All About E

Elias is a funny kid. He's got fascinating ways of communicating, of imagining, of learning, of expression and of generally living.

He hasn't been in diapers during the day for a couple of weeks. When he has to pee, he will even dance around calling out, "I have to pee in the potty mommy! I have to peeinthepottymommmmeeee! but he won't go in his pants. It's surprising how simple it was for him to catch on and buy in to the process.

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He sings or talks quietly all the time. Sometimes he is making up songs and stories, sometimes he is quoting books, but his mind is always going. He also loves to dance, and he and Kindred and I have dance parties in the kitchen often.

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Now that he is learning to form complete sentences, Elias has a sort of copycat mentality. For instance, if I am helping him put his shoes on, it might sound something like this:

"Turn around and sit on the step so I can put your shoes on." "Sit on a steps an put my shoes on?" "Yes. Now lift up your foot." "Lift up my foot?" "Push it all the way in." "Push it all a way in?"

And so on.

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If he doesn't want to do something, he won't say, "I don't want to do that." He will just put a "no" in front of the statement. Like this:

"Elias, do you want noodles with sauce?" "No I want noodles wiss sauce." "Elias, it's time to get your PJ's on." "No I haffa get my PJ's on!"

Today he was playing outside in the crunchy snow on a rather precarious slope with a broom and a melting puddle. I advised him, "Elias, don't slip and fall on your head." His response was, "No I fall into the cold icy muddle on my head." And then as we were getting wet clothes off and dry clothes on after our outing, I asked him to put his left foot in his shoe and he took a deep breath and lifted his right foot for me. When I emphasized that I needed the other foot, he smirked at me then grinned full out.

"I juss kidding!"

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Elias notices now when Kindred can remember the words to songs more quickly than he can, so he's started working on beating Kindred to the lyrics. He is downright angry when Kindred begins to sing a song he's already set his mind to learning. "NO SING A SONG, JIDGIE! IS MYYY SONG!!"

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"DO IT MYSELFFFF!" is a new favorite mantra.

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Tonight Elias and Kindred were playing and somehow (probably because I was on the phone and making dinner) Elias got his fingers slammed in the basement door. He came wailing and screaming to me with his hand aloft. I did all the necessary kissing and he was not recovering. "I'm siiiiiick!!!" he roared. I asked if he wasn't feeling well in his tummy and he cried, "Nooo, I'm sick in my fiiiinnnnggerrss. They are hurting so so baaaaad!" After some ice and come more kisses, he sniffed softly and said, "No I'm sick. I'm happy." He attempted a smile despite the tears still fresh in his eyes.

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Ok, I'm almost done. So Michael is in this show. And he plays a character named Mr. Brown. Mr. Brown is an old man, the (former) school janitor. As the show got closer and closer, Mr. Brown would make frequent visits to our house on his way to rehearsal. Elias completely played into it.



"Misher Brown?" he would ask. "Hi Misher Brown. Like Brown Bear whatdoyou see." Elias would talk only to Mr. Brown and ask about the show and about the songs he sings, and about his white mustache. He never called Mr. Brown "Daddy."

So there's your preview and plug. If you want to see Michael (and monay others) in all their glory, COME SEE THE SHOW!



E's Remarkable Imagination on Vimeo

Snow Day(s)

We had a rather minor snow day last week. The temp was good for playing, but the snow was not plentiful. The boys still tried their, uh, hands? bodies? at snow angels and loved it.



Daddy also let them eat snow.


Then it snowed again last night. And it rained and rained all afterwards. Cold icy rain. So we didn't get a chance to suit up like little Fatty Red here.


But Michael and Kindred did make a little Buddy. Yep, Buddy the Snowman. At one point Kindred remarked that he needed to get to the North Pole so he didn't melt. But Kindred also got really hung up on the fact that of course he couldn't go to the North Pole. Why not?

Because he doesn't have any feet, Mama. He needs feet!

Poor footless Buddy. He looks content to me, though.

Over and over and over and....

Gloo-Ooo-Ooo-Reeya on Vimeo.

