A Day Out with Thomas at Roaring Camp Railroad

Today was very special. Not only was it James' father's birthday (Happy Birthday Dad!), but we also took Peyton down to the Roaring Camp railroad in Felton (near Santa Cruz) for their Day Out with Thomas event!

They had all sorts of activities set up around the grounds including train tables, bouncy houses, face painting, bubbles, videos, and of course, the Thomas train that took us on a beautiful ride through the redwood trees.

It was a delightful day and we can't wait for it to come back next year! We'll definitely visit Roaring Camp prior to then. :-)

Peyton the Contortionist

Every day, after school, I take Peyton to either the Menlo Park or Redwood City train station to watch the midday trains. He loves seeing the trains. He says "Hello train. How are you doing?" most of the time - not as often as when we first started doing this.

Peyton likes to play on the crossing tracks after the trains leave the station. The trains only come hourly between 10am and 3pm.

A northbound train (right) and southbound train (left). This doesn't happen to often, but when it does...

...Peyton gets annoyed when I ask him to turnaround to take a picture with both trains! Bad mommy - ha!

Last week, we got quite a surprise. The northbound train pulled up hauling two engines! Peyton was confused but liked it!

He likes to play on the crossing tracks after the trains leave and likes to inspect the crossing arms.

Happy at the train station yesterday!

We usually get to the stations a few minutes before the northbound train arrives and then wait another 10-15 minutes for the southbound train. During this time, Peyton stomps on leaves, looks at the train schedule board, watches what people are doing, and if all that fails, he does this (at the Menlo Park station):



My little contortionist. I'm not sure how much longer he'll be able to do this as he's growing, growing, growing!

Trains and Spelling

Life has been crazy at the Stafford house recently, so I apologize for not posting any new updates lately.

Peyton is doing very well! He started his school district classes in September. He attends a social skills group two mornings a week and has 30 minutes of speech therapy prior to his social skills group one day. The group that he's currently in is comprised of 5 kids all with some language delays which are causing delays in socialization. Last week, I met with his teacher and she told me that Peyton's language skills are above what she's teaching in his current group, so she will be creating a new group for him and one of his classmates starting in November, that will focus exclusively on applying his language to socialization. James and I are very pleased that the teacher is willing to make this change so early in the school year!

The three other days of the week, he continues to go to his inclusion preschool at Milestones, part of Abilities United. He loves it there! He's made some great friends. Our little guy is growing up; he now calls me "Mom" and James "Dad". Rarely, he'll call us Mommy and Daddy, but he's definitely not a little baby any more!

Potty training has derailed - up through last week, he was able to pee and poo on the potty, but just wouldn't tell us when he had to go. Then on Sunday, he refused to go to the potty AND refused to get his diaper dirty. This caused big messes at night. :-( So, I've had to beg him to go in his diaper and we'll revisit the potty another time. (He'll go at school, sometimes, so it's definitely a control issue on his part - my little Taurus).

But, I'm happy to tell you that Peyton has started to SPELL! He can tell you what letter words start with, and has learned to spell his own name. We are so proud of him!

Peyton's FIRST Train Ride!

This weekend was the Abilities United Carnival at Peyton's preschool. James and I have been trying to plan a day to take Peyton on the train, but couldn't find the right time because we would always need a car wherever we ended up. Plus, we didn't want to go anywhere too far, in case he didn't like it (you never know).

There's a train station about a mile away from Peyton's preschool, so we decided that a 4 stop ride would be perfect as a starter trip. I dropped James and Peyton off at the Redwood City station. I waited with them until the train came.

Peyton was SO excited.

He was happy to hear the train.

There it is!

Waiting patiently.

So excited!

I apologize for the loud screech of the train's brakes as it stopped at the station, but here's a quick video of them getting on the train.

I picked them up at the California Street station and we made our way over to the Carnival. We had a lot of fun, and Peyton got to experience his first jumpy house. He loved it!

Then it was back to the train station and I got my turn to ride with him back to Redwood City, while James drove to pick us up.

 The earlier train had been very full, so Peyton had to sit on James' lap and couldn't really look out the window as there was someone in the window seat. The Northbound train was pretty empty, so we got seats to ourselves and Peyton got to sit by the window. 

 He was surprised to hear the conductor's voice come over the intercom.

We had fun!

 I tried to get him to look at my phone while saying Chugga Chugga Choo Choo, but he was glued to the window. Once again, I apologize for the loud background sound.

 He was really fascinated by how fast things were passing.

He LOVED riding the train. He keeps asking to ride the train again. Now, he wants to ride the train to the Academy of Sciences. The train station is on the other side town, so we'd definitely have to split up and have one of us drive up and pick us up and then drive to the Academy. Maybe....

Play Date with Naoki!

A few weeks ago, we were invited over to Peyton's friend Naoki's house for lunch and a play date. Peyton was so happy to see his best buddy from his early intervention class and Naoki was happy to see him too!

We went into their backyard for some outdoor fun.

Naoki's little brother Koki joined in the fun. He's just so darling!

Peyton practiced dunking the basketball in the hoop.

While Naoki was having fun filling up the wheelbarrow with water.

Koki helping his big brother.

Peyton decided he enjoyed watching Naoki, so he would dump out the water just to let Naoki refill it.

Then we took a walk to one of the play areas in Naoki's community.

James and Aki, Naoki's Dad, were pulled into chasing the boys around. (Koki stayed home as it was his nap time).

It got hot, so we went back to their house and, since Koki was asleep, Aki brought out the "special trains" - a motorized TOMY train set from Japan that is just awesome. Satoko, Naoki's Mom, and Naoki built one track.

Look what the engineers built (Aki is also an engineer)!

Naoki and Peyton loved watching the trains zip around.

We want to thank the Matsuda's for having us over that day. We had so much and look forward to doing it again soon!