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Journal Key:

Green = Steve | George = navy | Janet = Purple | Evelyn = Black

9/21/06 (Thursday)

It was a nice, cool day, and Cara was outside playing with her pink jacket on when I pulled up at Susan's. Susan took her by the hand and they came over toward the car. Cara was happy to see me. The first thing Susan reported was that Cara had hurt herself; she fell down and scraped her face. I admit that I had to look a little bit, even holding her up, to see what had happened; it's pretty minor. Her lip is a little bit cut, and she has some red spots. Susan said Cara cried so loudly she was sure all of her teeth had been knocked out! However, she had had a good day. She did plenty of playing and plenty of falling down, probably because she was tired from being up at five in the morning. (She was in a fine mood and just wanted to play.)

Cara and I read books and hung out, and then Daddy called to say he'd be late getting home. Cara and I were on our own for dinner again! We had pork chops and I made some rice. I fed Cara as much rice as she wanted, and she ate some pork chops, but the big hit was, strangely enough, the frozen vegetables I zapped us. She pointed at them and made me give her some. She ate her carrots and corn, and she hogged the broccoli! I've never seen her like broccoli before. I admit, it was one of those packages of vegetables with sauce on them. I guess that did it! Cara let me clean up from dinner, and then Steve got home.

We wanted to give him a few minutes to eat, so we went outside to run around. We went over to Julianna's to wish her good luck, since she's going away for the weekend. Cara was very good and let us hold her. She pointed out lots of things in Julianna's kitchen and took out some slippers to play with. Julianna gave her a little tow truck with Burt driving it, and she made it drive up Cara's arm. Cara now believes that it is meant to drive only on people, so she has already driven it up me. Now Cara is finally being read to by her daddy.

9/22/06 (Friday)

Happy birthday, Steve!

Cara sitting comfortably in her daddy's lap as I arrive in the morning. For breakfast she inhales two scrambled eggs, a waffle and a quarter of a bagel. Then we have our standard morning before the trip down to Middletown for her sleepover.

We walk out to Lloyd Street and Cara notices birds flying by and tiny squirrels in the distance. When we began this ritual and she was not yet walking, she paid careful attention to the cars whizzing by but now they lack interest. Today, other smaller things are more interesting. Anyone for a trip to the zoo?

In the gorgeous, crisp sunny afternoon we all - Grandpapa, Great-grandma, Cara and me - went out into the back yard where we kicked Cara's ball around and sometimes she even got to pick it up and put it back into play. But most of the time she ignored it while we helpfully kicked it towards her or right past her.

Far more interesting for her was the presence of the Schmutz, who rubbed against her and allowed her to pet him. We all made our way up the path into the park, and the Schmutz came too! He raced past us, waited for us in the grass, and leaped up onto tree trunks. While we ran around on the basketball court he remained among the trees. Cara was chasing the ball - it has a clever way of escaping from her just when she is about to catch it - and finally kicked it off onto the grass where she caught sight of the cat! No more basketball for her. We had to wander through the trees admiring his form as he jumped on and off of things. When we had been to the playground and returned, he was waiting and came trotting towards us, baby and all.

There was plenty of action at the playground. There were some other kids there, a man walking a dog, and a JCP&L truck nearby. At one point the electrical work suddenly caused a loud BOOM. We were startled, and some other little girl had to be comforted by her daddy, but Cara was unfazed. She's an ambitious climber, but declined to go down the slide.

At home, however, she happily made her little toy giraffe slide down the incline from my knees to my feet as I sat on the floor, over and over, while I provided the "whee!" sound. This she thought very amusing. She put away a good supper - some peas, a small piece of lamb, some bread, two hot dogs and half a container of yogurt for dessert. After supper she played with her upstairs toys. She's getting very good at pushing those big yoga balls around, saying "Ball, ball, ball." Then, for a change of scene, we moved downstairs, to an entirely different set of toys. None of the zoo animals made it into the bath this time.

At about 8:30 George mentioned the word bath, and Cara gave a squeal and ran to the tub. She was very impatient and offered to climb in with her clothes still on. Instead of tossing in one toy at a time, she simply dumped the basket. In the tub we let her play for a while. Then I started using the washcloth and soap. This is a very ticklish little girl! George was in and out of the room, and each time he left she started calling after him; each time he returned, she beamed.

