Mall Santa

Friday afternoon we took the kids to the mall so Tai could pick out an ornament to buy for the tree. This seems to have become an annual tradition, if doing something twice makes it a "tradition".

Anyway, we were walking through the mall and came across a sad Mall Santa and his elf, sitting all alone with no children anywhere in sight. Obviously anxious for something to do, he vehemently waved Tai over. Naturally, Tai went into shy mode and was almost too scared to even walk past. But when Santa waved a free coloring book around, Tai was convinced to step just a little closer (leaving a good three feet between him and Santa) and reach out and grab the book.

Then, of course, Santa popped the question: "What would you like for Christmas? Popular Option A, Popular Option B, or Popular Option C?"

Are you kidding me? A multiple choice Santa? Talk about a leading interview question. Is it always this way? Having *never* sat on a Santa lap myself and having a child who has also never done it, I'm not sure if this is how it normally goes, but it sure seems lame to me. I was expecting him to mumble under his breath, "Available at Target, Aisle 17, for $29.99." I mean, really, who is paying him to lay out options for these kids?**

I indicated to Santa that we had already sent him a (purposely vague) letter and that he should look for that in the mail. But it was too late. My son had already responded with "Option A." Coincidentally, he will be receiving Option A from his grandparents. Knowing him, he'll remember this interaction and I'll have to field questions Christmas morning about how and why Santa contacted his grandparents and told them that Tai wanted Option A. Ugh.

**And don't even get me started on the fact that the options he laid out were totally gendered. Oh how I wish Tai had said, "Actually, I want more pink Hello Kitty socks." And I'm just glad Quynh is still too young for Mall Santas to ask her if she wants (a) a Barbie or (b) a Bratz Doll.

I Don't Have it in me to Construct Paragraphs

So you get a bulleted list today:

• After wrapping five of them, I now know exactly what size piece of wrapping paper is perfect for wrapping a Zhu Zhu Pet.
• I am delighted to report that my husband took my son to the ballet today. They are such Modern Men.
• Tomorrow is Minh's birthday. And we've gotten to the point in our lives where his gift consists of: (a) sleeping as late as he wants, (b) dinner from Pizza Hut, and possibly (c) a home-made card from Tai, if he's amenable to an art project tomorrow morning.
• Swim class continues to go well, despite Tai's insistence each week that I inform his teacher that he's "only going to put my feet in today" or "going to hang on to the wall the whole time". By this point in the game, the teacher just says OK and rolls her eyes because we all know he's going to get in and swim like a fishy.
• Quynh is waking from nap. I must go snuggle her till the boys get home.

Mixing Worlds

This year, because Tai's birthday party will not be held at home, we've felt free to expand the guest list quite a bit. Instead of four kids, we are expecting between seven and ten. We've invited his "usual" gang of school friends, but also some out-of-school friends, as well as two cousins and four grandparents.

This should be interesting.

Actually, I think it could be great. The guests are all people Tai loves and it might be wonderful for them to all meet each other. Or it could overwhelm him and cause a meltdown. Or he could devote all his time and attention to a couple kids and ignore the rest. When they are 4, there's just no predicting. Needless to say, I spent the last several days agonizing over the location, date, time, and guest list. And this year it was supposed to be easy--since we won't have to host it at home.

Anyway, it's officially booked and the invites are sent. Now I can take a deep breath and all I have to do is spend the next few weeks agonizing over cake, snacks, and party favors. Ugh.

In Case You Get Lost....

...ours is the house with the six-foot-tall sparkling inflatable snow globe in the middle of the front lawn.





Oh yes, our mischievous neighbor has outdone his own past hijinx with this stunt. I foolishly mentioned to this man that my kids love all the tacky decorations in the stores this time of year and then immediately saw a naughty twinkle in his eye.

Two days later Minh went to take the dog out for "last call" and found this, still in the box, in our driveway. Even though it was late, and cold, and dark, and I was tired, I immediately started hatching a plan to go set it up on his front lawn. We got as far as opening the box and reading the directions before deciding that anything with an air pump, and stakes, and tethers needs to be set up in the light of day.

So what could we do but set it up on our own lawn the next day? And, of course, the look of sheer joy on both kids' faces was priceless when it first inflated. Tai loves the way the lights shimmer at night and Quynh calls it "pop up!" and keeps asking to touch it.

Alas, I fear this item has now joined the annual decorations for our household, for years to come. If our neighbor keeps this up, we'll soon be able to start charging people to drive by and gawk at our holiday decor.

I've promised our neighbor that there will be retaliation, I just don't know what, or when.

Quantifying My Life

18 - number of months since Quynh was born (how did that happen?)

25 - number of pounds Quynh weighs

2 - number of turkey dinners we attended last Thursday

3 - number of servings of cranberry sauce Quynh ate

0 - number of bites of turkey Quynh ate

101.8 - fever both kids came down with last weekend

6 - number of hours of television Tai watched while sick

5 - number of new words Quynh seems to learn each day

3 - number of words she can string together ("more please, daddy!")

1 - number of days it took me to read this month's Book Club book

3 - number of people who will be attending Book Club this month

15 - number of online scrabble games I've played recently

1 - number of online scrabble games I've won -- I need dumber friends

47 - number of months since Tai was born (I really need to start planning his birthday party.)

6 - number of social events planned for December, thus far

0 - number of Christmas gifts I've bought so far

1 - number of personal days I'll have to take off work to get Christmas shopping done without kids in tow

Sometimes It's Like My Kids Are People

Tai has been interested in selecting his own outfits for quite sometime now. And he certainly has specific ideas about what he likes. He tends to choose bright colors and shirts with pictures on them, and has a fierce preference for pants with elastic waists. This past weekend he went to a birthday party and carefully selected his outfit 2 days in advance -- running pants, a bright yellow t-shirt featuring colorful lizards, and black-and-yellow arm-warmers, which are actually baby leg-warmers. (Whereas I would have put him in dark-wash jeans and a neutral shirt, or perhaps a sweater).

Well, now Quynh is starting to voice her fashion preferences too. Sometimes I think it's just her way of asserting her independence for no good reason. Occasionally I pull a pair of pants out of her drawer in the morning and she yells, "noooooo!" And if I grab another pair of pants out of the drawer and she'll often say "noooo!" and then go for the first pair I picked.

Then the other day at Costco, I was perusing the feety pajamas (because I have a documented weakness for feeties). I selected some adorable, gender-neutral, red pajamas with little brown doggies all over them and handed them to Quynh. Then I pushed the cart around the other side of the pajama display, just to see if there might be another pair we should get (seriously, I have a pajama addiction) and Quynh spotted the pair she wanted.

She thrust the red doggy pair back and me and leaned as far out of the cart as she could, toward the PJ display, reaching for the pair she wanted and saying "eh! eh! kitty! kiiiiiiitty!" My daughter had her heart set on pastel pink leopard-print pajamas, with kitties on the feet. Oh man, of the 17 designs available these were *way* down on the list of what I thought was cute. I feebly tried again to sell her on the dog ones, but she had her heart set on the kitties. As the cashier rang them up, I rationalized that it's only pajamas and no one will see them. But I fear this is only the beginning of the end of my ability to dress her however I please.

Class Clown

We had our first pre-school parent-teacher conference last week and Tai's report was remarkably consistent with the past 6 conferences we've had since he started "school" at the age of 8 months.

We've conferred with four different teachers about Tai and they all tend to use the same types of adjectives to describe my boy. It goes something like this:

Intelligent

Articulate

Perceptive

Observant

Considerate

Kind

Loquacious

Gregarious

During one of our first conferences, back when Tai was about 10 months old, we were told that he and another baby could not be seated near each other at lunch because they would get too silly. Tai would purposely throw food on the floor and his friend would laugh hysterically and then throw some of her food on the floor. This would please Tai and he would then fling some more food off his tray.

(Those of you who know Tai and his circle of friends undoubtedly know the identity of his partner in crime.)

During the next two years we received similar reports from the toddler teachers. Our first indication that Tai requires an audience should have been when the teacher pulled up the slide show of pictures and explained that she searched and searched but could not find a single photo of Tai playing alone.

We were then told that Tai needed to work on "letting other children have a turn to speak at lunchtime" and that the toddler room had instituted a going-around-the-table system for taking turns sharing stories at lunch. Each time a child started in with their story a teacher had to remind Tai not to interject.

So now he's a preschooler. Not the oldest, or the most popular, but he still enjoys a loyal following. He told me that he sits with the same crew each day and lunch including -- you guessed it -- his old partner in food-throwing from the baby room. What he neglected to tell us was that he sometimes has to be separated from his audience in order to settle down, stay seated, and actually eat.

We were asked at this most recent parent-teacher conference, "What is mealtime like at home?" because they were trying to figure out if he's as silly and fidgety for us as he is for them.

The answer is yes.

