Too Snowy and Icy to Head Down the Hill for Birthday Cake

We made do.

With s'mores for them.

And peanut butter & chocolate graham crackers for the birthday boy.

(At least I remembered to bring the candles from home)

And Then It SNOWED

Well, yes, he did run out there in his tie-dye long underwear.

It was his first snow, after all.

While Ander and I Slave Away in the Valentine's Salt Mines (Having Set Our Valentine-Making Bar a Tad Too High), Zaza Bakes with jek

Ever the willing guinea pigs for scrumdilly-do!

(All pics by jessica)

Last photo, post sweet snack-a-thon, amidst the craft supplies: 'Za tucking in her wee woodland creatures

jek Plays With My New Lens

This goes along with my Rule of Sandwich Making:

Given the exact same ingredients,

Dubbadad will always make a sandwich

that is far superior to anything I can make.

Always.

Even if it's just peanut butter and jam.

And miss jek can point my very own camera at anything in my very own home (that I perhaps have even previously photographed myself), and she will capture magic.

Because They Didn't Already Have Enough Sugar in Their Systems (and Because Proceeds Went to Haiti Relief)

Yes, they chose to sit in that corner, under that sign. At Scoops.

• His: 1 scoop Green Tea, 1 scoop Coke
• Hers: 1 scoop Caramel Oreo

Because I Failed to Take a Single Picture at Ander's Class Picnic Back in December

There was a massive play structure a few yards away. Not one kid used it.

The Tree, and the Big Stick, and the Mud Hole and River (aka the broken run-off/sprinkler pipe) all had more pull.

And the Big News? The gossip that spread gleefully from picnic blanket to Tree to Mud Hole? Zaza has a wobbly tooth (bottom front, the right one), and a new tooth sneaking up behind it!

Yay for impending Tooth Fairy visits (it's been a long time)!

Yay for mud and sticks!

Yay for woodpeckers and neosporin!

Yay for portable and borrowable younger siblings!

Yay for older siblings reading in the sun and wrangling dam builders!

Yay for clementines and homemade horchata and flan and chewy chocolate cookies!

Yay! Yay! YAY for Kindergarten!

Snow Bear and Little Green Had Bento Lunches, Sunna and Sally Shared a Tea-Party-Picnic, and I Had Oatmeal with Jon Scieszka

• Fabric swatches (doubling as picnic blankets): from jek and Home Ec
• Book, as recommended by Ander to me: Knucklehead: Tall Tales and Almost True Stories of Growing up Scieszka
• Site: http://www.readkiddoread.com/home
• Ranunculus from Trader Joe's

Because There's Always Something to Make (Besides a Mess) at Grandma and Poppy's

Before We Left for School This Morning

She has been nervous about going into her room alone lately.

So he went and fetched her shoes for her. He even chose brown ones to match her outfit.

She was so grateful, and wanted to give him something in return. So here they are, at her desk, going through her stickers.

And then he found the stack of Thingy Things books that we read at bedtime the night before last, and he began a very silly reading of this book.*

He is her brave, kind, funny hero. Most of the time. You know, when he's not ignoring her or teasing her.

* "Not his short pants! His long pants!" (I thought of you, Katie!!!)

Because After Tuesday Gymnastics There's Not a Lot of Time, and Because I Want This Here So They Don't Forget, and Because I Love Them

Darn That Little House in the Big Woods (Especially Ma and Her People-Shaped Pancakes)

To counteract all this folksy domesticity, today also involved:

• driving across town and back twice, just to get Ander and Mr. A together for three hours
• Meat-Lovers' Pizza from Tomato Pie
• Zaza watching "Mustard Pancakes" via Netflix on the office computer, whilst Ander and I watched Order of the Phoenix in the living room

and

• Reese's Peanut Butter Eggs

As Tall as She Is

As resolved at New Year's, this was built 'on her own.'

(And then spectacularly demolished.)

"Here's the day that should have been."

I picked them up early.

It was raining hard, and we shrieked and sploshed to the car, and from the car to the mud room.

We made a fire.

I made two kinds of cocoa with mini marshmallows (four extra 'mallows on the side, too), and I put cocoa in my coffee.

We decided that it was just too rainy to slog across town to gymnastics.

We put more wood on the fire, and popped kettle corn.

Ander learned to applique.