Cara is on to us - she knows when we're getting ready to put her in bed. After the bath we started the bedtime routine as we know it. I toweled her off - she was very giggly and tickly - and got her dressed in her sleeper. George brought a bottle of milk which she took eagerly at first. But as he set about dimming the lights and turning on the bedtime music, she stopped drinking and began to cry! Hard! Oh no, she seemed to be saying. The fun is about to end! We let her take a few toys from the zoo, and then - it felt so cruel to do this - at 9 on the dot we laid her down in bed and tiptoed up the stairs.

For a few minutes she did an interesting kind of crying. She would cry real hard for a moment and then pause to listen - are they coming? no? And then she would try again. After a few cycles of this, the cries were less emphatic, and within 5 or 6 minutes by the clock she had given up entirely. It still felt cruel to do, but I think it's important to be consistent about bedtime. If we go back down and pick her up once, I'm afraid we'll never get her to bed again. Still, I wonder if there is a way to get her to sleep without tears.

9/23/06 (Saturday)

In the morning I'm afraid I burned her mouth by feeding her some eggs too soon. I should have just let her feed herself, which is what I will do in the future. We then went downstairs, where she demonstrated a whole new level of skill with our shape-sorter. Ours is pretty small and there are four shapes to fit, rather snugly, into holes - a circle (easy), a square, a triangle and a star (very difficult). Today, for the first time, she promptly fit the star into its hole and pushed it through. A triumph in my eyes, but she seemed to take it for granted.

Then once again it was time to say good-bye. Transitions are difficult; she didn't want to get into the car, but she did and drove away home to mommy and daddy.

Poor grandma! Even when you're a grandma, sometimes you have to be strict. Time feels much longer, too, when you're listening to someone cry--even if that person is certainly going to sleep anyway and knows that she should and is just testing you.

I was really looking forward to today, because my parents and I were taking Cara to the zoo! Steve had to work from home again, so it was time for an outing. Unfortunately, it was rainy! We'll have to go another week. Cara arrived home a little bit after eight, and at 9:20 she and I left to go to the mall. We had to take ourselves out of Daddy's way, and the parks were all too wet.

All day, Cara seemed kind of tired. At the mall, she wanted to be carried. I got a nice workout, carrying her around for almost two hours! We did have some breaks, though. We rode the escalators up, up, up and down, down, down for a total of five round trips! We went up, and Cara turned right over to the down, and then back to the up, and so on. There was no reason not to do it.

The past few times I've taken Cara to the mall I've skipped Tinytown (that's the name of the little playground, as I finally seem able to remember), because it's been so crowded. Today, though, we were there before the mall really opened, and when we got to Tinytown there were only three other children there. They left pretty soon, though Cara had liked playing with them and been convinced that she could keep up with two little girls much bigger than she, and it was nice to have the place to ourselves. I want to take her like that again and take some pictures. She had a great time on the slides and climbing through the boat. I put her down at one end, and she climbed to the other. First, actually, she stood in the triangular prow and spun around a few times. That was fun.

Eventually, Cara left Tinytown to play on the rides. The poor little thing was running and fell down and her cut lip bled again! She was okay in a minute, though. I put her shoes on her, as she had left without them, and we went and played on all of those rides thoroughly. We walked a little more, and then I got Cara a snack. I bought some little chocolate chip cookies, and we sat on a bench to eat them. Cara had three in her hands, which, along with her face, became coated with chocolate. Of course, she couldn't just sit on a bench. She had to walk around. She didn't go far; I called her and she always stopped and came back to base. The sight of a little chocolate-faced girl looking up at them did make passersby smile.

We went back to Stride Rite, and a nice boy finally (was this our third trip?) sold us some cute little brown shoes. They're dark brown and suede-like, with a brown flower design on the strap. They're velcro. Cara wore them all day. Cara was clearly tired; she didn't run out of the store even once. In fact, she sat in my lap and waited while the boy got the shoes. She did try to walk into the back room, as she does every time I take her to a shoe store.