A Catch up Post

So much to say, so much to tell. I've been keeping track of stories and quotes and events in my awesome little new agenda/planner that Michael got for me for Christmas. So while some happenings may go undocumented, several will not. Here is part of the collection I have:

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The Eagles were in the playoffs last weekend. (That's football for all of you non-sporty people.) Michael had to go to rehearsal during the game (I can't express how mad he was) and asked me to tape the game. Yes, tape it. No folks, we don't have all that fancy television and cable and HD technology where you can just record shows on your TV and watch them later. We have bunny ears. And a VCR. So I taped the game on VHS. Go ahead, laugh. Anyway, I thought it might be a good idea for me to know what was happening in the game, so I sat the kids in the chilly basement with the space heater and trays and their veggie burgers and we watched most of the second half. (I married a sports fan and therefore have if not an actual interest, at least an understanding of what is happening on a football field. So although I would not have felt even a little sad if I missed the game, I thought it would pass some time if I watched it with the boys.) Kindred and Elias finally learned the Eagles fight song while we were at a friends' house last weekend. This is a little surprising since E-A-G-L-E-S is probably the first word Kindred learned how to "spell." Anyway, so they sat there singing, "FLY, EAGLES, FLYYYYYY". Only Elias kept saying: Fah-LYYYYY, Eagos, Fah-LYYYYY!" Then when I called down to them to ask, "Who's winning?", Elias looked up and replied, "Me!"


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I came home from work last week to hear Kindred ask his father, "Can I show Mama my bunk bed PLEASE Daddy?" After getting an enthusiastic, "Yes" followed by, "Show her how you jump off of it. It's so awesome," I followed him upstairs, quite curious, slightly nervous. Daddy had placed Elias' little "big boy bed" on top of Kindred's twin bed, draped it all with blankets and sheets and created a "bunk bed" that Kindred could climb on top of and through and around and under and eventually launch his skinny body off. I watched, and was awed, yes. It's a pretty far jump.

When Elias joined us, Kindred started giving instructions about how and where to go to have the most fun on the bunk bed. He demonstrated for his brother: First, Elias, you go here [climbs up on the bed], then you go here [climbs around the railing], then you climb under like this [crawls under the little bed and disappears behind the blanket tent], then [grunting] you pull up you pants like this, then you can put your head on the pillow, then you can peek through like this! See? See, Elias?

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It's Potty Time! Elias has been a potty pro. For a few months he's been requesting to pee on the big potty when we take his diaper off. (Imagine the sight. Off comes his diaper, then he clutches his little goods and runs half bent over to the bathroom where he climbs up on the toilet and pees a tiny little squirt. Then flushes twice.) But we've since put up a "Potty Train" chart and he gets stickers when he uses the potty: one for pee, two for poop. When he completes his chart, he gets a special treat. He's already filled up one chart and is halfway through a second. His first special treat was that he got to eat ice cream for dessert even though he had not finished his dinner. We've even been taking him out with big boy underpants on instead of a diaper or pull-up, and he's had minimal accidents. When he does have an accident, he's devastated. But so far he's picked it right up. We are so proud of him.

This new accomplishment means, though, that Elias' sleep pattern has been a disaster. We can't get him to get into his big boy bed and stay there. He keeps popping out of his room and running around the house at bedtime. Kindred has been known to gather his stuff and climb into our bed to sleep when Elias is being nutty. We put Elias into the crib, he jumps and sings. We put him into the playpen in our room, he cries and screams. It's rough, but I know we will get through. I can't even imagine the idea of having two diaper-free boys. Hooray!

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Kindred has a lamb (Lamby) and a teddy bear (Tuna Salad) that are his sleeping companions. He explained recently the nature of his relationship to them. He is Tuna's daddy, and Lamby's mommy.


More to come!

Christmas Songs Still Ringing Out

I thought that I would want to keep my Christmas decorations up for a very long time because my living room looked so nice and clean and "themed." I was proud of myself. And then we did Christmas with my family over New Years weekend and when we came home I was SO tired of the decorations. So we pulled them down the following weekend and I felt relieved. Michael and I joked about listening to Christmas music for one last time while we put everything away. We laughed, but did not turn it on.

Turns out that we still haven't had that "one last time." The boys are obsessed with two particular Christmas songs: Little Drummer Boy and Angels We Have Heard on High. While one "pa-rum-pum-pum-pums" the other "in excelsis deos". Kindred has had one of them on loop downstairs for the past 35 minutes. (He's having "play alone" time.) "GloooooOooooOooooOooooOooooRee-Ya" he repeats, over, and over and over and over.... When Elias asks me to sing it, or play it (on my ah-pod, as he puts it), he always asks for "GoOoOoOoO." It doesn't sound like "goo" when he asks; it's more like saying "good" and leaving off the ending. Their favorite versions of these tunes are both done by Josh Groban, which is not only tolerable, but somewhat amusing, as Kindred repeats all of Josh's little rifts and scoops in his otherwise traditional hymn-sound. However, I must say that if this trend continues for much longer, I might start going around making one of these faces:






hee hee.

Kiddo quotes

All my boys went to the Aquarium without me today. When they picked me up from work they told me again about all the things they'd seen. Elias told me he'd seen Banana Sharks. We have no idea what he was talking about. Then Kindred described in detail watching divers cleaning the shark tanks. Crazy.

