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Journal Key:

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

5/27/10 (Thursday)

We've been running and running lately, and today we agreed to have an evening off. We skipped ballet. Next week, Owen and I will take Cara. Instead, today, the three of us stayed home and played this afternoon. We ate a dinner that everyone except Owen had helped to make, and then one of Cara's dreams came true: She has been hoping that she and Owen could take a bath together. They can't. Tonight, though, they both took baths at the same time. She may have been somewhat disappointed that I could not bathe Owen in his tub and play with her in her tub simultaneously.

The other day, Cara admonished Steve about drinking and driving. You shouldn't drink and drive, after all. He had to explain to her that coffee and alcohol are very different. She claims that she meant alcohol. We asked where she'd learned about the dangers of drinking and driving, but, according to her, she just thought of it herself.

5/28/10 (Friday)

A discussion with Cara on whether PJ will be her best friend in kindergarten.

Cara: Yes! We can go out to lunch together.

Us: !

Steve, finally: Where will you go?

Cara: Chili's. I'll show him how to get there!

Steve: How will you get there?

Cara: In the car.

Steve: You'll drive?

Somehow things fell apart there. Later, Cara told us that she liked it when the lights went out, and maybe tonight we could play ghost family. Steve suggested that he might be frightened. "Daddy, you're a big kid!" She also described how houses are "glued to the ground," with "that liquidy stuff that they put down a slide."

At bedtime:

Steve: Are you going to wear your pajamas from last night?

Cara: The top, but not the bottom. (They hadn't matched, anyway, so . . .)

Steve: Well, what bottoms will you wear?

Cara: You pick, Daddy.

Steve: You'll just say no to anything I pick.

Cara: No, I won't.

Steve: You'll take anything I pick?

Cara: Yes.

Steve: (looks in the pajama drawer, pulls something out) How about these?

Cara: But not pants!

5/29/10 (Saturday)

This morning I was going to go buy some bagels for my breakfast. The child convinced me to get donuts instead, and we went together for the first time to the Dunkin Donuts that we see every day on our way to preschool. Afterwards, the child ate about half of one of the donuts that she had convinced me to buy, and then said she was done and wandered off.

We got ourselves all packed up and headed down south to see lots of family: Grandpa, Grandma, Uncle Jim, Aunt Sarah, little Griffin, and Floyd and Rusty. Cara brought a little backpack of toys, but didn't spend a lot of time playing with them. We had some fun out back with the bubbles and sidewalk chalk, and spent some time swinging in the nice bench swing. We took many photos (which I will go through and upload tomorrow--too tired now!) of the babies and of Cara, and the babies spent some time in each other's company. They may have vaguely stared at one another for a little while, and Owen may have accidentally swung his hand at Griffin a few times, but mostly they ignored each other's presence. I wondered whether they were following some kind of unwritten Baby Code.

At lunch, the topic of Cara's lunch outings with PJ came up, and somehow Cara was asked again how she planned on getting out to a restaurant. Cara suggested a "car, bus, or limousine." Grandpa advised that if she had a choice, she should always go with a limo.

Today we got out a "foil art" toy that Cara got for her birthday, and which we'd been keeping at my parents' house. There are pictures with sticky sections onto which you can rub shiny foil in a variety of colors. Cara got almost everyone detailed into rubbing foil onto things. Cara also spent a lot of time playing Legos. She and I had a nice quiet time late in the afternoon, separately building space ships out of Legos. From time to time I would show her something I was working on, and she would say "Daddy, let me use that!" and she would take it and add it to her creation. But also she spent a lot of time putting pieces together herself.

For the longest time, my wife has been waiting to read Cara (and, indirectly, me) the books of Laura Ingalls Wilder. Today she finally convinced the child. We brought The Hobbit and Little House in the Big Woods with us in the car. Cara was at first excited to hear The Hobbit when told it was about magic, but I think seeing the little girl with the doll on the cover of the other book made her change her mind. Ev spent all of our time in the car both ways reading it aloud. Every time we were done a chapter, Cara asked for the next one. We also had to read more at bedtime. There are plenty of books and movies that we've been waiting to show Cara, and I hope that the rest of them go even half as well as this one did.

