bats, man!

this evening the whole family went to the library for the last event of the summer reading program (before the big party on monday). hayden had been waiting all month to go see live bats.
as soon as we got there, hayden somehow managed to get the front row, center seat (well, i'm sure it was through being pushy) and dave, talan and i took our seats in the chairs.
we really couldn't see hayden the whole time, but never really heard him, other than a laugh a couple of times. after the presentation hayden had the biggest smile on his face and kept saying how cute all of the bats were. he LOVED it.
talan wasn't too fond of sitting and dave eventually had to take him out. but while he was in the room, anytime they would show a picture on the screen up front talan would yell "butterfly!" i would say, "no, it's a bat." and he would yell even louder "BUTTERFLY!"
apparently the bats live at the cranbrook museum so we'll be taking a family trip there soon so hayden can get his fill of even more bats!

lego's at the library

we've been spending a lot of time at the library this month since they have the summer reading program. usually once a week we go for a special event and then several other times a week to pick out new books and turn in hayden's reading log and pick up his prizes.
we almost missed out on the event hayden wanted to go to the most, the lego building event. you have to register for each event the week before. when we went into the library to register, it was already full. luckily, the librarian told us she knew of at least one person that wouldn't be coming so she put us in the book.
they called to tell us to bring around 50-60 legos. dave and hayden decided he would build a castle and they put a big bucket of lego's that he would need together. it turns out that the lego event wasn't exactly what we had expected and a few tears came with it.
it turned out to be a lego building challenge. they had the kids separated by age groups but they still all competed against each other. they were told they could only have 50 legos, so we had to count out 50 of the pieces he thought he would need/want. the librarian would tell the kids what they needed to make and then tell them how much time they had. some things were a ridiculous amount of time like 1 or 2 minutes. the kids at hayden's table (the youngest kids) were not happy with this. hayden had a lot of castle type pieces which didn't help in some of the challenges.
hayden is very precise. when told to build the tallest tower, he couldn't simply just stack legos on top of each other to make it as tall as possible. he wanted to build a good sturdy and good looking tower. so in the end, he basically had nothing built. at one point he started crying and said "i'm NEVER going to get a medal!" as they were passing out 2 medals for each challenge.
one of the challenges was a BLINDFOLDED challenge in which they had to build a cube in 1 or 2 minutes. yeah...that one certainly wasn't the favorite over at our table!!! eventually hayden calmed down a bit and he even ended up winning the robot challenge. he was so happy to get a medal!
talan sat in his stroller the whole time and played pretty quietly with his own legos.
in the end, all of the kids got a goodie bag filled with legos, lego candy and lego stickers. they even gave one to talan.
hayden ended up having a DECENT time, but i know he wished he could have just built the castle that he had come intending to build. i must say, his adjustment skills are getting a bit better.

the blindfold challenge. they had to build a cube with no pieces sticking out. hayden didn't even have any pieces stuck together because he couldn't get it perfect:

the rocket ship challenge:
talan thought he was a part of the action too:

the tallest tower. hayden's didn't get any tall than this:
so happy to finally win a medal:
the medal winning robot:
the bridge challenge:

vandalism is fun!

the library is having it's summer reading program through the month of july so we went and signed hayden up the last week in june.
when a child reads 3 hours they are able to go to the library and get a prize. something hayden was able to do about a week into the program. he got a baggie filled with candy, a pencil, a bookmark and other fun things. once they meet that goal, they are then also invited to the big end of the program party in august.
once they read for 6 hours they are able to go and pick from either a frisbee or a bag. hayden only has about 25 more minutes until that goal, so we'll finish that up today and then head to the library for his prize this evening.
the last goal is 10 hours where they will get another prize.
besides all of the reading, the library has a whole calendar filled with fun things for the kids to do. many of the events are for certain age groups but some are for all ages. each week we are able to register for any of the events that we want to participate in for the following week.
the first event was a puppet making workshop. they were able to make as many as they wanted out of the 6 different stations. hayden went in and very quickly made a paper plate puppet and then decided that was all he wanted to do. after a little bit of persuading, and letting him know that there was nothing else going on that day, he made a couple other puppets. i helped talan make a paper bag dog puppet that he still carries around the house.
the next day, hayden was able to go to the library and paint on the windows. we got there bright and early so hayden was able to get a great window! he ended up painting a picture of thomas the tank engine (and thomas' name) and a robot. he also wrote his name next to both of his pictures.
after he was done painting, we stood in line to have his face painted. he has never actually gotten his face painted before. he has always opted for his arm. this time he kept asking "does it have to be my face? can i just get it on my arm?" but then eventually decided he would try it on his face.
i suggested that talan get a drum on his cheek and hayden decided he wanted a drum and a guitar.
hayden was up first and sat perfectly still for the lady. then i pushed talan's stroller up and talan kept saying "drum! cheek!" but as soon as the lady started to draw on him he freaked out a bit, so we just walked away. he had about a half of a circle but he really thought he had a drum on his face. he went around all day pointing to his cheek saying "drum!"
we then went over to the bubble area for a bit before heading home.
hayden had a good time and was very proud of his pictures. yesterday, talan and i went to the library without hayden and talan was so happy to see hayden's paintings. and i know hayden is looking forward to seeing them again this evening when we head over to pick up his second prize.

claiming his prime window spot:






face painting:



this was the drum talan got:
fun with giant bubbles: