the dog days of early spring

Happy Pranksters’ Day!

Linus: We played in the water with our blazing suits on.

I know the old adage says not to cry over spilled milk, but yesterday I mopped the kitchen floor and today Linus peed on it, and later knocked a bowl of cottage cheese onto it right before Gwendolyn spilled a full glass of milk all over it. Before the tears could start flowing, Linus peed on it again.

au naturale

We may not leave the house this week because I have two goals: get Linus potty trained (even if that means he stays naked for the entire week) and get Casper back on his regular nap routine and used to sleeping in his crib. I’ll let you know who goes crazy first.

Linus has never been much of a runner – he kind of lumbers along, struggling to control a body that is too big for him. But today while I was nursing Casper down for a nap, I heard the kids, who had sneaked outside without permission. So I went to wrangle them back in and when Linus saw me, he dropped the water hose and took off running toward the front yard at full speed, glancing back with an impish look on his face. And he was naked from the waist down. Because of potty training!

Casper turns seven months old.

snake charmer

Every Spring, students at the University arrange a big service project day as a way to say “thank you” to the surrounding community. Area residents submit job requests (yard work, painting, window washing, etc.) , then about 10,000 student volunteers go out into the community to complete the projects -- this year, over 1,000 of them. We decided to take part, so today, over a dozen undergraduates showed up at our house to help us dig up some turf and old paving stones and lay a new brick walkway along the side of our house. We still have some leveling and tidying to do, but we are really grateful for the hardworking students who helped us complete, in a day, a job that would have taken us a summer's worth of weekends.

In all the digging, we find a family of three small grass snakes. Gwendolyn makes friends with each one before setting them free in the backyard.

Linus, while helping the students dig, says, "We’re digging all the way to Africa. Africa has nice snakes."

Gwendolyn, who really worked hard today and was anxious to participate, told us that "I’m so tired, but I’m still working because I know that hard work is important."

We find a large honeysuckle bush (one of Daddy’s favorites), with six incredibly fragrant blossoms, growing wild in the backyard. We want one for the front yard, too.

Todd sings the kids a special tooth brushing song every night. Now Linus has started to sing a similar version to himself, but hasn’t gotten the hang of rhyming: “Brush away all the sugar, brush away all the teeth, so we can go to . . . bed.”

Before and After

garden parties

Nana left this afternoon and we miss her already. We think she had almost as much fun as we did during her visit because she has agreed to come back when the weather cools off (which unfortunately won’t be for another 9 months).

Apparently the children are dreaming of cooler weather because today they told me the sandbox was actually a snowbox.

Daddy: What if your house fairy comes and finds messy rooms?
Linus: She will leave nobody nothing.

Mama: What is the first ingredient in ice cream?
Daddy: Sugar.
Linus: No, it’s ice!

Daddy sings an old favorite, but with newly invented lyrics to get to Linus's nickname: "The lie bone’s connected to the knee bones -- Lineybones!"
Linus repeats his own version of the song: "Lineybone’s stomping on the eight bone!"

Gwendolyn is still trying to make friends with all the birds in our backyard. She pretends to be a little fairy (inspired, I think, by The Sun Egg) and she spent much of today singing to the birds, telling them stories, drawing pictures for them, and making special treats to hang from the one tree in our backyard. I think she hopes they will fly down and sit at her feet to listen to her songs, but we probably got as much as we could hope for when a male cardinal landed on the small ledge outside the kitchen window today.

two redheads are better than one

Today we took a little road trip to Brenham and toured the Blue Bell ice cream factory. It was a really fun time and the kids are just old enough to be interested in what we were seeing on the tour. Of course, the highlight was the free ice cream at the end.

Late this afternoon, Gwendolyn stood alone in the backyard for nearly an hour and sang songs of her own composition to the birds.

Opposite K residents in uniform

Yesterday the kids played so sweetly together all afternoon. Gwendolyn invented a land called “Opposite K.” She made official Opposite K uniforms for herself and for Linus, she invented rules and very specific social graces to be performed. Linus, who usually tires quickly of this type of game, was so involved that when I invited him into the kitchen for a warm-from-the-oven muffin, he replied, “I can’t. Opposite K is keeping me here.” The children kept calling me “Boss,” so I went with it and made various pronouncements such as, “All visitors and residents of Opposite K must clean the playroom!” And they obeyed every time.

We are told that Gwendolyn’s horse, the stick in our backyard, is named “Lou-Lush”

Linus: “This is crazy! I’m getting crazed!”

taste

Today we tried again with Casper and solid food. I pureed some fresh avocado and Nana fed him. Again, he was not impressed.

all boy

Linus, riding around the back yard on his horse (a long stick): “Giddy-down! Giddy-down!”

