January 26 - January 29, 2018 - Isla Mujeres, Mexico (3 years 6 months) – First 3 days

On the ferry crossing from Cancun to Isla Mujeres

At our hotel, there was a perfect little pool with a long strip of shallow water where Kadito could run, swim, and play without me holding onto him.  See video below for the live action version – "Mama, watch this!"

Arrrgh!  Inside a shark's mouth on one of the piers.  We were having a blast, pretending to be scared, and just as I was about to take the photo, of course, he covers his eyes… ¡No fotos!

The hotel had a (somewhat sad) little tank of slider turtles and Kadin loved watching them.  One waiter let us pick up the littlest one but the next day another waiter said we couldn't because one of them bit a kid once.  They aren't mean turtles so I suspect the kid wasn't handling him properly, but oh well, no more picking them up.
I love Dito's wispy hair, necklace, and bare foot in this photo. 

We had a day of rain on the Island and so Kadito and I went to the bar to play some pool. We must have spent over an hour there.  He loved hitting them, of course, but he also loved listening to them go down the tubes and running the tray to pull them out again.

At the beach… popcorn was our favorite snack.  Kadin would walk up and down the beach looking for the popcorn vendors.  I love that in Spanish, popcorn is "palomitas" which means "little doves".

The waves weren't very big on Isla Mujeres, but big enough to still have fun!  I left Kadin's blue life jacket at a bus station by mistake and found this inflatable one at a mega store in Cancun.

August 1 - 15, 2016 - 2 years 1 month

Such the little Alaskan!

Lots of daycare photos this week…  

Daycare carnival festivities with Angelo pushing the car. 

Kadin looks serious, but had some seriously silly times with all the kids at Skye's birthday party.  Skye is the girl wearing the purple striped jacket. 

Enjoying his favorite foods at daycare - apple sauce, raisins, and crackers.

This is at Mia's house and he is handing her her margarita.  What a helpful little boy!  Of course, he had to take a teensy sip to see if it was well-made...

July 1, 2016 - July 3, 2016 – 23 months and 3 weeks – PART 2: FOREST FAIR IN GIRDWOOD

Ama went off to visit other friends in Copper Landing and we packed up our camping gear and headed to Girdwood for the Forest Fair. 

Here, Kadin and I stop at Burrito King in Anchorage for dinner before driving one more hour south.

Friday evening, we set up camp and catch the last music show.  The popcorn booth was closed, but Kadin pulled his best labrador puppy imitation and begged a shirt full off of a nice lady and her daugher (you can see them in the background).

The next morning, Kadin was heading off to the festival in true Girdwood style – naked!  I managed to throw a quick outfit on him and we went off to hear some more awesome music (and Kadin was on the look-out for more popcorn).

Chillin' at the Youth Stage

Met up with Regan, Ben, and their kids, Nia and Teo.  Amazing to see how big they are!!!

We met up with Tressa too, although I didn't get a photo of her, she took this one as we listened and danced to more music.

Tressa and Regan both only stayed for the day, and in the evening I grabbed dinner for Kadin and I and went into the beer garden for a drink before heading back to camp.  I should have know that the beer garden was where all the kids were!  Kadin ate a bit of dinner, spied a young girl with popcorn, and had a new best friend.  Soon, there were about 8-10 kids playing in a mini-forest grove with the parents chatting, enjoying their beers, and keeping an eye on all the little ones.  AWESOME!

(BTW, Kadin is just in front of the kid with the tye-dyed shirt, not quite in view in this photo.)

More kids in the beer garden...

After the kid party broke up, I was about to head to our camp, when Kadin spotted another group of "kids" with popcorn.  He ran over to a group of 8+ college friends and asked the big blonde guy to pick him up.  What a hoot!  They were originally from Kodiak, seemed tickled pink to hang out with a silly toddler, and Kadin hung out with them for more than an hour.  

He actually hung out with one more group of adults who also had popcorn, but by then he was finally fading and we crawled home and read stories in the tent until we both passed out around midnight.

Our final day at the Fair and we finally got our own GIANT bag of popcorn!

May 4, 2016 - May 10, 2016 - 21 months and 3 weeks

The week started with mellow outdoor fun around the house and XY Lakes...

Kadin was surprised to see me strip down and jump into the lake… He started to take his socks and shoes off but one foot in the water and he changed his mind!

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The next day was an early morning to day care, where I scooped him up asleep in the bed and needless to say, he wasn't too happy about it!  

(Although, of course, he had a blast playing all day at the day care center.)

And the following day was such a long day full of fun that I couldn't just pick 2-3 photos.  

Morning:  First we flew out to Polly Creek and headed out to the mud flats to go clamming.  It was a 4 plane outing and Kadin's best buddy Sky was there so she and Kadin played in the mud to their hearts content, getting as dirty and wet as they wanted.

Afternoon:  The tide started coming in quick, so we went back to the beach and had lunch.  As the tide came in faster and faster, it was time to get the planes off the beach and Kadin snuggled down in his seat for the flight.

Late afternoon:  We were having so much fun, we decided to keep it going and land on a sand bar by ourselves and play in the afternoon sun.  Kadin loved crawling and rolling in the warm sand and so did we!

Early Evening:  Keeping the momentum going, we got back to Talkeetna and had to clean the clams.  Meanwhile, Kadin snacked on his favorite – Popcorn!

Late evening:  And of course, once the clams were prepared, we all met up for an impromtu party and feasted on them.  Kadin and Sky were pretty wired by then (also, someone gave them icecream…) and were running around outside playing with anything and everything!   I love how just a small patch of woods can be a forest for a child.