New Words

This afternoon, Nick showed me a couple of new words! Of course, when Daddy came home and I wanted to show him, Nick just smiled a big-ol' silent smile instead of blabbing the word like he had been doing.

The words are "ball" and "quack-quack"! Very exciting! I know that watching a Baby Einstein video last week helped him get "ball" down because they had a segment on balls that he watched carefully. So today I rolled balls back and forth with him saying the word and he said it almost every time except when Daddy came home! His version is "bah" of course.

The quack won't be recognizable for a while. It's more my tone and register of voice that he mimics when we see a picture of a duck. It's kind of a "gwah-gwah" but most of the resemblance is just in the imitation of my voice. Need I say it's darling?

Molly's Visit Begins

Molly's here! She came in last night and will be driving to Charleston tomorrow but then she'll be back with us on Tuesday, for another five days. Today she played cars with the boys and learned all about dragons with Xander. After lunch we went to Tree Hill Nature Center which was calming and pretty as usual, but Xander really got into it! Every showcase was "amazing!" and "great!" Of course the goats, tortoise, rooster, hens, possum, and owl were big hits. Also the tadpoles in the pond. Nick was very mellow in his stroller but responded to the hens. He got to hear the real-live, unmusical sound of goats bleating.

Downtown Field Trip

Today pest control came and we had to leave the house for four and a half hours. It turned out to be a great day, although tiring. First Erik and I had to get everything up off the floor that wasn't furniture and vacuum the carpeted rooms. What with packing lunches for all of us on top of the rearranging, this took all morning!

I had to (sadly) wake Nick up after only a half-hour morning nap when the guy came. He was really happy to be up and on the go at first, but tired quickly. We got snacks from the grocery store, dropped off things at Goodwill, and went to the big downtown library for Preschool Storytime. Parents and younger siblings are allowed in this one, so we all went in and Nick loved the place. There were some great toys around the room for someone his age. Xander's friends JT and Izelle were both there. After stories and an activity where everyone put up pictures of different flowers on a display board, they had free play time. Then clean-up, a song, and bye-bye time. Nick had a great time flirting with the adults in the room but drove away some preschoolers when he wanted to "play" cars with them. The bright spot was he got the big colorful carpet and a bin of cars and trucks all to himself. Elvia very nicely offered to bring both Xander and Izelle to the art time after story time while Nick and I refilled our parking meter. Then we had picnic lunch in the courtyard with JT and his mom, Cheri, and two other around-4-year-olds and their moms. It was nice, but a good thing we had all eaten a bit in the car earlier, because I mainly helped Nick move around in the courtyard and didn't eat a thing. Xander and the boys ran around for a while after eating. They were pretty hyper and a little bit loud, but it was genuine little-boy outdoor activity and good for them.

Then we browsed the children's library, Xander and the boys played a game of Memory, Nick fussed a bit and looked around with me, and we went for a walk to kill more time before heading home. We browsed two used book stores and Xander made his first purchase ever with his own money: a short chapter book on dragons for $1.00. Nick was kind of fussy throughout and had had his fill of food and drinks, so we went back to the car and drove home. We got home only five minutes before the allotted four hours post-pest-spray, and everyone was ready for a nap, so I went ahead in with them. Windows were cracked open, Nick went straight to sleep, I fell asleep on the couch, and from the dead silence in Xander's room I assume he's been sleeping, too. (He started rest time with me reading him the first dragon chapter and him going through the book on his own afterward.)

It was a last-minute plan to go to the library (because it was a last-minute scheduling of pest control) but it was so neatly perfect. Xander got to do art time with Izelle and her mom, who's an artist, and later got to run around and yell with JT and the other boys, which is what they're good at doing together.

Molly comes in tonight. Another exciting event. Unfortunately, I won't have a main dish ready for dinner. Forgot to thaw the meat. So hopefully Erik will bring home a rotisserie chicken to go with boiled dill potatoes, green beans, and caramel biscuits.

At the library, we borrowed a video and an art-filled picture book for Nick ("Signing Time: Happy Birthday to You!" and Baby Loves from the Metropolitan Museum of Art), board books for both kids because I know Xander will enjoy them, too (A Little Kitty and Who Are They?), an I Can Read book (Spider-Man Versus The Vulture) for guess who, and a Boxcar Children chapter book The Pizza Mystery in case Xander likes it. I have such fond memories of my second-grade teacher reading the Boxcar Children books to us.

