| Previous Week | Back Home | Next Week |

Journal Key:

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

9/9/10 (Thursday)

Conveniently, I have two days off from work. In the morning, I went to the doctor with a fever and laryngitis and got some antibiotics. In the afternoon, I picked up both kids and took them to the doctor. Cara's been having some indigestion; the verdict is that we should try avoiding dairy, greasy food, and spicy food (what a sacrifice that part is!) and see what happens in the next week. Owen has a cough. The doctor heard his wheezing a little bit in his lungs, so he had us try out using a nebulizer. I had to hold the plastic mask over his nose and mouth for about five minutes. He cried for a few seconds, but mostly he sat nicely. Cara and I recited poetry to him; my voice was kind of working, fortunately. The treatment reduced his wheezing, so we brought one home. We have to use it every four hours, unless he's asleep.

The next part was kind of pitiful. I put on a movie and lay on the couch while Owen jumped in his jumper. Cara wanted a snack, so I had her get herself some goldfish. She brought them to me to put some into the bowl. When Owen got antsy, I put him in his bouncer and moved to the floor in front of him. I asked Cara to pass me a pillow, and that helped. She put a blanket on me, too, and I lay there and slept when I wasn't reaching up to give him his bottle. We were like that when Steve got home, mercifully early.

Then I slept on the couch for a couple of hours while Steve got everybody else some dinner. Owen had a bath. Em came over to help make sure we had the nebulizer set up right (Casey's had one for years). Cara wanted us to do it in her room, so I sat there with Owen, who breathed open-mouthed while the medicine was coming in. He loves it. It's a medical treatment. One side effect is that he may get jittery. We would really, really appreciate it if he didn't.

Don't worry; Steve says he'll stay home tomorrow.

9/11/10 (Saturday)

Yesterday I did indeed stay home from work, and Cara went off to daycare. Grandmama picked her up from there and Cara had a nice sleepover, with a "gourmet tour of Atlantic Highlands." Meanwhile Ev and I hung around the house, with one outing to take Owen back to the doctor. The consensus was that, though he now had a temperature, his cough was better, and the doctor thinks his bug will take its course and that he will be over it in a few days. We continued the nebulizer, which Owen continued to sit mostly still for. For the weekend he is down to two treatments a day.

Today Cara was back in good time to prepare for her birthday party. It was Adelina's party! She turned four. It was a nice, but a little strange, to be back with the Yellow Brick Road kids, since after all Cara is older than them. She was excited to go and she did have a good time. It was actually at Adelina's house, which is rare for a kid party, and it was a perfect day to play in her back yard. The kids got fairy wings and play horses as favors, and a storyteller came to tell some stories. Cara was happy that she got to pick one of the story titles out of a box--she was that excited about doing it that she was raising her hand as soon as one story was done.

We still have one more YBR birthday party: Lucas' party at Chuck E. Cheese! We hear from Lucas' dad that Lucas really has a "thing" for Cara. Too bad it will be necessarily unrequited, since there will never be another Adrian.

Meanwhile, Owen was really pretty miserable today, though he had his moments. He continues with a high temperature and is generally uncomfortable. Evie set up Cara's old hand-me-down airplane doorway jumper in the downstairs playroom doorway and he jumped very happily in it for quite a long time. We also finally put the batteries in his jumperoo and he had a good time bouncing in that also, now that it lights up and makes songs when he jumps. It's possible that some of his crabbiness arises out of sheer boredom. I just know things will be so much better for him when he learns how to crawl! But for now I think what we are all earnestly hoping for is that he will get over his illness and get back to normal.

9/12/10 (Sunday)

He's normal, he's normal! Well, he's mostly normal. He's himself again, anyway. Owen still is very congested, and he does a little bit of sneezing and coughing, but he's not feverish and he's not screaming. It's very refreshing. It feels strange to be able to put him down and not have him explode. It feels strange that he's not crying even though we're holding him. Today he enjoyed scooting and managed to nearly ram his head into the bottom edge of the coffee table a couple of times; he seems to have started to curve less. He also really really likes jumping. He'll stay in his jumperoo for a long, long time. I moved it up, because he kept jumping so high the springs were crashing shut. Now he can't get his feet as firmly on the ground, but he's still doing it! He likes the toys, too. The lights are good, but he also seems attracted to a little wheel he can spin. He's sitting, he's standing, he's talking . . . . things are much better!

