Come along with the Castros and visit the railroad museum...

Today we had the chance to check out the Goldcoast Railroad Museum. When you arrive there are four tracks that have numerous train cars on each. The collection is a nice mix of old and new train cars, that you can go in and out of. On Fridays they have a special fun with food day for the kids. So we started by going into one of the train cars and eating ice cream. We then continued our tour by going on a train ride. Maddox sat next to one of his new "girlfriends". Her name is Lily. Maddox loves to hold her hand, give her hugs, and make sure she is always close to him. It is so cute to watch the two of them. She is a little shy and she gets the cutest little face when he shows her affection. After the train ride, I took Maddox to go look at the model trains. They were quite impressive. As was the Thomas the train play area that they have. Maddox was the only child in the play area and couldn't move from train set to train set fast enough. It was a little hot and humid so the walk back to the car was enough to knock both kiddies out right when we got home. We will definitely go back. (Especially since I left the camera in the car so I didn't get great photos)

Lily

Ringing the bell!

Come along with the Castros and play with ice...

Continuing our color theme for this week, Maddox and I whipped up a few batches of colored ice cubes. I let him add one (which turned into about 20) drops of food coloring into each space on the tray. Then came the hardest part, the time for them to freeze. We ended up checking them about 20 times before they were frozen enough to play with. When the time finally came I filled up his blow up pool on the patio and bought the ice cubes out to play with. He had a blast! He also had to try every one (even though I told him they all tasted the same, he just had to check it out for himself). In the end his hands and tongue were multicolored and the ice melted in about 2 minutes but he played with the "brown" water for a while. I always know if I can't think of something for us to do, water is the answer! Either in the pool on the patio or in small cup on the kitchen floor it is always good for at least a 30 minute activity. Which any mom will tell you the numerous number of task she can get done in 30 minutes....its so amazing!

Come along with the Castros and eat pizza and ice cream...

Since Harold is studying every free minute of every day it is a rare occasion when we go out to eat together. We were both exhausted and neither of us felt like cooking so we decided to do a quick pizza run. We don't eat much pizza at all here in Miami as nothing comes close to New York pizza so we just don't enjoy it as much as we enjoy other foods we do find here. We went to a resturant right down the road and guess what....we approve! Maddox isn't a huge fan of pizza but he even enjoyed a small piece. Afterwards, we headed across the street to a cute little ice cream shop. We love the little "drive in movie theater". But most of all we love the ice cream!!!

Believe it or not this ice cream tasted even better then it looks!

Come along with the Castros and practice matching colors...

I think that Maddox is a pretty smart kid (Don't all of us moms think that about our children?) but sometimes he does backtrack on some of the things that he has already learned. For example colors. I don't know what has happened but for the past couple of months he has been getting his colors confused and not remembering which is which. I decided to play a couple little games with him to practice some of his colors. I took clothes pins and popsicle sticks and colored one of each a different color. I then had him match the stick to the clothes pin. He is great at matching so that was simple for him . I had to come up with something else quick so I put down a bowl, plate, or cup of each color and had him go around the house looking for a toy or object for each color placing them on top of the matching color bowl, plate, or cup. I told him it was a treasure hunt and when he was finished he would get a prize. I loved that most of the toys he picked were cars or train related. He seemed to enjoy going on a "treasure hunt" and it was a great review too. I was also able to finish washing the dishes while he was busy looking. (Love these kind of activities!) After he finished the tasks he continued to play with the clothes pins and popsicle sticks building towers and train tracks. He is very imaginative too! Who knew it could be so much fun!

I put a little treat under one of the toys while he was finding the last item. He was so happy!

Come along with the Castros and build a tent...

Harold came up with the idea  to build a tent with Maddox and spend the night sleeping in it with him. Maddox cherishes any time that he gets to spend with his papa from the very second he walks in the door after work to the minute he wakes up. It was cute to see just how excited Maddox was. He didn't understand at first, he thought that he was supposed to jump on top of it like a trampoline. After knocking it down a couple of times he finally understood the concept of laying down inside. Although this didn't stop him from jumping around at all. He then collected all his stuffed animals as well as the portable DVD and placed them inside the tent all ready to go to bed. But that never really happened. Maddox goes to bed at 8 but he was too excited and when he was still awake at 10pm Harold gave up and bought him into out room to sleep on the floor in there. It didn't turn out as planned but Maddox still had a lot of fun! The pictures I got weren't great because Maddox just couldn't sit still, but here are a few. (And of course no pictures of them sleeping since that never happened.)

Come along with the Castros and discover new playgrounds with us...

Almost everyday we go to the playground. Maddox needs to let his energy out or it turns into a very long day for all of us. We have recently joined a new playgroup which meets 3 to 4 times a week. Many of these meet ups are held at local parks. This week we tried out a new park. At first I was not too fond of it. It was all sand, not too shaded (it was a beautiful day so it didn't really matter), it is located very close to a big road, and it is pretty big so it is harder to keep track of the kids. With that being said Maddox quickly fell in love. It allowed for many new challenges for him. He is a very physical kid so many things become easy for him fairly quick, but the equipment here was perfect for him. He loved all the climbing elements as well as any place he could hang. Afterall, he is my little monkey! One of my favorite things were these little seats that when the kids would sit on them they would start to spin around and around and around. Some of the kiddies couldn't stop them quick enough and got pretty dizzy. Just watching them the first few seconds after they got off was pretty entertaining! Maddox just kept saying woah woah woah. I wish I caught it on video for you. (maybe next time!) Landon loved it too as he is so happy anytime that he gets to sit in a swing! I must say it is nice to have a child that stays in one place for more then two minutes! I'm taking advantage of it now because it won't be too long until he is running around too.

This is right after he got off of the seat that goes around and around.

Come along with the Castros and do a puzzle with us...

One of my favorite things to do when I have spare time is to sit and do a puzzle. Now that I don't have much spare time of my own I enjoy watching Maddox try to conquer his puzzles. It really does amaze me, that this little boy with sooo much energy will take out a puzzle quite often to sit quietly and do. He is pretty good at completing them all on his own. At first I thought he was just doing them by memory but now he has begun to use logic to finish them. It really is quite impressive to watch how his little mind works!