Five Rivers 

C and his Lemon Boy tomato 

baby with a tree growing out the top of her head 

Our pumpkin is growing (green ball in the middle of the shot) 

skipping stones 

A picture of C and A playing "train," in which they both put their hands on a box and C slowly pulls it while she walks behind.

Everyone likes it. 

It's been a busy, busy week. Friends came over Saturday night and we had such a good time we stayed up much too late. On Sunday, we decided to pack a picnic dinner and go for a hike at Five Rivers. (We'd been there the day before, and C wanted to go back around dusk to possibly see more wildlife.) That was a lot of fun, and we plan on making it a weekly event as long as the weather stays warm enough. Deer, snakes, rabbits, frogs, and a very tame goose were spotted, but since the trail we chose was misleadingly long we didn't get home until well after the kids' bedtimes. So we were up late then, too.

Monday was Layla and Eliana's funeral, which was emotionally exhausting, plus Mondays are usually somewhat hectic because Dan has a rehearsal right after dinner. Tuesday we went to a potluck farewell party for a member of both Bethlehem Neighbors for Peace and Dan's a cappella group. Dan's group performed, and C had a good time with our host's kids. He's still shy, but Harriet, who is 6, was able to successfully tempt him into socializing with offers to show him the cat and lead him to the dessert table. And seeing 3-year-old Evie riding a scooter emboldened him to give it a better try than he does at our house. We left there at 8 to get the kids to bed and to meet some other friends at our house. A had been pretty unhappy for the latter half of the party, but when we got her home and the stimulation level decreased she decided she was happy. Instead of going to bed, she crawled around on the oh-so-clean floor of the pool shed until 10:15, when I decided enough was enough, and it still took me 45 minutes to get her to sleep. I wouldn't have minded going to bed by then too, but our guests stuck around until after 2. The drunken logic of one of our guest's arguments for gunowners' rights reminded me of being 18 again, and not in a good way. No one felt well the next day.

C went to Nana's house on Wednesay, and after the kids went to bed some neighbors came over to hang out on our porch. We had a lovely time, but after so many late nights I was glad that they, unlike us, had the sense to retire at a reasonable hour.

Our house also decided fall apart this week. The pipe under our upstairs bathroom sink developed a leak and the toilet started to run. The toilet was easily fixed (though how the float had become completely unscrewed is a mystery) but we haven't had the energy to do any more than turn off the water to the sink. Our basement generated a large pool of water, which we very much hope originated with the bathroom leak and is not a separate problem. The small front burner on our stove (the one we use most often, of course) decided to only warm foods, rather than heat them. Since it's a ceramic cooktop, we can't easily fix or replace it like we could a standard cooktop, and since it didn't quit entirely I spent several days wondering why water was never coming to a boil. (I even started to wonder if it was so humid the air was just too saturated to allow any additional water to evaporate at a normal temoperature.) The garbage disposal stopped working- particularly frustrating because it had already been replaced TWICE under warranty, and now the warranty has run out. (It's obviously not a good model to buy.) Miraculously, it began working again spontaneously, so we had that to celebrate.

A turned 9 months old yesterday, and got to go to the doctor to celebrate! As expected, the doctor had no useful information to impart about the cause or cure of her constant spitting up, which is getting worse rather than better. She measures somewhere around 29 inches long, and weighs something like 16 pounds, but those are both rough estimates. She's started climbing stairs, and indeed is COMPELLED to climb anything she can. She still tries to go down headfirst like a squirrel, though, so this new development requires my constant vigilance. No more reading while the kids play. She's also wanting to stand more and more, and I suspect that one reason we have trouble getting her to sleep is because she sees her crib as just an amazing opportunity to practice standing, with all the bars and rails for her to balance with. Too bad we can't just move her into our bed because of the aforementioned squirrel descent method. (There is a school of thought that believes that babies/ small children avoid danger pretty well on their own. A does indeed stop at the edge of the bed to think about her strategy, but then she tries to shimmy down headfirst. While she may recognize danger, her judgment is sorely lacking.)

