if there were any question about ava's very specific sense of style, see above. top bin has pants, bottom bin has tops. the grey pants are an anomaly, and took a little convincing...

pink, black, red, white. thats IT!

there is only one word that carter does not yet say: little. he still signs that. everything else? constant monologue. whatever he hears, he says.

ava: "carter! see the otter signs?!" (referencing the wild center signs that have an otter on them).

carter: "mommy! daddy! otter signs!"

my favorite was when we were waiting for our (gulp, ugh, i hate this...) cheeseburgers at mcdonalds in the drive through line--referring to the car in front of us:

"mommy, this car, go?"

or, referring to ava's skate coach:

"lorna teach me?"

in one short month, we have gone from nothing to sentences. superb.

ok. almost through the crunch. last night we had a christmas party to go to, and i actually think that might be the very last holiday event. besides new years, which is a non-event for the kids, really.

christmas was very successful, basically. on the saturday before the big event we went to the mountain one last time. the holiday week was due to start on monday, and our passes would be no good after that. then we made an attempt at going out to dinner at howard johnsons. i have managed the 2 kids at the pizza place pretty successfully, and thought this would be easy, though perhaps a bit greasy. no. not easy.do not, ever, take a small child or children to a restaurant if they are not completely starving. and especially not one with a 'food bar.' a very hungry child in a pizza place is easy: hungry? pizza. he or she knows what is coming. no guesses, no choices, nothing but solution to the problem of hungry tummy. in a place with a food bar, the hunger is quickly replaced with curiosity. so, we exited as quickly as possible, but not without establishing that carter does not like green jello, red jello, canned peaches, corn relish, cottage cheese, chicken wings, or broccoli.

when we returned home, guess what both kids wanted? food.

then, in a moment of supreme brilliance, i wrapped all of the kid's presents after they had fallen asleep.

later that evening, around 1 am, i woke up very suddenly and feeling not so great. i attributed it to it being the middle of the night and tried to go back to sleep. 1.5 hours later, i finally drifted off. carter woke me up a half-hour later, for a few minutes. then at 5 am, my eyes flew open. something was very very wrong. i lay quietly for a few minutes, localizing the discomfort, then came to a realization and bolted to the bathroom. now, there was NOTHING in my stomach. this did not make my brain relinquish its efforts to empty it. as far as it was concerned, there was something very very toxic in my belly, and it had to be out IMMEDIATELY. i spent the next 2 hours slumped on the bathroom floor, praying for it to end. i finally fell back to sleep, only to wake up again to the same routine. when the rest of the family woke up, i was literally unable to do anything. i collapsed in the big-person bed, and they fended for themselves. carter snuck in for a nap around 11, and he and i slept until 1. when we woke up, peter and ava had disappeared to go skate at the oval, and carter and i played quietly for the rest of the day. when peter and ava came home, they brought a movie. which one? RATATOUILLE. ugh. i could barely cope, since any mention of food made me heave. but i had been steadily improving, and after falling asllep at 8 pm, i woke up on christmas eve without nausea. intense pain in my abdomen? yes. nausea? no. peter and ava left again, and carter and i played quietly one more time. this automatically set us up for a mellow christmas eve. chrismas eve for me has always been a Big Deal, and so it is very hard to let go of that, but it actually was the best thing to have happened--the kids were relaxed, there were no huge messes, and the pain in my belly had finally subsided.

christmas morning found me healthy. i could not have been more pleased. whatever it was, it was gone. no one else got it, so i doubt it was a virus. and had it been food poisoning, we all should have gotten it, since i did not eat anything that anyone else hadn't eaten. it was weird.

anyway, christmas morning went by very quickly. ava recovered from an initial disappointment, in which she thought santa had brought her something that she had (secretly) asked him for and then when she realized that was not the case, she had a tough time seeing the value in her other presents. but she finally was ok, and started to enjoy herself. and she really enjoyed giving carter a gift, which was terrific. most of the toys have been well-received, after several days of getting to know them. the playmobil things were not intriguing in the box, but once i started assembling them she became very interested. carter, for his part, thought everything was great. and he got the playmobil airplane, which has been so sccessful, he has asked to sleep with it. as an aside, playmobil is utterly terrific. very small small small pieces, and thousands of them (requiring a LOT of parental imvolvement), but ultimately easy to put together and a lot of fun to play with. even for parents.

i made french toast, but the kids were not interested. carter finally fell asleep for his nap at 11, and we made it over to nana's and da's by 2ish. from 2:00 to 2:05 we opened presents, then the kids played for a bit, and then the excitement and frankly, pressure, of the day started to bubble up in ava--she started to get really bouncy, and a little bit defiant, and i thought "Alarm! alarm! alarm! Must Get Child Outside in Snow!" so, despite not having snow gear, we went on a walk. best idea yet. when we returned, dinner was on the table. and roast beef is very child-friendly.

When we got home, it took the kids an hour to fall asleep, and by the time i emerged from their bedroom, Peter was out cold, so I took it upon myself to organize. This involved removing the tree. I felt a little weird, but the tree was dead dead dead. I think it was because we did not saw off a bit at the bottom before putting it in water. It never drank anything. So, after de-trimming it, I hauled it out onto the porch, and then set about cleaning up and getting toys and cds and books and movies opened and getting rid of all the packaging (aaaaaaaahhhhhhh). This turned out to be a good idea, because the toys were ready for the kids first thing the next morning, and we had a lot more room once the tree was gone. Ava noted it immediately, but i had a plan: we were going to set it up outside. and decorate it with food for the animals. Which we did, and will continue to do through the winter. I am not sure how many animals benefitted from this first round other than Rose and one very pleased red squirrel, but I am pretty sure the woodland creatures will spread the word. We also cleared a skating rink on the ice, but abandoned it when I went through close to the shore. The ice is thick enough, but the shoreline is rotten (obviously), and what good is ice if you cannot get to it?

