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Journal Key:

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

10/25/07 (Thursday)

When Susan called to cancel this morning, I knew what had to be done. I hurried off to school to set up my classes for the day and to assure the principal that I would be at conferences this evening. On the way back, I stopped at the grocery store to make sure I had things for lunch and snacks. When I got back, Cara, PJ, and Casey were already playing.

We mostly had a mellow day, with no big projects or events. Casey is wonderfully self-sufficient; she must wanders around and amuses herself. All she needs is occasional response and encouragement, and she loves to hand people things. Cara and PJ are great, too, but they take more interaction.

We went over to their house for our naps, which went well. Cara slept in the same play yard she used yesterday. It was fun bringing the two lions and puma all over. Cara carried Puma and tucked him into her jacket because it was rainy. I had to get Lion out for PJ on the way over. Casey was anxious to find Li-Li. They were all tired.

We came back over here to play afterwards. I wanted to feel that I had done something productive with them, so I staged an Easter egg hunt upstairs. For fun, I got down the plush bunny who sings. I turned him on, and Cara started bopping along. PJ stared. And stared. Casey came in and started poking it. She and her brother turned out to be fascinated. I showed PJ how to make it start, and they were enraptured for several minutes.

Em picked PJ up to head to the pediatrician. In a little while, Ron came in. When he opened the door, Cara exclaimed that it was her daddy. I told her it was even better--it was Uncle Ron! She got up and ran over, arms outstretched for a big hug. Ron, whom I was very happy to see, took the two girls so that I could get ready, eat dinner, and leave for evening conferences. I had a long day.

Cara and her daddy, who got home a little while later, had pizza at PJ's house and had a good time. He gave her a bath and got her into bed on his own. There's a message from Susan saying she feels better, so things are looking up!

10/26/07 (Friday)

In the morning, Cara was very slow to wake up--Evie told me she heard Cara up late the night before, so she must have been short on sleep. However we had a happy reunion at Susan's house: we were so late arriving that Annikah and Aliyah were being dropped off at the same time, and Aliyah happily greeted Cara on the way in. PJ arrived almost simultaneously, very excited and shouting something over and over at the top of his lungs, which as it turned out was "It's GARBAGE DAY!!" Parents and children piled into Susan's kitchen, all happy to be back.

Evie tells me that Cara was very quiet on the drive down to see her Grandmama and Grandpapa. They report that Cara was also a bit listless at the house, and did not eat much. She did manage to force her poor Grandpapa to go out in the rain to rent a Diego video, to which she then ruthlessly subjected them.

10/27/07 (Saturday)

Cara's behavior yesterday seemed like the signal of a coming illness, but she had a very energetic day today and two big meals, so perhaps it was just due to lack of sleep. She slept very late into the morning, past 8, and got back to our house (or, as Cara would put it, her house) later than usual. Mommy and Daddy were very happy to see Cara again, to the unusual extent that we both came outside to greet her as Grandpapa took her out of the car. Grandpapa followed us inside and remarked very quietly that perhaps we could no longer talk about Cara while she is in the room--she pays too much attention to what we're saying! Evie had just been saying the very same thing to Ron the other night, and was happy to be confirmed in her suspicions.

Not too long after Grandpapa left, Grandma and Grandpa from South Jersey arrived--and with a gift, no less! It was a big box containing our very own brand new set of Mr. Potato Heads. At Grandma and Grandpa's house, Cara plays with the old ones that my brother and I had when we were little (complete with felt eyebrows and plastic pipes--there are no pipes in the modern version!), so it was a fitting toy; made doubly appropriate by the fact that the set included a Daddy Potato, Mommy Potato, and spud. (Inexplicably, most of the Daddy Potato's accessories seem to be geared towards making him a pirate.)

We all had lots of fun playing with these, though as usual once Cara settled on a "look" for a potato, it was pure sacrilege to even suggest changing his or her features. All of the other toys got dumped out as well, though oddly we never got to do Play-doh, and we never resorted to the television. Diego did make an appearance, but only in miniature plastic form, and only after lunch.

For lunch Grandmama suggested IHOP, and we readily agreed--but when we finally arrived there, in the rain, we found that it was far too crowded for hungry little girls (or hungry little grown men), so instead we went over to the Olive Garden. Cara had some breadsticks, and when the salad came she wanted the croutons very much. Cara is a big fan of croutons, and the waiter very kindly provided us with a heaping plate of them. Predictably when Cara's macaroni and cheese arrived, she didn't eat much of it--but she got through more than I had expected.