After Dan played chess last night, I rode my bike to the end of the next street over in an attempt to escape streetlights and see the meteor shower. Unfortunately, there were enough clouds in the sky to reflect the city lights. Since I could only see about 30 stars, I figured the likelihood of seeing much else was pretty slim, but I stretched out on my blanket for a while anyway and enjoyed the night. There were no cars, and virtually all the houses I'd ridden past were dark, and it felt good to be alone. But then I was afraid a deer was going to come step on me so I left.

We are trying to plan how to re-stain our back deck before it completely rots away. We expect to get it done by next weekend, since Dan is taking the week off, but we need to decide whether we really need to remove all the old stain first and whether using an opaque stain is a really bad idea. Comments on these questions are welcome.

Old business: C's day camp still sucks, but he apparently loves it, so we're very sad that tomorrow is his last day. I'm hoping that this bodes well for kindergarten, but I suspect the main thing he likes about camp is the stoner counselor who's willing to play cards with him (and probably lets him cheat). Maybe we can try to convince the school to create a card-playing position on the kindergarten staff.

A has added peaches, green beans, and avocado to her repertoire, and is still having a lot of fun crawling around. She's been fussy this week, which could be because she ate oats, because I ate cheese, because she's teething, or just because. We stopped the oats and dairy and hope for improvement by this weekend. She's very happy for the first hour after she wakes up after each nap, but things go downhill from there until her next nap. Trying to give her more naps doesn't work (she won't fall asleep; she's too busy being cranky) and we've tried everything we can think of to get her to nap longer.

Luckily, she put on a good post-nap face on Sunday, when we hosted a family party for my cousin Gus, who just got out of the army. (Well, provided a venue is probably the better term; Gus's mom took care of everything else, which made it very pleasant for us- a bunch of people came to our house, bearing food and beer, and we got to socialize without having to go anywhere. But anyway.) A was very charming for much of the afternoon, but she needs more sleep!

C does, too. He's been getting super-cranky in the afternoon, but will never agree to a nap. He's been getting less sleep at night because it's taking him forever- sometimes over 2 hours- to fall asleep, which pretty much sucks for all of us. We'll see if things improve after camp ends, and if not we'll change bedtime somehow. He clearly needs the sleep- he's been throwing whiny tantrums- but just can't get it....

And last night, in the 1.5 hour stretches that A allows us to rest, I too had trouble sleeping because I was thinking about my cousin and his wife, whose twins just died at 22 weeks gestation. Remembering how horrific it was to lose Teiva three years ago, I hate to think about what they're going through now. And it reminds me how lucky I am to have C and A, and how important it is that I enjoy them as much as I can each day, because everything could change tomorrow. Dan and I used to do a lot of long-term decision-making, and we chose to make some sacrifices for our future well-being, such as living on half of our income to pay off loans/ build savings in the first years of our marriage. We even began paying our mortgage down, and I started a retirement fund. Now we really don't plan ahead. I turned down another out-of-the-blue job offer last week because I decided that it just wasn't worth the busy-ness it would add to our lives. (Plus it was at Union College- commuting to Schenectady? Yech!) We'll need an additional bedroom to materialize within the next year, when A moves out of our room, but I just can't focus on any tasks that aren't fairly pressing. Maybe most sleep-deprived parents of young children are in a similar state, but losing Teiva definitely changed our outlook on work and savings.

Continuing the day camp saga:

On Tuesday, C and I again arrived at camp. In a remarkable and unusual display of social skills, he sat down next to a counselor who was playing cards with two other kids and said "hi." The counselor ignored him. He said "hi" again. The counselor ignored him. The third time, the counselor looked over and sort of smiled at him. Then C asked how to play the game. The counselor ignored him. (He had no excuse now, since he definitely knew C was there and was not just a nattering little voice inside his own head.) I couldn't take it anymore and forced the counselor to acknowledge him- not that it was too helpful, since the counselor was apparently too hung over to be able to explain the rules of "War" in a coherent way. (One of the other five-year-olds was somewhat helpful, at least.) After the thankfully short game, I told C I was going to go, and asked whether he wanted to stay where he was or use the cardboard bricks, and he (unfortunately) stayed where he was.