Incidentally, I was also charmed by the books. They tell a fascinating story of what it was like to grow up in the American wilderness, but they also show a general joy of life and a child's deep, abiding love for her parents and family. But I also couldn't help looking at it from a father's perspective. I am a modern man, with very limited experience in hunting or animal husbandry, who indeed can hardly get through the simple household task of hanging a picture without resorting to bad language. In comparison, Laura Ingalls Wilder's father is a Superman, a demi-god, who can be trusted to shoot a wild panther dead with a single shot from his rifle; who does not think twice about running at a bear to attempt to club it to death with the branch of a tree; a man whom "bees never sting." When we got to the chapter wherein Charles is depicted "making his own bullets," I was slapping the car steering wheel in frustration. However, my child still seems to like me well enough, and was excited for me to read the chapter titled "the Wonderful Machine," since she imagined it as being some kind of robot or Transformer, which is the kind of thing that I would like.

5/30/10 (Sunday)

I took Cara to another birthday party today, this time at a place sort of like an upscale Chuck E Cheese. They had an arcade and a big area where kids could climb and go through tubes and over obstacles and down slides, but there was also a section with lots of things for make-believe, like a post office and a grocery store and a restaurant. There were costumes, and several boys spent the afternoon running around as Superman or Spiderman. Cara ignored the pretend things completely and ran and ran and ran around, up and down, through the tubes and nets and things. It was hard to get her to come out for the party part. She insisted that she didn't want to eat, even though Adrian was trying his best to get her to come and sit next to him. She sat on my lap instead. When it came time for cake and, having wandered briefly out, we came back into the room, she was prevailed upon to sit at the table. She then stayed there well after the other kids were back to playing, eating her pizza and picking at her cake.

We came home after more running and jumping and climbing and falling and running and rolling to find Owen and Steve watching Star Wars. Owen seemed to like the light sabers. He'd had a lot of fun lying on his blanket while we were out at the party. After a while I put him in the stroller and we walked with Cara to the park.

What really impressed me about Cara today was how easily and well she played with other kids. At the party, of course, she played with her friends from preschool, but she hung out with other kids, too. They actually talked to each other, finding out names and ages. At the park, fortunately, she did the same thing. The first girl she played with was nine. They went on the slides and then moved to the swings, where they both actually swung about as high as anyone could possibly swing. After her friend left, Cara found someone else to play with. I was proud of her.

5/31/10 (Monday)

In the morning, Cara wanted to watch Star Wars. We were awfully pleased; we've waited for this day! We put on Episode IV. When we were explaining to her that Luke and Leia were "those babies," I realized that we'd failed utterly as parents. We'd always said that we'd show our children the series in the order in which it was created, and now Cara had seen the end first! I'm horrified. However, she may have suffered no lasting hurt from it. She liked A New Hope very much. At the end, she was jumping up and down, exhorting the rebels to "hurry!" She told Aunt Claire later that Luke Skywalker was her favorite character, "because he saved the day!" Then she jumped down the sidewalk for a while singing, "Luke saved the day! Luke saved the day!" She doesn't feel like watching Empire yet, though. I'm also somewhat concerned that she'll bring up again how sad Darth Vader was when his wife died, which she's not supposed to know about.

For Memorial Day, we went down to Aunt Claire's house. In the car,we finished Little House in the Big Woods and started Little House on the Prairie. Casie and Claire were very happy to play Cara's tea party game, which she had brought with her, because it was something to do other than watch The Jungle Book. It's a good game. All you have to do is spin a spinner and then you're allowed to take something from whatever category it lands on. The goal is to collect a plate, flatware, a tea cup, a creamer, a fruit, sandwiches, and a dessert. All of them are cute, and the whole thing gets laid out on a little tablecloth. Casie and Claire had actually made finger sandwiches today, so it was very appropriate.

