Afternoon Academy: The Natural World

Whenever Keith has to work two jobs in one day, which has happened a number of times during the past 5 weeks, Cole and I have had time together to hang out on the town and have dinner together. Those Mama and Cole dates usually involve outdoor activities that are mainly focused on throwing rocks or sticks in a body of water - ANY body of water. He likes to call mostly everything a stream, but he does know "river,""ocean" and "lake,"  he's beginning to tell the difference between stream, river, ocean, and lake.

Since the weather has been pretty warm over the past month, being outside has been a joy. Watching Cole do something he loves is a lot of fun. He gets so focused and can spend almost an hour finding rocks, watching them "bounce", finding the right sticks to "bang" the water with, following sticks as they float down the river or stream, and, most importantly, squishing his nice new Vans onto the muddy shores of the streams, river, and lake that we frequent.

We also spent a good amount of time in our very own backyard, which is a great resource for investigating plant and insect life. Cole can also use the time to practice his gardening skills.

One more routine we've established, whether on a date or not, is to have a snack before bed. I always eat a snack before bed so I don't wake up at 3 a.m. starving. And as you probably know from Cole's sleep history, we don't want Cole waking up at 3 a.m. either. Since Cole seems to have inherited my metabolism, I figure it's good insurance for longer sleep.

Cole looks at the ecosystem that lives underneath our "herb barrel"

At Split Rock, Cole sits on a bench with a cereal bar.

Cole loves Split Rock so much that when Keith asked Cole where an airplane was landing (after Cole so helpfully pointed out it was flying over us) Cole said "It's going to Split Rock."

Cole plays gardener

Nightly snack time.

This is yet another time that I come unprepared for Cole to fall in, which he did very shortly after I took this picture.

Cheese!
(I actually took this before I got the new iPhone, so go me for getting a good shot without seeing what it looked like).

Our backyard is full of spaceships and boats.

The Wallkill River, another beloved spot.

Happy 23 months to my little boy! One more month and you'll officially be a 2-year-old. Oh boy!