Dan called the parks department as soon as I came home with my new report. The woman in charge of the program apologized, said that she had told them to be sure to introduce themselves, etc., and assured us that she'd meet with the staff that day and have words. (She also said something vague about "trying to make it better this year," implying perhaps that last year was pretty darn bad too. Hmm, maybe SUPERVISION would help?) She also asked Dan to call her again later in the week to report improvement or lack thereof. (Seems to me that she should go spy on her own staff if need be, but whatever.)

Today seemed slightly better in the morning; most of the staff were at least engaged with the kids, although many kids were still at loose ends and no one bothered to help them. Another parent was clearly annoyed, and I caught up with her as she left and asked her to also call the parks department so they realize this is a real problem and we're not the only ones who expect camp staff to at least feign interest in their jobs. It sounded like she probably would. I'm really hoping that the administration realizes that they need to have someone on-site who actually cares. (I'm also really disturbed that there haven't already been complaints- this is the third session of the camp. None of the other parents stayed more than five minutes, even on the first day, despite the clear lack of- well- anything positive.)

Moving on. A is sleeping worse than ever, but having a lot of fun crawling and pulling herself up during the day. She's trying a lot of new foods now that she's decided to eat; so far she's had rice, millet, sweet potato, banana, lentils, raspberries, blackberries, and tahini. (And tomorrow she can try the first summer squash from our garden!)

Last weekend, we went to the Falcon Ridge Folk Festival. We had beautiful weather, and the kids were reasonably well-behaved until the ride home (which was hellish, and that theme carried on through the night), but given our focus on child-management we barely got a chance to enjoy any of the music. So while we had a good time, I think we'll wait a couple years before trying anything similar again.

In addition to crawling more determindly, A is starting to point/ touch things with one finger- a precursor to using the thumb and finger to pick things up, rather than raking at objects with the whole palm of her hand. It's amazing how she's making enormous strides in both gross and fine motor skills simultaneously, especially since she's also making more and more sounds. (She's not saying "hi" like C clearly did by this age, but she MIGHT have said "mama" and "da-da" a few times. We like to think she did, anyway.)

C began a morning day camp sponsored by Bethlehem Parks and Recreation today. It was so poorly run that I almost didn't leave him there, but with kindergarten coming up, I was worried about setting a precedent of backing out before giving the program a chance. (We'll be fully prepared to pull C out of kindergarten if it's not working out, but we want him to go for at least a month before making that decision.) None of the teenage counselors (there was no one there over 20) there introduced themselves to either me or C, and none of them made an effort to engage C in any activity. I might have excused them since I was still there and they may have figured I wanted to work with him, but there were two other kids who clearly needed help yet were just left to stand by themselves looking hopeless and confused. After half an hour, despite C's protests, I forced a counselor to take charge of him and left (feeling horrible). Once at home, Dan suggested that before we decided to pull him out, he'd check it out again and see what was going on now that I was gone. The kids were on the playground and a school administrator let Dan into a classroom facing the playground so he could spy on the kids. C was trailing behind the counselor I'd left him with, talking continuously, so obviously doing okay. Probably in the hopes of shaking C, this counselor was actually engaging with the other campers. The rest were chatting amongst themselves, except one who was sleeping on a picnic table. (Keep in mind- this was the FIRST DAY of a camp session for PRESCHOOLERS. When I was a day camp counselor, I certainly had days I sort of blew off, but I was working with grade-school aged kids that I knew well enough to know if one of them needed attention.)

Expecting the worst when I picked C up, I wasn't surprised to find him milling aimlessly around the cafeteria where the camp is based. But when I brought him out to the car, he was in a pretty good mood- apparently someone managed to break through their apathy for long enough to organize a game of duck-duck-goose, which for whatever reason he loves. And he said, "Maybe we'll play it again tomorrow!" So despite the mediocrity of the program, we're hesitant to pull him out when he's willing to go- again, because of kindergarten coming up. (Which raises a whole lot of questions about whether we should even be considering sending him to kindergarten if we think a camp where the kids are ignored is suitable preparation for it, but we have another month to contemplate them.) After tomorrow, we'll decide for sure whether or not to keep him in; either way, Parks and Rec will be getting a call from us demanding that they monitor their employees better. (There was a grown-up supervisor at the camp I worked at, and it definitely made a difference.)