I held them both, and looked them in the face.

I read aloud from Mandy (the bit where she first comes downstairs after her bout of pneumonia and eats with the family), and then from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, even though Zaza was listening, because we are sooo close to finishing, and something bad and sad happened, and Ander didn't see it coming, and at first didn't react at all because it was so impossible, but then it was true, and he was sort of limp with shock, which was wonderful in its way.

I was so glad to have a second chance at yesterday, and I told them so, and Ander reminded me of this, specifically The Island Light, and so the title for today's post was borrowed from the Bunny Queen, Janet.

The Good Bits Version: Brainwashing 101, or Prettier Thoughts, Beautifully Aired

Despite the photo record, our Martin Luther King, Jr. Day was a bit of a let-down.

Mostly because I was distracted by never-ending chores, and crabby about the very existence of said chores.

And because I forgot all about Dr. King.

Dubbadad was supposed to come home early, so I backed out of a cross-town playdate and thought we would have a cozy day in. I envisioned cocoa and books by the fire, maybe breaking out some paints, or baking some cookies.

Things started off well, with warm milk with honey, and mix-your-own-stuff-in oatmeal.

But then I started walking in endless scuffle-socked circles around the house, tidying, sorting laundry, cursing the never-used humidifier that kept toppling onto my toes in the bathroom, carrying bags of stuff to the car through the rain, unclamping Zaza's grasping arms from around my thighs, complaining out loud about the shoes piled by the door and the dried-up toothpaste on the sinks, barking orders, denying access to the computer and then schizophrenically and exasperatedly okaying access.

My downward spiral grew tighter as I realized there was no firewood and Dubbadad was not going to get home early after all and I was still in my pajamas and unshowered and the house still looked a mess.

I resented the laundry/sweeping/cooking/organizing/tidying/bed-making because they kept me from fully being with my children.

And -- badmommybadmommy -- I resented the children for interrupting my chore-a-thon.

But we were all saved in the end, by the Good Bits:

• Play Dough
• embroidered eyeballs
• Sea Monkeys
• spontaneous shame-free dancing to nerd rock
• and a good batch of chili

When Ander was little-r, I would tell him "the story of (his) day" at bedtime, rewriting here and there, glossing over or leaving out the scraped knees or lost toys or stinky fits (his and mine), and leaving in the Good Bits to cushion his fall into dreams.

A little brainwash-y, I know.

At first it kind of worked better than I had intended -- the bad bits actually seemed to be scrubbed out of his memory by the next day.

As he got older, the memories of the bad stuff were still there the next day, but maybe, perhaps, hopefully, he learned to focus on and appreciate the best parts of his day's adventure.

After Aliza came along, I came across this passage in the first chapter of Peter Pan, and felt a bit better about my brainwashery:

Mrs. Darling first heard of Peter when she was tidying up her children's minds. It is the nightly custom of every good mother after her children are asleep to rummage in their minds and put things straight for next morning, repacking into their proper places the many articles that have wandered during the day...When you wake in the morning, the naughtiness and evil passions with which you went to bed have been folded up small and placed at the bottom of your mind; and on top, beautifully aired, are spread out your prettier thoughts, ready for you to put on.

Dubbadad finally, finally escaped work and came home to us, bringing firewood and our favorite cocoa. (Which we will try to put to good use tomorrow.)

Miss C. is 9 (Which Means Ander is Nearly 9): "Can you be-leeeev the Hip-Hop instructor asked me if I was going to dance? Well, duh!" He Said

He obviously didn't have a problem with the ratio. Or with the Tree Pose.

And what he may sometimes lack in rhythm he certainly makes up in enthusiasm and chutzpah.

***I was thinking of this when I took that first picture.***

Gifts for the Birthday-Girl-Next-Door

Ander had been complaining that he isn't involved in the gift-choosing these days.

So we brainstormed:

• He decided a trip to Loyal Army was in order. Because who wouldn't want one of their t-shirts? (and i was good: I let A&A choose, even though I had strong preferences)
• He decided to make a gift for Miss C.: a painting of her dear, departed pet mantis (R.I.P. 'Manny'...we hardly knew you...). We looked at photos on the web, he did a rough in pencil on paper, and then he painted in acrylics on canvas board.
• And I decided some cool, middle-grade fiction was a necessity, and Ander rolled his eyes but acquiesced .