Then as I was trying to wrangle the little ones to bed, Kindred tried to convince me that he didn't need to put on PJ's. He was completely unclothed. "I want to stay nudie-banoodie and sleep in just my pull-up tonight. Just like you do, Mommy."

Ahem.

Free Money- A sociological study

I had a meeting downtown today. When it was over, and after discussing meager salaries and overwhelming work loads with a fellow housing counselor, I took the bus and headed back to work. The bus was crowded. I sat in the back and listened to Wait Wait Don't Tell Me (the NPR news quiz) on my headphones and tried to ignore the ruckus behind me that seemed to be causing quite a stir on the bus. From everywhere, guys were pulling cash out of their pockets and changing seats to sit in the rows of seats in the rear. Through my headphones I could hear moments of yelling. I decided it would be wise to know what was going on, so I turned and got my answer.

A man in his 40s was playing the bottle cap game with any willing participants. The bottle cap game? This is the game where a small fuzzy ball is hidden underneath one of three plastic bottle caps and a quick-handed person moves the caps around in various sequences to fool the onlooker about which cap hides the ball when he stops and asks, "Where's it at?" In order to guess, though, you have to make a bet. $5, $20, $60 -- you double your money if you are right or you lose the lot if you are wrong. Although these guys are fun to watch, I know they are crafty. I turned back around and minded my business. Then the gamer moved up a few seats so that he was sitting right across the aisle from me. I watched as he sucked in the people around him. Then he stopped and locked eyes with me. "Where is it?" he asked. I knew. He'd flashed it at me seconds earlier. "The left one!" someone yelled. He ignored them. "The middle," I answered. He picked up the middle cap and there it was.

Then he pulled out good ol' Ben and held him out for me to take. "You won," he said.

He was handing me $100. Just handing it to me. For free. For guessing right. I hadn't put any money down, nor had I really expressed any interest in playing. I just thought he was running a few trials to get people's attention before someone bought in. Suddenly he had my attention. I didn't have to play again. I could take the money, turn up the radio and sit, or get off the bus, $100 richer. But I knew it wouldn't be that easy. These guys don't play like that. I held up my gloved hand and shook my head. He wasn't giving up. "You won," he insisted. "You can take it. You aren't going to take it?" His eyes were big, a little disbelieving. "No," I replied. "Seriously? It's yours." When he saw I wasn't budging, he set up again and asked again after his fingers flew over the caps. I didn't answer, and he nudged the kid next to me. The kid pointed and he was right. The $100 was his, but he had to have $ in his pocket to prove he had cash before the Ben could be handed over. "Nah, Man," the kid replied. He showed his couple of ones, but he decided against accepting the bonus too. Pretty soon the gamer moved back again to behind us. After a minute I felt a tap on the shoulder. "Where is it?" he demanded again. I told him I hadn't been watching. Soon after, he got off the bus. His gig was up. But he'd had a pretty good crowd for a while.

It's a fascinating game of dexterity, wit, acting, gambling, risk and power, and while the mortgage payment rides on plastic and fuzz, people practically drool with greed when they see cash flying around in front of them. Their eyes get wide and shiny and wet, and they lose or gain a paycheck during the 12 minute thrill of a bus ride home.

I can see how it's tantalizing. I think I'm glad I passed it up. It was just too much. Too much of everything.

Feeling the Christmas Love

We put the boys to bed on Christmas Eve and brought our new little living tree in from the front porch. When Kindred and Elias woke up and came downstairs in the morning, the decorated tree greeted them. Elias loved getting his nose right up to the shiny ornaments and looking at his funny face in them. Kindred yelled, "I LOVE IT!"


They also got to see their new kitchen for the first time too. (A craigslist purchase.) You could tell Michael makes lots of meals and cookies with their assistance, because they immediately got the container of eggs out of the "fridge" and Kindred fried them up in the pan, adjusting the gas knob as necessary, and Elias pulled out the larger pot and announced that he was making soup.


One of our Christmas morning traditions is to snuggle and read The Nativity illustrated by Julie Vivas. (If anyone knows where I can get prints or anything done by this illustrator, please let me know. She is one of my favorites, hands down, but I can only find her work in children's books.) The children, when asked what the angel (who, in this version, wears floppy untied hiking boots) said to Mary, dutifully reply "No be afraid."


The boys did a little sleuthing and instead of buying lousy flimsy slippers for Daddy at Kohls this year, they found some amazingly wonderful handmade slippers on Etsy.com here. Kindred knew that there was something called "felting" that Daddy was going to have to do before he wore his new slippies, but Elias didn't think it seemed too difficult, so they chose colors and ordered them right then and there. The slippers come out of the package quite large, but after some washings in hot soapy water and wearing them cold and wet for 30 minutes then setting them on the radiator to dry for 2 days, they turned out to be his favorite slippers ever. Good choice, boys!