A's newfound mobility is keeping us on our toes. It's been so hot that we haven't had the energy to completely babyproof our house, and we're not entirely sure how to go about it since her brother strews choking hazards in his wake wherever he goes. So I've just been sticking really close and, when she goes for something dangerous, distracting her until I can remove it. But the aforementioned brother has the right to play outside of his room, and A is already throwing fits when I keep her from devouring his Playmobils. (I plan to have him store them out of reach, but this is when he was actually PLAYING with them.) Removing un-baby-friendly temptations made it a lot easier to keep C from getting frustrated when he was little, but I'm trying to console myself by remembering that he was more often bored because he didn't have another kid to entertain him.

Until today, she's been only marginally interested in solid foods. Maybe she's burning off a lot of energy now, because she devoured all the rice and sweet potatoes we gave her, and threw fits until Dan gave her the black raspberries he'd been picking for the rest of the family. Looks like we'll be making big batches of baby food soon!

from our trip; hike up Balm of Gilead (few other photos cuz our camera died) 

we baked many large cookies 

the balloon pump is a big favorite 

C opening birthday presents (note his 5 shirt) 

pre-crawling baby 

pre-crawling baby 

flying the kite from Uncle Matt and Aunt Candace 

home again!

We just spent a week at Twin Trees and had an completely delightful time. Overall, the weather was great (and certainly an improvement over the heat wave back home), we got to be outside a good amount, the bugs were bearable, and we loved getting to hang out with our friends who met us up there. C spent two nights with Nana and Ye-ye at Racquette Lake. He apparently had a wonderful time but we missed him. (Though I did not miss checking on him every 4 minutes for an hour while he fell asleep each night, or waking him up at midnight to give him a last chance to use the bathroom.) A learned to crawl for real now, and she's still pretty pleased with herself every time she does it. (Given her past developmental milestone patterns, that'll probably last about two days, when she starts to get frustrated that she can't walk. Gee, she's never satisfied with where she's at now, and always wants to be another step ahead. That doesn't remind me of anyone else in the family, nosiree; where could she have gotten that from?) The very first day she became semi-mobile, she started trying to take away toys from our 19-month-old guest. Can't wait to see how that plays out with C over the next few months....

The only real damper on our vacation was the travel. A screamed for large chunks of the trip both coming and going, and our trip home today took 3 1/2 hours (twice as long as it should) due to make-the-baby-happy stops (and she still screamed for about 1/3 of the in-the-car time). C was tired and whiny after such a busy weekend too, and at one gas station both of them were screaming. While I tried to get the pump to accept Dan's credit card and Dan tried to get A out of the car, the woman at the pump across from me started laughing, "They're both screaming now! Ha ha ha!" Not quite knowing how to respond to such a bizarre comment about a truly not-funny situation, I ignored her. (An assault charge would not have helped improve our day.) Anyway, A seems truly incapable of sleeping in the car, which means that she and I will probably not be able to accompany Dan and C on two long-distance trips they have planned over the next 2 months. We're hoping she'll improve after she's one and we can turn her carseat around.

Pictures will follow when the camera-keeper is able.

The weather did not cooperate for C's birthday party, so we ditched our outside-group-game plans the morning of and came up with several carnival-type indoor games to do instead- throwing balls in a basket, driving remote-control bumpers cars over Xes on the floor, getting timed on the Sit-n-Spin, etc. This change, however, solidified Dan's insistence that we needed plenty of dollar-store-plastic-crap prizes for all the kids. (Another party activity was decorating t-shirts, which I had bought to limit the plastic-crap we were handing out. Just the day before, C attended his friends' pirate party and was handed a bag of what is best described as garbage as we left, and I really didn't want to contribute any more to our local landfill. But I was overruled.)