Cara also got to help make scrambled egg pinwheels; Claire let her stretch out the squares of dough. Later Claire got her to try eating them. Cara, who of course had refused to try them earlier, ate her way, half by half, through two. We took another home for her to eat here. When I asked her what her favorite part of the day was, it was the pinwheels.

Owen had a good day. He got to hang around in just his diaper for a while! He does like to be naked. The other day I explained to Grandma Anne and Aunt Nancy how much he likes to have the attention of large groups of women and how much he likes to be naked.

Nancy: He should be a stripper!

Grandma: No, he's Jewish. He should be a doctor!

Nancy: He should be a doctor in a nudist colony.

Right now, that's my favorite career choice for him. Today he got the attention of lots of women, and he got to spend some time at least close to being naked. Claire's house also has two very nice ceiling fans. He didn't sleep, though, except for a couple of short stretches in the stroller. He did enjoy himself when he was awake, mainly, looking happy and surprised by turns.

Claire and I took the kids with us for a quick walk to Red Bank. We stopped to get ice cream for Cara, and the place had three different pink ice creams! It was astonishing. That's never happened before. Now we know where to go.

I played mermaids with Cara in the bath tonight. The queen mermaid explained that her doctor mermaid had died, but she still swam around as a " mermaid doctor ghost."

I have to add that I think the reason Cara was talking about "doctor mermaid ghosts" is actually due to Star Wars. At the end of the movie, even though Obi-Wan has died, his spirit is still able to give Luke helpful inspiration and advice. I explained this to Cara by saying that Obi-Wan was a ghost.

6/1/10 (Tuesday)

I sort of cannot believe that we've all made it through today. I had a class trip and then finished a project at school and then got my sub plans set up for tomorrow, when I will take Owen to the ENT. Then I picked up both kids in the rain and got them to Cara's final swimming class. Then my car was utterly, completely dead. The only two good things were that Owen stayed asleep and that the rain stopped while I was looking under the hood. Steve came to pick us up, Claire met us at the house, we got ready and sort of ate dinner, and then we went to Cara's preschool graduation. Then Claire drove Steve back to the Y to meet AAA and Cara and I got Owen to bed. Then I put new sheets on Cara's bed; she knocked over the vase of flowers on her dresser; we cleaned up the water on her dresser, stuffed animals, wall, and floor; I read her three books; and I talked her into the idea that she really did actually have to go to bed now. Please! So, oy! (As of now, the car is getting a new battery at a 25% discount, Owen is asleep, Cara is quiet and in the dark, and I'm washing bottles after I do the journal.)

This weekend, I got new nipples for Owen's bottles. He'd been "snacking" an awful lot at daycare, never taking a full bottle, and I thought maybe the Nuk nipples, which never really went well with these bottles, weren't working out. He managed to get used to the new ones, and today when I picked him up he had just finished five ounces, an unprecedented amount!

Cara has seen Indians in Peter Pan and heard about them in Little House. I know Steve has also been explaining things, but I took a crack at it today. I may or may not have gotten across the idea that they don't live that way anymore. I thought I'd made the concept of "Native Americans" clear, but then she referred to Steve as one later in the evening. I do think that it's an important point that I made when I thought to tell her that when we get Indian food, those aren't the Indians in question. "The words sound almost alike!" she said.

I'm very glad that Cara enjoyed her final swimming class. They had some fun in the water, going after pool toys. One part I know she also enjoyed, though, was the locker room. She manages, every week, to end up running around there naked. Today she went off to the bathroom with her bathing suit around her calves. She returned the same way.

Preschool graduation was beautiful. The Lollipops all sang a couple of songs, complete with hand motions. "I love you a bushel and a peck and a hug around the neck." Imagine the hand motions of a group of preschool boys! They strangled themselves with enthusiasm. The Munchkins had a song, too, and then the babies and toddlers were invited up, with parents. Steve took Owen and bounced him along to the bubblegum song that we've heard Cara sing a dozen times since she started at YBR.

