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Journal Key:

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

3/8/07 (Thursday)

Just when I was starting to wonder whether Cara had been somehow exchanged for some other child, she finally had a good day! She was up around 4:30, but we put her back down and she went to sleep. She wasn't happy at all when Steve got her up again and dressed, but she ate all of the eggs and toast he made her for breakfast. In the car, she sang to herself.

All day, I half-expected Susan to call and tell us to come pick up our child because she was just too crabby. However, when I went to pick Cara up at five, Susan reported a much better day than Tuesday! The art project was a painting, and I hear that Cara neatly painted her hands and arms. She carefully pushed up her sleeves, though. When Steve saw the final painting, he made exclamations of horror and disgust. It's good that he has this time to practice his reactions before Cara is aware enough to react to them. She seems to feel no ownership of her artwork.

Cara was very excited to see that her daddy was here when we got home. In fact, she was gleeful. She took him right to the kitchen so that he could get her a cheese stick. Then another. Then there may even have been a third. It was a difficult task, but Steve mostly managed to keep Cara busy while I cooked dinner. I made honey-sesame chicken with pineapple in it, accompanied by rice and broccoli. Cara was excited about the rice and ate plenty of broccoli, and, for the first time, she willingly ate some chicken I had cooked! Personally, I think it was the pineapple. Susan mentioned that they had had some today, and Cara had liked it.

Unfortunately, her enthusiasm waned and Cara flipped her plate over onto the floor. We did not express our disapprobation strongly enough to make any impression; Cara didn't cry. After a little bit more broccoli, she was off. After a little bit more playtime, Steve and Cara ended up in the living room with Blue's Clues and a can of puffs. I joined them, and Cara got up to go and pat the television. She ran back for puffs whenever she needed them. Astonishingly, when Steve turned off the TV, there was no crying. The puffs may deserve credit for that. Cara got up again and went to the TV. She reached into the shelf below it and petted something. Shelby had been there the whole time, and neither Steve nor I noticed! She's still there.

At one point, Cara and I were on the couch and a puff fell onto the floor. Cara went after it slowly, which is good because she went headfirst and I had time to grab her. Upstairs, she tried to get off the bed the same way. She does stick her arms out in front of her, but I think we still need to be vigilant. When I suggested that she go feet-first, she was willing to humor me.

I yielded to temptation and laid a trail of puffs along the hallway, into Cara's room, and leading to the closet. There I sat and waited. Soon enough, I saw a shadow. Along came Cara, squatting to pick up each puff and then sticking it into her mouth and moving on. I can't imagine why I never wanted to do that before. I don't think we can do it often, but perhaps once in a while . . . . It might make a good video.

Cara was not particularly happy getting into her bath or getting out of it, though there was a happy period in between. After I got her into her pajamas I had to read her a couple of books. Finally, she got up and we went to brush our teeth. Cara's stickers today were apples. I'm picking a single page randomly from the envelope and only showing her that one. "Curious George eat apple," said Cara. It may have been a question. I agreed, but I'm mystified. Does he ever eat an apple? Oh well.

We're trying to move Cara's bedtime earlier to help her adapt when the clocks change, and we actually did it! By 8:15, Steve was out of her room and she was down.

3/9/07 (Friday)

Cara woke up early today and had me make her four pieces of toast. Later, I hear, Grandpapa had to make her two more. They went to the mall and Cara got to run around and tire herself out. Interestingly, she also got to ride in her stroller. This is now novel and exciting for her; she waved at people as she rode by. By 12:30, exhausted, the little girl was in bed.

She woke up at almost four, when I was home. She had a hard time waking up; she was very cranky. I wanted to get her away from the TV, which was the only thing that would stop her crying here, so I told her we were going to see trains and we got into the car.

Before we went to Barnes and Noble, we had to go to the grocery store. Among other things, we needed more cinnamon bread for Cara's breakfast! However, of course, I thought of several things we needed, and we took a while. When we got to the register, Cara started wailing. She was not at full volume, but she was not happy. I feel bad, because I think that it may have been because I promised trains and then didn't deliver. I guess I'm not used to that level of comprehension; when they're little they don't seem to remember things, so you can kind of manipulate them. Now, I think Cara remembers what we say, and she expects things to come through.