Luckily it stopped raining so we could do the t-shirts outside. We had the kids lay leaves, stickers, cardboard cutouts, etc. on their shirts and I used a spray-on dye over them, so when it dried and we took away the decorations they were left with the image in white. Then Dan supervised an egg-in-spoon relay race and we brought out dessert. (C wanted chocolate chip cookie ice cream sandwiches. Could I go out and buy Chipwiches? Of course not! I spent forever making a double batch of enormous cookies from scratch and spreading ice cream onto them instead. They were excellent, I've been told- not that I could have any since A is still offended by dairy. And I'm not bitter or anything.) And then it was 3:00! Time to go home! We made it! And we're never having that many small children in our house again!

(Well, Ashley stayed until about 3:30. She wasn't actually invited; she's Megan's little sister. But she wouldn't leave. Dan said she could sleep under the pool table in the shed with the dog, and she was okay with that. But her mom ended up carrying her kicking and screaming to the car.)

A's been trying hard to crawl for the past couple weeks, but isn't quite there yet. She is able to sit up from a prone position now, though, and she likes to do that when she's supposed to be going to bed. So what used to be a 10-minute naptime routine has morphed into at least 25 minutes, and tonight nearly two hours. Given that she wakes up at least every hour in the night as it is, we're not too thrilled. She's been pretty cranky too, but doesn't seem to believe us when we tell her that getting more sleep would solve her problems.

Pictures are coming soon. Starting tomorrow, we will be spending a week at Twin Trees, so expect no updates until we return. (Should that be if we return?)

now THAT'S a pancake... (black raspberry flavor of course) 

C is thrilled to take nightly black raspberry walks lately. The railroad track-less trail provides plenty for all... 

Overheard at playgrounds over the past few weeks:

a six-year-old humming Black Sabbath's Iron Man over and over again (I thought he was pretty cool)

"You are picking up ants? You're such a freak!" (said by a parent, and NOT in an affectionate way)

"Don't go in the sandbox. You'll get dirty." (heard at least 6 times, even when the sandbox was dry)

"Rich hurt his toe getting out of the pool. He doesn't like little people. Little people don't make him happy in his heart." (from a 3-year-old girl)

"My mom says babies are too little to sit on the ground." (from a 4-year-old, whose mother had clearly been talking about my dirt-covered baby)

"The doctor says that I need to feed him at night 'til he's four months old, so we have another month before we can let him cry." (no, I'm no making this up)

"Finish up your juice so you can have your gummi worms!" (the "juice" was, incidentally, Capri Sun)

Hummers for the Earth

http://hummer.mightymiramichi.com/

C still continues to blow us away with his math skills (which luckily continue to develop despite our utter neglect). "If you have $10 and bunny crackers cost $3 a box, how many boxes can you buy?" After 15 seconds of thought and moving one hand as if he were stacking 3 blocks (I have no idea how his mind processes this), he came up with the right answer. (It's 3, Marley!)

Reading, however, continues to completely baffle him. He knows all the sounds letters make, and can identify the letter that starts a given word, but then he has some kind of mental block that stops him from going further. He can't identify letter sounds at the end of a word, and only sometimes can he read rhyming words. (For example: "This word is Rat, R-A-T. What letter makes the rr sound? The A-T make the at sound. What word do you think M-A-T might be?" And he'll answer "milk.")

A remains unimpressed with solid foods. She completely rejects them from Sarah, but will eat some from Dan. Maybe we should just give her Cheerios.

random notes

Dan's installed the pool table in the shed, and the shed now has a decidedly 70's-den ambiance. (Which is exacerbated by the records he plays out there.) Paco is a big fan of the new digs- we were all in the yard yesterday and he barked outside the door until we opened it so he could lie on the rug instead of slummin' on the grass like we were.

C's most recent invention idea is something that automatically stirs food while it's being microwaved so it's evenly heated.

