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Journal Key:

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

 

12/25/08 (Thursday)

Merry Christmas! Evie and I woke up before Cara this morning and were well prepared when she did wake up. It turned out Santa had visited in the evening (leaving only crumbs behind on his plate of cookies, as I pointed out to Cara) and left lots of presents. Cara mentioned, rather surprised, that she had not heard Santa. She got more good stuff. Some of the things she got were "potty prizes" which we never handed out. Among them were some new "girls" of the Polly Pocket variety. Dolls are always among her favorite things, which is why it was so great that she got the homemade Flower Princess dolls, with special flower-petal dresses sewn by GiGi and Grandmama Janet, last night. Some of the other girls are already borrowing the flower dresses. From her Aunt Claire she received a very cool Tinker Bell book with punch-out fairies that can be dressed in re-stickable outfits--it's our Tinker Bell web site come to life! We did some dressing of fairies in the morning.

There were many wonderful gifts, but the one she latched onto with the most excitement was a tiny little winged horse sponge which grows to many times its original size when soaked in water for several days (she became very enamored of a similar shark-shaped sponge that we purchased in North Carolina this past summer). We had to put it in water right away and even went to the extreme of putting it into a large Tupperware container so that we could take it with us to Grandmom and Grandpop's house.

At the house, more presents awaited! Uncle Jim and Aunt Sarah gave her, among other things, a nice Princess Belle playset--more girls are always good--which she had seen advertised on the packaging of her Cinderella playset, and was very happy to get. The exciting present from Grandmom and Grandpop was Cara's very own video game system! This is a great gift idea, because (as I'm sure the dedicated journal readers will realize) Cara is a fan of computer and video games, and this console has games designed for children which teach good basic skills like reading and counting. The problem with other games we play with Cara is that she generally does not play them, but directs us to play. This system is very much geared towards her use, and we were able to get her to take the controller and play some games already. It was pretty amazing how well she did recognizing numbers, and the games generally move at a good pace for her. One of the games is a Backyardigans one, so the old 'yardigans were very popular today.

Our big present to Cara was a Polly Pocket party boat. It has many wonderful features, including a color-changing girl, a deck with a table and a banana split, and an extra cool secret button which can drop a girl through a trap door into a jetski which then launches out the front of the boat. It was a very popular item.

Lest this entry become entirely a list of presents given to Cara, let me provide some other details. We had a nice huge brunch with many wonderful things, and we did a lot of playing with various toys, and some of us had a wonderful time sitting by the fireplace and tending the fire that was lit in it. The dogs got presents too and Cara I believe spent some time outside with them. Jim and Sarah left in the afternoon, and then Cara changed out of her fancy dress and got back to work with various toys. The new ones were not enough, because she also had me get out the Mouse Trap game and set it up for a few minutes.

In the evening we had to pop in our borrowed VHS tape of My Neighbor Totoro (we really have to get our own copy of that one of these days). Cara has really fallen in love with this movie and kept telling everyone how great this one scene was where Totoro popped out of a hole in a tree. She also seems to enjoy running away from random scenes which she apparently finds threatening in some way, though a less threatening film would be hard to imagine.

We did actually get in the car and go home eventually. Cara was alseep very soon after our trip began, and was upset when she woke up at the end of the journey. We watched some Backyardigans to revive her. Actually we watched quite a few episodes of the Backyardigans, and then for her books tonight I let her choose three out of a nice package of storybooks that she got for Christmas this morning. Two of them featured the Backyardigans.

12/26/08 (Friday)

This morning Casey and PJ came over for a couple of hours because Em and I decided to trade off babysitting. They brought their favorite new toys: Buzz Lightyear and two babies. Casey was very happy about being able to announce every ten minutes that her babies were sleeping. PJ was happy to shoot toys and people with Buzz's laser. Cara, of course, took this very seriously and was upset with him whenever he shot me. I got her to be interested, at least, in the idea that the laser, which of course is really just a red light, turns things red. She, PJ, and I went up to her room and crawled under her comforter with Buzz and turned all of our faces red.