Finally, we got to Barnes and Noble. Cara held my hand and we walked through the store to the trains! Once we were there, I was superfluous. Cara was happily engaged in playing by herself. I helpfully tidied some of the toys on nearby shelves. After a while, Cara started to wander. She wanted to be picked up. "Piglet!" she said. I looked around, and at the other end of the children's department there were two tall "trees" and Piglet was indeed in one of them. I put Cara down and let her show me where. She explored for a while before noticing that Pooh was in the other tree. "Pooh, come down! Out of tree!" She had a long talk with him. We also read some books, including a Winnie the Pooh musical book that played lots of piercing songs and which, fortunately, Cara got bored with it fast. When I was carrying her out, she said, "Froggy up ladder." Sure enough, Frog (of Frog and Toad) was climbing a ladder.

Next it was home to daddy and some cheese sticks, and then we picked up and headed to the Loefflers'. The kids were great. PJ likes to play on the pool table; he puts the balls into the holes. Cara got to get up there, too, this evening. She liked banging two balls together, and PJ thought that that was fun, too. She also had to look down all the holes to see where the balls went. Em and I went out to get dinner, leaving the men with the children.

Cara had grilled cheese and some oranges, which she insisted on eating with a fork because they were sticky. She was done, but when Em got out dessert Cara was ready to dive in. She had two little donuts. We gave her one, and she nabbed the second when the opportunity presented itself. She was ready for cake, too. It was late when we finally headed for home. So much for an earlier bedtime!

3/10/07 (Saturday)

Cara had some toast first, of course, but we had a special treat for breakfast: I made crepes. I spread them with Nutella and put strawberries in some; we decided the berries were perfect on the side. Cara stuck with berries at first, ignoring the cut-up crepe on her tray. Later she got her hands on a whole one, which she ate like a sandwich, as Steve and I had been.

When we were dressed, I asked Cara whether she wanted to go feed the birds. She did. This was some motivation for her to get dressed. She still didn't like it. Without our coats, we headed out to the front yard. I had a container of old bread crusts and bagel crisps, which I showed Cara how to throw onto the grass. Instead of throwing them, Cara ate the ones I gave her. Then she ate some from the lawn. Oy!

We ran around and played outside for the next hour or so. Cara slipped on the muddy earth and got her pants dirty, so I gave up and just let her get dirtier! The favorite toy of the day was sticks. "Sticks!" Cara would yell, carrying around a handful. It was thrilling to find more and more of them. Eventually, leaving muddy footprints on the blacktop, Cara and I headed to the back yard. There, our stick game was matured. I would swing Cara up, carefully not letting her muddiness get near me, and sit her on the railing. She would drop her sticks, and they would go "all the way down! Yay!" I encouraged her to find this very exciting. Then I would swing her down and she would look for more sticks. The yard is considerably tidier now.

There were also the usual back yard pursuits. I tickled her through the windows of her house. She went down the slide. She climbed in and out of her car. We played a lot with the big clear ball. I showed her how high I could throw it, and, thank goodness, it didn't land on her or on me.

For lunch, all Cara ate was two hot dogs, three quarters of a cheese stick, half a cup of yogurt, and a plate of lo mein.

When Cara woke up from her nap, it was time to go to Grandmama's house! As I had hoped Grandmama took Cara right out to the park. Grandma Emily, Aunt Theresa, and I went, too, as did the Schmutz. Cara loved it; she went on the swings twice, the slides three or four times, and the shaky bridge three times. She crawled through the tube. She turned the steering wheel. We went into the sand, and Grandmama built Cara a castle, which Cara enjoyed demolishing, twice.

During dinner, Cara wiped everything off of her tray, including her cup of yogurt. Miraculously, it landed right-side up! Of course, we had a drop cloth down anyway. A few minutes later, Grandpapa, who sits facing Cara, asked, "What happened to my window?" There was a huge splotch of yogurt on the sliding glass door behind us! There was another. There was yogurt dripping from the door frame. It was on the vertical blinds. It was on the ceiling. There were several spots, in fact, on the ceiling. It was the hugest, most dramatic mess Cara's ever made. After dinner Steve and I got a step stool and he cleaned the ceiling, which came out fine. Cara spent much of the rest of the evening climbing the step stool.

3/11/07 (Sunday)

The family had a lovely Sunday today. Cara and I spent a short part of the morning together by ourselves, getting up and having toast. Toast is her new favorite food, it seems (cinnamon toast, no spreads). She was so into the whole thing that she started flying her piece of toast around, saying: "Wheee! Hi, I toast!" Her playacting is definitely developing. When finished with her breakfast Cara continued in her bad eating habit of tossing her remaining food onto the floor--I was firm and told her this was bad and that the food was now trash. I made it clear that she had misbehaved. This upset her, so hopefully this is the first step in breaking her of the food tossing habit (maybe).