While Dan was buying stamps to send out C's birthday invitations, he ran into a classmate's mom, who was doing the same exact thing for her son. Her son and another classmate, whom we could tell from the very first day of preschool are going to be the prom king and queen in high school, are having a joint birthday party the day before C's. Their invitations included a photo of the two of them dressed as pirates and parchment torn to look like an old treasure map; they will be having a pirate-magician and, we assume, delectable pirate-themed food, treasure chest gift bags with real gold coins imprinted with each guest's name, and a real oceangoing sailboat imported to their yard for use as a playset. We printed out a "you're invited!" note on our computer for each guest (didn't even use card stock) and figured we'd come up with something fun to do a couple days in advance. Even as we sat around mocking Supermom after the kids went to bed that night ("sure, she's always nice in public, but that's because she locks her kids in their rooms when she gets home and drinks! Her kids are polite and well-behaved out of fear!"), we realized that we really were just jealous, and we blame our lame-ness on perpetual lack of sleep.

When C started eating solid foods, we carefully prepared single-ingredient organic fruits and vegetables, waiting five days before introducing a new one, and waiting several months before moving on to harder-to-digest grains. Perhaps when he was 8 months old, we might have given him some organic wheat-free Oatios. We started that route with A, and she's had no enthusiasm for banana, applesauce, or sweet potato. Today she was grabbing at stuff on the kitchen counter, including a few spilled Cheerios (the General Mills chemical-laden version of course- Oatios taste like crap; no way will we eat them). And instead of distracting her from the poison, I told Dan, "just let her have one." And she did.

Alas, the school won't give C free tuition, so I turned them down. I'm still keeping my eyes open for work- teaching is not really ideal, since it requires more energy than data analysis or research coordination or pretty much any of my other skills, but it seems to be the only field that hires anyone part-time for more than minimum wage! (Well, on the east coast anyway.)

We are sooo glad that the weather has finally improved; I couldn't take the oppressive heat any longer. If the rest of the summer is like this, I might feel better about living in the Northeast. We hear that the heat did kill off the blackflies in the Adirondacks, so maybe that will be the heat wave's silver lining.

We've been occasionally offering food to A for a few weeks now and she's been unimpressed, but today she took some sweet potato without spitting it out! I don't know if she decided she liked it or if she was too tired to reject it or if trying it over again just wore her down, but we'll give it another shot tomorrow and see if she's really ready for solid food. (She's getting so big!)

I told the school I'd only accept the job if they gave C free tuition, and they haven't gotten back to me yet. It sounded unlikely, but, you never know-

Well, I was offered the job, and now I just need to figure out whether or not I should take it- do I have the energy to deal with other peoples' kids and my own? Would I end up not making any money after paying for benefits, etc.? Do I really want to go back to having to be somewhere every single day? Hmmmm-

creepy cap and gown graduation photo 

C was the first child out of all 3 classes that "graduated" his pre-school last week to be called by name and come forward... Some of this had to do with the height order they chose for each class, and that his class went first. 

We got fewer bites at least- 

We spent Memorial Day weekend at Twin Trees in North River, fighting off blackflies and convincing the pipes not to leak. Since we were all sharing one unheated bedroom, we were lucky that C managed to sleep through most of A's cries both nights and only woke up to complain of being cold. (I got into bed with him to warm him up, which wasn’t so bad because I was cold, too. Dan and A got the electric blanket. I theorize that whatever evil force fields they emit are weak enough so they’re safe to use a few times a year.) Poor Dan was up much of both nights with A though, trying to let me get sleep, and since he didn’t want to wake anyone up in the main cabin either his choices were pretty limited. We did determine that dairy products definitely do make her sleep even worse, so I’m back to almonds and beans again.

Last week, I had an interview at Bethlehem Children’s School, a small private school a couple miles away, for a part-time middle school math and science teaching position. They asked me to come back to teach a class. They said not to worry about what the kids are working on; make it an enrichment activity.

So this afternoon I go in, wait for the kids in the classroom, wait for the three people who want to observe me, and try to get started. The board is completely covered, and it has a big note on it that says "DO NOT ERASE." Now, I’m versatile, but I knew I’d be more effective if I could write on the board, so I asked if there was anything else I could use. An observer disappears and comes back to say, "Let’s move to my room instead." (I would have preferred doing without, but what could I say?) So we all file into the kindergarten room, where the kids are thrilled to have a big carpet to sit on instead of desks. I start the lesson (discussing animal population fluctuations) and we all go outside for a Project Wild game that went pretty well and got the point across. (One kid said, "This is the best game I’ve ever played," which was affirming but made me wonder if she got out much.)