The next day was Michaela's birthday and she came over for dinner and a movie (Dumbo). That was very fun for the kids, especially since it involved ice-cream cake.

Then yesterday Ava had skating in the morning and we went to Corey's to make day-after-birthday-cupcakes with Michaela and then off we went to the Christmas party. When we arrived, Ava was completely taken off-guard by the number of people there, but after a bit she recovered and we spent 2 hours playing and eating and learning about manners and other people's houses. She did well, and all of the guests tolerated Carter's compulsion to push a truck around their ankles. We left at 8:20, home by 9 pm. Late bedtime. Both kids were tired and cranky today, but they fell asleep by 7:30, so we are inching out way back to calm and routine.

What a week. It is getting easier, in a way, but also a lot harder.

ava, looking closely at the green peppercorns in the dry salami: "mom! are these salami seeds?! can we plant them?!"

carter is still trying to figure out who jesus is. there has been a lot of talk about this baby, and everyone seems to think he is pretty terrific, and really, there are even displays on lawns of this baby with some donkeys and a mother named mary...

since he is such a great baby, and carter is also technically the baby (which he has confirmed with me several times: "baby?" "yes, you are my baby, carter"), he naturally has upped the ante a bit:

carter, pointing to himself: "jeeejuusss"

mom: "jesus?"

carter, still pointing to himself: "yeSSS. BABY. jeeeeejussss."

apparently, in 2.5 short years, carter has figured out how to find god within himself, something that humanity has spent thousands of years reflecting upon....

apparently it's really easy. annoint yourself, smile, and give your mom a hug.

for the last hour, i have been trying to figure out if carter broke my nose this evening.

i think not, as the pain is finally subsiding, but it was touch and go there for a while. it was a total accident, we were snuggled up and he was on the left side and wanted to get on my right side so he shot up without warning and just jammed his head into my nose-- and since i was lying down, he caught it right on the bottom and basically shoved it up into my sinuses. the crack that reverberated through my brain was nauseating. i instantly developed a headache and sinus pressure. that has not gone away, though the searing pain in my nose has.

it will be interesting to see what i feel like/look like in the morning....

in other news, we went sledding today. very fun, ava built herself a jump at the end of the run, caught air and landed on her back in a pile of snow. perhaps the funniest thing i have seen in a while.

carter talks and talks and talks. now he is enjoying the fact that he can convey his desires: "mommy! turn UP!" (music). and his favorite word is "shuff" = "flush" -- though he has successfully learned to say "darn!" very clearly.

i think what i am enjoying the most about ava is that she does some really silly things that are funny in a way that can get me moved to hysterics. and she has developed that kind of uncontrollable laughter/giggling that is mature enough (now that is a weird way to assess giggling) to share with an adult. there have been multiple instances in the last few weeks where both of us are laughing uncontrollably over the same thing. that is fun. she may not be a snuggly baby anymore, but she is a fun little person.

this afternoon, as i was waiting for them at the top of the hill, i was thinking about this, watching her climb up to me, and thinking how amazing it was that this person was here, joining me in life, and she was so unique and wonderful. i felt really lucky. it is a weird thing to describe.

and while carter doesn't get or giggles, he is just so NICE. as the ladies at the ski area nursery say, "he's a good guy..." -- we have this thing where i nuzzle him, tell him i have a secret, and then whisper "i love you" in his ear. EVERY TIME i do that, he pulls his head back, looks at me, puts his hands on my cheeks and gives me a big kiss. then he hugs me tight.

i could do that 50,000,000 times a day.

oh, and also, we were reading dr seuss's alphabet book, and i got to "B" -- "big B, little b, what begins with b?" and i was just about to turn the page and say "barber, baby, bubbles and a bumble bee" when carter pointed to himself. i opened my mouth to remind him that carter started with c, when he blurted out "boy." and then "bus."

yes. you are right carter. carter may begin with c, but you definitely know what begins with b.

so carter, as i have said, is talking up a storm--but still only single words, rarely linking them--he has some phrases (thank you mommy, mommy please, mommy on, daddy home, ava no!, and his favorite, seeeet dowwwwwwwn!), but he still likes to sort of narrate word by word what is going on in his life: running! running! walking. hiding! dark! show! nutcracker! mice...trash? milk. bratwurst!...

but today, someone, who shall remain nameless in her little camp over in corey's, naively introduced him to the phrase "pooped out.." as in: "gee, i wish i could, but i am completely pooped out."

ah. nothing could be more fun to say than "pooped ooooowwwwwtttt!" and even more fun are the horrifying variations: "poop! out!" "poooooooop in!" and so on. it does not help that ava finds this outrageously funny.

i cannot wait to take him to the grocery store.

