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Journal Key:

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

3/28/13 (Thursday)

This morning Evelyn was following after Owen with a tissue, and he ran into the kitchen, crying "No, I like my nose like this!"

Well, as parents, sometimes we win and sometimes we lose. Sometimes, Owen sits at the table and eats a good dinner. Sometimes, he leaves. Then, some of the time, we bring his plate out and get him to eat while he plays. I brought his plate out this evening. I fed him a few bites, and then I left. Steve came by. "Daddy," Owen asked, "are you going to feed me?"

Well, at least he ends up eating.

3/29/13 (Friday)

Everyone was home today, but Steve was working from home. In the morning, we got the kids to play together downstairs by suggesting that they build a house under the dining room table. This was so successful that they were mostly happy while I showered and Steve worked, and then they kept playing for a while longer after that.

The upshot of that was that the three of us could not get through all of the errands that I had planned for us to do, so we didn't have time to go to Barnes and Noble. Owen was really counting on Barnes and Noble. As a consolation prize, I took him to the book section in the A&P and, miraculously, I was able to get him a superhero book just like the ones we read at Barnes and Noble. By the end of the day, he'd gotten it read to him at least ten times.

That evening, we had the seder. Owen liked looking at his kiddie Passover books, and he was mollified by having an entire matzoh to eat, but soon he'd gone off to play by himself. He was not happy about being by himself, though. He kept trying to get us to come and play with him. Sometimes he'd just call from the other room, but he'd also come in to pull on me or Daddy or Grandmama.

When things got really desperate, he claimed, falsely, to have a poopie diaper and to need to be taken upstairs and changed. I took pity on him and read him a book, too.

3/30/13 (Saturday)

I got a shed for my birthday, and we spent the morning putting things into it. Of course, the kids could not let anything fun be put into the shed without taking it out to play with it. That is why, in their winter coats, they drew on the sidewalk with chalk, threw balls around, played chase with the jump rope, and rode their bikes. They tried blowing bubbles, but that didn't go well. Now, though, the outside toys are all outside, and Cara can get her bike out herself and ride around the block.

For the afternoon, we drove to Grandmom and Grandpop's house! Owen and Cara brought their game, the I Spy one, with them, and we all played it. (They had also gotten it out at the seder; I think Owen's really starting to get tired of it but can't quite accept that yet.)

Owen managed, though he was sitting in a chair with arms that really helped to keep him at the table, to not eat much beyond appelsauce for lunch. When we decided to go play outside, he suggested a picnic. For some reason, he was hungry!

3/31/13 (Sunday) - Happy Easter!

This morning Owen got me up early so that we could go downstairs and play guys. I was so deficient at this task, it being a little after 5:30 in the morning, that he soon became bored and led me back upstairs to watch TV, so that I was able to nap a little.

Once we were all up and human, we tumbled outside for our annual Nancy Circle Easter Egg Hunt! Our new shed was a good place to hide eggs, as were many other spots. After one run with kids finding adult-hid eggs, we had another run with adults finding kid-hid eggs. This was much harder because the kids did not seem to remember as well where all the eggs were hidden, and some were under leaves and inside of prickly bushes. Owen, as a finder of eggs, still needs adult supervision. He in fact needs someone to follow him around, point out the eggs, and sometimes put them into his basket.

After that, we managed to get ourselves packed up and over to Aunt Claire's house! Grandmama immediately got the kids some nice Easter baskets, with cool sunglasses and swimsuits in them, and of course chocolate bunnies, but also Tootsie Rolls. Both kids loved the Tootsie Rolls; I have volunteered to eat Cara's chocolate bunny. Owen loved his chocolate bunny and was quite invested in eating it. But when the time came, having carefully and completely divested it of its foil covering, he became horrified when his fingers got chocolatey, and gave up after having eaten only the ears.

Grandmama and Mommy bravely took the kids out back a few times to go egg hunting, which Owen gladly enjoyed as an alternative to sitting still and eating a meal. It was an exciting Easter because a skunk had been sighted in the neighborhood, which caused several police officers to stand around near the bushes across the street for quite some time, keeping an eye on said skunk. It was never a threat to us and eventually the policemen were gone, presumably with the skunk.

In addition to outside activities, the children enjoyed going upstairs to Claire's room and apparently pummeling people with pillows. After Grandpapa pre-emptively commandeered the downstairs television remote and put on basketball (to the horror of the majority of the rest of the party), the women and children retreated entirely upstairs with Claire's device and watched Phineas and Ferb on its smaller screen until it was time to go home.