On the way home, Cara fell asleep in the car. I was able to carry her into the house asleep and put her down for her nap; it was a quarter to twelve. Grandpa Jim was here today to work, which was exciting for Cara when she woke up. She spent quite a bit of her time lying on the floor and peeking into the basement. He brought us some books Grandma picked up. One is a really cool flap-lifting book with colors and shapes. It has the highest flap content of any book we have. Another is a Madeline book I remember from when I was a kid! We looked at those for a while.

After Cara had some lunch, we went out again. We went to the pet store, where Cara was allowed out of the shopping cart to look in the small animal cages. The first she chose, when she ran to them, was uninhabited. She found the bedding very funny, though, and pointed and laughed at it. She liked the animals, too. We fell into conversation with an employee, who was nice enough to take out a rat for Cara to pet! Cara was characteristically cautious. She enjoys the chase, but she really isn't sure what to do with the animals when she gets an opportunity to interact. I think she petted it a little. We got to pet a ferret, too, with similar success. She was excited, though. We spent some time with the fishies, after I led her across the store by saying, "fish, fish, fish, let's go see the fish." She wouldn't get back into the cart, see, and I had to push it, so she got to walk. She picked out a few dog toys she liked, but fortunately a dog took the one she had settled on.

Later Daddy, done with his work, took Cara and her stroller outside. She went to PJ's house, of course. We wound up invited to our first Rosh Hashanah dinner! Cara and PJ played together, but he was pretty mean to her. He took toys from her, and he tried to close the baby gate on her! She climbed into a wagon of toys, and when he saw that he climbed in after her, pretty much on top of her! This was funny: they were eating dinner next to each other, and PJ was paying close attention to Cara. He had already gotten some bread from her tray (she had a lot). He reached over and grabbed her sleeve. He had to try a couple of times, but he got a hold on her wrist. She really didn't seem to notice. He pulled her arm up and put his head down and got her fingers into his mouth. Then he gave up. Whatever he was trying to do, it didn't seem to have worked out as well as he had hoped.

After months of sporadic work, Uncle Ron has finally succeeded in teaching Cara to high-five. That is, she responded correctly once. It may not happen again.

Back at home, Cara was a happy girl. We all sat in the game room and played with a toy penguin. We were tossing it around. I wanted to play monkey-on-the-middle, but Daddy is much too nice to Cara. Cara lay down, and I put the penguin on her tummy and asked her to give him a ride. She got up and ran off with him. We heard noises, and soon she came back with the penguin (sitting, as she had instructed him) in the stroller! She pushed over and indicated the side door with emphasis. For the first time, I felt the need to spell something in her presence! I didn't want to say the word "out," but that was what I thought Cara wanted to be.

9/24/06 (Sunday)

This morning Cara slept past 7:30 and then we both went in to get her. She was happy to see us both. We went downstairs and I made Cara some eggs which she obligingly ate. Then Mommy whisked her away to the supermarket, where I'm sure she had a lovely time. We tried to get some long overdue housekeeping duties out of the way--rather, Mommy did some cleaning while I tried to keep Cara occupied. I took her outside for a little while where we played with her little house and her slide toy--she found a plastic bowl which went down the slide before her. I provided a "wheeeee!" noise to accompany this, which Cara picked up on, though hers was actually in a lower register and sounded more like "eeeeee." She and the bowl had many fun trips down the slide. She also demanded to have her little watering can filled with water. Though I showed her that the water trickles nicely out the holes in the spout, she invariably dumped it out by turning the whole thing upside down. When we went back inside, she was a little wet.

The exciting developmental thing that happened this morning was when Cara and her Mommy looked at her book about animal mothers and babies on the farm. There are circular pieces with six different animals which can be matched with their pictures and fitted into place on the pages. Today, Cara for the first time managed to match them up!

At around 11, our housework still not quite done (in fact, presently at after 9 pm Evie is trying to sneak in some vacuuming we didn't get to earlier!), we popped a clearly tired Cara into the car and started off for her grandparents' house. There, Cara was happy to point at Rusty and meet her regular toys. Even her Uncle Jim and Aunt Sarah arrived. Cara got to show Uncle Jim her belly button (when asked by her Mommy to do so, Cara promptly whipped her shirt up so Jim could see--we were all a little surprised at her forthrightness!), had some cake (we were celebrating several birthdays), and spent a lot of time being corralled and played with by her grandparents while we other adults played some cards. I realized we are becoming the kind of people who do things that to kids seem incredibly boring--Cara probably can't imagine why or how people could sit still around a table for so long!