After lunch, I had to go by myself to the mall to run some boring errands. Evie got out the new Candyland and Chutes and Ladders games she had purchased and tried to get Cara to play them. Candyland, which we had hoped she might be able to figure out, didn't really work. Chutes and Ladders was a success, because it was a Dora and Diego-themed version, with tiny figurines of Dora, Diego, Boots the monkey, and (of all things) Dora's anthropomorphic Backpack. So all of Cara's little plastic buddies got to spin to see who got to slide.

Cara did not have her nap, but she had slept so late that it made little difference--in fact, she was full of energy in the afternoon. She has taken to saying "Hum-de-dum" a lot lately, and at one point recently I recited the Humpty Dumpty rhyme to her. I imagine she was already pretty familiar with it, but she picked up on it in a big way and was going around yelling "Humpty Dumpty had a big fall!" and so forth. Stickers were very big today--somehow or other she ended up with our entire collection of stickers, which is vast, and was putting lots of them onto pieces of paper. We got to show Grandma and Grandpa how we play with the doctor kit, and Grandpa got to read a bear-themed activity book to her before they had to leave.

Cara also managed to do a flip today. Inadvertently.

To while away the late afternoon, and to do another little errand I needed to do, we went south and eventually ended up at the book store. It was crowded at the spot where kids can play trains; Cara spent a little time there but then her Mommy took her to look at some Halloween books. There is a nice reading area in the children's section, but it was pretty crowded there, too, and they ended up sitting very happily on the floor. We did not find any particularly good Halloween books for children, though Cara didn't mind them too much.

For dinner it was off to Panera, where Cara enthusiastically devoured her whole bowl of broccoli and cheese soup, even to the point where Mommy was tipping the bowl and scraping out the last few drops, and Cara was still looking into it and saying "There's a little more!"

One more item of note: after most of the bed time routine was gotten through, Cara was still playing with her Chutes and Ladders figures (the game had been brought into her room). She was doing some playacting with them, and something happened which caused me to remark, "Eureka!" Cara looked up and asked, "My reeka?"

10/28/07 (Sunday)

We brought up the "Eureka" thing at dinner.

"My reeka?" asked Cara.

"No, eureka," said Daddy.

"No, I Cara!"

Cara slept late again this morning. She got up nice and cuddly and I got to read to her for a little while until she went downstairs to find her daddy and play with her new potato heads. We got her dressed in some of her 2T pants from the drawer of Pants That Are Too Big. They are still too big around the waist, and I rather ineffectively applied safety pins. When I stepped outside to find out how cold it was, I decided to change her into heavier ones! I found another pair that fit a little better and was much warmer. I also found a thick Winter coat handed down from the twins. It was green! We got ourselves ready and soon we were in the car, heading to a local farm to pick pumpkins with PJ!

Aunt Claire had suggested that we go to this place, and it was great. There were plenty of pumpkins to select among, and there were plenty of other things, too. There were several photo things to stick the kids' heads through. There were hay rides, but they were too long for us; we skipped that. There were pony rides. PJ was excited about the pumpkins and was picking them up and carrying them around. As soon as Cara saw the ponies being led out, she reached for both of our hands. "Let's walk," she said, and we picked our way across the field of pumpkins to the ponies.

Now, I had told Cara that there might be pony rides. She was ready. She wanted to ride the red one. I wanted to ride the green one. Unfortunately, our only choices were white or dark brown. Cara happily chose the dark one. Her daddy held her on and she went for her second pony ride ever. PJ was next. He wanted the white one. He wasn't too sure, at first, that this was what he wanted to be doing. After all, we were here for pumpkins, right? Soon, though, he was happy.

We took some head-through-the-hole pictures. The first one was too tall. I could kind of hold Cara up, but then PJ showed up, too, so I put her down and held him up. Finally, I just had them both stand on the hay bales and stick their hands through their holes. That worked. The next one was the right height, and we got all three kids! The first thing PJ did, though, was to pick up a small pumpkin and drop it through the hole. This seemed like a good idea, so Cara joined him. Casey, I found, was playing peek-a-boo through another hole. She was a very happy toddler throughout this experience. The pumpkin field was kind of like a big obstacle course, and she just wandered around, overcoming obstacle after obstacle.

