underneath all that fur, he usually looks so much bigger! Tyler... loves to pull on the tuff at the tip of Mojo's tail. Good thing Mojo is so good natured and understanding!
Here's a video of Tyler enjoying Mojo's new haircut!

Here's Tyler playing with one of his cool toys! My sister Kareen actually got this for Tyler when he turned 1, but he never really got the hang of it. I think he's finally getting to the stage where he likes to pull things around with him. And lastly, studious Tyler at the computer. He loves sitting there and tapping on the keyboard and rolling the mouse - even though we try really hard to distract him with other things!
Coming up this week - Tyler's 15 month doctor appointment! Whoohoo! I'm excited to see how much he's grown, but not looking forward to the shots though.

Note: I've been meaning to play my violin to Tyler and see how he responds to the music. I used to play to him when I was pregnant, and he'd kick/move around in my tummy! I was really excited to share this with him again... but it didn't turn out the way we had hoped. As soon as Tyler heard/saw me playing, he decided that he wanted to hold my violin. ... GASP. I don't really let anyone touch my violin, not even really Will! The result? A screaming, hysterically angry Tyler. Sigh. Hopefully he'll be better next time we try this again...

Have a good week everyone!