Of course Zaza decided she wanted in on the gift-making action. ("She's my friend too!" True.)

As she has previously made a wee drawstring bag with her new sewing machine, she and I settled upon making a large re-usable drawstring bag in which to 'wrap' the other gifts.

'Za chose the fabric from the scrap bin, and picked out a grosgrain ribbon that she was certain Miss C. would love. She ran the fabric through the machine for the two main seams herself. She sharpened pins. She helped get the ribbon through the drawstring 'tunnel.' She was very proud.

And she chirped (really! chirped!), "I made that!" as she handed off the gift to Miss C.'s mommy.

In the Kitchen: Instead of Washing Dishes or Starting a Load of Laundry or Prepping Dinner

• Lemons from the tree in the side yard that we always thought was a lime tree, and some Cuties (in thrifted Pyrex).
• Wee wire birdcages (found in my Christmas stocking) in the window over the sink.
• The air conditioning unit atop the 'green' condo complex being built across the street.
  

...and Later I Found This (or "How Dare You Get All Melancholy and Nostalgic! We'll Show You! We Refuse to Outgrow Anything!")

The last photo, the one with the cups? Those are the pom-pom creatures Ander made for Zaza for Christmas, really, really, really enjoying the dregs of some sort of invisible beverage.

And jek made the French-knotted cookies.

After Ander Saw the Photos from the Last Post

Slip-Sliding Away

The sand box Nelson built us is gone, taken apart in the last garden remodel: sand recycled between the bricks in the newly expanded patio; sand toys left en masse next to the toddler play area at a local park; termite-chewed wood and Alissa's acid-rain-stained Sunbrella cover hauled off by the gardeners.

Things are being outgrown and left behind and passed on every day now. Mostly -- and most obviously -- clothes and shoes.

But the dusty toys and books -- those are somehow more concrete and thus more melancholy-inducing reminders of Ander and Zaza's inevitable (and joyful! don't forget: joyful!) growing up.

I relocated the block bin a while back so that they have to walk past it every day, and still the blocks sit there, forgotten, untouched.

(Does one ever outgrow blocks?)

(And if Ander outgrows them, will Zaza rush to leave her block-building days behind her in an effort to keep up with him?)

I have whittled the board book collection down to a few kindergarten concept books, rhyming stories, and board book editions of longer picture books. They sit on a low shelf in Zaza's room, right next to her reading-friendly pile of cushions (aka the 'cuddle corner'). It appears that she mostly uses that shelf to display music boxes and framed photos, right in front of the board books, blocking them from view.

The toy kitchen/store is pretty dusty too, despite my rotating the toy sweets and tea pots and stove-top display whenever I pass by.

But I think I find the neglected bath toys the most heartbreaking.*

Baby Ander would shove that smiling rubber tug boat into his mouth -- the smokestack resting on his upper lip -- and squeakily gnaw away, working those gums or two or four teeth back and forth, with all sorts of drooly concentration.

That was waaaaaaay back when I actually sat in the bathroom during bath time.

Now I wash dishes while they bathe, ears tuned to the sounds which bounce off the bathroom tiles, splash across the hall, dash across the dining room, and ricochet around the kitchen sink.

Not so long ago I would catch snatches of silly character voices, or the mumblemumble of narrated bathtub adventures involving Playmobil 'guys' and measuring cups and rubber ducks and plastic sea creatures and boats, and copious amounts of splashing.

Now Ander and Zaza take separate baths -- and mostly take showers -- and those long, bubbly, play-full tubby times are circling the drain.

I listen for the shower to stop, so I can hustle one child out and the next one in. I listen to make sure that the steam from the showers isn't setting off the MEEP-MEEPing hallway smoke detector. I listen to make sure nobody is dawdling.

But once in a while, as I scrub cheese off a dish and frazzle Dubbadad's nerves banging pots around the sink, I will hear Zaza singing or telling herself a story in the shower.

And I am grateful, and so so so relieved that this sweet sweet stage isn't over just yet.

*Though that spiky-haired Ikea rubber boy doll runs a close second -- he has lived in so many diaper bags and stroller baskets and purses over the years, and I am just not ready to pass him on or box him up.

After an Argument with Ander (a Couple of Weeks Ago)

Something else those Crayola Window Markers are good for:

making up...