We ran into someone we knew: one of my students was there, and her mother, whom I just saw at conferences, works with Ron and Em! PJ helpfully brought several pumpkins and put them into their cart, which he also tried to push away.

We went out to lunch afterwards and very responsibly washed the kids' hands. I sat Cara on the counter and did her two hands in two different sinks. PJ and Cara were both very polite to the server and also very well behaved. Steve sat next to them and kept them amused and in line. Just for fun, Em got them both to point at the ceiling and look up for a picture.

The kids were definitely all tired, even Cara, who had slept until after eight. When we got home, she wanted to sit and play. She knew we wanted to take her upstairs, and she said no. I went over and held out my hand. She took my finger and, wailing, walked upstairs with me. We walked into her room, and she just stopped and plopped herself onto the floor, where she sat and wailed that she wanted to play downstairs. I changed her diaper. I read her a story. I asked her for a hug. (I use that to get hold of her and put her in bed. How awful!) She wailed. I put her down. She curled up. I put her blanket on her. It was more than three hours later when I went in to wake her, and she had barely moved.

After her nap, Cara wasn't quite ready to play downstairs. We curled up in front of Diego. I put my arms around her, and if I moved them away she moved them back. It was about twenty minutes before she got up and ran off to play. The baby potato head went over to its mommy, only to discover that she had become a very strange creature. I am able to detect a difference between Cara-saying-"mommy"-as-a-potato-baby-talking-to-its-mommy and Cara-saying-"mommy"-as-herself-to-get-me-to-fix-the-potato-mommy. The potato mommy, as far as possible, is all purple, even down to the goofy purple lips.

I got down to work and made a good dinner. When Cara came in and found it on the table, she climbed enthusiastically into her chair. "It's hot," she told us, adding "It's smelly!" Some inquiry exposed the fact that she thought it smelled good. We discussed the idea of saying, "It smells good." When Cara finished her spaghetti, Daddy got her more, with sauce this time. "It's smelly!"

After dinner, Cara and I made brownies. I measured, and she poured things into the bowl. I also had her scoop the mix from one bowl to another, which she did with great care. She helped me stir. (Reaction to the fully-mixed batter: "It's smelly!") She watched me pour it into the pan. Then I showed her how we lick the bowl, both with fingers and with spoons. Daddy must never know, because I think he thinks it's gross. When I told Cara we were making brownies, she announced that she wanted a pink one. That is a strange idea on many levels. In the end, she didn't get any. Once they were in the oven, she forgot all about them.

PJ, I hear, can do somersaults. I recall trying one three or four years ago and deciding that I could not. However, I wanted to get Cara to try it. I could see no other way but to model one for her. So, I tidied up the toys, got down low, tucked my head down as far as I could, and rolled over. Cara was thrilled. I felt far more successful than I had expected to. I tried it again. I asked Cara whether she could try. "No," she laughed. A few minutes later, I tried again. Then, she decided to join me. She got down in crawling position and stuck her leg up in the air, as she does for a headstand. I got her to come over by me and showed her how. When she tucked her head down, I grabbed the back half of her and turned her over. Daddy came to watch and we did it again. Cara was pleased. I got Steve to try it, too. I think his reaction was more like mine from a few years ago. I think he might agree when I say that I am now the only one in the house who can do a somersault.

10/29/07 (Monday)

We've been letting Cara use a big-girl cup at breakfast lately (Why at no other meals? Because we forget.), and it has made for some interesting breakfasts. She is drinking from it beautifully, but she also sees it as a great opportunity to dip. She dips everything into her water. She seems quite happy. We're raising a raccoon.

I asked Susan, when I went there to pick Cara up, what I could bring for the Halloween party. I actually got very lucky; she hadn't arranged to get plates or napkins yet! Cara and I headed for the party store. Cara was charmed when she noticed the clown in their sign. Inside, we looked at a lot of stuff. We held hands, of course, and we ended up taking turns leading. It was a little bit like a three-legged race. We went down most of the aisles. The best part may have been when Cara discovered a display of little stuffed animals that had gotten sort of shoved behind some seasonal items. She went in to look at them, pulling on my hand to drag me with her.