The graduates got lined up in the hallway and walked in one by one, wearing mortarboards of yellow construction paper, to take seats in the front, and each got a special award from Miss Jane. Cara is the Best Painter. Then each one graduated, shaking Miss Grace's hand and getting a diploma. Finally, while "Lollipop" played, she tapped each one on the shoulder to release him or her back into the crowd.

We were sitting in the front row, Cara on Claire's lap. Owen was a good baby, and Miss Kathy kept talking to him in the middle of the ceremony. I guess he'd been looking at her. Finally there was a long slide show with pictures of all of the kids and all of the activities they've had this year. Cara was in lots of them, and there was one shot of just her face where the whole crowd said, "awwww!" There were also two shots just of Owen on his first day. YBR is a nice, nice place. I'm really glad to be sending my kids there.

At some point I remembered that I hadn't had a chance to pick up my prescription today. Cara said I should have. I hadn't had a chance, I told her. Yes I had, she said. When, I asked, had she seen me standing around today? When the car was "completely dead," she said, quoting me.

Back at home, we had a little more to eat and Cara got to play with Claire for a few minutes before Claire and Steve left. Then I had Cara help me put Owen to bed. I let her read him a story. She read two. She picked out his cloth books, which was very considerate of her. She brushed her teeth by herself while I put him down, and then, while I put new sheets on her bed because her mattress pad, she moved a big pillow and knocked her roses backwards all over everything. I gave her a towel to use on her stuffed animals while I got everything else. I read to her, but she really wasn't interested in going to sleep. Fortunately, she's a well-behaved child. I'm about done.

6/2/10 (Wednesday)

Owen and I went to the ENT today and waited for an hour and a half! In that time, we basically went through our entire repertoire of activities and moods. He was friendly, cranky, hungry, eating, happy, fussy, tired, and playful. I got to rock him, dance with him, feed him, play with him, and talk to him. Once we got back into the examining room, of course, he was very happy. He liked the nurse practitioner, even though she looked in his ears (he didn't like that part). He was sad to see her go. More to amuse myself than him, perhaps, while we waited for the doctor, I picked up a picture book and read it to him. It was Dumbo, the book version! I think it did distract him. It's funny; just yesterday we were talking to a new mom at work about how when you start reading to them they really need incredibly brief books. I'm used to Cara, for whom Dumbo would have been very easy and short. With Owen, even though he can't really have been that engaged, I found that I had to jump back into the instant abridging that I used to do when I started reading to Cara, years ago. I kept those pages turning, and he may have looked at them.

The ENT has to have been the dozenth person to try looking into Owen's ears. Everyone has said that there's wax in there. Today, we got it out. The doctor sent us to the "Procedure Room," where I had to put Owen down on a "papoose board." It was a board with big cloth flaps all around it; they velcroed over him in the tightest swaddle he's had, probably ever. I suggested to him that this is what it would be like when he was taken to an asylum and given a straightjacket. A nurse held his head and I stood where he could see me, much good that did, while the doctor used some sort of magnification system to guide her as she used a big, scary, pointy probe to get the wax out of his left ear. The poor little guy!

The doctor was able to finally see his ear drum, and, as everyone who has looked into his ears has suggested, there is actually some fluid built up in there. She wants to give him some time to work it out on his own, so we're going back in two months. If it's still there, he'll get ear tubes. Em, knowing how Owen feels about medical procedures, predicts that he'll need them. I'm not sure. He's a medical-procedure junkie, but he also seems to be the type of guy for whom things seem bad but turn out okay.

I told Em that Cara was the tallest kid at preschool graduation. Em told me that Cara had been the tallest kid at kindergarten orientation.

Cara wanted four books tonight. I made a deal with her about tomorrow: if she's in bed before 8:20, she can have four. After 8:20, only three. We pinkie-swore and shook on it, and I made her explain it back to me. If this works, I'm moving the time back to 8:15!

After I'd tucked her in, when Steve and I were downstairs, Cara called him. He went upstairs. She wanted to tell him not to turn the bathroom light off.

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