Eventually it got late and back into the car we all piled. Cara was lucky enough to get some chocolate chip cookies (left over from yesterday morning's outing) fed to her by her Mommy--eventually I looked into the back seat and saw a sleeping girl with chocolate smeared all over her face. We probably got on the road a bit later than usual, and Cara was not particularly happy to be pulled from the car at 7:30 pm. Her bath was not a happy one, even with her sharks to keep her company, but Cara was very willing to be read to as always.

9/25/06 (Monday)

Cara's nap was cut short by some inconsiderate men drilling and banging with hammers nearby. So we had to go out to Johnson Park for the afternoon. We've been down on Johnson Park lately but today it was ideal. Cara did all these things: she climbed a near-vertical ladder by herself, she picked up leaves (following the lead of a nearby little boy) and fed the goats, she slid down slides without fear, she put her hand through the fence to pet the coyote, she was very friendly to other little boys and girls, she went running off down a path knowing that I would follow. In short, she was a pleasure to be around. When we returned home, the men were still banging and hammering and Cara is a little sunburned, but I know she had a good time.

To "PET THE COYOTE"????? Is anyone but me concerned?

Well, on Mondays I want to go to the gym in the afternoons, but it was such a beautiful day out that we went to the park instead. We went to Donaldson Park, and Cara ran over to the playground. I had brought goldfish crackers, and I gave Cara a handful. The stairs at the playground are kind of a grille, and of course she dropped a fish through the bottom step. There she stayed, poking her finger through after it, looking concerned and saying, "uh-oh!"

The slide at this playground may be the scariest around, but Cara has conquered it. It is twisty and tall, but she went down it confidently, smiling and triumphant. She is ambitious about ladders, but the vertical ladder is beyond her at this point. There's another ladder, though. It is bent and has curved rungs, and Cara has been trying to get onto it for a couple of weeks. The last time I took her there, I kept pulling her off of it. I tried helping her up it a little, but it was no good. She couldn't do it. Today, she was more persistent, and I let her try. I went up behind her, with my arm around her middle. The ground may be soft, but those metal rungs could crack her jaw open! To my amazement, Cara can basically climb the ladder! We went up about eight times, and on several of those trips Cara made it all by herself. It's astonishing and terrifying.

Some big kids came and played tag all over the playground equipment. It was a little bit scary, but they made sure not to step on Cara. She loved it. She very much wanted to join in, but even she could tell that this was out of her league. At one point she approached one young man with some lovely mulch. I think she dropped or scattered it, because he took it one step further and started throwing the stuff! He didn't throw it at Cara, but she clearly picked up on the idea of throwing mulch very quickly. I hope she forgets quickly!

It was an idyllic afternoon; we ran all over, we climbed, Cara even had a great time in the swings! We played chase and we waved at people. Cara got to climb on the big rocks that line the road. The only bad part was bringing her home; she really didn't want to leave the park. Neither did I.

9/26/06 (Tuesday)

Cara slept late today and Daddy only left her five minutes in which to eat her waffle! Predictably, she ended up being driven to Susan's with the waffle clutched in her hands. When I went to pick her up she was playing happily outside with PJ. She did come willingly, though.

We went to the park. Cara climbed her ladder six times, and I was careful to give her only a couple of goldfish at a time, so she would eat them and then climb again. I've noticed an important Toddler Rule (I'm sure you all remember the very important Baby Rules.): At home, it's fine to drop food on the floor and run away. At the park, though, you must pick up any food you drop and eat it very quickly.

A big girl (she turned out to be six) came and played on the playground. Cara was fascinated; she stared at her while the big girl ran, climbed, swung, and slid. She stared so determinedly that she went up the ladder facing to the right the entire time. I was not particularly pleased with this experiment. That ladder really is dangerous! I'm sure I would be absolutely terrified if I were to watch her go up it with someone else. Since I'm the one going up with her, though, I'm just mildly terrified.

When the big girl went on the swings, Cara had to go on the swings, too. Something happened that happened yesterday, too. Cara got tired of swinging and I took her out. She walked over to the other swing, five feet from the one she'd just exited, and demanded to be put in. She then had a wonderful time swinging.

