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Journal Key:

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

11/19/09 (Thursday)

The other day, we were looking at the newspaper. To keep Cara amused, we gave her a Thanksgiving ad to look at. She found a "football hat" and was confused. Well, we said, people seem to play football on Thanksgiving. Do you like football? "Yes! I like football with Grandmama and Grandpapa; we see the show, and sometimes we even get snacks!" Somehow, football on television holds fewer charms.

We got our new carpeting today. Cara is delighted with it; she rolled around on it and claims that it's very comfy, although it really isn't and we didn't pick it out based on comfiness. She insisted on eating dinner in the "new" dining room. It was nice. I had moved some child-art clutter out of the room and into her playroom, and she has neatly moved it back. Oh well. Interesting moment: Cara emerged from the playroom on the crest of a wave of realization; she had been telling Buster to look at the new carpet and it had dawned on her that Buster wasn't looking because she had already seen it.

In the bath, Cara had her mermaids out. Before she got out, she wanted to "make cookies." Mermaid cookies! "What goes into mermaid cookies?" I asked innocently. "Mommy, you don't put mermaids in mermaid cookies!" I guess the only edible ones are the ones you catch yourself.

Why context clues don't always work: In Bedtime for Frances, Frances keeps popping up out of bed until finally her father tells her to go to sleep or she will "get a spanking." Cara's interpretation: Frances will be very tired the next day after preschool.

11/21/09 (Saturday)

Aunt Claire came up today and did some art projects with Cara. Claire's very good at cutting out girls. The two of them made a family of three girls and a mommy who is identical to them, and there is also a house and a dog and the mommy is cooking dinner while the girls play. One girl gets to ride up and down on a balloon. Because she's five. What was upsetting to Aunt Claire: She cut out girls with dresses and bows in their hair, and then Cara insisted on her cutting out identical dresses from paper in other colors.

Cara's been sleeping with her cats from Build-a-Bear a lot lately. They have dresses and things, which they always take off before bed. Tonight, Cara selected some "new" toys to sleep with; they've been on display in the office, and we moved the book shelves today and left the toys in Cara's room. She picked Steve's old dog toy, which is a puppet with a bone, and a Jane Austen doll. She quickly discovered that the dog's overalls would come off, and of course his shirt soon followed. Next, she flipped over poor Jane. Jane's dress, for some reason, has velcro on the back. Cara laboriously pulled it off, leaving Jane with nothing but her white sewn-on gloves and socks, except for a pair of white bloomers. Those were no good, though; off they came. Cara is sleeping with a naked Jane Austen.

11/22/09 (Sunday)

Dressing Jane Austen in the morning was fairly difficult.

It is of course interesting to watch Cara's speech develop. I've noticed a couple of things lately: She still really does not understand "tomorrow." I'm pretty sure that she often refers to what she will do "the next day," and when I use "tomorrow" she sometimes asks me to confirm that this means "the next day." She also does not understand "never." She has never watched Curious George in a long time. Today I delivered a small minilesson on why "never" doesn't make sense there and what phrases could apply in its stead. It's hard to define "never" without saying "never." Later she did use one of the phrases I'd suggested, so the lesson took, at least for a few hours.

Things have been rearranged somewhat in the playroom, since we've put a book case in there, and it's brought to Cara's notice some toys she's been ignoring. This afternoon, Cara, Daddy, and Jane Austen sat around the little table in there for a picnic. "Why aren't you eating, girl? Won't you eat anything?" Cara asked Jane solicitously. "This girl isn't eating her pizza," she reported.

Undressing Jane Austen this evening was fairly difficult.

11/23/09 (Monday)

I was very happy this afternoon that, when I picked Cara up from preschool, Jane Austen was fully clothed.

Today was the bake sale! I made cupcakes and decorated them; it was an adventure. Cara brought a quarter to buy a treat for her snack. I wondered whether all of the kids would just get whatever their own moms had made, but they didn't. Cara had a brownie! We bought some leftovers to bring home.

Cara does still like to humorously hit herself on the head occasionally, though her interest has dwindled. There is a boy at preschool, Adrian, who hits himself on the head and calls his head a coconut. He also calls himself a coconut. We know this because for the past three days Cara has been saying things like, "Oh, I'm a coconut! I called myself a coconut. Adrian calls himself a coconut!" She calls herself a coconut or hits herself in the coconut at least seven or eight times a day. Boy, that Adrian's funny!

On entering ballet this evening:

Cara: I'm a coconut!

Other girl: I'm a coconut, too!

I have to bet that the real Jane Austen never got to sleep on a sheepskin rug, naked but for socks and white gloves.

11/24/09 (Tuesday)

Jane Austen was naked when I picked Cara up from preschool today. I mentioned this to Miss Jane. "Oh, that's who I thought that was!" she said.

Cara says that Miss Jane wears different shoes every day. Different from Cara's shoes? A different pair of shoes every day? I have no idea.

Cara, at dinner, I swear: "I'm a coconut! I called myself a coconut! Adrian calls himself a coconut." Every day.

The lollipops walked to the grocery store today to use the money from the bake sale to buy healthy food for people who need it for Thanksgiving. They all helped to carry it back. Cara's impressions: She had to hold Colin's hand. She does not remember what they bought. She does not remember what she carried. The end.

11/25/09 (Wednesday)

On tv there's a little spot about how curious kids are and all the questions they ask. "Are you curious?" we asked Cara. She was shocked. "No! Never!"

Cara tried to deny that she was a coconut, last night, and to claim that I was, instead. I told her that she was a coconut, and that therefore I was a coconut tree. The discussion naturally led to what Daddy might be. He's a flower.

Cara is a coconut.

We had fish for dinner. Cara insisted that she did not want fish. We reminded her that she had liked it last time we had it. Nope. We reminded her that she had to eat it if she wanted dessert. (We have leftover cupcakes!) Well, okay, she'd have a little bit. She ate it up. Could she have more? Okay. Could she have more than that? Okay. Just a little more? Okay. She'd forgotten that she likeded it!

What a coconut.

Cara didn't want to take a bath tonight, until I reminded her that she could "do showers" in the bath. This is a game the she and Steve discovered; it's lots of fun to have a particular bottle filled with water and poured out on her head from very high up. Lots of fun. I was confused, though, by what she was talking about and asked whether she wanted to do showers in the bath or take a real shower. Showers in the bath.

Five minutes later, she had Steve emptying the tub so that she could take a real shower. It turned out to be really nice, though. She washed herself. I put shampoo on her head, and she rubbed it in and rinsed it. She played. She loved it. She didn't want to get out.

What a coconut.

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