In her playroom yesterday, Cara set up an elaborate scenario. She put Owen's door toy across the doorway. To get through, she crawls through the door. Steve and I have to step over it. She was surprised when we had her move it today. At the far side of the room, with their backs to the door, she set up a line of chairs. Then she got together all of her human dolls and, for some reason, her little Halloween kitty. Each has been put into a chair. Most are then covered with blankets. Some have bibs.

When I came down, she was nowhere to be seen. Then I heard a clanking. She was over in the corner with her kitchen toy. She was getting "drinks" for the dolls. As many as possible have cups and plates. It turns out that it's a dinner theater of some sort. They've been sitting there for over twenty-four hours now. The only thing they've had to watch is Buster, who likes to sit in that corner. Sometimes she washes herself there. I guess it's entertaining.

Owen and I stayed home while Steve and Cara went to the mall. She finally got the haircut I'd been planning on getting her before kindergarten started. How did I end up not doing that? She got about two inches off; it looks a lot tidier. She's vaguely sad that it's not long anymore. We've shown her that it still is. She also got to ride on the train, which she chose over the carousel, using a ticket she bought with her own money.

At the Playmobil store Steve tried the old, "maybe for Christmas" line, but Cara answered that she wanted whatever it was now! She didn't get it. She did end up getting a small thing, though. It's a baby unicorn and a little fairy. When they got home, I had to get out all of Cara's dollhouse stuff so that she could play with it. It was nice. She set all of the kids and a lot of moms up in beds in the attic. I believe I heard her telling Steve there were no dads. I didn't remind him that moms are traditionally dead in fairy tales, so it was certainly fair. I asked whether her new doll was playing. No, she was sitting out in the dining room. She was the tooth fairy. I was passing through later when another doll was coming out to get her. It was her mother.

9/13/10 (Monday)

Owen enjoyed his day at YBR, but he didn't object when I came to pick him up early to see the doctor. I set him in a chair in the waiting room and when I looked up all of the women behind the counter were waving at him through the windows. After that, he was not satisfied with sitting; he wanted to stand up. He can balance himself by holding our fingers, and he can even organize himself well enough to get one of those fingers into his mouth! Things were very slimy when they called us back. We saw a different doctor today, but we both liked her. He's not wheezing, so he's done with the nebulizer. His breathing is still "coarse," though, so she suggests that we use saline nose drops. We have definitely found a medical treatment that he doesn't like!

Cara really really loves kindergarten, and she's excited about Back to School Night, which is tomorrow. We're excited, too. She's learning not just the days of the week but also . . . the days of the month? Probably not. It turns out to be the months of the year. I remember learning a song, but she's learning them kinetically. She was sort of able to recite them for me by accompanying herself with meaningless hand gestures. First she accompanied herself with a brief ballet demonstration, which I was not surprised to learn was not from kindergarten. Another exciting thing that happened was that they had visitors from "the three grade" who helped them with a project. Cara's was named Wendy.

In Cara's backpack today we got the materials for a fundraiser. (I know, I know . . .)

Cara: What's this?

Me: They want us to . . . sell things.

Cara: At school?!

Me: No, here.

Cara: I don't want to sell things!

Me: Me, neither.

Cara: What's this?

Me: This is the catalogue, the things they want us to sell.

Cara: We don't have these.

I explained the process and the idea that the things they wanted us to sell would be provided, that they didn't want us to sell, for instance, her dolls.

Cara: What are these!?

Me: Those are the prizes you can get for selling things.

Cara: I want to sell things!

One of the two catalogues is kind of nice, so I'll be bringing it around. Don't feel obligated to buy anything; if we sell too much, Cara might earn her own flat-screen television, and then she'd keep it in her room and her brain would atrophy. So only buy if you feel like it. It does support the PTO, and I joined the PTO. The PTO does a lot.