We got plates shaped like kitties and clear plates with spider web designs. I got two packages of the former, and Cara agreed to carry them but then neatly put one back. She basically would carry the latest thing we'd selected. I was curious, so we walked down the aisle of children's costumes. Suddenly, Cara spotted it: George Curious Monkey! I asked, and she definitely agreed that she wanted to be George for Halloween. It came in a large enough size, so I bought it. We headed home to dress up as George and surprise Daddy.

I was very glad she was happy, but I was also a little bit sad. I mean, I had planned out her pink kitty costume carefully! I was proud of it. PJ has a great Diego costume, though, and I know he's excited about it. I hated to think that Cara might be disappointed with hers, so I didn't mind buying George.

We got into the house and Cara was ready to take her socks off. I got her to leave them on and suggested that she take her pants off. No. Okay, I got her into her George costume. With the feet over her feet (they have elastic bands across the bottoms) she had a tough time walking. She was pleased, though. I carried her upstairs to the mirror. For the first time, I think, Cara looked in the mirror and was disappointed. It really is too big for her, so it's quite baggy. She took it off and wanted to go watch George. She was okay, but I was bummed out.

I got out the old Halloween stuff. The bunny costume from past year would fit pretty well now, I think. What Cara liked was her Winnie the Pooh candy sack! She remembers what that's for! She wants candy in it. She is ready to use it to collect candy.

In the mail, Cara got a package! It was from her great grandma in Florida; she sent a gorgeous fuzzy pink scarf. Cara loves it. She likes to wear it around her neck. She likes to swing it around. She likes to run around with it. She likes to spin around with it. We called Grandma Anne to thank her, and Cara very politely said, "Thank you for my scarf," into the phone.

That scarf gave me an idea. I got out the old pink scarf we have put away in the basement. I folded and rolled it up and sewed it into a nice tail for Cara's cat costume! Her pink sleeper has polka dots, so I used a marker to give the tail some spots. It might work out after all. I hope.

10/30/07 (Tuesday)

When Cara and I got into the house, Cara headed straight for the bay window. She did not take off her shoes. She did take off her coat. She did squeak loudly at Buster. She also tried to pet Buster. Then she climbed up into the window, where she played with stickers. All of our stickers are spread out in the window, with a couple of pieces of paper that are already pretty covered in them. Cara was very happy. She likes to stick them in patterns, on top of each other or holding hands. On one page we have several killer whales kissing.

I came upstairs to get settled, and I could hear her down there saying things like, "I like this guy!" and "I like all these!" I went downstairs again. She gave me a little frog sticker. I put it on my pants. She gave me another one. Then another. That is why Cara started putting stickers on her pants. It went on and on. They went all the way up one leg; the other leg was only partly covered. She also got her hands. I decided it was time to go to PJ's house.

Today was an important day. On her refrigerator, Em hung the pumpkin picture PJ made. He stuck little bits of orange tissue to the pumpkin and green tissue to the leaves. Beside it hangs another pumpkin, which has several bits of orange tissue randomly glued to it. It's Casey's first project!

After dinner, it was arts and crafts time. In the interest of our later sanity, we stripped the kids! I got out the paint, and we put the pumpkins on the table. PJ and Cara both grabbed brushes and jumped right in. I was surprised that Cara did not stick to pink. She also liked blue and red and a little bit of green. PJ branched out but mostly stuck to green. He used a novel slapping technique of applying paint. Casey wanted to paint, too, so we let her try. Her pumpkin frustrated her by rolling away sometimes, but she got paint onto it.

At the end we cleaned up the children a little, carted them off to their respective baths, and quickly rolled up the newspaper. We wiped some paint off of the high chair and booster seat, and we were done.

10/31/07 (Wednesday)

It's Halloween! I stayed here later than usual in the morning to help get Cara ready. The kids were to arrive at Susan's in their costumes and change into play clothes later. As soon as we woke her, we started getting Cara excited about being a kitty. It wasn't hard. I had been a little bit apprehensive, but she made no objections to getting dressed in new pajamas in the morning. Her tail was quite long; it touched the ground when she walked, and I'm sure it spent all day getting pulled when she tried to climb on things. I got her hair up in pigtails and put her kitty-ear barettes on her, drew on a nose and whiskers, and she was ready.

Everyone had a fabulous day at Susan's. Susan was dressed up as a clown when Cara arrived, which Steve thinks made Cara a little nervous. Susan reports otherwise. She says, as she has said before, that Cara is a party animal. Nothing phases her. She liked the games, the food, and the costumes, not even getting upset by Avery wearing a mask. The games sound good. They had a pumpkin hunt, and they played with a parachute. Our plates, napkins, and tablecloth were a big hit. I'm glad I got a variety. Besides the spider-web plates and kitty plates, I also got napkins with cute bats on them and a tablecloth with lots of different animals. They had lots of treats, but Susan kept them off candy all day.

