And Mommy do your best to crop out every kid in class so as not to violate the "internet privacy code of conduct concerning other people's children".
Day Two
Adam's a happy guy. And he's loving school. The funny thing about it all is how much more TALKATIVE he's become since starting! He's like a different kiddo. Kindergarten has opened the vault.
I know I haven't written enough stuff about Natalie! And she's seriously the silliest little thing ever. So I'm compiling a bunch of "Natalie-isms" here to make up for several posts. Hopefully this gives a good sampling of the broad spectrum that is Natalie at the wonderful age of 3.
One of her silly habits is that she falls asleep in the middle of the hallway at night. Gets out of her bed, drags her ladybug pillow and blankie out and plops herself right there above the stairs. I've moved her back into bed several times only to get a report from Jason, "did you know Natalie was asleep in the hallway when I got up?" Now I just let her sleep there undisturbed.
night #1
night #2
night #3
And of course this is how it really looks as I'm walking up the stairs trying not to step on her.
She kind of does whatever she wants at night which means that she's often up playing in her room for at least an hour or two after "bedtime". And obviously she sleeps wherever she wants. I mostly go with the flow on this unless she's bothering the other two.
In kitchen news, Natalie loves to cook.
She makes "tookies" out of playdoh...and then sticks them in the fridge.
So I find bags and tupperware with multi-colored "tookies" tucked all over the fridge that I'm not supposed to touch. "Because they're cooking." And they're for Noah's party. See the pink tupperware down there?
Tookies.
In the lunchmeat drawer. Tookies.
And down deep in the produce drawer. More Tookies.
Don't take them out! They're cooking.
I really should do a whole post on Natalie's wonderful Bie. That Bie is so important to her and such a part of her that I will be sad if/when she decides she doesn't need it anymore! Her Bie is her precious pink blanket that she carries with her all over the place and sleeps with and still sucks on like she's a breastfeeding baby. And she delicately pinch, pinch, pinches the pink fabric up and down one of the folds, just like "twiddling" nursing behavior. She holds it up to her face and I see her big brown eyes always peering over and I just know I will always hold that picture of her in my mind as a sweet toddler girl. (And notice how every single sleeping picture I posted with her in the hallway has her Bie in it.)
Where Natalie goes, the bie goes.
Even in Brother and Sissy's first day of school picture
A picture from May 2011. You can see her "twiddling" the fabric.
Another picture from May 2011. Her tongue is doing that suckle thing. And she's sleeping with her Wiggles DVD like it's a teddy bear. This is one thing she doesn't do anymore! Although now she sleeps with her teddy bear "Jeff". (Named after the sleepy purple Wiggle of course.)
All that time watching Wiggles videos I think has contributed to her being really excellent at remembering songs. Here she is singing a song she learned at Vacation Bible School. Now mind you, she didn't utter a peep of this song during that week nor the week after! And then bam a week later I start hearing her bust this out and she sounds like the most evangelical three year old I've ever heard.
So that's a bit of my sweet lovable and ornery Natalie. I wuv her!
We just got home from our super-duper Wiggles concert! Hooray! Or "Hoop de Doo!" as they say. I was so excited when I found out the Australian group would be coming to So. Cal. I simply had to buy tickets. And AFTER I bought the tickets I found out that this will be their very last tour with the original group members: Greg Page, Murray Cook, Jeff Fatt and Anthony Field. All but Anthony are retiring and there will be three new Wiggles cast members starring in the show.
This silly little children's group is a big deal because they've been singing and dancing to my children almost every day and thus their music has become the soundtrack of this stage of my life. I just know that in 30 years if I happen to hear "Do the Monkey" I'll be right back in this house in this living room with a 3 year old Natalie, 5 year old Adam, and 7 year old Francesca. It's a beautiful thing! And I'm quite grateful to the group for that.
The Wiggles characters: Dorothy the Dinosaur, Henry the Octopus, Captain Feathersword and Wags the Dog
So for this event I splurged and got us some good seats and all five of us went to our "Wiggly Party". We enjoyed ourselves so much although I know the kids were pretty overwhelmed at first with the whole thing. It is quite strange to meet people, whom you've only seen as 5 inches tall on TV, in real flesh and blood. Like "hey these are the real Wiggles!" Not just characters playing the fake Wiggles cast, but the actual Greg, Murray, Jeff, and Anthony. And even the real Captain Feathersword. That's pretty cool! Natalie especially was much much quieter and still than I thought she'd be. It wasn't until I bounced her around a lot on my lap that she loosened up a bit. Adam was scowly through quite a bit of the show which is pretty typical for him. I do know that he enjoyed it though and will likely talk about it in a week or so at the oddest moment. He never forgets things. He'll remember this one for sure. Francesca enjoyed the concert a lot and I know she'll remember too.