We have high hopes that Owen is progressing towards being ready for the potty. Tonight when I put him on it, he seemed to be making attempts to go. Regrettably, they were vain attempts, and he immediately peed when he got into the tub. But he was very aware that he had peed, and he wanted to get out right away and try on the potty again, which I thought was very impressive.

4/1/13 (Monday)

On this last day of my spring break, everyone else had to go to school. Owen continued his weeklong boycott of sleeping past six; he woke up as I was getting out of the shower and wanted to go see Daddy. Daddy was sleeping. I figured Owen could come in and hang out on the bed while I got dressed, but he came in, was dismayed that Daddy was sleeping, and went back to his room to sit on the step stool and be somewhat unhappy. Eventually he came downstairs with me.

I took both kids to school. Owen and I dropped off Cara; it's the first time he's been there in the morning in at least a month, and the ladies were glad to see him. He hid. At YBR, oddly, he clung to me and cried when I left. Poor little guy.

He was fine after I left, of course.

I am so happy that we got that shed. When we got home, Cara went into the house and dropped off her stuff; she was back out with the shed key in a moment, and we rode bikes. Off she went around the block, while Owen and I meandered along in hot pursuit. He mostly walked his bike along, though for a bit he tried out pedaling as I pushed gently. He was also holding "his" rope, which is really Cara's Disney Princess jump rope. The handles are now our laser guns (I often have to hold one), and we are going to shoot Cara in the neck and the tonsils.

Cara soon was out of sight, and I talked Owen into turning around to meet her coming the other way. He and I only actually got all the way around the block once, but Cara went around several times and we went back and forth several times. Owen was always concerned when we couldn't see Cara. He missed her. Not in a shooting sense.

4/2/13 (Tuesday)

Owen has, among his menagerie of stuffed animals who live on his bed, the ugly yellow donkey that Steve got in college. He picked up that donkey last night and referred to it as his hee-haw. The hee-haw wanted to go to the party. It started talking to me, so I talked back to it.

Donkey: I want to go to the party!

Me: Um, ok. What are you?

Donkey: I'm a hee-haw.

Me: Oh.

Donkey: What am I?

Me: Well, some people would call you a donkey.

Donkey: Oh.

4/3/13 (Wednesday)

Owen slept until almost seven this morning; I went in when I heard him crying. As usual, his immediate concern was the locations of the little guys he'd slept with. I'm always impressed when he knows exactly who is missing. I have to stick my hand into his bed and fish around until I find the missing heroes. Today, when I was looking, Owen asked me whether I could put my glasses on. Well, really, no, not right now. He was disappointed. He was pretty sure, though, that Daddy would. He got out of bed and went off to find Steve to ask him to put glasses on.

It's possible that Owen understands about Wednesdays, somehow: he was asking me whether we were going to PJ and Casey's house tonight when we were getting his stuff at YBR. This week they came here, which is also exciting.

Steve got home right after we got in, and Cara came bursting out of the house to see him. To my surprise, Owen burst out after her. I'm pretty sure he opened the door himself.

At dinner, Steve had to tell Owen not to put his socks on the table. That means, possibly, that Owen took his socks off all by himself for the first time!

The four kids all played together up in Cara's room, which was great. Owen loved being able to play with the big kids. He came into the kitchen to tell us, "Those kids are lost. I have to go find them!" Off he ran, to save the day.

By the time the evening was wrapping up, though, Owen was on the couch with the Nook, watching the Superhero Squad. I told him it was time to come and say good-bye. He didn't want to. I explained about being polite or being rude. Nope. Finally, I took the Nook. He threw a fit on the couch, screaming, "I'm rude! I'm rude!" Apparently he hoped that I would give the Nook back so that he could continue to be rude. He got it back after he came downstairs, threw a very dramatic fit for a while, and said "bye" to Em through the door, seizing the last possible chance to do so.

I read Santa Duck to Owen again tonight. It's a library book in which Nicholas Duck dons a Santa hat and coat someone has sent him and then all of the other animals believe that he is Santa Duck and tell him what they want. When he finally meets Santa, Santa asks Nicholas what they all want. Nicholas really is Santa Duck. Last night, I asked Owen who had sent Nicholas the hat and coat. Last night, it was a chick. Or a chicken. Tonight, I asked again. It was a chipmunk, but we can't see the chipmunk because it's in a hole. Owen sounds very confident about all of his answers.

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