Although Minh and I are now officially "over" Tai's sense of humor and do our best not to encourage his mealtime antics, his sister (unfortunately) thinks he's hilarious. Tai's shenanigans elicit deep belly laughs from Quynh and requests for "more! more!" She's also taken to imitating his physical comedy routine, whether that means balancing your cup on your head or pushing your chair away from the table mid-meal.

We are in trouble.

If You Wait Long Enough....

....Things actually will come back in fashion.

I never really thought that would happen to anything in my closet, but it has. And I'm not even talking about the Skinny Jeans with the zippers on the ankles (damn, I threw mine away in 1991). I'm talking about Converse All Stars.

The other day my office's 20 year old student worker came in wearing a shiny new pair of converse low tops and engaged in a conversation with a similarly young co-worker about said shoes. I found myself shocked that The Kids These Days are wearing the same sneakers I wore all through high school and into college. Whaddaya know.

So I fessed up to still owning two pairs of high tops and a pair of plaid low tops. They've been in my closet for.....oh....17 years or so. I have no idea why I never threw them away, even though I had no intention of ever wearing them again--probably due to my sentimental attachment to them. And now my hoarding has paid off and I'm back in style, having worn my plaid sneaks to work, and really stretched the definition of Casual Friday.

And this morning, while dropping Tai off at school, I noticed that one of the work-study students in the pre-school room was also wearing low-top converse all stars. Based on this, I'm now certain that I am either (a) totally hip and cool or (b) dressed inappropriately for my age and making a fool of myself.

Don't Forget to Vacuum!

Tai is so excited for his playdate tomorrow that he was eager to clean up the house this evening. He stated immediately after dinner, "I'll push in the chairs and make everything nice and neat. You (Mama) clean the table."

"OK," I said.

"Oh! And don't forget to vacuum!"

Sadly, he's come to think that the only reason to clean the house is having guests. Not too long ago he found me cleaning up and asked, "Who's coming over?" When I said, "No one" he was perplexed. He also occasionally asks, "Why are you vacuuming for so-and-so? Are they allergic to animals?"

Well, That Never Happens

It's very rare in parenting (actually in Life) for me to make a decision and then realize that it was the *correct* decision. Although I spent a full week worrying that my enrolling Tai in the next level of swim lessons was going to be the Biggest Mistake Ever, it turned out to be a Fantastic Parenting Move.

We had no tears or anxiety on the way to swim class, though he did remember (and remind me of) his plan to simply sit on the edge and put his feet in. I said that was perfectly fine, but if he did decide to go in, I'd buy him anything he wanted out of the snack machine in the lobby of the YMCA. And I made sure that while we were checking in he perused the contents of said machine and picked out what he would get, if he went in the pool.

Apparently the promise of a 60-cent bag of Goldfish crackers goes a long way.

He made sure I told his teacher that he was feeling nervous and might just want to sit on the edge. She said that was perfectly fine with her, took him firmly by the hand, and led him over to the edge of the pool. He was already comfortable with this teacher, as she was the same one who taught Pike and Parent. I took my place on the bleachers.

Of the 5 kids she had lined up on the wall, Tai was the last one to get in the pool, but he did get in. And the next thing I knew, he was literally on the teacher's back, with his arms around her neck like a baby chimp. She taught the first 10 minutes of the class with an extra 30 lbs on her back!

And soon enough he was comfortable hanging onto the the wall, awaiting his turn to do whatever activity was next. Before the 30 minute class was over, he had jumped into the deep end and even tried a sitting dive -- both firsts for him. I was so proud I nearly cried.

Nudge....Nudge....Splash

Last week was the final Pike and Parent swim class. Although Tai displayed some amazing bravery early on in the class, the last few weeks he has been insisting that I hold onto him because he is, "afraid I'm going to sink." Not sure where that's coming from.

He's also been expressing anxiety over the idea of moving on to the Pike/Eel class, which would require him to go into the pool without me. At first I was horrified at the thought of having to force him to do something that scares him, and potentially cause him to fear swimming altogether. I told him we'd talk about it and decide later which class to sign up for, mentally resigning myself to 6 more weeks of having to remember to shave my legs for Freakin' Swim Class.

But then the more I thought about it, the more I wondered if this might be the time to push him beyond his comfort zone. And the more I thought about the fact that the Pike and Parent class is only offered at one seriously inconvenient time slot, the more I convinced myself the right thing to do was to sign him up for the next level.

So I did. Behind his back.

Last week as we were leaving, he overheard talk of the time slot change for next week and started crying and pleading with me. "Mama, I don't want the class without the parents! Don't make that plan! That's not my decision!"

Needless to say, I felt horrible for having gone behind his back and signed him up for something I knew he was afraid to try. I tried to say, "Oh, let's not worry about that until next week." But he insisted we have it out, right there in the parking lot of the YMCA. So we talked it through and we've made a plan.

This Saturday I will not be going in the pool. But he might not either. He's agreed to sit on the edge and put his feet in and consider going in, if he feels comfortable. If not, I told him he can just watch for the first week and then go in the second week. To which he replied, "Or maybe after 3, or 4, or 5 weeks." Smart kid.

Will this be the right path? Is this just the little extra nudge he needs to feel more confident? Or will this destroy his self-esteem, make him question his trust for his mother, and instill in him a fear of water? I guess we'll wait and see.....

My Kid is Cute, and Weird

I had this conversation with Tai this morning:

T: When do we get to go trick or treating again?

K: Not until next Halloween.

T: Next year?

K: Yes, you’ll be four-and-three-quarters by then!

T: Wow, do you think my socks will still fit me then?

K: I dunno.

T: Is that an age for dying?

K: No, of course not.

T: Will my socks still fit me when I die?

K: I dunno.

T: What if I never die?

....and on and on.....

Adventures, Big and Small

Last weekend we took the kids to Six Flags New England, a place we had not been in more than 10 years. Despite my concerns that paying $100 for admission and $15 for parking might not be worth it, considering Tai's hot-and-cold fear of rides, we decided to try it. Some friends of ours were taking theirs kids (almost exactly the same ages as our kids) so we figured it'd be a fun way to have a play date. And we hoped that the other little boy might help coax Tai onto some of the scarier rides.

The last time we went to Six Flags, Minh and I enjoyed the water park and the Mind Eraser, and then I literally thought I might die on Superman, Ride of Steel. Not coincidentally, that was the last roller coaster I went on, to date. During that trip, I never even noticed that they had kiddie rides.

During last weekend's trip to the park, however, I hardly noticed the thrill rides, as we spent all our time in Thomas Town, Wiggles World, and Looney Toons Movie Town. My, how times have changed. Tai's fear seems to be one of speed, as he was happy to go on the slow moving train, the carousel built in 1902 that creaked and groaned in a disconcerting way, and even the kiddie version of the elevator-drop ride. But one look at the kiddie roller coaster sent him running the other way (a boy after my own heart?)

Actually, I'm trying hard not to let my fears rub off on him, and I offered enthusiastically to go on the kiddie coaster with him, but to no avail. He also skipped the helicopters and rockets ships in favor of the teacups, cars, and monster trucks. Quynh went on a few rides herself and had a blast climbing and running around in the play area. All four kids enjoyed the live Wiggles show, which contained no actual Wiggles, but a woman who put her heart into every song and clearly had aspirations bigger than the Six Flags Stage. My favorite part of the show was the security guard, in charge of keeping kids from rushing the stage, who danced with such enthusiasm we were sure he was after the role of Captain Feathersword.

Then, on Monday, we grown-ups went zip lining in the Berkshires. Now this is my type of adventure. While roller coasters terrify me (because they're certainly going to either derail or crash, or throw me from the seat). I was not the least bit scared of zip lining. Perhaps it was the heavy-duty harness, or the feeling of control (we were taught to brake as needed). Whatever the reason, my only fear of that first zip was the worry that I'd do something wrong and look like an idiot.

After three hours of zipping, repelling, and traversing bridges from tree to tree down a mountain, I was plotting our return visit. Since the first few zips of the day were spent learning how to take off, break, and land, I'm sure we'll have even more fun now that we are experts. But maybe we should skip the Berkshires and head straight to Costa Rica?

Nothing is Cute at 2am

My fantastic sleeper is not so fantastic anymore. For months now she's been sleeping 7pm-6am straight through, like an angel. Suddenly, all last week she started sleeping till 7am -- even better! And then this week her wake up time started creeping earlier and earlier. 6:05, then 5:50, then 5:40. And THEN last night she was up calling for me "Mama! Mama! MaaaaaMaaaaa!" at 1:30am.

Ugh. I was sleepy and I have a cold, and I'm a softie, so I went to her after 5 minutes of very loud wailing. I tried (briefly) to comfort her without taking her out of the crib, but she was all "up! up! up!" so I caved in and brought her to our bed, hoping she'd snuggle with me and go back to sleep. No such luck.

First she pointed at the TV "watch! watch!" I said no. She wailed.

The she handed me her nuk and lovey and said "all done" (sleeping, I assume). Yeah, right

.

Then the cat heard all the commotion and jumped up on the bed. Great. "Nibbies!!!" Quynh squealed.