the most absurd thing happened tonight with the kids. they have been watching the barishnikov/kirkland video of the nutcracker on youtube, and both have been completely obsessed (to the point where we have to listen to it in the car all the time as well..) -- anyway, carter has upped the ante a bit where he pretends he is the nutcracker and he narrates the entire mouse-king battle (dark...clara...tree...big...mice! mice! mice!...cracker...). this evening, as it got dark outside, carter announced that clara was outside and needed to come in. so, imaginary clara came in. and sat down at the table. and then carter started to show her around the house. and then ava insisted that she was really with her at the table. and carter insisted that he had her, and then ava jumped up and took her--and then the battle over imaginary clara began. and it was a crazy all out tearful screaming battle and i was pretty much pulling my hair out and found myself saying "ava! please give clara back to carter" and then she came up with an alternative clara, and carter did not want that one, he wanted the one that ava had, and finally i had to kneel down and have ava hand me "a" clara without any commentary re how many claras there were and then i had to hand-deliver this clara to carter. it was insane. could it get any more difficult to mediate sharing than having to distribute an imaginary person??????

and then, carter stubbed his toe, and ava was all sympathy and sincerity. so totally random.

we are all pretty busy. seems like every morning we just get up and go. it is winter, so we are packing bags upon bags--ski bags for ava, and carter, skating bag for ava, diaper bag for carter, school bag for ava, snack bag, extra bag, mom-bag, and yet at the end of the day, they are all discombobulated and i have to spend a half hour re-packing everything for the morning.

we are in the throes of getting ready for christmas too--since all of our christmas stuff is packed in a box in the very bag of the storage space (seemed like a good idea in august, and i did not count on forgetting about it until the temperature was in the single digits), we are improvising this year. we got our little tree--very easy: "hi, can i help you?" "yes. please give methe smallest tree you have..." "how's this?" "perfect, thanks" "do you need help getting that in/on your car?" "nope (as tree fits horizontally in the back of the car), thanks!"

the great part of the tree-hunting was that the tree farm has horses, pigs, piglets (3 little pigs...), and some breed of steer/cow. aside from their gaseous nature, the piglets were really cute. the pigs were huge, and were carter's favorite, and ava loved the horses. we have been back several times.

as for the christmas prep at home--i got on the ball and put christmas music on the ipod, so i don't have to worry about the cds, i had santa deliver some christmas books early (such a tricky guy...), and we are making our own tree decorations--one a day. or 3, since there are 3 of us, but each day we decide on a new tree-craft. and i have been hanging up ava's art projects from school. it is actually pretty festive. fortunately they are little enough that the missing decorations are not that big a deal. and the projects are helping the kids get all super-excited.

and then i tried to make almond-brittle-praline-ish candy. it was a recipe in martha stewart's magazine. it only had sugar, water, almonds and salt. it seemed easy. i should have known better.

first, boiling sugar (ie carmelizing) is outrageously hot (340 degrees farenheit, to be precise) and it takes a while to cool. blowing on it to take a little tast does nothing to protect one's epidermal layer.

and when the recipe says "don't stir..." they mean "don't stir you idiot, because otherwise you will get a suddenly crystalizing lump of scalding hot sugar clinging to your spoon and it will end up being a crazy mess..." and remember...use a spatula to spread it on the cookie sheet, do not rely upon your fingers if you value them.

oh, and also...waxed paper and parchment paper are not interchangeable. waxed paper has wax. wax melts. and then you have waxed pralines or brittle or whatever this is. not tasty.

ultimately, after a second try, i managed to right all of my first-effort wrongs, and turns out it is pretty good. but what a chemistry lesson. candy making is NOT a child-friendly thing.

we went to "Stars on Ice" last night. there was one show, 8 pm. 1 full hour after bedtime. but just 1 show, and we knew ava would love it and be motivated, to say the least. she gets a lot out of watching the older girls, so why not let her see a gold medalist?

so, i told her she could go if she took a nap. unbelievably, she did. and she made it through the whole show, and all the way home, finally falling asleep at 11:30. holy moly. carter finally collapsed at the show around 9:30, which i figured he would do.

and it was worth it--ava barely moved a muscle for the 1st hour. carter was equally thunderstruck, though he did get a case of the squirmies eventually. the show itself was pretty good, though i could do without the hyped up rock-n-roll uber-sexy numbers. it really is not necessary--the most compelling pieces were the classical traditional skating routines. lots of tremendous skating and jumping and, in the case of the couples, tossing and hoisting the women to ridiculously dangerous heights.

however, based on some of ava's feedback, i believe the last half was essentially a total blur for her. we could have easily left at the intermission, but she would not hear of it.

the funniest part of the whole thing was that this was the first time in 3 years that i have been out in the evening. when ava was little little she went to bed later and we did manage to take her to some musical events, but when she started going to bed at 7 (october 2004), that stopped. so, last night was really werid. usually, at 6 pm, we are doing the nightime dishes-bath-teeth-pick up-jammies routine, and last night we were left with an eerily quiet hour during which we just waited to leave--finally at 7 we started towards lake placid. and i felt SO WEIRD. here i was, leaving home, to go OUT, when i usually am curling up with the kids to put them to sleep. i cannot explain how disconcerting it was. completely foreign. like i was doing something i should not be doing. part of me really wanted to go back home. and i told that part of me to stop being ridiculous. but clearly having kids has allowed me to tap into that part of me that is perfectly happy snuggled up in bed or on the couch at the end of the day, letting the rest of the world go get their squirmies out. i never was much of a nightlife person--much to the dismay of a friend in san francisco, who after a long monologue about how she needed to get out and RAGE!, she looked at me and with an exasperated sigh said "you don't rage, do you?" and i said no. i never really saw the point. however, i do love to go out to dinner. and i adore going to places that have lots of comfy fancy couches and mellow music and fancy drinks where you sit down and have some sort of interesting conversation, and i love to get dressed up, but 1. those loungy-type places simply do not exist here, 2. i have to eat dinner for the rest of my life--there will be the opportunity eventually, and 3. i have no time to do the requsite maintenance to be able to dress up convincingly--how people find time to file their nails, i'll never know.