Today at DT they made a project that's a cat, and they practiced the letters and wrote the word cat. In kindergarten, apparently, they discussed the letter T. When I was reading to Cara, she asked me whether, when we got to the end of this page, we could look for the letter T. When I finished the page, we had to sit up and I had to hold the book on my lap while Cara showed me several Ts and we talked about them. She found Ts that were "lowercase, and . . . that other one." I asked her, when we were done, whether a teacher had suggested that we do something like that. No, she just wanted to.

9/14/10 (Tuesday)

It was Back-to-School Night! We were all (except Owen) excited. I asked Cara what I'd see in her classroom. Today, she said, they'd gotten to see a baby owl. And a mommy owl. They're both named Echo. Real owls? No. If they were good, they got to give them a little pet!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Outside the classroom, the kids' self-portraits were hung. They'd been given a featureless person (from the chest up) and gotten to fill it in as themselves. I was surprised at not being able to recognize Cara's. For the first time, she gave herself brown hair. She also pierced her ears and was wearing dangly apple earrings. We got to hear about what a day is like in the classroom. The kids bring their folders to the tables and sit in the tiny, tiny chairs. When they're not using the folders, they put them into the ingenious canvas pockets that hang on the chairs' backs! They're working on the letters of the alphabet, but they're doing it out of order, in a system organized by the strokes that make up the letters. Cara's in a room with two teachers; having taught in-class support, I like the idea of her getting the benefit of having all of that expertise in one place.

Steve and Em and I were all very happy with what we saw and heard. We talked a little with both teachers before we left. PJ is insisting on being "Peter" in school, and Cara is Cara. The special ed teacher was surprised to hear that they're close friends, which gives us hope. We'd gotten the impression that they had spent all day every day together.

Homework starts next week! We have a lot to look forward to.

Juliana stayed with Cara and Owen, as planned, and all three were happy. When we got home, the kids were both in their pajamas. Cara had done a wonderful job being a helper. We're proud of her.

Before we were responsible and got everyone to bed, I wanted to try something. With a tiny bit of help, Cara read "The cat sat on a mat." Then she handled "The cat sat on a bat" pretty easily. "The cat sat in a tree" was more of a challenge. She's really getting there, though.

Oh, and we did get to see both owls. They're the "class pets." And they are both named Echo.

9/15/10 (Wednesday)

I left Owen on the floor in the living room this morning, and Cara got things set up for him. She cleared the floor and stood up some pillows in front of the couch, to keep him from ramming his head into the wood. She's a very good sister. In the afternoon I left him sitting up downstairs with her and went to get some laundry. "Hurry, hurry!" I heard her muttering to herself as she came upstairs after me. I asked her to please keep an eye on him, and it turned out that she'd been rushing up to get the boppy to put behind him so that he could sit up better.

Owen got a gold star next to his name (figuratively) for being the best-behaved baby at YBR. I have to assume that that means that the others were all awful. I asked Sandi whether she had noticed how his scooting habits have developed; she says he needs a bigger room. I got a (figurative) gold star next to my name for not freaking out because when I picked him up Owen was rashy around his mouth. It's got to have something to do with the dribbling he's been doing. Also, he wore long sleeves and spent the day chewing on them.

Cara got to go to the school store today. She and PJ each had $5 given to them by their very indulgent mothers. Cara came home with a brown paper bag containing a pen with hearts on it that hangs on a string, an orange smencil, a pink pencil sharpener, and four little plastic bracelets, along with a dollar and a quarter. PJ came home with a quarter. No one is really sure what happened, but he and Cara both say he bought things. He's unconcerned.

I got to do a really cool Scooby-Doo floor puzzle at playdate tonight. The girls left me alone with it.

While Owen had a bath, I read with Cara some more. She read, "The cat sat on a mat. I sat on the cat. I saw a bat. I saw a fat cat. The cat was flat. The flat hat was fat." There's only so much room for innovation, and there are only so many sentences you can make with those words that make sense! That's the part that's challenging for me. The best part was when we'd read "The cat was flat," and I was ready to move on but she wanted another sentence because she was excited that she could read.

| Previous Week | Back Home | Next Week |