After Linus helps Todd with the letterpresses, he goes to wash his hands at the laundry room sink where I catch him sticking his entire head under the running water. He explains, “I need to wash my hair because it’s been on those presses."

in all their Easter glory

Tonight after dinner, Gwendolyn invites the family into the living room, which has been elaborately decorated with play silks and cloths, for a “game.” She passes around a basket and asks each person to choose an item.

Todd chooses a plastic egg. Gwendolyn explains that this is the “first part of Easter, with the Easter Bunny hiding eggs with candy inside.”

Linus and Casper choose wooden nails from the toy workbench in the playroom. She explains that these are for the part of Easter when Jesus died on the cross.

I choose a hand-drawn picture of a person (Jesus) lying on a bed, surrounded by 7 crying people who she explains are the apostles.

Nana chooses a wooden plate from the toy kitchen and Gwennie tells us the plate is the rock which the angel moved away from the tomb because “Jesus is risen.”

I’ve been worried about not having a very Christ-centered Easter this year, but was humbled by the lesson my 5 ½-year-old came up with on her own.

Gwendolyn then leads a re-enactment of the Nativity with Linus as Joseph (or Jophes, as he called himself) and Casper as the Baby Jesus. Poor Todd is the donkey and the flight into Egypt ends in the bathroom with teeth-brushing.

Happy Easter!

welcome to the season

While on the drive to the greengrocer, Linus calls out, “The map says go North and then go South.”

We spend a long time outside today – mowing the lawn for the first time this season, pruning trees, and grilling our dinner. The children want to come outside to help Todd with the charcoal fire, but he insists that they get their shoes on first. He eventually catches Linus attempting to sneak outside, not in his trainers or sandals, but hopping along in a space bag he'd emptied the quilts from and crawled into as if it were a boy-sized prophylactic.

Mama: Linus, can you sit down in your seat?
Linus: No, I need to wiggle around.

round and round and round she goes

Today we drove to the city to run a couple of errands, but mostly to visit the zoo.

Casper had his first taste of solid food today, at a Mexican restaurant, surrounded by loud noises and with a cloth napkin tied around his neck. Still, he thought it was totally gross. We tried sweet potato and then pear. He made horrified faces, spit the stuff everywhere and cowered to the back of his high chair when I came at him with a spoon. I secretly hoped I could fill him up on solids for the ride home since nursing in public is so hard for him (Casper is a very distracted eater. He’s just so interested in the world around him that he has trouble concentrating on nursing unless we are in a dim and quiet room all alone.). Instead, I put him in the sling and he half-nursed half-tried to pull the glasses off my face and both of us got soaking wet. He finished his meal snugly in his carseat on the way home with Mama unbuckled and sprawled over him, trying to convince him that the view from the window wasn’t all that. Fun. Really, really fun.

celebrating the spring equinox at the children's museum

While eating breakfast, Linus asks, “Mama, poop is not invisible, is it?”

Linus addresses members of his family as, Sir, Ma’am, Judge, or Your Majesty.

Linus, coming in from the backyard: “We’re tired of playing in the stupid, yucky sun.”
Gwendolyn: “Well, Linus, you’re a son. Are you stupid? Are you yucky?”

Linus has been a little aggressive toward Casper lately. Today, while Casper was playing in the playroom with the big kids, Linus knocked him over. Linus also declared that Casper cannot keep any clothes in Linus’s room.

Casper is really moving these days: rolling like a pro, scooting backward and often getting up on his hands and knees and rocking back and forth.

ice cream panorama

Nana’s luggage arrives from the city today, perfectly intact and with the two jars of homemade jam (which were hidden inside) unbroken and still cold! To celebrate, Nana takes us out for ice cream.

Linus and Gwennie were arguing about which of them could like a certain toy (since, obviously, two siblings can’t like the same toy), and Linus said, "That's all right if Nougat likes it -- he's a girler."

adventures for nana

We are scheduled to pick Nana up from our little local airport (a ten minute drive from our house) this afternoon. Before strapping the kids into the car, I check the flight status and discover that Nana’s plane left three hours late, meaning that she will miss her connecting flight and have to wait four more hours at the big airport in the city. After getting to the airport at 6 this morning, she won’t make it here until after 7 pm. That is unacceptable, so I pack the kids in the car and drive the two hours (in the same unrelenting rain that caused all these canceled flights) to the city airport.

Arriving at the airport, I find that parking at the three nearby terminals is full; we have to park at a distance, then take the underground train to find Nana. Finally at the right terminal, we page her (with no results), talk to the person at the information booth (with no results), and finally convince the airport security to give us a pass to enter the terminal.