Then Buttons came over to see what was going on "Butties!!!"

After goofing around for 15 more minutes, and taking a few sips of water, she settled. And was *almost* asleep when Minh came to bed at 2am. (why he was up that late, I have no idea)

"Daddy! Hi!" she said as he climbed into bed.

Then she stood up, walked all over the bed, climbed up on Minh and tried to play with him.

Minh and I did our best to pretend to sleep and ignore her, so that she would get bored and settle down.

Then she broke out into song "A, B, C, D....."

She never asked to nurse, but did sign, and say, the word "eat" a couple times. But I'll be damned if I'm gonna set a precedent where you can get up and go have a snack in the middle of the night.

After what seemed like *forever* she settled next to me, on my pillow and started playing with my hair, twirling it in her fingers in a very uncomfortable, tickly, knot-producing way, and saying "mama, mama" quietly.

Finally, she was still. I opened my eyes only to find her laying very still, eyes wide open, staring at me.

Creepy.

I pretended to sleep for 10 more minutes, then peeked again.

She was still staring at me.

Eventually, we all fell asleep again. Probably around 3am.

I can't wait to see what time she wakes tonight.

Pike and Parent

Tai and I are enrolled at a swim class for 3-5 year olds in which the parent also goes in the pool. It meets Saturday morning for six weeks and I'm hoping that at the end of six weeks he'll want to sign up for the "regular" pike class and I can just sit on the sidelines and watch.

I think it was a good choice for him to take the class with the parents, because the first couple weeks he was clinging to me and always making sure I had a good grip on his waist. But last week he had a breakthrough. With a bubble on his back and noodle under his armpits, he "swam" all over the pool. When I first let go of him, he noticed and panicked. So I held him lightly. But then I let go again and he was kicking those legs and moving himself across the pool, so I whispered in his ear "I'm not holding you -- you're doing it on your own."

He had reached the edge of the pool, and it was time to turn around and swim back across. I positioned myself in front of him and held out my hands. But he said, "No, Mama. Don't hold me. I can do it." I was so proud of him. And during the "free time" portion of class that's all he wanted to do. He swam over to the toy bin, then across the pool, and then batted a ball back and forth with the instructor (on whom he appears to have a huge crush). All the while with no adult holding on to him. I wished I could take a video to show everyone, but I was standing in 42 inches of water and my phone was on dry land.

The Well is Dry

Q has not nursed in over two weeks. About a month ago I implemented the "don't offer, don't refuse" method of weaning that worked so well for Tai. However, Q is her own person. This method served only to piss her off and turn her into Cranky Pants Clingy Baby 24-7.

So I began turning down her requests to nurse, which made her fiercely angry for about 1 minute each time. But in between she was more pleasant. So we went cold turkey. And I tried to keep us out of situations that would cause her to ask. So each morning after taking her out of her crib, instead of snuggling her in the glider I'd whisk her off to the living room, or the breakfast table. But I missed our morning snuggles.

After a couple weeks, we're just getting back to the point where I can sit with her in the glider again. We read several books each morning while Minh and Tai are still snoozing. She just can't get enough of Peek-a-Who these days. It's really quite nice. Every couple days she still asks to nurse, but with a look in her eye like she knows she's being ridiculous. And she's much less angry when I turn her down. Soon I hope to be able to snuggle her in our bed on a Saturday morning without causing an argument over my breasts.

I'm guessing the well is indeed dry at this point, though Tai has other ideas. The other morning Quynh was being unusually grouchy and was pawing at my shirt. Tai noticed and said, "No, she doesn't nurse anymore. She can still eat food. And Mama's food still turns into milk, but Quynh can't drink it."

Personal Shopper

I'm taking a personal day tomorrow. To go shopping.

Is it just me, or does anyone else periodically go on shopping "sprees" thinking they they are buying loads of new stuff that will ensure a closet full of fashionable, well-fitting clothes for years to come, only to get home and realize that (a) you really only bought six things and (b) those six things are so nice they make your old clothes look worse? So now you only have six things you feel like you can actually wear.

Anyone? Anyone? Is it just me that does this?

Well, tomorrow I'm headed to the mall, once again. This time I not be pressed for time (since the kids will be at school) and I will not hesitate to (gulp) spend tons of money. All in the name of not having to go shopping again for a good long time.

I'm going to justify the money spending with the fact that whatever I buy now should fit me for a very long time, since I'm done with pregnancy and nursing. Now I just need to stop eating like I'm still nursing a newborn 10 times a day ;)

Hibachi!

Last night we found ourselves out and about at dinner time, so we decided to take Tai to his first-ever Hibachi dinner. Here's your re-cap:

• The balloon animals were a big hit with both kids.
• Quynh was a huge hit with the wait staff.
• Tai was mesmerized/frightened the entire time.
• I was the only one who successfully caught a piece of zucchini in my mouth.
• Minh successfully caught sake in his.
• Tai refused to open his mouth, got squirted in the face with water, and was not pleased.
• Quynh was fidgety and fussy and not very engaged in the spectacle at all.
• Tai ate a *ton* of shrimp and scallops, deftly avoiding all vegetables on his plate.
• Quynh filled up on orange juice and soup, and then hardly ate any dinner.
• We topped it all off with Herrell's Ice Cream.

When it was all over, we asked Tai "What was your favorite part?" and he replied, without hesitation, "I didn't like the fire because it almost burned my head."

Poo Haiku

Diapers handed down
to sister. Two poops in the
potty. Minh cleaned both.

Three Book Clubs

Last night was the second meeting of my book club. Despite my original ambivalence, I think I am actually enjoying this new endeavor. I am reading more, which is nice, and I get out of the house every 6 weeks. The interesting thing about this club is that the two Founding Mothers have very different personalities and, accordingly, taste in books. As a result, the first two books we read were radically different and these two women tend to butt heads a little bit during the meetings, which keeps things spicy.

Although I finished the first book mere hours before the first meeting, this month I finished weeks ahead of time and made it half-way through another book, lent to me by a friend and neighbor. It is excellent and I've already recommended it to two different friends. My neighbor and I plan to get together for a glass of wine once I finish this book and have our own little unofficial "book club". And she's already recommended another book for me to read after this one. Suddenly I feel like I'm in two book clubs--how did that happen?

Last night at dinner I explained to Tai that I was going out for a book club meeting and that Daddy would stay home and put him to bed. Of course, Tai wanted details about what a book club meeting is like, so I elaborated. Apparently, after I left Minh and Tai had their own book club meeting during which they discussed the Frog & Toad series as well as How The Grinch Stole Christmas. From what Minh tells me, Tai's participation in the discussion included, "I like Toad because he says 'blah'." and "I like the part [in The Grinch] where he takes all the gifts but then brings them back."

Minh and Tai's book club meeting quickly ended when it morphed into a tickle session. At my meeting we occasionally got temporarily off-topic, but there was no tickling.

Things I Do Because I Have Kids

There are many of things I no longer do, since becoming a mother. Sleep late, go out to the movies, take the dog on many-mile hikes, skip dinner, spend all afternoon reading a good book, etc.

But there are a number of (enjoyable) things I suddenly find myself doing because I have kids:

Going to the beach.

Using the public library.

Going out for ice cream. Frequently.

Picking blueberries.

Selecting a hotel because it has a pool. And then using the pool.

Coloring.

Going to county fairs.

Re-watching great movies like Shrek and Toy Story.

Singing. Wherever, whenever.

Dancing. Usually in the living room.

Attending local events -- tree lightings, outdoor concerts, apple festivals, etc.

Playing hide-n-seek.

Drawing on the driveway with chalk.

Swinging. Sliding. Playing.

Sparkle and Ash

I find myself the mother of a little boy whose favorite color is pink, who is undeniably drawn to anything that sparkles or shimmers, and who always wants to be Princess Fiona when we "play Shrek".

This same little boy is also just discovering the concepts of fighting and violence. Every other sentence out of his mouth seems to be about fighting. "These dinosaurs are fighting" "Quynh and I were just fighting" "Let's play fighting -- it might be a little violent, OK Mama?" Maybe he only says all that to Push My Buttons, because he's also started using rude words* just to get a rise out of me.

Today at the mall he wanted me to buy him three pieces of "back to school" clothing -- (1) a pink t-shirt covered in glittery peace signs, (2) a pink and grey shirt with a sparkly princess crown on the front, and (3) Fire Chief rain boots (to go with his fire fighter t-shirt and fire fighter rain jacket). Not that women can't be firefighters. And not that male firefighters can't wear pink glitter under their gear.....just sayin'.

I bought him all three pieces.

He seems to be right in the midst of figuring all this stuff out on his own, I just hope he doesn't learn the societal norms via a mean kid at school the day he decides to wear his princess shirt. Perhaps pairing it with the fire fighter boots will turn it from Girly to Avant Garde in a very Project Runway type of way.





*His knowledge of rude words/phrases currenlty consists of "stupid," "hate," and "you're disgusting."