Steve and PJ had a really good time playing with two little racing cars that Claire had bought Steve. They raced them in the kitchen, and then they got really creative and built themselves a ramp out of my cookbooks. Cara played with them a while, too. Casey's babies were sleeping.

All of the kids ate a good lunch, and then they headed over to Em's for a couple of hours. After that, we had a very lazy day. In the evening Cara and I binged on Clementines, though I managed to stop us before we went too far. I think that that may have been the most excitement we had today.

This evening, after the bath, Cara decided that we had to hurry and brush her teeth before Daddy came upstairs. We did this once before, of course, very loudly, and I prompted Steve when he came up to ask Cara whether she was ready to brush her teeth. Today, we had to send him back downstairs first, and then we very loudly brushed her teeth. When we were done, Steve came up. "Daddy," Cara said, "You have to say, 'let's brush your teeth!'"

12/27/08 (Saturday)

Cara is having a great time playing with her Christmas presents. Steve's doing a fabulous job with her video game console. The two of them have gotten it running half a dozen times in the past two days, and Cara is getting very independent with it. She has a hard time with things that require precise timing, but she's able to make the characters walk, jump, and run around. She can drive the little cars. She can sort of negotiate the menu screens. Sort of. I feel weird saying this, but I'm very excited because she's learning to play video games! I'm not excited about the video game part, really, but about the learning to do things on her own part. That is definitely very exciting.

She also has spent some time with the Playmobil magnetic castle set, playing with the tiny princesses. There are four princesses, each of whom is standing beside a prince; they're so tiny it's a good thing they're attached! Cara got them all arranged on the castle, and then she decided that two of them were getting married. (One princess has a white dress.) The little carriage came, accompanied by a horsie noise, and the pair got in. They rode to the back of the castle, where they took a slurpy drink from the fountain and lined up to wait. The carriage went, accompanied by a horsie noise, and parked in a corner. Then it went, accompanied by a horsie noise, and picked up another couple, who took a drink in the fountain and lined up to attend the wedding. And so on. There was a nice crowd,the weather was great, and I'm sure the ceremony was lovely. It was a little too small for me to see.

12/28/08 (Sunday)

Cara and I went out to Barnes and Noble in the morning. We read a lot of Hanukkah books, including one in which the Blues Clues gang goes to Orange Kitten's house for a Hanukkah party. None of them have ever celebrated Hanukkah before, so there are a lot of pictures of Joe looking very confused. When I was looking for a book for me, Cara noticed the cafe. She wanted a snack. Well, I thought, if I were out with Claire, I'd let her get something. Cara and I went and got a pizza-pretzel, which was a warm pretzel with pizza stuff in it. Cara got to choose our table; she went with one on the lower tier, where she got to sit on the cool bench. We ate the whole thing. "Why are people walking by us?" Cara whispered. I gave a noncommittal answer. "Maybe they don't like us!" suggested Cara. I gave a more clear and committal answer.

In the afternoon, Grandmama and Grandpapa came. It was very warm out, so we ladies went for a walk. Cara ran most of the way. We went all the way to the park, where we played for a long, long time. We chased each other a lot, climbed on things, slid down things, and swung. And swung. Cara actually went on the big swings by herself for a little bit. We ran around so much, in fact, that we tired Cara out. By the time dinner was over, she had that tired-eyes look. Before seven thirty, she actually asked for her bath. This may partially be because I bought her some new bath toys for Christmas, but I think she's also very, very tired.

12/29/08 (Monday)

As usual on days when I'm home and Cara goes to daycare, I got to drive her to Susan's. The novelty is a great bribe to get her to go without complaining. She was happy to get to see Susan and her friends, though, and she had a pretty great day. In the morning, we brought Cara's growing horse in its tupperware container for Susan to see. She was, of course, thrilled. I got to bring it home then, so that it would "be more comfortable."

