Back To The Grind

Ian and I rounded out our trip to Arizona with slightly better weather (yay!) and a trip to the Phoenix Zoo.

I'm not sure what Ian's impression was of the zoo. He loves to ride in the stroller, but we had him in and out of it many times, which I'm sure was annoying, and it was nap/lunch time right about when we embarked on the adventure. This meant that we were on the verge of tears frequently. He did like the orangutan though, maybe because there was an active baby that looked an awful lot like a human baby playing.

He loves to people watch, so I think that was his favorite part of the day. It was a nice zoo and a bit warmer than the previous days, so we had a great day all in all. Despite the $6 kids meal of chicken nuggets (the most nutritious thing on their kids menu), of which he ate less than one, it was a fun way to spend the day. I think he'll enjoy the zoo more after he's home a while and starts to figure out that animals in the zoo are not just different sized dogs.

We did a bit more shopping (the primary passtime here), opened more early Christmas presents (!!!), and relaxed. It was a great trip and Ian seemed to really adapt to yet another different environment very well. There were only one or two 1am wake ups and he napped like a pro in the pack/play, which I half expected to be really difficult. We had tried to make his crib environment as much like home as possible, which I'm sure helped matters.

While in Arizona, Ian started trying to wave, but it's the backward wave with his palm and fingers facing him, and it is accompanied by "dada" instead of "hi" or "bye". It's really cute. Especially the sentiment that he was thinking about Shawn and really started saying dada more the last day.

He also walked barefoot on grass for the first time. Since it's the desert, the grass was a little "pokey" in places, but he did OK. I'm not sure if he understood why we were walking around on it without shoes on, but he was a trooper and survived unscathed.

On our last day, we put together a tent and tunnel, but he's not quite ready for that either. He started to warm up to the tent a bit once we bribed him with toys, but the tunnel was long and scary. That's a toy for next summer I'm afraid. At least that's the kind of thing that lasts for many years before getting old. One day he'll be begging to sleep outside in it.

The flight home was fine. We had an empty seat next to us again, so I'm very glad we didn't spend the money on a ticket for him. He was OK for the first half of the flight, bribes of food and all, but the last hour was a bit dicey. I could tell that he wanted to sleep, but couldn't get comfortable. There was a teenaged boy behind us and I could tell he was annoyed. Put on your iPod headphones kid and ignore us. Once, you were in Ian's shoes and someday you'll be in mine.

We're glad to be home and back to our old routine, but Arizona was fun and my parents were great hosts. It was hard to walk away at the airport, knowing they won't see Ian for a while. I'll have to make a point to show him pictures of them and say their names. I definitely want him to remember them and our fun trip.

Below are a few more pics of the week:

At the zoo with grama & paga

With mama and Mr. Giraffe

Ian's first piggy back ride (I put a stop to the fun right after getting a picture)

Paga did a great job of getting exercise in those legs

Ian's feet in grass for the first time

He was not thrilled about the tunnels. Grama was nearby to stop the torture...

...But he warmed up a tiny bit to the tent section