While we drove home, we saw lots of kids trick-or-treating. Cara pointed them all out to me. Some were passing our house when we got out of the car, and she stared. They went next door, and I got to explain that they didn't want to go into the house. We went inside to get some candy ready. I had groceries to put away, and when I came downstairs Cara had taken most of the candy out of the bowl and was organizing it by color. I had opened a bag that had Tootsie pops and multicolored Tootsie rolls. The most interesting pile was the pink.

After a while, trick-or-treaters came to our house. I had explained to Cara what would happen and told her she could help give candy to the kids. She climbed up into the window to look, and she came down when I went to the door. When the kids had left, I turned around to look for Cara, who was nowhere in sight! She had gone behind the basement door. I believe she explained that she was shy. I told her that that was okay and that she could just sit in her little chair and watch next time. That sounded acceptable.

I threw some distractions at Cara, but eventually she decided to eat some candy. She had had a lollipop on the way home from Susan's, which of course had been put down on the carpet by this time, and now she moved on to better things. She really liked the pink Tootsie rolls. They were a success. She also opened at least three Tootsie pops, none of which were pink enough to be satisfying. I tried to slow her down, but really I figured some candy couldn't hurt, for one day. She still ended up eating a good dinner.

After dinner, I sat Cara down next to the computer so that I could look at a picture as a model as I painted her face. it turned out better than last time! I had taken her shirt off first to keep things neat, so it was easy afterwards to get her into her costume.

Cara was excited about being a kitty, even to the extent that, as we were preparing to go outside, she crawled around on the carpet, saying "Meow, meow!" Our timing was good, because PJ was coming towards us as we were walking up our driveway. PJ: "Cara! Cara!" Cara: "I coming PJ! I kitty!" Ron, Casey, Em, and her parents were all there as well, so we were a happy group. Our first stop was Juliana's house, where we spent some time climbing about and taking photos, like last year. Then we continued on the end of the Circle, crossed the street and came back on the other side. Evie estimates that we trick-or-treated about seven houses, so we successfully met the reasonable goal of doing more houses than last year.

This year the kids were into it and had a much better grasp on what was going on. Earlier in the day Cara had turned to her mommy and said, "I hungy for more candy!" PJ (who had been a little afraid of the process last year) was very excited about the whole thing. He was much better about saying "Trick or treat!" than Cara (who gets shy and says things with her head down when no one can hear them). After each house he would say "More chocolate!" and be ready to move on. He had a nice backpack (Diego's "rescue pack") in which to carry all of his candy, but a lot of the time he insisted on trying to hold all the candy bars in his hands. At one point he was carrying the backpack upside down, and Cara happily picked up the items that were falling out and put them in her Winnie the Pooh head. At another house PJ generously tried to give one of his goodie bags to the person at the door.

Cara said "Thank you" when prompted, and was good enough to show her tail to one nice woman. She insisted on having one hand held by Mommy and one by Daddy, which made picture-taking difficult (though we did get some good ones). She tried to hop along everywhere while we had her hands. Throughout the evening she would keep saying "I hear more kids!" and when we got back home it was "More kids coming to the door!" whether there actually were or not. Eventually she was comfortable enough to wave at the kids that came to the door.

When we finally did get home, Cara knew what to do. She up-ended her Pooh head and took a look at what she'd collected. Then she proceeded to arrange the candy by type/color. Somehow she ended up with yet another lollipop. After some debate, we finally decided to skip bathtime, but there was a very unhappy face-washing. At her request, Cara remained in her kitty sleeper, with the tail still on. Even at storytime she was climbing into the chair saying "Meow, meow." To go with her mood, I read her the library book Great Cat, which is about a giant cat that lives with a nice young bachelor. Then we read Go to Sleep, Groundhog!, which features a Halloween scene.

At diaper-changing time I had taken Cara's lollipop, as she claimed she didn't want it. It was a Tootsie Pop and I was very carefully getting it down to the chocolate center. I had just gotten there at storytime, when Cara (who had just brushed her teeth) smoothly plucked it from my hand and silently devoured the remainder.

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