This evening, Cara got to look at Hippos Go Berserk with Daddy. On the cover there is a picture of several happy hippos, one of whom is upside down. Cara took the book and turned it over, so that she could look at him. Having satisfied herself, she turned it back right-side up.

Cara has finally started pretending to use the phone. She takes phones from us or picks up her own phone toys, puts them on her shoulder, and says something. It's always the same something, and we're not really sure what it is. We'll see. I was on the phone this evening and I tried putting the phone to her ear, and she said "baby" and then tried to steal it from me. Oh well.

9/27/06 (Wednesday)

A cute moment: I'm upstairs and Cara is downstairs. Normally she's onto this difference in elevation and wants to set things back to equanimity. But this morning, after a little while, I noticed that Cara was not climbing the stairs, setting things right in the world.

I listened for a bit longer and then I went downstairs. Cara crawled to meet me at the bottom of the stairs, smiling and happy. In the bathroom, with Cara giggling at my side, saw that she'd destroyed half a roll of toilet paper, shredding it and scattering it everywhere. Here's the cute part. When I sat down on the couch opposite, Cara went and found her Curious George monkey and carefully walked with him into the bathroom and then came out carrying him in front of her. Clearly, she wanted me to believe that the curious, mischievious monkey had done all the damage and not the charming little girl who just happened to be playing nearby.

Is this the beginning of a human conscience?

That naughty monkey! I got home early because it was Back-to-School Night, and Cara and I went off to the mall. I had two errands to do, and we also went to Tiny Town. It wasn't at all crowded, and we had a good time running around.

We were busy playing when I noticed a handsome young man of about three or four sitting in the boat. He was looking at Cara meaningfully and patting the seat beside him. I got her to go over there, and I put her in the boat. "There's plenty of room," he said, again patting the seat. Cara didn't quite make it over to that seat, and they got out of the boat. They went down several slides together; he was very encouraging. Cara, of course, wants to hang out with the older kids, so she was happy to follow him. Her attention span is not equal to his, though, so she would kind of wander off, and then he would pop back up again. Once, he held her hand as they went down a slide. It's the first time in Cara's life that I've had to wonder, do blondes really have more fun?

I got home just in time to see Mommy out the door for her Back-to-School Night. Cara and I had to have dinner, so I made her three chicken fingers, which I believe she ate every bit of. She also had a cheese stick, some fruit snacks, and most of a fig newton. Not too long after that we had to jump in the car. I took Cara through the drive-thru at Dunkin Donuts to get some munchkins for our special playdate at Em and Ron's--it was Casey's month birthday! While in the car Cara was in the back seat with a stuffed bunny toy she had somehow ended up with. Then and later on when we were walking to PJ's house I heard her say something like "UHN-neee!" At first I thought perhaps she was asking for her Mommy, but I think she was trying to say bunny.

Cara was good at PJ's. We had ice cream sandwiches and munchkins. PJ decided to see if his munchkins could bounce--they could not, but they did fall on the floor at high speeds. Cara seemed amused, but fortunately she is not a good thrower and did not seem interested in trying this bad habit on for size. While in her booster seat Cara used a phrase that I've heard her saying pretty often lately. It had sounded to me like "tee DAHT!" But when Ron heard her saying it he immediately asked, "Is she saying kitty cat?" I looked around and sure enough she was staring happily at their cat who was on the living room window sill. The words are coming hard and fast!

Have we mentioned that Cara also says "Wow"? I'm not sure where she picked this up but she will often look at some of her toys or something and go "woooowww." It's very cute.

Anyway, time got away from us and it was past 8:30 before Julianna, Cara and I left Em and Ron's. We waved goodbye and I tried rushing Cara through her bedtime routine, but it was still something like 9:20 before I finally put her down. In the tub, Cara ended up playing with only one toy: her watering can. She's never brought it in there before, but it's a great bath toy--she actually got it to sprinkle water out of the spout like it's supposed to! She enjoyed this quite a bit. She drank most of her bottle unaided (though she still needs to work on tipping it up more), and then we looked at one of her Richard Scarry books. When we got to the last page, Cara deftly reached over and peeled the pages back to an earlier point in the book--she didn't want it to end! But little girls can't stay up all night.

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