Mother's Day 2010

Wonderful Mother's Day yesterday. Couldn't have been better. Erik got up with the kids and I slept in until - gasp - 11:00! Then Erik prepared a fresh waffle, eggs, bacon, and coffee for me. We played with the kids outside for a while and then it was naptime. Got to lounge and read and take a bath. After naptime, we decided to go to the zoo for the evening! It was a gorgeous, cool (for Florida) day, animals were stirring, and the crowds were leaving as we entered. The kids got to eat dinner at the zoo and Erik picked up take-out for us while I got the kids ready for bed. More lounging and reading! Not much cleaning up! It was wonderful.

I forgot to mention Erik had taken the boys to the store in the morning and brought me a beautiful flower bouquet and a singing card from Toy Story 2.

He Wants To Do Something Wrong

This evening I went into the bonus room to use a permanent marker that was in the desk. Xander had all his figures (and a few animals) out on the floor. He came up to me and said very quietly, "I want you to go away."

I asked, "Why? What do you want to do?"

He whispered, "I want you to go away."

I whispered, "Do you want to do something wrong?"

He whispered, solemnly, "Yes. I want to get out the other animals." (I told him earlier that he could play with all his knight/creature figures but not the animals, too. He had to choose between them.)

I said, "No, you may not do that. You know why? You and I are going to have to clean up your toys in 25 minutes before bed, and if you get more than one set of toys out that's too big a job. But you can play with all your figures here, and even those few animals I let you have earlier."

He said, "Okay. Look! Is it Narnia?"

I said, "Yes, it looks like Narnia to me!"

Now he is happily playing.

An Adventure In Keeping Cool

We had what you might call an adventure today. An almost-adventure. What happened was that I decided we could drop off our Teacher Appreciation gift at preschool today. I was rushing to get both kids ready, Xander was eating slowly, Nick kept grabbing for my keys, I was helping Xander get his shoes on, and the last straw was probably my sweater on a hot day keeping me uncomfortable as I tried to get us out the door before Nick started a real fuss. I tossed my keys to the side where Nick couldn't reach them, got Xander's shoes on, grabbed the various bags we needed, and got us all out the door and into the car. The kids were buckled up. I wanted to start the car. No keys. I had finally locked us out of the house on a hot day with no way back in, no faulty window. It was only a matter of time because when I lock up the house, I lock up the house. I leave no lock unturned. Which is why I usually have only one place I keep my keys. It is very important that someone like me keep them nearby! Long story short, I called Erik's phone a bunch of times in a row causing his coworker to go find him and hand him his phone which had been charging at his desk. He very, very pleasantly drove back home to let us in the house. We played in the back yard while we waited which turned out fine. In those first few minutes, I really had to work to keep from losing my cool, and I'm sure my frustration showed in the way I talked to Xander a couple times. It was a lesson to me on rushing and impatience. After Erik saved us, I grabbed the keys and we went.

We dropped off a bowl of treats with the director once we got to school because we appreciate everybody there. Xander had insisted on carrying the popcorn box with Ms. Nokosha's stuff in it. He got very shy when he saw everyone lying down in dim lighting. We had arrived at nap time. That and the fact that he was only dropping by school rather than having been there all morning combined to make him act strange. Ms. Nokosha kept asking him what was the matter and put him on her lap as he gave her our little gift. She tried to get him to talk but he was being so quiet. He almost looked scared! I asked him to tell her what movies he loved, since we were giving her treats on a movie theme. That opened him up to say that he loved Spiderman. She said she loved Shrek and Happy Feet and asked if he knew those movies. He nodded. Meanwhile poor Nick had been in my arms sweating. Those infant car seats are very safe but they are also sweatboxes in the car in summer. I had to read the car manual when we got back in to figure out the best way to get the air conditioning back to the back seat! We left after a few minutes and when I asked Xander how it was dropping off the gift to Ms. Nokosha, he said, "I love Spiderman." So anyway. He did say that he liked giving it to her and yes, he thought she would like it. By the time we reached home, he was his old self again and said this week we could look for more things and give her another gift!

Then he told me he was tired and wanted to sleep for rest time. !!!!!!!!!!!!

Today's Funny Activity

Xander thought of this one on his own. He got himself completely under our square laundry basket and Nick went to work pushing it around. Lots of giggling from the boys.

This is going to be great when they get old enough to entertain themselves!