Maine Bullets

• Quynh The Climber delighted in crawling all over the rocky shore and in and out of stinky tide pools for about an hour one evening. Braver than her brother, she'd reach right into the tide pool and pluck out periwinkles with those chubby little fists of hers.

• Speaking of periwinkles, Tai only picked up the empty periwinkle shells, sitting on the dry rocks. When it was time for dinner (lobster shack on the water's edge) he handed them to me and I shoved them in my pocket. Hours later, back at the hotel, I tossed them on the desk and realized that they were NOT empty shells and NOT even dead. We watched them crawl around the desk a bit and then "sent them home" via the toilet.

• For Tai, "vacation" means juice with every meal. It's even better than chocolate milk, apparently. At each meal he'd ask the wait staff to list the juice options and it seemed like he picked a different one every time. We got to one place and all they had was cranberry juice. He gave the waitress a look like, 'Well, if that's all you've got, I guess I'll take it."

• We learned many things while in Maine, including the fact that a single order of mussels in white wine and butter sauce satisfies both our kids, but only if Minh and I don't expect to eat any.

• Tai became much more outgoing around strangers during this trip. Not sure why, but we're thankful. One night in a very empty restaurant Minh and I were able to finish our meal while Tai went and drank cranberry juice at the bar, chatting with the staff and patrons alike. Of course, when I joined him 10 minutes later, I caught him admitting to liking the Yankees as well as the Red Sox--very dangerous thing to say in Maine, even for a 3-year-old.

• Tai's newfound independence made a trip to the Portland Children's Museum both easier and harder. Minh was working, so I had to keep track of both kids myself. Luckily, I could drop Q in the fenced-in "toddler area" and stand nearby while Tai visited each exhibit on his own. It was so great to have a break from "Mama, look! Mama, come here! Mama, come play with me!" He was so bold, however, that I lost track of him a couple times.

• Quynh can now do spot-on impressions of a fog horn and a train whistle.

• Each night in Maine, we put the kids to bed at the same time (7:30 -- late for Q and early for Tai). We'd turn off the lights and Minh and I would lay down and pretend to sleep too. Once the kids were snoring, we'd sneak out of bed and stay up a couple more hours. Except that one night when we both feel soundly asleep. At 7:30pm. Vacation=exhausting.

Duck Boat Trauma

Non-refundable Duck Boat tickets seemed like a good idea a month ahead of time, but not during the fit Tai threw on the street corner when he decided he was terrified of any contraption that started out on land and then drove into the water. It started as little whimpers and the question, "Will you protect me?" as we neared the stairs leading up to the boat. I promised to protect him and hold him tight, but to no avail. Soon we were experiencing a full blown Freak Out with tears and yelling. We tried calming him, reassuring him, bribing him (with a bravery Milky Way). Nothing worked. Smart kid, he even tried to bargain through his tears. "Can Daddy take Quynh (sniff sniff) on the boat and Mama can (sniff sniff) take me to buy the Milky Bar (sniff)?"

After he calmed a bit, we asked the Duck Boat Captain several questions and received the "right" answers. But Tai decided it was still too scary, and was particularly horrified that there were no seat belts. Makes me wonder.....how on Earth are you supposed to teach your kid about safety and the importance of things like seat belts and NOT turn them into neurotic Scaredy Cats?


Incidentally, the conversation with the Duck Boat Captain went like this:

K: "Is it fast and scary or slow?"

Captain: "Painfully slow and boring."

K: "Is there a big bump and huge splash when it goes in the water?"

Captain: "No, it's slow and gentle."

K: "Is it safe?"

Captain: "Yes. See that sticker over there? We got an award for safety blah blah"

K: "See Tai? They got an award because it's soooo safe and so fun."

Captain: "I didn't say it was fun."


Now there's a man who loves his job.

Wait 'Till He Tells The Kids at School About This One.

Although Tai is a typical pre-schooler when it comes to avoiding all green food, we are fortunate that he's not terribly picky and is not easily freaked out. He likes to try new things as long as they are protein. And he has a love of seafood that includes scallops, shrimp, crab, and lobster. On our recent trip to Maine, Tai devoured nearly an entire order of mussels and picked all the big chunks of lobster out of Minh's lobster roll.

So when it was time for the last dinner of the trip and we found ourselves at a restaurant that offered a kids meal of a whole (small) lobster and fries, we decided to go for it. Not wanting to waste money, we checked with him first. He was very excited about the idea of having a whole lobster on his plate.

Now, Tai knows full well what a whole lobster looks like. We often visit them in the tank at the supermarket. And he knows that they are in the tank so people can buy them, take them home, and cook them. This does not bother him, thankfully.

So Minh and I were not prepared for Tai's expression of confusion mixed with just a bit of horror when his meal arrived. Sadly, we didn't get a picture of that first moment, but we did capture his exclamation that, "They didn't take the legs off!" At first I wondered why he was so confused, when we told him it would be a whole lobster. But then I remembered that he's seen whole cooked turkeys and they look nothing like live turkeys. Same deal with chickens and ducks, right?


After the initial shock, he was eager to learn from his daddy how to pull the legs off and suck the meat out, crack open the claws, and dig out the tail meat. He proudly wore the bib, used the tiny plastic fork, and asked lots of questions. "What do we do with the eyes?" "What about the head?"

In the end, he ate about 2/3 of his little lobster and enjoyed every bite. He did so well that we got him a dessert too. Three bites into it I asked how it was and he said, "Mama, it's so good, I can't even tell you!" It was a fantastic end to a fun but exhausting trip.

You're HOW Old??

I just had this conversation with someone in my office:

Her: I just can't get into The Wire. The first couple episodes were boring, and it feels kind of....old.

Me: It's not that old. It premiered in 2002.

Her: Yeah, when I was 12.

Nuk Free

Tai has slept the past THREE nights with no nuk and we’re so proud of him. After the three of us had a lovely night out together, Friday night came to a horrible close with the expected (but still heartbreaking) crying and yelling.

He's smart, I'll give him that. He'd yell anything he thought would get me to open his bedroom door. "I need a song!" "I want someone to rub my back!" "I need someone to put the covers on me!" Each time I caved and opened the door, he immediately changed his chant to "I need nukkie!**" and several times claimed he was going to go into Quynh's room and take them back from her.

So I held the door shut until he screamed himself hoarse a-la Sam Kinison playing the Trump Card, "I need to go pee pee!!!" Finally, I let him go use the potty. The screaming stopped but he was crying so hard he could barely breathe. And he now directed his anger toward his sister, who was sleeping mere feet from the bathroom, with a dozen nuks in her crib. “I don’t like Quynh anymore. I want to put her outside this house! I don’t want her in this family!”

I put him back in his room and (at his request) took off his PJs. Then I resumed my post, holding his door shut and feeling awful about it. He banged on the door, cried, and yelled requests for the nuk, as well as, "I don't want this pull-up on!" Finally, after about 10 more minutes of crying, there was silence. He had, presumably, fallen asleep on his floor.

At 6am the next morning he came out of his room pleasant-as-can-be and buck naked, and asked, "Mama, is it OK if I sleep naked?"

Saturday night Minh put Tai to bed and there were some weepy requests for the nuk. After an extended bedtime that included stories, deep breaths, and a song, Tai did not come out of his room after being tucked in. Sunday night he didn't even request he nuk. He seemed a little unsettled as I prepared to leave the room, but he didn't come out and went right to sleep. We seem to be through the worst of it.

Sadly, this seems to have been the end of napping, but I think the exhaustion has been helping him fall asleep at bedtime, so I'll take it.




** Incidentally, Minh wondered out loud if he ought to try screaming and crying the next time he wants nookie.

If You Can't Beat 'Em, Distract 'Em

Friday night is the big night. No more nuks for Tai. Ever. No backing down. It's marked on the calendar and everyone knows the plan -- Tai, his grandparents, his teachers, even Quynh.

We picked this weekend for a number of reasons, including the fact that we happened to have playdates and family visits to distract Tai from the withdrawal he will, no doubt, experience.

Additionally, we've actually scheduled a pre-trauma distraction. Friday night we have a sitter for Quynh and we're taking Tai out to dinner and a show. It's something he's been wanting to do anyway, so we figured we'd use it as a pre-reward. A celebration of his Big Boy-ness, if you will. If fire dancing, drums, and greasy Chinese food don't take your mind off your worries, then I don't know what will. This will also cause him to stay up past his usual bedtime, which we hope means exhaustion and the ability to fall asleep without the nuk.

Despite all this over-preparation, I'm sure there will be be tears. And probably bargaining. And rationalizing. And yelling. But hopefully after a few days it will fade and we'll move on peacefully. (Until we have to do this all over again with Quynh. I sure hope she likes hula dancing.).

The Countdown

Tai will be giving his nuks to his sister in FOUR DAYS.

A Post That's Not About My Kids

I'm about halfway through a book that's neither particularly engrossing nor painfully boring. I had no idea what it was about when I started it and the first section was actually pretty entertaining. It has had some funny moments and for a few pages I thought it might turn into a murder mystery. But now I'm starting to fear that this book might actually be Not Good.