Once I’m able to get myself, a baby, a stroller, and two kids who won’t stop asking why they have to take off their shoes through airport security, we find Nana! Of course we get lost in the maze of the parking garage, but we eventually get in the car and on the road. Finally, we’re home.

While trying to deal with the shellshocked children on the return drive, I had started to question the trip; after all, we made it home barely before Nana was scheduled to arrive on her flight. But I get a different picture after Todd drives over to our little airport to retrieve Nana’s luggage. Walking in at 9 pm, he’s told that the only flight from the city all day – the one Nana wouldn’t have fit on – has just arrived. Apparently, there were at least four cancellations and several delayed flights. We say more prayers of thanks at this point as we imagine what would have happened if I hadn’t gone on this six hour escapade when I did.

tv junkie? foodie? engineer?

I don’t mind that my children are relatively clueless when it comes to preschool pop culture. This afternoon I let them watch Clifford on PBS while I folded laundry. This dialogue followed the screening of a Barney commercial:
Gwendolyn: Can we watch that?
Mama: No, I think it’s kind of scary.
Gwendolyn: But it’s Barbie. It’s not scary.

Gwendolyn, on what we should eat tomorrow, when Nana gets here: “Noodles, or pancakes, or chips, or waffles, or syrup.”

Gwendolyn, on what we ate today (bean dip): “I had seconds, I liked it so best.”

We got back from Dallas to find that Lilac, a little fairy who frequently visits our house and leaves gifts when rooms are tidy, had put up a magical fairy door in Gwendolyn’s room. Gwennie’s been obsessed with how she can arrange to see Lilac when the fairy comes through the door. This afternoon, she fashioned a Rube Goldberg contraption out of string and a rock. She engineered it so that when Lilac opened the door, the string would pull the rock onto the dresser, waking Gwennie up. (Instead, the doorknob ended up falling off the door.)

Imagine that cute glittery door against a pale green wall.
I can only paint one room at a time . . .

shades of blue

We are home sweet home! I think we are all happy to be back home together, though initially, Linus was trying to convince us that Casper should be left at Granny and Grandad’s house. Poor Casper. He didn’t sleep well on the drive back and then while Gwennie and Linus were reuniting with all their toys, he felt the need to explore and reconnect with every square inch of our bed and his crib. It took me three hours to get that exhausted baby to fall asleep.

Daddy: Maybe we should have called Linus “Justin,” because he’s always asking for “just one bite” of my breakfast.
Gwennie: Maybe we should have called him “Sherry,” because he likes to share.

lousy sMarch weather

bird lady

Remember that snow I wrote about just one short week ago? Today we went to the zoo where we dripped with sweat and got sunburns. Good times were had by all, especially in the bird house, where we fed jays and cockatiels.

Linus finds a “Night of States” map puzzle at Granny’s house, and asks to put it together. After we have it done, I ask him where we live. He points to Texas and says, “Right here – in Mexico!”

Linus: I’m going to run away from this house! Disgusting!

redhead trouble

I love the age of two. Two and a half even. Two and three quarters? Not so much. And three totally sucks. This is one of the many ways in which it has become apparent that Linus is almost three: Last night on our way to Granny’s hospital room (to sneak her a baked potato so she wouldn’t have to eat hospital food for dinner), I stopped at the vending machine and bought the kids a little bag of cookies to share. They both wanted to carry the cookies, but since Linus was already carrying the potato, I gave the cookies to Gwendolyn. Right there, he threw himself down on the ground and began sobbing and wailing that he wanted to carry the cookies. With Casper in the sling, juggling the potato and diaper bag and trying to keep Linus quiet enough not to disturb every patient on the fourth floor, I was able to convince a reluctant Gwendolyn to give the cookies to her brother. The moment he had them in his hand, he popped up from the carpet, dried his tears, said, “You can carry the cookies, Gwendolyn.” and handed the bag back to her. Possibly the worst $.80 I’ve ever spent.

Linus has been combining his love of the scatological with a new found interest in rhyming words:
“‘Kiki’ and ‘peepee’ rhymes, don’t they, Daddy?”
“Hickory, Dickory, Dock. The mouse ran up the clock. The clock struck four, the mouse peed on the floor!”