so, what it all boils down to is that i don't go out. and i am fine with that, knowing that fancy dinners are in my future eventually. but last night was a testament to the fact that i should probably go out at least a few times a year, just to make sure i don't forget how.

and it was so neat once we got into lake placid--it was all decorated for christmas, and we might as well have taken the kids to 5th avenue, they were so amazed. i know ava felt extra special. carter was simply bewildered.

and on a totally different topic, the words keep coming fast and furious out of him. it is like a faucet finally got dislodged. and curiously, he struggles to make the sounds in some words, but can make the same sounds in other words. so (with the exception of the hard "c") he can make letter sounds, but sometimes cannot do it in the midst of a long word. the best part about it? his frustration level has diminished significantly. thank god.

carter wanted to get out of the tub the other day, and i told him to stand up so that i could pick him up. i went to put my hands under his armpits and hoist him out (it is a very deep tub), and he suddenly scrunchd his shoulders up and urgently said "babi! babi! babi!" -- this is either baby or bambi, i have not discerned which since he says it when looking at bambi and he also refers to himself as such when he needs a snuggle in mom's lap--i loked at him and said "do you need your baby? bambi? and he shook his head, bent down, scooped up an imaginary baby or fawn, and held it in his arms, looked at me and said "BAAAAAAAbi."

then he handed me the precious cargo. i took it, and then proceeded to follow his verty strict instructions as to how to dry it and where to put it. when he was satisfied that i had taken care of it to his specifications, then and only then would he get out of the tub. after he was dry, he said "babi" and went to where it was resting in a chair, picked it up again, rocked it a little, bent over and gave it a kiss and then said "aaaaaaaawwwwwwwwwwwww." then he put it to bed.

earlier today, ava asked if we could look at dolly the dolphin from seaworld online. this lead us to youtube, which - as an aside- is great for entertaining kids provided there is strict adult supervision, and this of course led us to shamu, which triggered carter's memory, and suddenly created an obsession of monumental proportions. he wanted shamu RIGHT NOW. he would go to the window and say "shamu?" and then he picked up my cell phone and said "shamu?" -- what i wouldn't give for a phone call from 'shamu." and all day long, SHAMU SHAMU SHAMU SHAMU...even ava got exasperated and finally said "carter! we have to take a PLANE to see shamu. we cannot see him today...maybe in 6 days."

ava has been using colored pencils these days, and suddenly started chanelling marc chagall. it is really weird. and if she is not doing that, she is insisting on taking a perfectly square (this is where i come in) piece of paper and completely coloring it in with one color. the squares are large--6 x 6 for example--and it takes her a long time. and she usually has to do one for each person in the family, based on their favorite color. once it was circles--these were the flat inner circle of a paper plate that i had to cut out perfectly. and of course, the 3-dimensional obsession continues. the other day she wanted a bag made out of paper. or a basket--can't remember which. so, she asked me to help her construct one. i thought about it, then cut a cross out of a piece of 8x11 paper, sort of like the american red cross shape--then i folded the arms of the cross up to form a cube-ish shape without a top. then we stapled it and put a handle on it. she was ok with it, but she finally said "mom, i want it made like this--with this piece of paper here, and this here..." and she basically figured out how to construct a much larger bag with a piece of paper for each side. we were on our way out the door to go visit nana, so i told her that we would do it later. turns out, she recruited and directed nana in the effort, and she made a very large 8x8x11 bag/basket.

and the funniest part of all of this is that after spending HOURS completely absorbed in these art projects, when she is at school, she makes no effort--the teachers set up projects and she puts a gratuitous scribble or glues a token button on something and signs her name. i have no idea why, but i know they all think she has no interest in art.

the only thing that she clearly was interested in was a beading project in which she strung blue-dyed pasta on a string for a necklace. she told me on the way home that the teacher told her that she needed to use all of the colors, but that she only wanted blue. i can just imagine the standoff. since she came home with an all-blue necklace, i'm guessing the teacher backed down.

thanksgiving was a hit--relatively chaotic and in no way elegant, but we have established that ava really does like turkey, gravy, mashed potatoes and pumpkin pie. so, i can add those to her repertoire. hallelujah. carter likes turkey and whipped cream. not together, but i'm sure he would not decline whipped cream no matter what it was paired with. his irish roots are emerging.

(i swear they passed an urn of whipped cream with the roast beef when i was in dublin. i think it was meant for the fruit salad, but it was on the same table.)

Carter's needs are technically simple, but sometimes, they just cannot be met. Sometimes it is just not feasible to let him wash the dishes NOW! and sometimes I just don't have any candy. Sometimes, there has already been too much sugar granted in one day and little children just have to get over the fact that there will be no more until tomorrow. Sometimes, I can't stand up and go with him to wherever he desires (there are some moments in the bathroom that are non-negotiable).