So why do I continue to read it? Because I have to. I joined a book club and the first meeting is in 2 weeks. Now I'm stressed out that I won't finish it in time or that I'll finish it, but have nothing to say about it other than, "It was pretty good" or, "I didn't like it."

I've turned down book club invites before because of these two fears. I am a slow reader so I knew Book Club Deadlines would create stress, for me. And I always figured that at book club meetings you have to say something insightful to show that you really understood the Deeper Meaning of the text. Something that makes all the others in the club go, "Ahhhhhh." I know alot about book club meetings because I've seen The Cosby Show and Still Standing. In both cases, I believe the fear was that the husband would embarrass the wife in front of her book club. But the dudes always pull through in the end.

So why did I accept this invitation? Maybe because the club is being started by two of my good friends, whom I don't get to see very often. (And who I didn't even think liked each other that much, but now they're starting a book club together. Go figure.) Or maybe because I liked the idea of having a break from kiddo bedtime, getting out of the house once in a while, and drinking wine with some other women. (There will be wine, right? On TV there is always wine.)

So here I sit, ambivalent about my situation. Last night it was 9:30pm by the time I was done with all the parenting, dish-washing, lunch-packing, and laundry-folding. I grabbed my book and was heading toward my reading chair when I realized I didn't want to read. I wanted to flop down on the couch next to my husband and watch my new favorite show. So I did.

I have to go now, I should be reading.

Favorite Shirt -- The Next Episode

And Then There Were Eight

Last weekend we camped with our old college friends and long-time camping buddies, Jake & Dianna. Back in the day, when we were in our early twenties and childless the four of us would all share one tent, one stove, and one lantern. We'd spend half of our time taking long, strenuous hikes that led past waterfalls to amazing vistas and the other half either napping or playing cards. Ah, to relax for a weekend in the woods.

But this time there were not four of us, but eight. Since the last time we camped together, we've produced a total of four children. On this trip there were two stoves, three lanterns, two picnic tables, four cell phones, two GPSs, a house-sized tent and a pop-up camper. And no relaxation.

There was still hiking--I think we did a whole mile on the relatively flat "nature trail" before Tai fell apart. And, honestly, with the extra 25 lbs strapped to my back I was about done after that too. But we did manage to help Tai find his first geocache. He's been proudly telling everyone that we "found a treasure box!"

And there was still card-playing. Tai now knows how to play Go Fish. Come to think of it, there was still napping too. After a failed attempt to get any of the toddler/preschooler crowd to settle down for a nap, we took them to the beach while Minh and Quynh snoozed the afternoon away.

There were also several new activities we never used to do while camping, such as: sand-castle-building, tag-playing, diaper changing, and attending the Bird Show put on by the Department of Recreation and Conservation. Sadly, they seem to have used the words "bird" and "show" very loosely. We spent a full hour listening to a Bird Fanatic describe in excruciating detail the different types of beaks, feet, and wings of about 25 different types of birds. With each description he wore a different hand-made bird mask. There were no actual birds at said Bird Show. Just paper mache.

Quynh was not too sure about the whole camping thing when we first arrived. She kept tripping on the uneven ground and complaining when we were too busy setting up the tent to play with her. Then we had the nerve to tell her not to eat any rocks or pine cones. But she soon found her Campground Legs and started having good time (and sneaking Rock Snacks when no one was looking). For her, the highlight of the trip seemed to be the simple act of strolling along the (paved) campground roads and waving and calling to all the other children we passed. Unlike her brother ("I'm feeling shy") she walked right into other people's sites and made new friends.

For Tai, the highlight might have been seeing a real live ice cream truck for the first time. On our walk over to the Bird Show, we heard the unmistakable tinkling of Ice Cream Truck Music. Tai's eyes lit up and he asked, "Can we get something from the ice cream truck?" Of course we indulged him. Jake asked Tai what he wanted off the truck and Tai replied with his standard order of "chocolate ice cream". He was then only a little confused to be told that the ice cream truck does not sell actual ice cream, only sugary-frozen-popsicle-thingys. He was easily persuaded to try a SpiderMan Pop.

The trip was a success. An exhausting success. Despite all the work and the long-gone days of playing scrabble all afternoon, I am looking forward to another trip in August.

Hand Me Downs

Anyone who has seen a picture of Tai in the past 18 months or so is probably familiar with his Favorite Shirt. When he first got it, it was much to big for him, but he wore it sans pants and called it his Fancy Dress. Now it's getting a tad small and, as Tai will tell you, it hurts his ears when we pull it over his head. He's worn it as frequently as possible, year-round, and it's been through the wash so many times the colors are now faded. We've been warning him that it's getting small and he won't be able to go on wearing it forever.

In addition to the Favorite Shirt, Tai is also partial to some of his pajamas. A kid after my own heart, he really enjoys staying in his PJs all day on the weekends and we both have a hard time resisting PJs on sale at Target or Costco. As a result, he's received four new pairs of PJs in the past month or so (sizes 3 and 4T). His PJ drawer was beginning to overflow.

So the other day, when Tai was busy playing downstairs, I went through his drawer and pulled out all the size 2T PJs and decided they now belong to Quynh. (Interestingly enough, they went right into her drawer.....no need to wait until she grows into them. She's already there.)

It occurred to me that I should inform Tai of what I had done before he saw her wearing some of her "new" PJs. I was worried that might cause a melt down along the lines of "hey, those are MY dinosaur pajamas!!" So the other morning at breakfast I showed him a big pile of pajamas and explained that they were getting too small for him so I decided to give them to Quynh.

"All of those?" he asked.

"Yes" I replied and held up each pair so he could see exactly which PJs were being handed down.

"OK. I don't mind that," he informed me.

I started to walk away from the breakfast table, to deposit the PJs in Quynh's room, and he called out, "Oh! Mama! Don't forget to also give Quynhhy my Favorite Shirt because it's getting too small. It hurts my ears."

Love that boy of mine. So, those of you who check out the picasa albums of my kids will soon be spying a whole new generation of Favorite Shirt photos, featuring Quynh. Lucky you.

Talking Dinos

On our recent tour of upstate New York, we happened upon the Petrified Creatures Museum of Natural History. It's just a tad different from the other Museum of Natural History we visited in Manhattan a few months back.

In fact, I'd say "museum" is really being generous. It's essentially someone's house. That someone also happens to be a licensed Real Estate Agent -- in case you want to kill two birds with one stone.

The first room you enter is the "gift shop" and it smells like Old People. It has a dark, dingy appearance that makes you feel like you must be the first patron in quite some time and that the gifts for sale have been sitting there a very very long time.

After you fork over $9 per adult, the woman (Stella, I assume?) lets you into her Backyard Museum. This essentially consists of three major areas:

(1) displays of actual Petrified Creatures under wooden shelters. The displays are narrated by a very loud recording that you activate by ringing a doorbell. The "creatures" included trilobites, a horseshoe crab shell, petrified wood, and fern imprints on rock. Fossils indeed, but still not very exciting.

(2) large (though not actual size and not to scale with regard to each other) plaster dinosaurs painted in array of colors (hot pink, turquoise, bright yellow, etc). Each dino had a mailbox painted to match and inside the box was.....a doorbell! When you press the doorbell the dino "talks" to you. Tai didn't notice, but 4 of the 5 dinos had Stella's voice. What he did notice was that the T-rex (pictured below) threatened to eat him and the stegosaurus said that she was not very smart. Poor thing has low self-esteem.

(3) An area in which you could dig for real fossils. Stella even said that if we'd forgotten our digging tools (which we had, shucks!) we could borrow some of hers. We skipped this part in favor of heading back to the car and continuing our journey west.

Oh, and at the very end of the museum path she had a display about minerals that included rectangular slabs of marble, clearly purchased at Home Depot, and a large brown rock with a sign indicating that it was a meteorite. Tai and I thought it just looked like a rock. Makes me wonder if we could open a Meteorite Museum in our backyard....

I have to give her credit actually. She obviously found some cool stuff in her backyard and turned it into a source of income. Hell, I think it was worth the money just for the Unusual Experience and Blog Fodder.

Cow Parade

This past weekend we trekked up to Brattleboro, Vermont for the Strolling of the Heifers. The parade starts at 10am sharp and we were warned to get there very early to find parking and a good viewing spot. Taking this warning very seriously, we found ourselves in downtown Brattleboro at 8:45am. (This is the part where you are impressed.) Some days I can't even get to the kids' daycare by 8:45am, but last Saturday we were all up, dressed, and loaded into the car by about 7:40am. Of course, three of us had not eaten breakfast yet.

Tai was thrilled to eat breakfast in the car for the first time ever. In fact, Friday night he had much difficulty falling asleep and one of the several times he emerged from his room he told me, "I'm so excited for the Strolling of the Heifers....and to eat breakfast in the car!"

