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Journal Key:

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

8/23-30/09 (Sunday-Sunday) Our trip to the Outer Banks!

We left at six o'clock on Sunday morning, hoping Cara would sleep in the car for a while. Unfortunately, she woke up enough that not only did she not sleep any more at all, but she also was aware enough to make sure we didn't "forget" the cardboard box that Puma's been using as a bed. I had carefully planned to forget. The trip down was very pleasant, though. Cara was awake the whole way and amused herself almost the entire time, using the lap desk I'd bought her to draw and dressing up the ballerinas in the sticker book I'd also picked up. I got car bingo, too, but that ended up being very amusing for me and Steve and not awfully interesting for Cara. I can report that there are not many windmills or sheep in Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, or North Carolina.

The rental house had, of course, a great pool. Cara found a noodle she really liked; it was the palest of about three pink ones. I don't think she put her swim vest on once, as least after the first day or two. She jumped around in the water, or she paddled on her noodle. She got really good at dog paddling with the noodle under her, and of course she also rode it like a horse. Grandmom bought two floats, one of which was a donut-shaped thing for Cara. That was a huge hit; Cara could hold on and kick and get around, and she was small enough to just kind of pick her legs up through the opening and suddenly be lounging on the top. It was perfect.

Cara's Favorite Person of the trip was definitely Uncle Jim. She wanted Uncle Jim to sit next to her. She wanted to sit next to him. If he wasn't around, she wanted to know where he was. Was he on his way? Could we go get him? When he was there, she wanted him to draw things for her or show her things on the computer. She even got over the fact that the first mermaid he drew for her had to be soundly rejected because its face was "scary."

It was interesting to live with two dogs for a week. Floyd and Rusty, of course, are very different. Rusty is a busy dog. Cara spent much of her time tattling on him. "Rusty's going downstairs!" "Rusty's smelling that!" "Rusty's going over there!" Floyd is much calmer. Cara liked to bring him his bunny toy. She also spent some time, on more than one occasion, showing him pictures. His reaction was unclear, as he was asleep.

Aunt Sarah and Uncle Jim brought a collection of Looney Tunes with them, and Cara got to watch a few on one of the first nights. This led to repeated requests for more, more, more on all subsequent nights, and it also led to great misery when people were not satisfied with watching just one even though they'd agreed that that would be okay.

Cara spent a morning at the beach with Daddy, Grandmom, and Grandpop. The waters were a bit rough, so we spent most of the time digging in the sand. Grandmom helped Cara to make a ring-shaped castle, and I dug a trench or canal from the center hole out to the water. We waited patiently and eventually the tide came up and the canal paid off. We thought it was funny that Cara was willing to dump buckets of sea water over her head--until we realized that the water was full of sand. By the time we left, the child's hair was a sandy mass, and her swimsuit was packed full of the stuff. It was impressive. The child had a lot of fun screaming at the waves, and we even saw several dolphins playing in the water near the shore.

The three of us drove down to Manteo to go on a boat ride; it was a dolphin-watching tour in the sound. This was somewhat superfluous, since Steve and Cara had already seen dolphins at the beach, but it was still really cool to get out on a boat and see them up close. We spotted eight or nine of them and watched them for about an hour. The last time we took Cara on a boat I think she was two. It was a paddle-wheel steamer in Lake George, and she hated it. It's made me nervous about taking her on a boat, but that's silly. She's a totally different person. This was a small, flat-bottomed boat; it wasn't awfully comfortable. Cara loved it. She loved leaning over and watching the spray churn along the side. I pointed out that if some got into your mouth, it tasted salty. Cara spent quite a while riding with her tongue out. She loved the feel of the boat going fast. She loved looking at the dolphins and the birds and the water. It was an adventure.

Incidentally, on the boat they sold Snickers bars. We were not alone in having to explain to our child what one was. Cara wanted no part of it. She was horrified at the very idea.

Cara's daddy, of course, is very very silly. He's been "silly" for a while. Sometimes, he's silly without even doing anything. In the past week or two, though, Cara's begun, instead of just pointing out that he's silly, telling him to "Be quiet, Daddy!" This happens when he sings or says silly things or sometimes for no reason at all. It got bad for a while, but it may be calming down. We're not sure how it started. (She did also tell me to be quiet, but only once.)

We did spend a lot of time hanging around the house. How did Cara occupy herself? Mainly, she made people draw things. I think that not one adult escaped from having to create mermaids, ballerinas, or princesses. I personally felt very lucky to be asked for princesses once or twice, because I feel far more comfortable drawing those. Sometimes, a drawing would be rejected. We often had to draw the three ballerinas from Cara's sticker book. At least one drawing was rejected because when Cara put the hair on (that was her job) she forgot to put the blonde in the middle. We drew and drew and drew and drew until finally we used up the whole pad of paper and had to use the backs of some sheets, which was a very difficult thing to talk the child into.