When we go back in, half the kids need to go back to their own room to get their water bottles so we have a super-long transition; I write the data that we’re going to graph on the board and hand out graph paper while I wait. This was supposed to be a joint math/science lesson, and I planned to talk about the differences between dependent and independent variables and how independent variables go on the x-axis when you graph as the "math" portion. It turned out that this was decidedly not a good idea, because these kids had never drawn a line graph before or used the terms x and y axes. It took me a while to catch on to this, and it was pretty awkward. Meanwhile, one of the kids- the daughter of one of the administrators- is lying on the floor doing nothing. I ignore her. (I don’t even know the kid’s name, and was at a loss as to how to handle it.)

At any rate, I left thinking it was kind of a disaster. I mean, maybe they realized how awkward it is to work with a group of kids you don’t know who don’t even know what you’re doing there (the week before school’s out, no less); how difficult it is to know what level to aim a lesson at when you’re coming in from nowhere (and I must say that I had drawn a line graph by the end of sixth grade); or how ungraceful a class with so many transitions can become. But all three screw-ups? That takes a lot of overlooking.

But, they’ve e-mailed me asking me back yet again. They have evaded my question about salary/ benefits/ tuition remission for C thusfar, so I’m afraid that after going through all these interviews they’re going to offer me so little money that it won’t be worth it. (Honestly, I’d rather not work so many hours when A's still so little, but part-time jobs are so hard to come by around here that I feel like I need to consider it for our long-term future.) So we’ll see what happens NEXT week….

New haircut! 

in process- but you have to wait to see the result! 

Last week was a pretty sad week- our washing machine broke and left us with piles of unwashed diapers for five days, and our toilet overflowed, filled the bathroom with three inches of water, AND leaked into the basement (requiring every remaining towel in our house for clean-up, and of course we couldn’t launder them afterwards).

Since things pretty much sucked anyway, we decided to put together my parents’ hand-me-down office desk. It was fairly straightforward except when the baggie of hardware to go with it disappeared for twenty minutes or so until C innocently suggested, "Maybe it’s in the Lerkim," which is his Lorax-inspired hiding place behind the chair in our living room. Indeed, we found it there- apparently a Barbaloot had whisked it away when we weren’t looking.

This desk was large enough to replace three desks previously inhabiting the office, and they spent several days being shifted around the house. (For a while they blocked our downstairs hallway completely; for a while one prevented us from opening the hall closet; for a while one occupied our bed.) Also, the transfer of computers-and-supplies between desks has been fairly painful, and two large plastic tubs that we’d just purchased for storing recyclables have been usurped and are now holding piles o’ crap under the desk.

But now, all is good. The washing machine was fixed and while it still cost plenty of money, the repairman took pity on us and sold us a "service agreement" that covered the repair for about a quarter of what he could have charged us. The toilet disaster is cleaned up and may have provided C with a good visual lesson in what happens when you use too much toilet paper. (He also has been instructed on where the water turn-offs are.) The new desk is much prettier and more functional, and the old ones have all been relocated or sold at a convenient neighbors’ garage sale.

So now what are we in for?

bad parents

We’ve been bad parents this week. On Wednesday, Dan was the parent helper at preschool; we figured for snack we’d bring in cheese and crackers or something we had around the house. At 11 p.m. I remembered that it was supposed to be a pseudo-birthday celebration for C since he turns 5 over the summer- crackers weren’t going to cut it. So in the morning I dig out a three-year-old box of brownie mix and start mixing it together- when I realize we have no eggs. Hmm, what do eggs do in a recipe? Here, I’ll add some more oil- and a little water- and I’ll beat it up with some ground flaxseeds to hold it together. Just in case it doesn’t work, I’ll put some cookies in the oven- we had just enough frozen dough for 16 very small cookies. But it’ll work. No problem. I’ll toss some leftover Halloween M&Ms on top too, to make it look festive.
For future reference, flaxseeds do not replace eggs. C wanted to bring it along anyway, so he did. 5-year-olds aren’t too picky when it comes to chocolate, luckily, so they were only slightly phased by the lumps of greasy chocolate sludge they were served. (I’m glad we had the cookies too!)