We met up with two of Tai's friends from school and all enjoyed a fantastic parade together. The highlight, of course, was the many cows. But also of note were the baby cows (which Quynh took one look at and signed "dog!"), baby goats, a horse dressed up as a cow, marching bands, and tractors. It was the perfect parade for our animal-and-music-and-farm-equipment-loving boy.

Quynh also enjoyed herself, though it was very difficult to keep her from joining the parade. She desperately wanted to follow the cows down the street and couldn't understand how a fun event like a parade could possibly require so much sitting still.

Vermont is a fun little state and I think we saw some excellent examples of its quirkiness. For instance, there were the organic farm folks carrying signs in the shapes of giant vegetables emblazoned with messages about organic food, healthy eating, sustainable living, etc. And, logically, the huge purple eggplant sign that said, "end racism."

Then there was the Asian Cultural Society comprised of several white men and three mail order brides. 'Nuff said.

The group that tugged at my heartstrings was the middle school marching band. I don't know much about music but even I could tell that they were pretty bad. In an adorable way. And they were all out of step, including the drum line. I didn't even know it was possible to play the drums and be out of step.

After the parade we had an early lunch at a nearly empty restaurant where we let three toddlers and Quynh run wild on the deck. The young waitress looked a little bewildered at the chaos, but handled it fairly well. When a childless couple showed up, we tried (feebly) to reign our children in, but it was no use. That couple lasted about 2.5 minutes before decided they'd prefer to dine inside.

If only Tai had napped on the way home (or after arriving home) the day would have been a roaring success. But we did all have a fantastic time and it was worth the long drive early on a Saturday morning. We'll totally go back next year (we just may need to find a different restaurant).

Playing Hookie

Tomorrow my entire family is playing hookie from work and school to drive to scenic Lawrence, Massachusetts.

On purpose.

An old college friend of ours now owns a restaurant in Lawrence, so a bunch of us are all converging on his place for a little Lunch Reunion. I'm looking forward to seeing old friends, letting our kids goof off together, and eating some tasty sandwiches. Minh's hoping to being offered the chance to open a franchise in Western Mass. Because Northampton needs another restaurant.

Crying It Out

In preparation for Quynh's move to the toddler (!) room at the end of August, her teacher strongly suggested that we get her to sleep through the night now, so she'll be rested enough during the days to drop her morning nap. (A day in the life of a toddler is full of play dough, circle time, climbing, running, jumping, and there is no opportunity for morning nap.) So to prevent her from being the toddler who routinely falls asleep in her lunch, we decided we had better get her (and me!) some solid nighttime sleep.

But how? Quynh's teacher basically told us to shit or get off the pot with the whole co-sleeping thing. She suggested we either (1) put Quynh in her crib at night and leave here there and not go in at all when she cries or (2) buy bed rails and let her sleep with us all night long. Neither option really appealed to me, but I certainly want her in her own crib. So I decided to review the more gentle options for achieving that goal.

I went back to the books I had poured over when Tai was tiny. First I read about one extreme, written by the woman who thinks babies should never ever cry, and that progress toward better sleeping should be measured every 10 days to look for slow but steady progress. Ugh. The book included photos of her 5 kids all snuggling together on a giant bed in the "sleeping room." This woman might be a little nuts.

Then I read about the other extreme, where you plop your baby in the crib, close the door, and don't go back in until the morning, no matter what. The book actually says there is no limit on how long to let them cry and if they vomit from crying too hard just go in, clean it up, and then leave again.

Seriously? These are my two options?

Then I found the book that claims to be the "middle of the road" approach. Sounds perfect for me. I pride myself on my wishy-washy-middle-of-the-road-ness. I cracked open this book at 9:15pm on Saturday, but by 9:30 I was falling asleep and had not yet read the details of this sleep training method. I decided I'd read it on Sunday and we'd start our new plan (whatever it was to be) Sunday night.

I hit the pillow and feel deeply asleep. So deeply, in fact, that Minh told me the next day that I missed Quynh crying and fussing for an entire hour. He was still up watching TV in the living room and took my staying in the bedroom to mean that I'd decided we were going to let her cry it out. But I was really just too tired to wake. Yay for parent-to-parent communication.

She woke 3 more times that night, which I heard. At 2:30, 3:30, and 5:30am she woke and cried for 5 minutes each time. Then went back to sleep. Sweet.

Sunday I realized that we had accidentally started a cry-it-out program. Not what I intended, but I figured that we'd better stick with what we started. So last night we did it again. Not sure if we slept through any crying early in the night, but she did wake at 2:30 and cried for 5 minutes. Then at 4:30 she screamed for 10 minutes and I *almost* went to her. But then she found a nuk (she has about 6 of them in her crib) and settled back down. At 6am she squawked and I ran in to her, scooped her up and nursed her in the glider for about 15 solid minutes. All the while she was staring up at me with those huge dark eyes as if to say, "Where were you last night?"

The books, and Quynh's teacher, claim that this method works fast -- in a few days -- so I'm really hoping that tonight is the last rough night where I have to lay in bed, listen to her scream, and watch her on the video monitor to make sure she's OK. I'm excited at the prospect of "fixing" her sleeping habits, but I do worry about what she thinks when she's crying so hard and no one comes to comfort her. I find that part very sad.

Wish us luck tonight.

First Purchase

Some folks say that a mis-behaving toddler is a bored, un-challenged toddler. So, in a recent attempt to make our lives a little smoother, we created a "chore chart" for Tai. The chores themselves are very simple (he is only 3, after all) and include things like: feed the pets, clear the dishes from the table after breakfast, brush teeth, use the potty, and get dressed. Those last three in particular must be done with cooperation in order to get the check-mark on the chore chart. If we have a bare-assed kid running around the house singing, "you can't catch me" while I chase him down with underwear and jeans clenched in my fist, there will be no check-mark next to "get dressed".

So, what do the check-marks mean? For a 3-year-old, pride in a job well done does not seem to be incentive enough for good behavior. So, we thought about some sort of sticker chart or tally of check marks that you can turn in for a special treat. But he's kinda over the whole sticker thing. And the kid already gets a ton of special treats (edible, watchable, you name it). So we decided on cold hard cash. Five cents for each chore.

Tai already had two piggy banks, given to him as Christmas gifts. So now he can finally use them. We've designated one as "savings" and one as "checking" (spending money). We've had this system in place for about 2 weeks and today he emptied his checking account into a plastic sandwich baggie (maybe he needs a change purse?) and made his very first purchases.

Despite his claims that he was going to buy "a whole box full of toys" he ended up spending his money at the Amherst Farmer's Market--where boxes of toys are scarce, at best. After turning his nose up at fresh baked cookies and pastries, he considered buying a tomato seedling (before he remembered that Daddy already had that covered). So he purchased a $2.50 organic blueberry smoothie (which he shared with his sister, without hesitation) and tossed two fist-fulls of change into the tip jar of a little 2-person-folk-band. I wholeheartedly approve of his decisions.

In the end, he came home with about $2.00 of unspent money and no box of toys, but he doesn't seem to mind.

Tackling the Next Big Topic

Death: Already covered. Next: Religion.

Q: What do you get when you cross and Atheist with a Buddhist?

A: A very confused toddler.

Last weekend Tai went to the carnival with a good friend of his. On the way to the carnival they were excitedly discussing the rides that they would go on and ended up having a conversation that went like this:

N: When we go on the ferris wheel, we'll go way up high in the trees. We can look for birds and bird nests. God lives in the trees.

T: Huh??

N: God lives in the trees because He can hear everything. Did you know that, Tai?

T: No, I haven't seen that movie.

Q Has a Mind of Her Own....

....and she's learning how to express herself. In addition to clapping, waving, and playing peek-a-boo, Quynh can now sign "more," "dog," and "book."

Quynh knows what she likes and has learned how to sign "more." She does this primarily for cheese and tickles.

Each morning she wakes (in our bed, see previous post) and leans over me to look at the floor next to the bed. Then she says "ga." I call Buttons over and Quynh points and exclaims "Ga!" (As if to say, "Yes, the dog! That's what I was asking about. Thank you, Mama.") Then today I was holding her as I walked by Buttons and she pointed and said "Ga!" she then slapped her thigh repeatedly (the sign for dog).

Finally, just now, I was trying to get her to settle down for nap. She had her nuk and her Skipt and the noise machine was on. I was rocking her in the glider, and shhhh-ing her. But she was resistant to the whole nap-time idea. She struggled to sit up in my lap, pointed at the pile of board books on the night stand and then signed "book." Adorable? Yes. Genius? Of course. Cute enough to make me give in and let her skip nap? No Way in Hell. I wish I knew the sign for "Nice try, Miss."

My Son, the Carnivore.

We’ve let Tai watch a few episodes of Life (which includes a substantial amount of death) and he’s now fascinated with animals eating other animals. He doesn’t care much for herbivores, except for the role they play as prey. He often wants to pretend to be lions or polar bears or komodo dragons and go hunting for meals. Poor Quynh usually gets cast in the role of unsuspecting ibex.