I smiled through the whole show!
Anthony coming into the crowd to collect roses for Dorothy
So happy Greg was at the show!
Natalie loves Jeff. She even has a stuffed bear she named Jeff.
Captain Feathersword Paul Paddick
Can you point your fingers and do the twist? Natalie can!
They sang favorite songs, did lots of silly acrobatic tricks, and came out into the crowd to say hello. For me, it was a celebration of my kids' childhood and of me and Jason as young parents! Thank you Wiggles for a wonderful show!
Many many years ago a woman with a Down Syndrome child was on Oprah and she said that having a special-needs child forced her to research everything that kids could do at certain ages. Most parents stop hyper-reflecting on their child's developmental milestones after the age of about 3. Which is a good thing, in my opinion, since there is no point in being hyper all of the time. But while culturally there is more focus on "performance achievements" (ie: in school, sports, music, art) overall it seems we're dropping the ball on teaching kids functional achievements (cooking, cleaning, repairing stuff, making stuff, being of use to others!). In this interview, the mom said that she learned children should be able to cook some things by age 7. So she started her Down Syndrome daughter in the kitchen at that age to help prepare her for the future. Reflecting on this, I recalled hearing stories of women from other countries who said they were preparing the entire family meal by age 9.
Believe it or not, I've had that Oprah episode in my head for all these years, just waiting to have a kid old enough to put to work. ha ha!
Kids it is time. Actually I've had Francesca learning a few things already, but definitely now that she is 7 I feel she is at an age where she can more reliably learn things. How to cut, how to turn on the stove, how to work the microwave, how to measure, and most importantly, how to read and follow directions.
So last week when she wanted Top Ramen I said "Sure if you can make it yourself!" So I stood in the kitchen, but I absolutely refused any help beyond watching her turn on the stove.
"Mom, what do I do?"
"Read the directions!"
"Boil two cups of water." "What do I do?"
What does "Boil two cups of water mean?"
"I don't know."
"Well, I guess you're not getting any Top Ramen because you're going to have to figure it out."
Lo and behold someone figured out to get a pan.
It was quite an interesting experience watching her struggle with this concept of reading and following directions all by herself. But most importantly, I want her to learn that she can DO THINGS. She can solve her own problems. She can think things through. She doesn't need me to do every single thing. She can read. She can measure. This is all fun stuff actually, and I'm glad she's at an age where she can develop these skills. It's quite fun!
So here is a pic from yesterday. We decided to make cookies. Adam learned how to crack an egg. Francesca had to read all the ingredients and directions and she learned the difference between how to measure out brown sugar and measure out flour. She worked the beater. Both she and Adam spooned the batter onto the sheet. I stood there and watched and did as little as I possibly could.
My sweet Adam turned 5 years old a few weeks ago. He is my precious boy! A few short years ago all I could do was complain about how much he cried and how much I didn't know what to do with him. And then, with a bit of practice on my part, and a bit of maturing on his, our forces came together and Adam bloomed into a wonderfully sweet boy! YAY!
At this point, just about everything charms me about him. His fuzzy wuzzy head. The way he can't pronounce R's at the end of woods. (Did you get that?) And I especially love his shy demeanor that explodes into a raucous WOO! OH! at the smallest surprise.
He has this funny little habit lately of kissing flowers on shirts like he's a bee. Which means that if one of us girls in the house is wearing a flowered shirt, we will be bombarded with bee kisses that just don't quit. So then someone gets mad and yells "STOP IT ADAM!" and he's actually gotten himself on timeout for not stopping with the kissing!
One of the coolest things about being a mom is watching the kids grow up and into their own personhood. I love that I get to be here to guide and witness. It's so much fun!
So around here one of the milestones I've been waiting on is for Francesca to lose her first tooth. I noticed that all of the other children in her class look like little jack 'o lanterns and it got me wondering when in the heck my girl was going to start shedding some incisors. So finally about two months ago we realized one of her bottom teeth was slightly loose. FINALLY! She was nearly seven!
Anyhow, about a month after that, I noticed something else: Her adult tooth was coming through behind the baby tooth. That's when I started prodding her to get serious about the wiggling. So she did, and it did get looser but still it hung on and hung on. I started getting impatient and wanted that tooth out of there because by the time her birthday was near, that adult tooth was 1/2 way in. But her birthday came and went, and still that tooth was loose, but not out. I gave myself a "call the dentist" deadline, but on the day of the deadline she made so much progress with it, that I knew I wouldn't have to take her to get it pulled anymore.