The needs may be simple, but when not met--holy moly look out. The crying and the whining would make even the most stoic dentist toss a bag of marshmallows at him. It takes nerves of steel to deal with it. And then, if reprimanded, he crumples his lip, whimpers, and points to his throat as if to say "but mom, i am SICK. i have a SORE THROAT." -- he as totally learned to capitalize on my sympathy. of course, i have no way of verifying if his throat is sore, but it is interesting that it is only sore when I tell him no. Or, in some more less-enlightened moments, when I snap "Carter! STOP WHINING!"

I am looking forward to the end of the toddler tantrums and the start of the preschooler defiance with great anticipation.

you know, i hate to admit to being a fan of pilsbury, because it flies in the face of the vaguely granola efforts to instill a sense of where our food comes from and that we should not rely on mass-marketed huge mega agriculture production machines for our sustenance, but my goodness, their ready-rolled pie crusts (conveniently in a sheath of plastic and cardboard), are FANTASTIC when it comes to kid-level pie making. 1. they taste good. carter attested to that ("mmmmmmm"). 2. NO FLOUR to deal with. thus no vacuuming or freaking out over the dark green chairs. 3. really really really good crusts. could not be improved upon, and that was seconded by grandma.

so, we spent a relatively mess-free morning making cherry pies. i ADORE cherry pie. and all i had to do was give each kid a crust, spoon some filling (canned)into the middle, help them fold it over, and bake it. voila. nearly as good as the mcdonald's version from the 80s.

and then, with that part over, i gave ava a bowl of heavy cream and a whisk and said "here. make whipped cream." -- would you believe that she did it? almost all the way at least. she whisked and whisked and whisked and whisked. at least 20 minutes.

i am going to task her with making our butter from now on. maybe open a creamery.

in other news, she had a great day at skating, did really well, remembered how much she likes it, passed the basic 3 skills, hooray. she was getting so lukewarm, but it was so hard to know if that was a phase. i am thinking it was a phase. my policy is to keep her going, but at a reduced pace when she gets like that, and honestly, i think the forced break due to illness made a difference.

carter and i had a great time while she was skating. CanAm (Canadian-American) Hockey tournaments are going on and they had a huge set up, including a 'goal' board that was divided into a tic-tac-toe set up that lit up in squares when you hit it with the puck--the idea being that one person wold shoot, hit one of the nine squares, then the next person would shoot, etc. carter tried to hit the puck with the hockey stick, got frustrated and resorted to hitting the goal board with the stick, much to the amusement of the staff. when ava was finished, she waltzed out, picked up a stick and sent the puck flying into the 'goal.' nice. left-handed too. she knew precisely what to do with that hockey stick. i asked how easily i could have one at home. they also had a video feed of the "miracle on ice" -- the 1980 US vs Russia hockey game for the gold -- Carter was frozen in amazement. Not only were there people on screen banging around into each other with sticks, on ice, but it was on a HUMONGOUS television. he thought heaven had just been delivered.

and tomorrow, he probably will be talking about hockey. every day, words words words. literally, it is like he just decided to do it. i know i have talked about that before, but it is so weird. it will be an interesting case study. please god, let this be the last time he makes us all jump through a series of bureaucratic hoops for no good reason. not that i did any of the jumping. the county did that for me. i, and many others, have just been doing the worrying.

if you spill a bag of potato chips into a sink full of water, they don't disintegrate. they reconstitute into potatoes.

if you are patient, and wait 3x the time the recipe calls for, you can get curds and whey on the first try at cheesemaking. after a day of separating the 2, we now have something resembling (in appearance and taste) ricotta. not bad. it is currently hanging in the refrigerator, draining the last of the whey, and hopefully forming itself into a little ball.

we all had dinner together--the whole family--this usually is 45 minutes of chaos, because it is a rarity and very exciting for the kids. but tonight, everyone stayed politely in their seats, no bickering over who gets to sit in daddy's lap, who gets to eat the meat that daddy cut (no one wants the meat i cut up), no spills, no whining, no poor behavior at all. not only that, but it was supplemented with efforts at politeness that went above and beyond the expectations--ava offered to get me a drink, a napkin, to give me some of her meat, asked if i had had enough, did i want her chair because it was so comfortable--on and on. earlier, she recognized that i was a bit stressed over carter's whining, and she took it upon herself to entertain him, take care of him, get him something to eat and so on--i looked at her and said "ava, thank you so much. that was very kind--to both of us." she beamed.

so that's good. perhaps i am going to succeed in my efforts to raise thoughtful kids.

because i was nearly pulling my hair out with carter today. he is a really great kid most days, but when not 100%, wowie. the world comes to an end and he is just devastated over everything. for example, the other night he was very very very angry that it was dark out. could he have picked anything harder to gloss over or distract from? i mean, we have windows. no hiding the inky darkness beyond them. and he was really upset. throw himself on the floor on his belly, arms over his head, cheek smushed into the floor "my life is over"-style.

today, he was just not wanting anything other than to wash dishes or nurse. washing dishes means a lot of towels, moving all danger out of the way, and no hope of doing anything in the kitchen for myself. sometimes it is really not convenient for the advancement of the family's daily agenda. i let him do it about 6 times, then i was out of towels (they are all frozen solid on our porch right now).