We had our morning Disney programs, and then got ourselves dressed and ventured out to do some errands. We ended up at the pet store, where Cara had lots of fun looking at the mice and fishies, and pointing out the pictures of kitties on various kitty-related products. Then it was back home where the child and I had a short period running around outside. It had rained and the yard was still very muddy, but we managed to avoid any clothes-changing events, and just got a couple of sticks thrown over the back railing before we got back into the car and were off to South Jersey.

Cara had the joy of seeing two dogs, Rusty and Floyd, and her Uncle Jim and Aunt Sarah! Cara was a little annoyed with Rusty for wanting to smell her, but of course loved seeing the two dogs frisk in the back yard. She found her little bunny lawn statuette and toted him about for a while--he received many kisses. Stick-collecting was also very popular. She found a corner of the yard where the mulch had been somewhat dug up, and tried to continue the job by improvising makeshift shovels or just digging with her hands. "Build castle!" she said, remembering her experience with Grandmama Janet of the day before (and a recent Curious George episode in which George fantasizes about building a full-scale sand castle). The castle plans never came to fruition, but she did get a new pair of pants.

Much coloring was also done, though in this Cara is more of an art director than an actual participator. More often she finds colors and hands them to people, commanding them to draw. Eventually Cara wandered off and Daddy and her Aunt and Uncle were left in the kitchen, dutifully scribbling away. Cara has been generous with non-crayon items as well lately, handing pieces of her food around to those she feels are in need (Rusty did not receive any donations). Poor Grandpa worked hard to convince Cara to eat the cherry from her fruit cocktail, but Cara gave it to Mommy!

Some Curious George was watched, but not an inordinate amount, and not long after Floyd, Jim and Sarah departed, we packed up the little girl and drove off as well. On the trip down, Cara did some good sleeping, but probably didn't conk out at all on the way back to the "kitty house." After a while she began declaring things like "I Cara!" in the back seat. We stopped at a restaurant (Friendly's) for dinner, where Cara was intrigued by the big bendy straw on her cup of chocolate milk. She can certainly drink out of a straw but has trouble when it comes to taking her mouth off--she was frequently spattered with little droplets of chocolate milk and Evie and I found ourselves wiping some part of her every few seconds. She shared our mozzarella sticks, and she was very enthusiastic about the marinara sauce, which Mommy fed her from a fork. By the end, she was eating it herself with the fork, also sticking her hand in. She would dip her hand, lick off a little, and hold it out to be wiped. After her meal she slipped right out of her high chair strap and was taken on a few laps of the restaurant by her Mommy. She was given one of her light-up Halloween wands as a play thing and so was staring at all the other restaurant patrons through a glowing skull, happily shouting "Daddy! Ahh you?" She met everyone in Friendly's at least once. Then Daddy caught her and we went home, back to where the kitties live.

Incidentally we should probably try to break the habit of referring to our home as the Kitty House. It sounds as if we are merely renting from our pets.

At home Cara continued bubbly and cheerful, rolling on the bed and eventually running about naked. She was not happy to be put into her tub, but quickly cheered back up when I gave her her empty conditioner bottle (which we enjoy filling up and dumping out). Now she is in bed chatting to anyone who will listen.

3/12/07 (Monday)

Another wonderful day for Cara. She woke up at about 8:20 (remember the time change) and watched only twenty minutes of the Mickey Mouse Club. Then she changed into clothes and at 9:30 we were on our way to adventure at Johnson Park.

It's a 50+ degree day and Cara enjoys all of it. She gets two very long rides on swings and I can report that for the first time, her feet drag on the ground because she's so big (soooo big!). She enjoyed the swings thoroughly and enjoyed climbing up to go down sliding boards just as much.

The going down part was almost funny to watch as Cara's pants were a little moist from the dew still on the slides. So when other kids came, their rides were faster because their pants were dry. When Cara tried it, she still came down slowly, because her pants didn't dry.

At one point, she cried out "Mommy! Daddy!" at a young couple up ahead of us at the Park.

We met a nice doggy. We went into the men's washroom were I cleaned mud from Cara's hands after she'd played in dirt, against my explicit wishes ("No, Cara, not in the mud! Oh!").