We had a night out on the town tonight. We hung out at Barnes and Noble, where we got to read several My Little Pony books. They are truly astonishingly horrible. None of us can keep any of the characters straight, for one thing. Even Cara has no idea which is which, but she loves them anyway.

Bedtime has been a source of great amusement lately, at least for me. Last night, Cara had me bend down low so that she could whisper to me. "Tomorrow," she said, "in the morning, I want . . . to get . . .more presents!" Great idea. I gave her a lengthy explanation of Christmas and Hanukkah being over, but New Years coming and then her friends coming over. It was nice and distracting. I hope.

The other night, in the bath, something reminded me of Goodnight Moon, which I had read to Cara recently. I recited some lines, and Cara added the one about the old lady who was whispering hush. "Mommy," she said, "you can whisper hush to me." Okay. We got her out of the bath and into her pajamas. We brushed her teeth. We tucked her in, and Steve read to her. He turned out the lights and left. Five minutes later, wailing. Steve went up, but he came back down. Cara needed her mommy. I went in, and the distraught child informed me that I had forgotten to whisper hush to her. Well, you try to whisper hush convincingly while cracking up inside! It was a great challenge, but I did my best.

12/30/08 (Tuesday)

When my car pulled up at Susan's this afternoon, not only Mommy, but also Daddy and Aunt Claire got out! Big, big excitement. We got to show Claire all of the fun stuff we got for Christmas, and she finally got to play with all of the things she bought Cara. Claire and I made soup for dinner, and Cara kind of floated back and forth between us in the kitchen and Steve. After dinner, she politely asked whether she could go play. Steve and I are not sure at all whether that was a fluke. She showed Claire her video game, which she really is doing a good job of playing.

With great enthusiasm, Cara and I "sneakily" brushed her teeth before Steve came up. By the time he arrived, we had brushed, flossed, and picked out the evening's books. Then we had hidden. Cara was behind the door to my room, and she had directed me to hide in the bed. Steve came in, saying, "Where's Cara? She needs to brush her teeth!"

Reading with Daddy before bed, Cara saw a page that had pictures of different sporting events. "I like golf," she remarked, pointing to the table tennis picture.

12/31/08 (Wednesday)

Cara had no problem with the logical argument I produced this morning: we wanted to go to the aquarium, so we had to clean the house first. We also had to go to the grocery store first. Once we'd gotten those things done, we were off! We headed down to Jenkinsons' Aquarium, where we got to see the sharks be fed and to almost touch some rays in the touch tank. Actually, Steve was able to touch them. Cara stuck two fingers in the water and couldn't really reach. There was also a small snowstorm that turned the boardwalk and the beach white, which was pretty cool.

From there, we headed to Grandmama's house. Cara painted and played, and she and I got to mix up biscuits for tomorrow's brunch. Cara liked cutting them out; she picked out the tiniest cutter and was ready to start using it before they were out of the mixing bowl. Tomorrow, we'll be just like the princesses in that classic book Princesses Are Not Quitters.

The main event of the day was the party at Aunt Claire's house. It was not, as Cara first supposed, a birthday party. It was a New Years party. At first, it was just us and Casie and Claire. That was good. When more people showed up, that was good too! Cara was in fine form, squeaking and running and jumping and dancing and throwing things. Puma had to be spoken to about over-enthusiastic jumping. Cinderella had to be rescued from under the stove. Cara had a very, very good time. It may have been her best performance at a holiday party this year, in fact. She was friendly, funny, and independent.

We stayed until a little after ten. The last thing Cara said in the car was, "Mommy, I didn't brush my teeth!" Then she fell asleep. At home, I volunteered to carry her in. It's hard to pick up a dead weight! She woke up enough to hang on a little, and I lugged her upstairs. We took off her coat. She picked up a stuffed animal. She crawled into bed, we tucked her in, and she was gone. Happy New Year!

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