and nursing, well, my enthusiasm for it is a little diminished. i mean, i know he is sick, and so i should just plunk down and acquiesce, but there comes a moment, when after HOURS of it, you just say "no. sorry." and then he loses it. and then he looks at you with those eyes and the guilt. my god. so today, when that moment came, that is when ava, bless her soul, stepped in. (5 minutes after swatting him with a small stick, but whatever). i was so proud of her. she saw that he needed help, i needed help, and figured out the best way to accomplish that (string cheese).

she is learning. and learning fast. things upset her too, but her disappointment emerges less as anger and more as total disappointment, crumpled face, tears spring out of her eyeswithin 2 seconds of the offense. the world is also over for her but with a lot more sturm und drang--this cuts to the depths of her 4 year old soul, whereas with carter it is very much about trying to control the exterior of his existence. to be honest, the devastation that she exhibits is a lot easier to deal with--sympathy and hugs work. it is like the empathy switch got flicked a few months ago, and not only can she exhibit it, but she also NEEDS it. all kids need it, obviously, but carter does not recognize it when it is offered and when it helps him. ava does. and she appreciates it. in that regard, i am gaining new respect from her. for the last year, i had become something of a bore. now, i think she sees that perhaps i understand her.

this does not mean that she is an angel--oh no. but her behavior is getting easier to interpret and manage. and carters is getting more difficult to interpret and mollify. but one thing is certain. if he knows he has done something wrong, he will move heaven and earth to get to me and give me a kiss. and his kisses, snotty and smoochy, are just the best.

what a month. carter finallly is over the fever, but he is still coughing and oozing goo, but at least he is in better spirits most of the time.

the other day, it finally snowed. we got out of the car, and i set carter down in the middle of the faling snowflakes that were conveniently huge. they were tumbling out of the sky and he just stood there, looking up, hand out, mouth open, eyes wide, completely entranced, and then after a minute or so, he pointed, looked at me for a minute and in a voice overflowing with joy whispered "bubbles!"

and then he started to dance with them.

we went to the golf course where it accumulated, and the kids had a great time. the dog had an even better time, especially when she stumbled upon a gaggle of canada geese. she almost looked like she was a puppy again.

carter has suddenly decided to start adding words at a ridiculous pace--i cannot even keep up with them anymore. it is like he sat back, looked around, reflected on the past year and said "yup. i put them through enough. now i can start.." one of his favorites in 'bratwurst' -- and he actually does not really like bratwurst itself, but he refers to hot dogs as such. but he also really likes saying it--bratwurst bratwurst bratwurst...and the other day, when we went to visit the kitties at the humane society, when asked what he would name a specific kitten, he said "bratwurst!" -- now how funny would that be? ava attached herself to a little white kitty, and was determined to bring it home today, and i was not really sure how i was going to get out of there without it, but someone had claimed her by the time we arrived.

we have had plenty of projects over the last weeks, due to the fact that all other activities have been curtailled. one day we made crackers--rather good, if a bit soft, and we are now in the middle of trying to make 'farmer's cheese' -- just call me mrs. ingalls. it is actually sort of interesting. applesauce is a huge favorite too. that is really fun for them to send through the food mill. the other morning i set up a painting project with poster paint, but both kids were curiously not into it. they really do prefer watercolors. which is just fine, because that is much less of a mess. i find it odd though that they don't like the poster (and finger) paint. ava never even put a brush to it, preferring the glitter and glitter glue to anything else.

ava has suddenly cultivated an interest in fairies and elves and dragons and goblins and often you can find her over by the plants, conjuring up a new world. it is interesting, because a year ago, she had ZERO interest in the wee folk. and that was a problem at the waldorf school, since the fairies run everything there. but now i am making up stories a la the lord of the rings every time we are in the car.

carter continues to love vehicles. and now he suddenly is determined to be a part of every dishwashing event.

our halloween candy is still available in quantity, and both kids seem to be forgetting about it, which is good. i know i have not written about halloween. it was fun, and i will write more later. but i am seriously pooped. and the house is a mess.

carter is very sick. no time to write about anything. fever for 5 days now and tonight it wont go down w/ medicine. of course, it is friday. no dr office hours tomorrow...

today was a really great day, and there is no other explanation other than the fact that i went running BY MYSELF for 30 minutes this morning. i don't think i have done that in 4 years. of course, i have had time to myself, but not to run outside alone in the morning. i never knew how crucial that is.

anyway, despite the fact that it was a rainy gray day, we had a great time, and i never got anxious about all of the messes, etc. sometimes after 6 hours of being inside with crafts and toys and cooking and snacks i start to feel a little, well, tense. but today we had a great time with our crafts, and somehow i got the weekend cleaning done (how??? i have no idea. usually i feel like the house will never be clean).

and i imlemented one of the more brilliant ideas of motherhood that i have. when we were at the ups store, carter spotted the rolls of paper for adding machines and pointed to them. i looked and thought, hmmmm....lots o' fun for $1.50 each. today, when they were playing in their room, i set them out at their little table along with a box of markers and crayons, and when they emerged, you would have thought santa had visited. talk about a lot of fun. you can write on them, you can draw on them, they can be a bandage, they can be an accessory. you can pretend you are a rhythm gymnast, you can make up a scavenger hunt, and you can write secret messages. and when you are tired of all of that, you can make a nest.

what is really great is that they are so narrow and they pretty much force one to write in a line--something that ava does most of the time, but sometimes the words sort of fall all over the paper. this was a good way to impose some structure without her being aware.