Granny came home from the hospital today. Yea! We are so happy to have her home. Before picking her up, Grandad (who is a world class practical joker) played a prank on her. He told her that Linus had gotten into his workbench in the garage, taken a wrench or hammer, broken the passenger side window, and dented the door of her two-month-old car. Linus has an ongoing love affair with tools and is always “fixing” things, so this was highly plausible. Mom was beside herself, in tears, worried about poor little Linus (who was oblivious to the joke) who might be thinking that he had done something wrong. We had to let her off the hook pretty quickly, but when she got home, all she wanted to do was hold her little redhead.

warm & cozy

Todd is here! I am so happy to have my sweet husband back with me I can hardly stand it. Gwendolyn may be just as excited. Poor little girl fell asleep last night crying for her daddy.

at the carnival, I mean, hospital

My children want to move into the hospital and live there with Granny. We had a great visit with her this evening. She is looking so good and is very mobile, and the pathology report came back showing that the cancer has not spread. (!!!) The kids all piled into the hospital bed with her and had a great time moving the bed up and down. And then the nurse brought them ice cream cups! And then when we were leaving a woman gave them each 2 helium balloons! It was hard to convince them that leaving the building was the right thing to do.

a little library love (and talk about husbands)

This morning while Tiffany was fixing her hair and make-up, Gwendolyn joined her in the bathroom and played with Auntie Tiffany’s rings. Before saying hello or good morning or anything else, Gwendolyn asked, “Why don’t you go out and get a husband?”

In other husband-related news, today is our anniversary. Lucky number seven. Today we've shared seven seven-minute phone conversations.

Gwendolyn turns five and a half.

Gwennie the worm

During prayer at church today, Casper grabbed hold of Linus’s hair. As soon as the prayer ended, Linus loudly called out, “Watch out! Mr. Grabby is here!”

While driving today, I point out some remaining snow on the roadside. Doubtful, Gwendolyn suggests, “Maybe it’s smooshed marshmallows or flour.”

The kids have a favorite song and today when Casper was squealing, Gwendolyn cleverly made up new lyrics, “Scream, scream-a-ding-ding! Scream, scream-a-ding-ding! Scream, scream-a-ding-ding! Who is it? It’s Dr. Screams!”

patio play

Gwennie's miniature snowman version of our family

Linus takes his red monkey sleepers out of the drawer and walks around with them, pretending they are Kiki the Monkey. As he holds them next to the fire, “Kiki needs to get warm by the fire.” Placing them in the chair next to you, “Kiki wants to sit here next to you."

Granny has surgery. They remove a foot of her colon, a number of lymph nodes and her gall bladder. All goes well, but she looks pretty hammered when I visit that night.

snow day, part 2

Yesterday we played outside sans jackets. Today we had wet, slushy snow.

Linus climbed in bed to cuddle with me this morning and lovingly said, “Mama, you stink. You smell like a goat.”

the self-proclaimed King of the Garden sits on his throne

While helping the kids clean up, I put some of Snow White’s dwarves in the toy bucket. Gwendolyn tells me, “Those are little gnomes from Snow White and the Seven Dwarves.”

After his bath, Linus takes his washcloth and tells me, “I want to hang this up until it's crusty.”

Gwendolyn: Why is your name Linus?
Linus: Because my mother and father named me that.

snow day (well, snow morning)

There was very little snow left this morning, and it melted pretty quick, but both kids have snowballs in the freezer.

I hear Linus crying and when I ask Gwendolyn to tell me what happened, she explains, “We had a big fight and Linus got the best of it.”

snow dance of the preschoolers

This afternoon the kids and I drove to Granny and Grandad’s house so we could be here to help mom before and after her surgery. A couple hours after we arrived, it began to snow! The really amazing thing is that Gwendolyn and Linus were actually able to bridle their excitement long enough to fall asleep tonight.

dance of the preschoolers

Last night Casper rolled off the bed. Damn! I was really hoping he would be the kid to make it through babyhood without crashing to the floor. He’s fine, but he was really mad!

We have two sick boys. Linus has been running a fever and Casper has congestion and a barky little cough.

Gwennie: Are polar bears bigger than gurgly bears?

Linus: Scott, help us!
Mama: Who’s Scott?
Linus: It’s Grandpa Sam. (He's right -- Grandpa Sam is Scott, but we can’t figure out how Linus knew that.)

Daddy: All right, Linus, let’s go clean our room.
Linus: I’m a puppy.
Daddy: Well, puppies like to clean up their things.
Linus: Puppies like to clean up their poop with their paws.

orange on blue

We find Gwendolyn in Linus’s room early this morning. After asking her to not wake him up in the mornings, we get her explanation: “I didn’t wake him up. He woke up because I came in here.”

When Gwendolyn wakes Linus up from his nap, I ask her to leave his room. Once again, she explains the situation, “I’m here to tell him a story and give him some opportunity and to cheer him up.”

Linus tells Daddy, “I have two apple trees outside my window, which we need to go water.”