During breakfast one recent morning, Tai suddenly began explaining to me that “When polar bears eat fish they eat the whole thing – with eyes and fins and everything. But when we eat fish we take the eyes and other stuff off so all that’s left is..........fish.” Well said, I think.

Then yesterday when I picked him up from school, his teacher shared this gem with me. At Circle Time they were going to sing a song about spaghetti and a teacher asked, “What can we put in our spaghetti?” Tai said “duck!” One of the other kids cracked up laughing and exclaimed, “You don’t eat ducks! Ducks fly!” Tai immediately corrected the other child by explaining very matter-of-factly that you can eat duck, but first you have to take off the eyes and the feathers, and then cook it. My son, the gourmet chef.

My Daughter is Broken

Each night I nurse Quynh and rock her and put her in her crib around 7-7:30pm.

Then she wakes around 8 or 9pm (not long after we've rid ourselves of Tai). I rock her, or nurse her, or sing to her, and she falls asleep in my arms. Then I place her back in her crib. Often, just as she hits the mattress, she snaps awake and starts screaming. So I repeat the process until it "sticks."

It usually only sticks for an hour or so. By that time (1opm-ish?) I'm just about ready for bed, so my heart is no longer really in the fight to get her to stay in the crib. I usually try once more--nursing, rocking, etc., and place her in the crib. If she stays asleep, I hurry off to bed to get some rest before she wakes again. If she starts yelling, I give up and bring her to bed with me (where, inevitably, she falls immediately into a very sound sleep, without even nursing first). The girl just wants to be snuggled.

I can't really complain, because I'm pretty sure I "broke" her.

When Tai was a baby I read all the books and worried endlessly about his sleeping. I kicked him out of our bed at 5 months of age and worked tirelessly to make sure he could put himself to sleep (and back to sleep) in his own crib. There was a 2-week period when he'd wake at night and I committed to not taking him out of the crib, so I'd end up sleeping on the floor of his room, holding his hand through the crib slats so that he'd know I was there and be able to fall back asleep.

With Quynh I either don't care as much or just don't have it in me. When Baby Number Two starts crying at 9pm, not only am I more tired than I was during Tai's babyhood, but I also have to worry that she'll wake her brother if I let her "cry it out." But that's mostly an excuse. I'm just not able to let my babies cry. Never have been (hence the sleeping on Tai's floor for 2 weeks).

Everything started out the same. I kicked Quynh out of the bed at 5 months, putting her to sleep in her crib. But then I was all too happy to bring her into the bed when she woke to nurse. That first wake-up used to be at 2am. Then it was at midnight. Then at 10pm. And, now, it's at 8pm. There go my evenings.

The trouble all seems to have started when cold/flu season and teething hit at the same moment. When her wake-ups started coming earlier and more frequently I'd make endless excuses for her:

"She's sick this week and needs extra snuggles."

"She's all stuffy and needs to sleep in our bed, propped up on pillows."

"She's teething."

"She's teething again.

"She's still teething." (Where are the damn teeth?)

So now she's broken and I can't decide what to do. Part of me wants to "fix" her and part of me is just fine with the way things are. I mean, I get to *snuggle* a soft, warm baby all night long and I don't have to get out of bed when she wants to nurse! But I also no longer have the evening to myself and I fear getting up and taking a shower in the morning because I worry she'll wake and crawl right off my side of the bed (Minh is a very sound sleeper -- I have emerged from the shower to find him snoring and Quynh *standing* in the bed pawing at the paintings hanging above the headboard!)

I think we all know I probably won't do anything. I don't have it in me to let her cry, or sleep on her floor. And I'm not ready to run out and buy bed rails and declare us the official Family Bed type of folks. I'm going to keep blaming the teeth and hope it all works out. (And you can all laugh at me when I post again about the 3-year-old girl who won't sleep in her own bed.)

Squashed Imagination?

So by now anyone who reads this knows that I have a relatively strict policy of Not Lying to My Kids. (The whole Santa Claus thing excepted.) But lately I'm wondering if I'm too literal in some of my answers to Tai's questions and if that might be squashing his imagination.

I started thinking this when we were at the mall last week and there was a (person dressed as the) Easter Bunny upon which kids could sit and have their picture taken. We walked over to watch and asked Tai if he wanted a turn. He shook his head and asked me, "Is it real?" I wasn't entirely sure what he meant. Is that a real rabbit? Is the Easter Bunny a real entity? (Not being religious, we don't talk much about Easter and had not decided whether to play up the Easter Bunny thing or not.) So I said, hesitantly, "I think it's a person, dressed up like .....er....The Easter Bunny"

Now don't get me wrong. Tai has a pretty great imagination. He makes up stories and all manner of pretend play. And when he tells me Emmit is sick it's not like I say, "That's impossible, Emmit is a stuffed animal." I'm not that literal. But what I don't tend to do is talk about fanciful things like fairies, ghosts, monsters, leprechauns, or the Easter Bunny.

So, Easter. We will be coloring eggs. I love a good Art Project. And we will be (coincidentally) having brunch with friends that day. Easter Basket full of candy? Easter egg hunt? Discussion of The Easter Bunny? Undecided. And time is running out.

NYC Part 2: The Kids Had a Blast

Quynh:

While on Spring Break in NYC, Quynh learned to wave. While walking through Chinatown, she waved at anything and everything from her perch on Minh's back in the ergo. At dinner one night, the waiter came over and said hello to her. She stared back at him. Then, 30 seconds after he left, she waved emphatically in his direction. Waving? yes. Timing? not so much.

Quynh also realized, while on vacation, that diaper changes are a stupid boring waste of time and she won't stand for them anymore. Gone are the days when she'd be still for changes. And gone are the days of cute little wriggles -- feeble attempts to get away. This girl now means business and it takes 2 adults and a toddler to get her into her PJs at night. Oy.

Quynh enjoyed two swims in the hotel pool, though her pleasure was derived largely from the disturbing behavior of constantly trying to drink the (inexplicably) salty pool water. Yech.

While in NYC, Quynh had her first: scallops, dim sum, ice cream, and cheesecake. Not a bad haul.


Tai:

At the Bronx Zoo, Tai's refrain was "what's gonna be the next am-ma-mul?" The second we arrived at any animal, he asked what was next. This is in stark contrast to last September at the National Zoo, when he was content to look at the pigeons for 15 solid minutes.

The trip to the zoo did, however, mark a major milestone in Tai's life. He took his first ride on a carousel not sitting on the Lame Stationary Bench. Up until now he's always been afraid to ride on the horses. But this carousel wasn't horses. It was bugs--all manner of bugs. Tai asked to sit on a red ladybug, but they were immediately taken by all the little girls. So we had to settle for a white spotted beetle, which we assured him was just a different type of ladybug. This big step paid off, and he was brave enough to ride on a horse at the Central Park carousel the next day. This is awesome because Minh and I were sick of sitting on the damn bench.

Tai's impressions of Manhattan? "There's a lot of stairs in New York City!"

What was his favorite part of the trip? "The subway because it's loud and goes super-duper fast!" Clearly, he would have been content to ride the subway (standing, holding onto a pole, of course) for hours. Who needs to go to a museum? We could have entertained him all day for a mere $2 in subway fare.

We did, however, go to the Museum of Natural History with several of his buddies from school. The kids were interested in the exhibits for about....10 minutes. The rest of the time was spent on snacking, pottying, and jumping off benches while the adults were all too tired to intervene. Near the end of the museum trip, Tai started begging to go back to the hotel and nap. Sorry kid, the hotel is in Jersey and it took us an hour to make our way into the city this morning.

NYC Part 1: Country Mice Belong in the Country

Minh and I hadn't been to The Big Apple in about 14 years. Needless to say. we were not the right people to be preparing Tai for the trip. Our first day in Manhattan Tai asked someone where we buy the tokens for the subway and was promptly laughed at and told that those were phased out in 1998. Whoops! Sorry, kid. Last time your Daddy and I were in Manhattan there were tokens.



One Day 2 Minh and I split from our Friends Who Know New York to venture out on our own and meet up with some old college friends who work in Manhattan. We needed to get ourselves from Central Park to Times Square and were told it was easy and would only take 15 minutes. Being a bit shy of taking the subway ourselves, we decided to take a cab. So we exited the park and found ourselves at a busy intersection. I walked to the edge of the sidewalk and tentatively waved my hand as if to say, "um...excuse me?....taxi? please?" After 10 minutes we decided this was not working. Maybe we needed a better corner? So we looked up our destination on our phones and decided to walk in that direction and continue to try to grab a cab. But then we saw that it was only 14 blocks, so we walked the whole way. This took more than the 15 minutes we had allotted and caused Tai to fall asleep in the stroller about 10 minutes before dinner, but we got there.



After dinner in Times Square we needed to get our butts all the way back to the hotel in Jersey. Gulp. We had our instructions. Take the A Train to 175th then get on the 186 bus. The friends we were dining with live all the way out in Queens, but graciously offered to walk us to the subway station. I accepted their help and told them they just needed to get us to the right station and we'd be fine from there. But when I asked them how we know whether to go "inbound or outbound" they decided then and there to accompany us all the way to the bus station. In the end, they went many miles and probably an hour out of their way to see us safely onto the 186 bus back to Jersey.