Thursday was Show and Share Day. We never remember to bring anything in for it. This time I realized it while dropping C off, and the best I could come up with was- my library card. (Dan at least could have dug a photo out of his wallet.) So I gave it to him and told him to talk about how fun it is to pick out books. (We don’t want to think about what his teachers think of us by now.)

Monday, C had no matching socks that fit him, due to our washing machine being out of commission. "How about you wear sandals today?" Luckily he was amenable, and the weather was borderline-acceptable for it.

Maple likes to help garden... 

View from 36" 

Looking up, looking down

4/26/05

Despite all the truth behind the popular conception that parenthood can leave you in a constant mental fog, only capable of functioning at the intellectual level of a head of baby bok choy (well perhaps less, when we sleep less than a cabbage gets to), there’s also nothing like parenthood to help you take notice of things.

Like how many seconds your infant can sit up by herself now, balanced on pudgy forearms like a potato- shaped motorcycle with missing wheels, before tottering over…Or how noisy the world is during the day when your baby is trying to nap (and how eerily quiet in the house at night, except for the dogs heavy sighs, as you pace back and forth, back and forth)…

I’m also still re-learning to see the world through C's 4.75 year-old eyes—view from 36 inches I’ve been calling it (though his eyes may be farther off the ground than that at this point). The hundreds of digital photos he’s taken since getting the camera the Christmas before last illustrate this well—dog butts; a dozen seemingly identical pictures looking straight across at the top of a block tower; automobiles looming large, shot while passing, as if with a fish eye lens; adults faces from underneath, peering down like parade puppets.

But it’s his fascination with money (and occasionally noticing a track) that has reminded me to look down, and look well. There are a surprising number of coins to be found when you’re that low to the ground, and more than a few bills as well. Although I usually notice other treasures. Today it's amongst the flotsam in the little strip of green space next to A's doctor’s office parking lot.

Even the trash has meaning of course, though. Take the styrofoam coffee cups and takeout plates and discarded car air fresheners, and the solar calculator I tried, just to be sure it didn’t work. These are signals from folks who didn’t take the time, or care enough to bring a travel mug for their cup of Jo, or to find a trash can. I’ve always struggled to understand just when it became OK to cast our garbage to the wind. Sure litter has been around since kids threw clay tablets with their old homework assignments into the pit by the road, but mass roadside litter-storms probably coincide with the period when automobiles started appearing everywhere like dandelions in the spring. I just can’t picture people throwing a pop can from a bicycle very often, or a crumpled piece of paper from a horse-drawn buggy—these modes of transport would put you too close to the offending object, and your guilt, for too long (and again when you passed by on the way home). And if you drove the only car in town, I’d think you’d want to show it off and honk and wave to everyone in passing—"ah-wooooo-ga!"—not be known as the fast and fearless littering roadster).

But when I’m done pondering this and look past the mound of cigarette butts, I see nature(remarkably) in our midst. It takes a moment to register, but those clumps of gray fuzz mean we’re standing below an owls dining room. Below—that means there’s something above—and only then do I look up and notice the great old (and half-dead) tree with no leaves to shade with yet this spring. A relic no-doubt overlooked by those that tidy up nature for us and make sure all those dead trees are removed post-haste (afterall, this thing could fall on your car, or several; though it will most likely come down in a storm, when no one’s likely to be parked at the far end of this big lot).

But I’m glad it’s been overlooked for now (they must not have been looking down closely enough to notice it); and I can picture the owl with a midnight snack, and almost hear it as clearly as the redwing blackbirds are calling right now—telling me it’s spring, and that at night there are also frogs to be heard in the marshy area back there. Maybe I’ll see if A's doctor has night time appointments…

-Dan

No teeth yet... 

A likes to say "ahhhhhh"