On Thursday night, I'd had enough and decided we needed to pull it ourselves. So up to the bathroom we went and with minty dental floss I tied a slippery knot around the thing. I let her fiddle with it for about 5 minutes before I got the courage to grab the floss and give her tooth the yank it needed. Not wanting to go wimpy on the thing and possibly not pull hard enough, making things worse, I jerked my arm really fast and out popped the tooth! We heard a "clink!" and no more. She was surprised I pulled it but said it didn't hurt. I was BUMMED because we lost the darn thing! It really is gone, I've checked.
However, I was glad to have it out, requiring no dentist calls and her big tooth looks super cute in its new spot.
For her seventh birthday, I decided to change things up a bit this year. In years past we've done the whole "bounce house" big party thing. And that is a lot of fun, but since she's getting a bit older, I wanted to scale things down a touch. Probably due to my own desire to bowl I decided that she should have a bowling party! It turns out I didn't have a chance to bowl (why I thought I would I have no idea) but the bowling turned out to be a great idea. I invited some local friends to bowl Friday after school when they have a discounted rate from 3:30-5pm. This was pretty cool because it cut down on party costs, and I didn't have to clean my house before or after, and the kids all got to try something new and fun. Just as I love watching my own kids grow and change, it's really fun to also watch my friends' kids' grow and change so I'm glad I got this cute group shot:
Frannie is having a great first grade year overall. She's really doing well in math. She's improving steadily in her reading although I'm not sure I'd say it is her best subject. But she works at it and is doing just fine. She's still doing her piano lessons and I'm really excited because I think we've finally found a system to help her practice. For the past 3 or 4 months she has been doing ok at piano but really not quite good enough simply because she doesn't practice enough. As she's introduced to more skills the practicing gets harder and she complains more and I haven't been super-disciplined about her having a set time to practice etc... Sometimes when she's complaining about it I've wondered if we should just throw in the towel on the thing, but something inside of me always says "No." So I've talked about it with Jason and we both agree that this is good for her and she should continue and we just need to figure something out with the practicing. So here's what we're doing now and it has worked really well for the past two weeks and I hope it keeps working! Basically I've told her that her lesson costs $15 a week and she's going to be paying for her lesson now, and the way she earns money for her lesson is that each daily practice session is worth $3. So she has to practice 5 days a week to have the money for her lesson, but if she practices more she can still earn more. And if she practices less, then she'll have to take the rest from her other money. Each day that she practices I physically hand her the three dollars that she puts into her piano bag. I feel like this very physical exchange may be helping her to understand that the time she puts in is worth something and her songs are sounding SO much better! The first two days of wrestling with the new songs seem to be the hardest, but after that it really starts coming together. It is music to my ears seriously!
First off- I didn't do my New Year's Resolutions whatsoever!! ha ha ha No Spanish! No emergency kit! No recipes from Food and Wine! (although I did try internet recipes) And no new photos in frames! It's a good thing I figured out other things to do, but wow. What a way to not accomplish a few goals.
Ok, so here's what DID happen in 2011. Rather than separate it out month-to-month I'll just take it in big categories.
Frannie- finished kindergarten in June. Her teacher was Mrs. Byers and her friends were mostly Zoie, Heather and Nicole. She also finished her gymnastics class and I decided to try her in piano over the summer. I have this thing with extra-curricular activities that I want the kids to express some amount of joy and willingness to do the thing- whatever it may be- because it takes me time to schlep them there (which means Adam and Natalie get schlepped too) and money to pay for it. So I'm not super-keen on continuing an activity that I have to bribe participation in. And gymnastics required the bribe of a Del Taco .49 burrito. Anyways, so I decided to put gymnastics on hold for the summer and I started her in piano classes with a teacher who lives next door to Nataki. Her name is Linda and she's super sweet and a good teacher. Frannie has since finished her first level 1A book and is working on the next one. It's a joy to me to hear her practice and play and I hope this is one activity that she'll continue to grow with. I never did re-sign her up for gymnastics or anything else in the Fall. Mostly because she started first grade and it is a longer school day and we wanted her to adjust to that. I figured piano was enough. I do have the desire for her to learn some sort of dance just because there is so much value to learning body control and movement, but for some reason it's just not the right time. I'm starting to think about homeschool dance. Shoot. I took lessons all those years. Why don't I teach my own kids to dance?