Only one scary moment. At one point Cara took stairs up to the top of the slide and then, at the top of the stairs found herself holding a support in her right hand and a support in her left hand. But unfortunately, a small part of each shoe was over the lip of the step and she felt her center of balance behind her so that if she let go, she'd fall down backwards over the metal steps. I was nearby, already at the top and at her first whimper, I reached over and pulled her forward. From there she ran on.

I thought that she'd come far: she recognized the danger and acted correctly.

At home, I put her in for her nap at 12:15, a little late. She went off to sleep quickly but then woke up when the phone rang. She then cried, complained and cajoled ("Happy Birthday, papa!") me for the next hour. But I was strong and at 4 P.M. when her mommy arrived, she was still asleep.

Cara slept for a while; she was completely out when I went in to look at her around 4:20. Soon enough my presence woke her. She directed me directly to the kitchen, where she enjoyed a cheese stick and then some goldfish crackers. Then more crackers. Then more crackers. And then some more crackers. She got jealous when I tried reading the paper. First she insisted that I look at her: "Mommy, here." Then she said she would read the paper. She took it happily and hid behind it for a few seconds. I shared her crackers, though sometimes she was not pleased. A couple of times she fed me crackers, but more often she tried to fake me out, holding a cracker out to me and then eating it herself. She also pulled this on Daddy at dinner.

In the meantime, I had had an e-mail from Em saying that they had gone outside yesterday to play with their sidewalk chalk. This sounded like fun, so I had decided that Cara and I would go and buy some and then spend the rest of our time drawing until Daddy got home. Cara sounded like she bought into this idea, but she was very unhappy when I took her tray away. I had to give it back. We finished our bag of fish. I found a snack trap and emptied it out for her. Then I had to open a new bag. When there were signs of slowing, I filled a snack trap with fish for Cara to bring with her. Thus armed against starvation, she was enthusiastically ready to go.

We went to the Rag Shop, where Cara eagerly got down and soon dropped her snack trap. She found some cute sports equipment I didn't buy her, and she carried around a decorative, anthropomorphic bunny who came up to her chin. She loved him. In the interest of getting her away from the bunny, I found Cara a pinwheel! The bunny was history. We picked up our chalk (Cara selected a blue bucket; I had considered red.) and headed for home. Both new acquisitions were fascinating to Cara. She loved it when I blew on her pinwheel, though she herself could not achieve much. She loved holding her bucket of chalk, even making me leave it with her in her car seat on the way home.

When we pulled up, I sent Cara to show her pinwheel to Juliana, who was, naturally, very impressed. Cara counted Juliana's outdoor lights, and we went off to draw. Cara eagerly scribbled, and I drew a big spiral for walking on and a little hopscotch board. Then we saw that Em and PJ were coming out. I asked whether Cara wanted to show PJ her pinwheel, and she took off running. It was not the pinwheel she wanted to show him. She carried her whole bucket of chalk all the way to PJ's house! At first it seemed that she had brought it only to taunt him, because Cara did not want to give PJ any chalk. Soon I snatched him some, and then they could put the bucket down and run around.

Em and I traced their hands and wrote things for them, and the kids ran and ran. The real fun started when Steve arrived. He, of course, can actually draw. He made the kids a funny face and then a big kitty, and then he drew "PJ" in big block letters. The kids both ran around, loving stepping on the things, occasionally adding scribbles of their own. PJ was upset whenever he broke the chalk. Cara, at one point, lay down, and I traced her whole self. When she sat up, she slid down the driveway on her tushie, smudging the drawings and coloring the bottom of her jeans interestingly. Ron got home and added a T-rex head about to eat the kitty. Steve added a dog. He drew a bear, using both hands and drawing both sides at once. Steve and Ron were considerably better sidewalk artists than Em and I.

Cara got a doctor's kit from Juliana. She loves sticking the syringes and thermometers into her mouth. She peers through the auroscope. She also whistles through it. She seems to be ignoring the stethoscopes, and she cannot work the blood pressure cuff. I'm glad she got it, because she has fun playing with them at other people's houses.

After dinner, Cara asked me to read her a story. What story? Curious George ride cow. This makes sense. The one called Curious George Rides a Bike has him on a bike on the cover. Therefore, the one where he is riding a cow on the cover must be Curious George Rides a Cow! We read Curious George Gets a Medal, and Cara helpfully pointed things out to me. In the scene in which George gets the cow to help him pull the pump, there's the cow with whom he interacts in the foreground and another cow with a calf in the back. "Baby cow," Cara tells me. Then, "Daddy cow." Oh, dear! It certainly is logical, I guess.