we made applesauce --carter refused, ava gobbled.

carter said "stuck"-- as in "mama...deet deet...stuck" (mommy, my train is stuck).

we finally went out in the afternoon. first to the animal shelter. hooray! kitties! ooops. closed for a function. very very upset carter. tears, wailing..."meeeeeooooowwwwww! meeeeeeeeeeeooooooowwwww!!!!" lesson: do not promise kitties, ever. use as a surprise.

then to the toy store. lots and lots of fun there. no longer have to worry about carter tripping and falling on the stairs or raiding all of the shelves--he is content to just play. ava, not as engaged. then to the bookstore, then home.

ava and i did the 60 piece jigsaw puzzle that we purchased, and she was VERY proud of her accomplishment. carter liked his lacing beads. which also substituted as a sorting challenge.

so, between some of the life-skills lessons i have received lately regarding dealing with difficult situations that are complicated (that is deliberately opaque), and my morning run, things got pretty darn cheery around here.

that and i read an amazing article in a quaker magazine about parenting, and it just reiterated my deepest feelings about raising my children. please let me do 1/4 of the job the parents in the article did. it was inspiring to say the least.

so tonight, i told carter and ava that we were having hamburgers, a favorite for both of them. not for me, but whatever.

as we were driving home, we passed mcdonald's. both kids have had enough hamburgers there in the past few months to develop a serious adoration for those confections of pickles, grease and white bread. carter, thinking logically, sent up a howl of protest when we did not stop.

i said, oh no honey, we are having hamburgers at home.

carter said "nuh-uh!"

and then ava piped in:

"well, carter, mommy does not want us to have too many mcdonald's hamburgers--do you know why?"

carter shook his head

"well, the meat in the hamburgers has bad stuff in it because the farmers who raise the cows feed them yucky food and give them medicines that gets into their meat and then into us, and that is not good...that is why mommy likes organic meat..." etc.

not only did it stop carter in his tracks, it very nearly stopped me in my tracks.

apparently, she IS listening to me ramble...

deer season in the adirondacks has begun.

this is the only place i have ever lived where it is a matter of course to drive down the road and see men with rifles hiking along the shoulder of the road.

just imagine it--driving along, dooo deeee dooo...oh, look, a man with a high-powered gun with a scope and such just ambling along toward my car....

and believe me, it is not just ONE man. many many men. it is a very serious time of year here. no hiking for us. anything, even a bright red jogging stroller, looks like a deer 'round these parts...

lessons learned: tap shoes are NOT the smartest gift in the world for a 4-year-old.

to be sure, she loves them. loves them. asked to sleep in them. in that regard, they are a great gift. however, after 10 minutes of tapping tapping tapping tapping tapping, you have had enough. after 2 hours, you think you are going to lose it, and after 4 hours, you have. not only that, but they mark the floor. not good. and WOW do they hurt if accidentally clipped against your ankle. oh, and they are wickedly slippery on certain surfaces. but she does look cute in her long pink and blue tutu, pink cardgan, pink tights and tap shoes.

lady and the tramp has edged out mary poppins. both of them love the bloodhound.

carter is actually adding words at a furious pace. his current favorite is STOP! and CHOP! he said something today that was unmistakable, and surprising, but of course i canot remember it. but he still manages to convey complicated and abstract ideas--whenever we go to fish creek playground, he plays this game where he runs up the ramp of the play-scape, says "bea!" = "beast" , i say really! and he holds up one or two fingers. then he runs down the ramp, "kills" it and runs back up, and says "bea" in a way that cannot be written--basically he conveys that the beast is no more. and then suddenly there is another one! and he runs down. and runs up! and says "bea!" and holds up a finger, and i say "another one!" and he nods vehemently, and then runs back down and "kills" it again. he plays very intently with his animals, and his favorite thing is to help them go potty. or to feed them. today we were sitting together, and i wish i could remember exactly what we were discussing, but i said something very complicated and abstract to him, and he did it. i wish wish wish that i could remember it. but i was too distracted by the crazy dance he did with the 2 flyswatters almost immediately thereafter.

ava had her art supplies while i put him down, and when i came out, she had made a surgical mask out of pink construction paper. with a little help from me we got it tied on, and then she almost immediately pushed it up on her forehead. i got a green one, and when i put it on, i did the same thing. and promptly forgot about it. THANK GOD i saw it in my rear-view mirror before leaving for the playground. it was not an attractive headband. although i could have perhaps said i was considering jainism.

yes. still sick. apparently, carter got off easy with just a wicked temp for 48 hours. i have had the worst sore throat of my life for 5 days now. plus cough. ava now has a temperature. with a sore throat and a "splitting headache" -- ah. just like her mother. i predict that tomorrow will be a very tough day.

plus, she burned her hands on the woodburning stove a few days ago, and that is causing her a lot of pain. it was not technically a bad burn--nothing like carter's, but one of them did blister a bit, and the skin sloughed off today. she was not a happy camper. until today, the worst of the experience has been her utter mortification. she was warming up her hands, and in order to touch the stove, she would have had to breach the barrier of the protective screen--something she knows not to do--so, she had to lift her hands up and over and then lower them at least 9 inches to the top of the stove, clearly a deliberate act. i know her hands were cold, but i have a little theory that she also was wondering "what would happen if I touched this stove?" -- a little bit of curiosity about exactly how hot it was, a little bit of attention seeking, and a little bit of simply needing to learn a tough lesson on her own. add to that a hard time judging the distance between the backs of her hands (fortunately that was the part she brushed the stove with) and the top of the stove. think about it--hold your hand palm down over the table--you know where the table is--now turn your hand over and try to do the same thing. it is different. not as sensitive. so, all of that = one bad burn on the back of her right hand.