The only problem was we weren't sure where to get off the bus. I was goofing around with my phone, not paying any attention, when Minh said, "are you watching? we have to request the stop we want." Ugh, I looked out the window and didn't recognize anything, so we decided we'd already missed it. So we hit the stop request button and got off, somewhere in New Jersey, at 9pm. Certian that we'd missed our stop, we immediately did a 180 and started walking in the direction the bus had come from. I pulled up the hotel address on my phone and noticed (after 2 whole blocks) that we were going the wrong way. Apparently, we got off the bus a few stops too early. After that self-guided Walking Tour of Englewood, NJ, we made it back to the hotel by about 9:45pm. The next day we found ourselves on the 186 bus again. By this time we were seasoned travelers and it was daylight, so surely we'd get it right. That time we only got off 1 stop too early. We'd just about figured the whole bus thing out when it was time to head back home.

The Many Faces of Tai

Pneumonia Tai

• is feverish, uncomfortable, and pathetic
• is given unlimited juice and television, and much pity
• wakes at 4am unable to stop coughing and crying
• but then "naps" from 10am to 3pm

Healthy Tai

• refuses to brush his teeth
• has learned to "sass" his parents, using the strongest language he knows. ("I'm really gonna open this door!" and "I'm never ever gonna go to bed!")
• glances sideways at a parent as he yanks a toy out from under his sister, causing her to fall over
• makes us miss Pneumonia Tai, just a bit

Daylight Savings Tai

• comes out of his room every 7 minutes from tuck-in (8:30pm) until 10:15pm. (Note, Grey's Anatomy loses something when you have to pause it 9 times.)

Did I say I was looking forward to our trip to NYC? The one where the four of us all have to sleep in the same room (two to a bed) for three nights? I'm just glad Q's still nursing, because that's my excuse to sleep with her. She crowds me and she wakes 4 times a night, but at least she doesn't kick and spin around like a Toddler Sun Dial in the bed. Good luck, Minh.

NYC Will Never be the Same

That's right, the Country Mice are packing their Costco Luggage with their poly-blend sweaters, $30 jeans, and sensible shoes, and heading to The Big City.

Luckily, we've roped some friends into being our Free Tour Guides, and we plan to meet up with some folks who live down there and know their way around. I'm now only slightly scared that my little family will get lost or separated. I'm much more scared by the thought of 3 days in a row with no nap. Not only is Tai unpleasant to be around when he's tired, but I worry that three days in a row will set some sort of precedent and he'll decide to give up his nap thereafter. Oh, the horror.

But, setting my anxiety aside for a moment, I'm very much looking forward to this trip. Tai is beyond excited because (a) we're going to see dinosaur bones, (b) we're going to the Bronx Zoo, and (c) the hotel has a pool! (I remember when, as a child, I didn't care if we were going to Idaho on vacation, as long as the hotel had a pool).

We'll actually be travelling with Tai's best friend and meeting up with two other buddies from school at the Museum of Natural History. What more could a kid ask for? This trip promises to provide education, entertainment, life-long memories, and (most importantly) fodder for some decent blog posts.

Low Energy Role Play

This evening I suddenly realized why toy doctor's kits are so popular. It's not about alleviating your child's fear of the doctor or starting them on the path to a prestigious and lucrative career. It's about being able to play with your child while half-asleep on the couch.

Tonight after dinner, Tai asked me to lay down on the floor and asked me if anything hurt. I promptly presented with a severe headache and backache. For this, I was examined with a stethoscope, given an elbow x-ray, and had several vials of blood drawn from the tip of my finger. I milked it as long as I could before he moved on to the next activity, which involved me having to stand up.

But my acting skills are nothing compared to Minh's. He really takes his imaginative play seriously and is especially good at the persistent vegetative state.

Death.

Tai's experience with death, thus far, has been limited to:

(a) Asking us to re-tell the story of our cat, Gorby, who died long before Tai was even conceived.
(b) Being told that my parents' dog, Taz, died and that they got a new dog named Cassie.
(c) Hearing that two of the fish in the tank at school died. And then meeting the replacement fish.

Friday we got word that our neighbors' dog, Red Dog, had passed away. On the way home from school Friday I gave Tai the news and we talked about drawing a picture for Red Dog's youngest owner (and Tai's friend), Lila, to make her feel better. Naturally, he had some questions.....

"Why did red Dog die?"
(Well, because he was old and sick and his body stopped working.)

"What is their dog's name now?"
(They don't have a new dog. Red Dog died last night and now they don't have a dog.)

"Was his tail moving?"
(No, once an animal dies it doesn't move anymore.)

"Why is Lila sad?"
(Because Red Dog died and she loved him. Wouldn't you be sad if Buttons died and then she wasn't here anymore?)


Oh Boy, this is where I went a little too far in my explanation and opened a huge can of worms.....


"Is Buttons going to die?"
(Yes, everything dies eventually. But Buttons is young and will probably live a long time.)

"And Smudge?"
(Yes, someday.)

"And Nibbies?"
(Yes.)


I watched the wheels turning behind his eyes and cringed as I waited for it.......


"And Quynh??"
(Ummmm........yes. But not for a very very long time.)

"And Me?????"
(Um yes. Again, not for a long time.)

"And you? And daddy?"
(Yup.)

"Who is going to live in our house when we are all dead?"


So, pretending that I did not just emotionally scar my child and cause him to live in constant fear of his own death, we went on with our afternoon. He painted Lila a picture and then we played and talked about the usual mundane stuff. When Minh came home, Tai made sure he heard the news about Red Dog. And then the topic of death was dropped, for a little while.

Just this evening, while attending a Super Bowl party at a friend's house, we were standing around the kitchen, eating guacamole and chicken wings, and chatting with several people whom we had just met. And then there was a lull in the adult conversation. So Tai filled it with:

"Someday I'm going to die."

Summer Olympics, here we come!

All the cool kids take gymnastics lessons. Mine included.

Tai had his first gymnastics class this week and Minh and I were both bursting with pride (and shock) as Tai boldly walked into the gym, by himself, and took a spot in a circle of about 15 kids and 3 adults, none of whom he'd ever met before. "Who is this usually brave child?" we thought.

"Ohhhhh, that's more like it," we thought, when everyone in the circle stood up and started stretching and jumping around, while Tai sat open-mouthed on the floor and stared around the unfamiliar room. For 10 solid minutes.

After abstaining from the warm-up, Tai readily joined in the small group activities, which basically consisted of going through various little obstacle courses. (Crawl through a tunnel, go down a slide, hang from a bar, walk along a balance beam, etc).

The very first step in his very first activity? Do a somersault. "Oh no," I thought as I watched child after child (who were all older than Tai and who had all clearly been taking gymnastics since birth) do perfect somersaults down the wedge-of-cheese-shaped mat. Knowing that Tai cannot do a somersault, my anxiety mounted. Would he balk at even trying? Will there be tears if he tries and fails? Will the Russian judge be unfairly hard on him?

Watching all this through a window, we could not hear any of the conversation, but we saw Tai climb up to the top of the Cheese Mat and the teacher gesture to him to squat down and do a somersault. Mere seconds later the teacher realized who he was dealing with and decided he needed to give more hands-on help. With Tai squatting at the top of the mat, and the teacher's hands on his waist, I can only assume that the teacher verbally instructed Tai to tuck his head down and roll. And Tai promptly flopped onto his belly, legs sticking straight out behind him. The teacher, apparently, decided not to push the whole curl-up-into-a-ball component of somersaulting and just helped Tai flip down the mat, his body straight and stiff as a board. Clearly, Tai is already training for the roundoff-backhandspring-layout that will no doubt become his signature move by age 5.

The good news is, Tai had a really great time and can't wait to go back next week. This means I get to look forward to 12 more weeks of sitting in a crowded waiting room among seasoned parents who sit in the front row, blocking my view of my kid, while they do work or play with their iphones. Someday maybe I'll be that seasoned, but for now I'll enjoy watching Tai try his hand at gymnastics and hoping that he someday masters the back handspring, which I never did. Or at least a somersault.

Sleep Nursing

Last night I woke up and found myself sitting in the glider in Quynh's room. I looked down to find Quynh draped precariously across my lap -- her mouth at my breast and her legs dangling down over my knees.

I had no idea what time it was, when I came into her room, or how long I'd been in there. The last thing I remembered was coming into her room sometime around 11pm.

I placed her back in her crib and stumbled back to my room to check the clock. It said 1:30am. Had I been in there since 11pm? Or had I mis-read the clock, and it really said 1am when I went in? Or had she woken at 11 and then again later, and I managed to get up and go to her without really waking up at all?

I wonder what else I do around the house in my sleep.... maybe I can put this new skill to good use and wake up tomorrow to find that I've folded all the laundry while snoozing.