Shelby lay on the shelf under the TV again tonight. Cara petted her. "Hi, Shelby. I Cara," she said. Actually, she can't pronounce the letters L, K, or R, really, so she said, "Hi, Shebby. I Tawa."

3/13/07 (Tuesday)

When I got to Susan's today, everyone was playing outside! Susan says that Cara called "Mommy!", but she certainly didn't come running when I arrived. She spent some time playing, since I wasn't leaving right away. She got out a little ride-on toy, and then she found a nice rock, and then she wanted to get into the wagon. I distracted her from the wagon by asking her where she got the rock, and so she went and put it back. Then I asked her where the ride-on went, and she put that back, too.

We had barely gotten home when we headed for PJ's house. It was time to play outside! PJ and Cara shared the puffs Cara had brought, and they ran around like crazy. Both of them like playing peek-a-boo through the windows of their little houses. Casey got to sit in the swing, and Cara wanted a turn! Eventually she got one. It was the best-catered swing session she'd ever had: she got water and puffs. We also walked around the pool several times and argued over the golf balls we found. Cara wanted to ride on a bouncy horse toy, and when we got PJ away from it (he wanted it because Cara did!) she got a turn! I helped her bounce and made my best horse-riding theme music, and then she bounced on her own and went, "doot-doot, doot-doot!"

Daddy and Cara played with Cara's doctor kit while I cooked dinner. The thermometer has a dial that changes the temperature, and it has faces on it for those of us who cannot read. Cara turns it and says, "Happy face. Crying. Happy face. Crying."

Dinner was a triumph. For the first time this year, I bought corn on the cob. Cara hasn't tried it in months and months. Would she try it? She was thrilled! She finished her first ear in minutes and then tackled a second. She had to take that one back again later because she'd done a bad job and could get more off of it, and then she ate what was left on the end of mine. I think she'd have kept going. To make up to her for the fact that there was no more corn, Steve got out the Jell-O. Cara is not awfully good at eating Jell-O. I think that Steve fed her some. I was washing dishes. Cara called me. I had to come feed her. I asked her whether Daddy could. No. She grabbed the bowl away from him. When I came over, she handed me the spoon and the bowl. I fed her. Was Cara being a baby? "Yes. I baby," she pointed to herself. I even did the airplane thing with the spoon. Soon we were out of Jell-O and heading downstairs.

3/14/07 (Wednesday)

A gorgeous day. The thermometer in the car read 71 degrees. Naturally, Cara and I went to the mall.

I had to buy some socks; while pursuing this trivial goal, Cara got to play at PlayMobil, where they've become accustomed to us. In the stroller, she rode two elevators, the entire length and breadth of the mall; she played enthusiastically in Tiny Town which for some reason was not crowded at all. She had a wonderful time.

At home, instead of her usual yogurt lunch she ate two stale pieces of cinnamon toast and then went quickly and with only a minimum of complaint to her nap.

Remarkably, when I got home this evening Cara was again having some toast. She loves to offer her food to us; this is probably because we share ours with her. I'm trying to take what she offers sometimes, though I usually don't really want it. (I always want goldfish crackers, but they're not often offered!)

We went upstairs, and Buster was on the bed. Cara and I said hi to her, and Cara walked over to Steve's night stand and picked up a book. "Read story, Buster?"

We ran over to PJ's house as soon as I could change into play clothes. The kids ran around in the driveway, stomping on their chalk drawings, for a while, and then we headed inside to play with trains. PJ has an engine that goes by itself, and he would not let go of it! I've barely seen it go, because he just hangs onto the thing. Cara and I read a nice book about bunnies, which Cara got Daddy to read to her again later. Casey is sitting up like a big girl, playing independently.

Outside, Cara wanted to go on the swing. There's one toddler swing and also a stiff plastic big-kid swing. PJ tried the big-kid swing for a few moments, and he really can swing! Cara, in the little-kid swing, saw this and wanted to try. We got her on, and she swung a little bit and then got right off. She ran away to play elsewhere. PJ's swing set has a fort with a ladder at one and and a slide at the other. PJ and Cara both got up there, and PJ and I started playing with a golf ball he was holding (his daddy had taken his train). "Down slide, Mommy?" Cara asked. I told her to say excuse me to PJ, and, while I was helping her around him, she did!

Cara loves PJ; he's her best friend, but whenever he comes near her, she shrieks. We're basically ignoring it and hoping it will quiet down. I do occasionally lecture her on the inefficacy of the technique. She's probably just trying to manipulate us, but in a way it seems like flirting!

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