As far as other interests she loves to ride her bike (and now skateboard) and play with Legos and build things in general. She loves crafting and cooking. Basically, Francesca is a DO-er. Give the girl something to do hands-on and she's a happy camper, and that includes chores and organizing games with Adam and Natalie.
As I mentioned, in the fall she started first grade and so far it's been magical for her. The girl loves school. She loves her friends. She loves her teacher. She asks to go to school on the weekends. She asks to do more homework. And darnit, that's the way it should be. Shouldn't the little ones just LOVE school? Yes, I think so. So I'm happy that she's enjoying herself and that it's been a good year so far. Her reading and math skills are improving, and she's basically just where she should be. Her teacher is Mrs. Hansen, and her best friend at school this year is Heather.
At home she's a great big sister and helper to me.
Adam- I've seen big changes in Adam this year. And I feel that even in the last month I've seen him grow and change a lot. First, he got taller and he got bigger feet! His feet are now bigger than Frannie's which irks her no doubt, but I can tell he feels like a Big Boy because of it. In fact he told me today when I called him my "little boy" that he's not a little boy, he's a big boy. Well, ok, you can be mommy's big boy. I used to worry that he'd be so shy and not make friends well. Wrong. He makes friends with other little boys just fine. He's got an active imagination with all of his trains and cars and even though he can be an introvert, it's not a socially handicapping kind of quietness. It's pretty cute because I can see the quiet smirk or whatever it is and know that inside he's really into whatever is happening.
On Tuesdays I take both he and Natalie to the mommy n' me preschool class and he loves that. They both do. I think he's doing well with his "kindergarten readiness" because before I know it, it'll be fall and he'll be off to school.
Both he and Frannie asked for skateboards from Santa Claus, probably because of this video that Jason showed the kids. It is Adam's favorite youtube thing to watch by far.
The funny thing about skateboarding is that Adam is a "two feet on the ground" kind of kid. So it actually isn't something he's taking to just yet, although he definitely likes the idea of it. Frannie on the other hand is on that thing every day.
Other than preschool we don't do any special activities other than park days on Wednesdays and Thursdays but that is really all he needs. During the weekdays Adam and Natalie play together and fight constantly as is typical for kids. All of the kids have a good close relationship actually and that's nice.
Natalie- She's 2 1/2 and a feisty one. She's cute and smart and stubborn and has a VERY LOUD SCREAM! Oh dear. She's a really good talker and here are some of her most commonly heard phrases:
"I not paying with you eny-MO!" "Pbbb!" (That last part is her tongue out spitting at me.)
"I not gone to pay with you eber a-GIN!"
"Sees my sisso. He's my AM." (She's my sister. He's my Adam.)
"I want ba-ba cup!" (So we get her off the bottle, but she still needs to have a sippy cup of milk to go to sleep or for comfort.)
"Where's my bie?" She still loves that pink blankey and needs to suckle on it for comfort. We can NEVER lose that thing! She'd cry and cry and cry!
She did potty-train this year so that's good. She got #2 down really fast but it took all summer of me working on it with her to get #1. But she got it! So other than "I gotta go pee pee!" I also hear her saying "I need my pie-see!" (my privacy).
This year has seen one destructive act after another from Vasaline spread all over her body, to minty toothpaste, to massive yogurt smears, to drawing on walls and breaking the car cd player and our television by shoving weird stuff in it. I sort of think she's getting better now (although I hesitate to make that declaration too confidently.)
All of this is ok though because Natalie is a very good cuddler and she's funny and cute.
Jason- Jason has fully embraced his biking and fitness hobby. He continues to post at bicyclefriends and he loves riding every weekend and riding with the kids too. He taught Natalie how to ride which he was super proud of. He also won a few races this year. He competed several times in the KnobbyTime mountain bike races held at Bonelli and he won a few 3rd and 2nd place finishes. He's made a lot of friends through the cycling community and bikes are his favorite thing to talk about! He continues to work for Canidae and does a great job for them. Jason is a super-duper Dad and I appreciate how he always helps with the kids and around the house.
Jamie- As for me, I love being here with the kids and taking care of them and life around the house. Maybe I'm tired because it is 11:50 on New Year's Eve and I'm feeling done with writing this, but I'd rather not write a big huge fat paragraph about myself! Suffice to say, things are much the same with me and I'm enjoying life.
and the photo that didn't make it to the Christmas card...
Happy, Screamy, Sulky- and Silly in the back
Here we are on our way to seeing the Metrolink Holiday Train.
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