going to the pumpkin patch!

Kiernen took a photo of me - he likes to practice with my camera as much as if not more than his own. I rather liked this one.


Then it was my turn to take one of him. He's all smiles until the camera is pointed at him. Then he's Mr. Serious. Don't be fooled, this kid is a funny guy.


We went to a corn maze this week. Kiernen's very favourite activity was this duck race. You put a little rubber duck into the white half-pipe, then used the water pump to propel it to the other end. Each end had a duck, so they could race, then you'd switch ducks. He wanted to do this again and again, and it was what warmed him to the rest of the place.
Kiernen picked out his own pumpkin and carried it to the wagon himself. He insisted.


Then he pulled the wagon with all three of our pumpkins on it - again, by himself. He pulled them almost all the way back to the entrance, which was across an entire parking lot. Pretty impressive!


Another activity he enjoyed was lassoing the bull - he did this quite a few times as well. First, throw the lasso over the bull's head.


Then pull tight! Make sure he doesn't get away!


And of course once he'd warmed to the idea, we went through the corn maze - we followed the map (a photo of the maze on a postcard) and answered the questions at each station to make sure we went the right way through. Kiernen enjoyed this, too - but not as much as the duck races!

More photos of the day at the pumpkin patch can be seen here: 

2010-10-23 1

Since Kiernen has turned 5, he has become Mr. Independent - all of a sudden, he can do everything on his own, and if we even offer help, he gets offended. An example: he gets his own overalls on AND snaps them up, all on his own. He tucks in his own shirt. He's been dressing himself for years on his own, but these were the last couple of things he ever needed help with. And now, not so much. He puts away his clothes on his own, and puts them in the hamper when they're dirty. He can sleep in the top bunk of his bed on his own, too, and sometimes he does - although he still prefers to snuggle next to a warm body - preferably that of his mother. But he HAS slept in that top bunk on his own, with some stuffies. More than once, even.
We talked about who he feels his special friends are and why: J (he's bigger and plays Lego Star wars); F (he likes to do pretend play (cars, trains, Star Wars)); O (pretend play with trains, Kiernen gets to be "the boss"); G (his favourite ault outside of his Mama - she really plays with him); A (does pretend play, is nice). *

* An aside this week about J and A: the other day, apparently J told Kiernen not to play with A. I didn't really know about it until after the fact and we talked about it and how J is NOT the boss of him and cannot tell him who he can and cannot play with. I noticed that a few times after that this week Kiernen brought it up again to me and said, "Tell J he's bossy, Mama, and he can't tell me not to play with A," when he'd see A. I'd let him know again that he can play with whomever he wants, and J is not the boss of him. But I could see that he was conflicted - it seemed that he didn't want to make J upset with him by playing with A, yet he really wanted to play with A. In the end, he played with A, reminding himself I think that it was okay and that J was being bossy when he told him not to play with her. He seemed quite conflicted about it, even sad, and said that J was bossy. It seemed he really needed my reassurance there that it was okay to play with her. Just very interesting to observe.

Back to his friends: we also discussed the friends he doesn't connect with much anymore and why. (M doesn't really do pretend play; little M fights a lot). He said how J is bigger than some of the kids. I talked about how being the biggest also meant that it was important to be the gentlest and look out for the younger kids. 

We read some jokes from my old joke book in preparation for Halloween - this book I've had since I was a kid, and I used to read it. I told Kiernen that it makes people smile when you offer a joke in exchange for their treat, so he might want to learn some to tell when we go trick-or-treating in our community. He particularly liked these two: 

Q: How does an octopus go into battle?
A: With lots of arms!
and
Q: How can you tell an elephant is in your refrigerator?
A: You can see his footprints in the butter. 

Those made both of us crack up, so I believe they might be the ones we use for Halloween. (Feel free to use them yourself, that's great comedy right there.)