On the last night, we cooked out on the charcoal grill. After dinner, the three of us went back in the pool for one last swim. The house was called Evening Sunsets, so the sky over the sound was getting pink beyond the fence and over the sound. I toasted marshmallows, three at a time, and brought them over to the pool. Cara has finally learned to appreciate toasted marshmallows! It was a beautiful night.

It was very sad to say goodbye to everyone and head home. Still, while it wasn't nearly as exciting as the idea that we were going on vacation was the previous Sunday, Cara did, I think, look forward to getting back here. The ride was tougher for her, I think. She did try some bingo. She liked spotting things, but she also liked closing the little doors over things, and if you asked her whether she saw, for instance, a windmill, she'd say that, yes, she did, there was one right here. On her bingo card. She took a very reasonable nap in the car and woke up, thank goodness, perfectly cheerful. We got home in the late afternoon and, while Steve and I were unpacking, Cara dumped out the contents of at least four of her bins of toys. I guess she missed them.

8/31/09 (Monday)

Cara and I had our last Girl Day of the summer. In the morning, Cara read the comics. She asked about the Slylock Fox cartoon, which is a mystery. Someone had stolen a dog's watch. Slylock looks around and finds the culprit. I had Cara look around. She spotted the ice cream vendor with a watch on either wrist. She solved the mystery! She was triumphant and went marching around, all bent over, looking through an imaginary magnifying glass.

I'd planned on taking her out to lunch at the mall, where we'd buy her some pants. I sorted out her closet and had her try on the three longest pairs. One was long enough. We were also going to do groceries. However, the car, when we started it for the first time after our week away, had some very interesting problems and instead we drove straight to Gus, the car's doctor. From there, however, we walked easily to the diner for lunch!

Cara had a waffle. With two eggs. Then more eggs, which I had to order specially. I'd done this before, at the MHOP, where her waffle was so much smaller as to be done rather quickly and more eggs made sense. Unfortunately, I found that I'd set a precedent. She did finish most of the waffle. We walked back to Gus, who explained the problem, accounting for all of the symptoms (alternator "seized up," belt went bad), and then we walked home. Parts of this walk are somewhat unlovely, but it was cool to look down at Route One from the overpass and see the diner where we'd been and the gas station and houses we usually drive by to get home.

In the afternoon, that wretched, wretched child remembered that at some point over a week ago, on our drive down to North Carolina, she'd decided that she wanted her Race to the Mall back out. Fortunately, she also remembered what I'd said about having to "put other things away" in its place. She interpreted this as a direction to clean up, which she did. We changed the gerbils. We vacuumed. We got out the racetrack, in all of its pieces. I did manage to put it back together right and to find batteries for it and everything, and then I actually was able to rearrange things in that room to make room for it by putting a whole bunch of other things into the basement. So, it was a very fulfilling afternoon for us both.

9/1/09 (Tuesday)

We had a lot of jobs to do after I picked Cara up from preschool. Cara, though, walking through Highland Park, could think of lots of other fun things we could do instead. I turned the advantage to myself by transforming her ice-cream-getting idea into the notion of having popsicles after dinner, which meant we had to go to the grocery store to get popsicles.

First, though, we went to the library. Herb the Vegetarian Dragon was in! We were triumphant. It must be someone else's favorite book, too, since it was out for so long. I refuse to believe that a lot of other people like it. We managed to find a few other books we liked.

At the grocery store, Cara and I made our way about with great difficulty. She likes to push, which I think she does by hanging from the handle, putting one foot on the lowest railing, and pushing off with her other foot, like on a scooter. I get to walk ahead and steer and say things like "okay, forward. forward. forward. . . . now stop, stop, stop! stop!" Then sometimes she puts both feet up without telling me and all of the forward momentum is generated by my steering hand, and I only realize it after things have been more difficult (well, differently difficult) than usual for a few moments. In the produce department, though, we did make a breakthrough. Cara can now be sent off to get bags from the rolls they put around, neatly tearing one off and then dilly-dallying to carefully smooth back onto the roll whatever part of the next bag is hanging off. She's very proud of herself.

Dinner was late. It was very dusky out when Cara and I made it to the front yard with our popsicles. It was (I checked when we came in) 65 degrees out. They were . . . good popsicles.

9/2/09 (Wednesday)

When I arrived to pick Cara up from preschool, she and a few other little girls were working hard to stick maple-seed helicopters onto their noses. I wonder whether Cara remembers that I showed her that. Today was my first day back at work and therefore Cara and Steve's first day mostly on their own in the morning. Somehow, they managed to survive without me. I'm not sure how to feel.

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