Another Etsy.com purchase was made for the boys: a 5 piece handmade wooden train set. It is awesome.

Then it was stocking time.

Snacks! Yogurt-covered pretzels, dried fruits, trail mix. Santa, you're the best.

(At some point, the chirping Easter bunny made an appearance....)

K for Kindred and E for Elias

And now for the section I will subtitle: We love you, Aunt Lindsey!

Merry Christmas to all, and to all, well, you know...

The Eves

We had a very nice holiday season that has not yet come to a close. We are visiting my parents in western PA and haven't even finished opening presents yet. (We started last night and still have stockings to go.) However, before I report about the holi-DAYS, let's talk for a minute about the Eves.

When I say the Eves, I am not talking about multiple women with the same name, like Heathers. I am specifically referring to the day-before-the-big-day. These days have not traditionally gone well for me. You'll recall last year on Christmas Eve when I had an appointment for the boys to get their flu shots and discovered while there that their health insurance had been cut off because the welfare office hadn't received the necessary paperwork to reinstate the boys. I packed them up and hauled them from the doctor's office to the welfare office where I was yelled at several times for having roudy children who wanted to stand on the seats, and then was seen after 45 minutes by someone who promised to look for my paperwork which I had in fact mailed months earlier that they had just misfiled. The boys were turned back on on New Year's Eve after I called and pestered them for the whole week and they magically found my renewal packet. (Incidentally, I'm fighting the welfare office again this year for the SAME exact DAMN THING. I even took them to court. They didn't show up. Anyway, I digress...)

This should have taught me my lesson. Don't plan anything for the Eves. Don't even leave the house. But no, like a dummy, I decided to go on with life and plans as usual.

Christmas Eve was on a Wednesday. Elias goes to "school" on Wednesdays, and since he was missing the last 2 Fridays of the month, I figured it made sense to take him in even though it would only be for half the day. I also had a half day at work, so it seemed to be a sensible plan. I drop him off, then pick him up again around 12:30pm. When we walked out of the house at 8am, we nearly bit the sidewalk because it was so icy. I had trouble walking around the car on the road to get inside. The whole street was slick. I watched cars stop calmly at the stop sign at the end of our street and decided our street simply had not yet been salted and perhaps it was worse because we were parked under a tree. I urged my neighbor getting carefully into his car to be safe, buckled Elias in, and started off on our journey.

About 2 minutes into the trip, it became very clear that no roads had been salted-- they were all as slick as mine had been. I thought about calling Michael and telling him how bad it was out there but figured there was no need to bother him. He wasn't going to have to drive in it. I began my strategic plan regarding the best route I was going to take to get to Elias' school: Avoid small side streets and overpasses. I passed a bus turned sideways, it's rear end crumpled against the side of a church. I quickly and carefully avoided the car spinning its wheels in front of me and made good choices about how to get back to Wayne Ave., a well-traveled and wide street. At this point while I am patting myself on the back for my good driving skills, it should have occurred to me that with roads in this condition, I should make certain that Elias actually has school. I did not. Onward I went, cautious but confident. Then I made my crucial error.I'd forgotten that the small hill in front of me was a bridge over train tracks. I saw another sideways-facing bus on the downslope, and then multiple cars flipping and spinning every which way. I stepped on the brakes, thankfully stopping myself before getting into the foray in front of me. But the drvier behind me did not stop so quickly and I had my own little private foray. BUMP! I was prepared for the hit-- I saw it coming, and felt badly that my car had been so responsive when his had not. Elias was fine, didn't make a sound. But the man in the small Toyota truck pulled up next to me, mumbling and shaking his head. When I asked if he was OK through the open window, he continued to shake his head and mumble. At this point, I realized that he was mumbling in Spanish. I backed my car up and pulled behind him to get his insurance info, which after some miming and repitition he produced his AllState card and I began to copy his info. My car was pretty damaged despite the hit being fairly soft. I got out my phone after I realized my Spanish skills, although they were more comprehensiove than this gentleman's English, were insufficient to communicate as thoroughly as I wanted to, and I started to call one of several bi-lingual friends. He began waving at me urging, "No policia! No policia!" I assured him I was not calling the police, but none of my friends were answering their phones. So I stumbled through the rest of the conversation, telling him I would call him again in a few days with "mi amigo hablar en espanol con usted, Senor," and got back in my car and got the heck off that bridge, where the situation was worsening.

A few blocks away, I pulled over and called Michael to report what had happened. Then I called Elias' school. It wasn't opening until 10am.

New Year's Eve I got the plague.

I'm telling you, no more plans for the Eves. I will sit quietly and wait for the big days to arrive next year.

More reports about those "Big Days" and pictures to come soon.