Mino has been keeping us on our toes as of late. He is a full fledged toddler. He runs all day until he is angry or falls, he is happy until he is crying, he is laughing until he is screaming. I wish it was OK for everyone to be as open with how they really feel as this child is. We have found that the days of sitting on a mat in the living room batting at toys and having that count as fun are long over, this one needs to move. Since it seems that there will always be snow on the ground outdoors we have branched out taken advantage of some of the great indoor things to do around here.
Obviously eating is key, he goes for week long phases of what he loves. For a while he couldn't get enough waffles, now he wants nothing to do with them and prefers Raisin Bran. Who knows.
The Mall of America has a great aquarium that, with a coupon after 3pm is pretty cheap. We went to go try that out and it was a resounding success. They had a tank where you can pet animals like star fish and horseshoe crabs and sea urchings.
They had a room that was dark with almost black lights with tubes of jellyfish and mirrors. It was pretty sweet.
There is a huge walk through aquarium tunnel that has some very large fish and sharks. That is one thing, my child is not fearless. He is happy happy happy then all of a sudden very scared. I tried to lean him against the glass when the shark was swimming by. Whoops. That didn't happen. I suppose I can see why, that shark is multiple times larger than him, and even with his little broken fang teeth, the sharks teeth are more intimidating.
The octopus was more his scene. And the gift shop that you have to walk through on the way out. Without having a kid I never would have noticed this, but you know those vats with rocks you can pick out. Those are small rocks, the vat is really low. Mino likes rocks.
For Christmas we got him this sweet RadioFlyer wagon thinking that in the next couple months we could go walking to the park. Well, we are, just bundled up under blankets with winter hats on.
We improvise at home. Rudolph's nose is a surprisingly painful weapon when swung around really fast.
Nana and Granddude came so we pulled out the big guns and went to the Science Museum. Martin and I geeked out thinking that Mino would love to experiment and learn about cells and weather. Wrong, he loved the steps, and anything he could climb on. Once we found this section he was having a blast. Around the corner there is one of the best fully preserved Triceratops skeletons in the world, so that was the highlight for me.
Whilst sharks scare my child, apparently heights do not. He enjoyed the panorama of the Mississippi river with the paddleboats.
After yet another snow storm (and Mino doing his darndest to have his hairdo match doggies) we were really struggling with ideas. Martin's coworker mentioned this great indoor playground. We scoped it out.
Amazing. If I was 20 years younger I would have died. It is broken up into the under 4 years section and the over 4 years section with a separate open gym and a pool. The big kids section is 4 stories of rope ladders, slides, chutes, monkey bars. Super cool. Mino couldn't get enough of going up the stairs.
And down the slide.
And up the stairs.
One thing that is fun year round is baths. The kid loves them. But I learned the hard way that it isn't a good idea to let him learn how to drink out of regular cups with bathwater. That makes for an upset tummy and a screaming baby all night long.
And we have a biter.
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