poor kid.

on an entirely different note, somethng i have to get down for posterity--she has watched cinderella a few times, but after seeing it once or twice, we were riding in the car and listening to something on the radio, and a waltz came on. she said "mom! this is just like cinderella!" -- i was literally flabbergasted. yes, the prince/cinderella scene is a waltz, and yes we were listening to a waltz, but totally different. somehow she knew. perhaps others are reading this and saying well, duh, but as someone that is totally not auditory, this is incomprehensible to me. i nearly drove off the road.

and then, i immediately thought--well, i am in for a challenge. because i don't learn with my auiditory system. not one itty bitty bit. it is, in fact, my biggest weakness. and therefore, teaching her will be a tad difficult. i am inclined to read and write in order to learn. if a teacher stands in front of a class, and i don't take notes, i will have no idea what was said. not to mention a severe weakness when it comes to music, movies, and poetry slams.

hopefully she is at least kinesthetic--then at least we can meet in the middle.

ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! lead everywhere. everyone is testing, and lo and behold, lead is in everything. just go to the cpsc website and see.

it seems every decade there is a new safety crisis. 90s it was thimerosol. 00s it is lead.

i have something resembling the flu. carter's gift to me, i guess. he is fortunately fine. i am bedridden. medicine is not making a big difference.

speaking of, interesting that manufacturers are pulling cold meds for the 2 and under crowd. i never had to worry about their safety or efficacy, since both kids cannot handle anything other than tylenol, but it is an interesting development. vicks is probably thrilled.

ok. today was the 3rd day in a row that we left the house at some ridiculously early hour and did not return until late afternoon. phew. it makes for a very tired mama. anyway:

1. laurie berkner was great. we drove to albany in the am, made it on time (!!), and she performed all the songs that ava knew. ava was frozen in her seat for about 2 songs, then decided that yes, she did want to get up and dance with the other kids in the aisle. and that was it. she periodically returned to her seat, but preferred the kid-zone. carter enjoyed it, but had more fun going bumpity bump down teh giant staircases of the concert hall than anything else. both kids got lollipops upon our return to the car, which carter promptly decorated himself with. he fell asleep and for a moment we thought he might have sealed his lips shut with lollipop goo. he was fine. the last 45 minutes of the drive were a bit rough, but we made it. carter asked to go poopy at the country store, and when he got performance anxiety, he transferred the effort to the little potty in the back of the car. he thought that was fun--sitting on the potty in the way back with the hatch open, gazing at long lake. i am sure it was a funny sight from the street view too.

2. sunday we returned to the corn maze (after hitting the grocery store). we solved the puzzle in under 2 hours, had a BLAST with the minor exception of some idiot's choice to chuck an ear of corn over the maze--blindly. guess whose head it nearly hit? yes, carter's. guess who soundly chewed out a few local teens in an explosion of mama-bear fury and remarkable verbal acumen? given that i cannot usually get 2 words out without stumbling upon them, i was surprised at my ability to quickly humble these kids into recognition of their stupidity. if i had not been so upset i would have walked away rubbing my knuckles on my collarbone, but i was still shaking. we returned to having fun and searching for the exit. when we got out, the local 4-h happened to have set up pony rides. hello, universe? thank you from the bottom of my heart. the kids nearly fell over with joy. after that and some more truck and big digger play in the sawdust pile we went to skating (covered in mud and sawdust), then finally got home at 6:30.

3. today, it was a day-o-agriculture. first banker's orchards. no apple picking, all gone. tears brimming in one 4-year-old's eyes. but, they had a petting zoo, a pile of sand with trucks and diggers, some little old-fashioned rides, and doughnuts. all was ok again. then we went to rulf's orchards. yes, picking, red delicious only. great, where do we go? the woman at teh counter told me to go down the road and turn left at the jamaican trailer. i started to ask, then thought to myself: given that this is an orchard with apple trees and apple trees only, anything called a jamaican trailer must be very obvious. turns out, that is exactly what it was. a large trailer home for the workers from jamaica. i had a bazillion questions about the practice of hiring jamaican workers as well as the experience of being a jamaican worker, but kept my nose out of it other than to learn that some stay, some go home, and they all work to prune the trees in the winter. after that, we got 2 hot dogs at the little stand at the orchard and ate them in the gazebo. ava looked at hers for a long time. it was in a bun, something that she has not had yet. then she looked up at me and said "i am going to eat this differently today!" with the sort of excitement that only a 4-year-old can bring to a novel endeavor. carter simply reached into the bun, grabbed the hot dog, ketchup and all, flung the bun on the floor, and ate his like a banana. then carter had a brief nap in the car, and we went to the pumpkin patch. they fired up the tractor and hay wagon for just us, and off we went to the muddiest pumpkin patch ever. we found our pumpkins, and rode back. both kids thought the tractor was pretty neat. ava spent a long time watching the ground go under the wheels. she was leaning out over the edge, staring at the ground for nearly the entire ride. i watcher her and wondered what could she be thinking? remember staring out the car window? how absorbing that could be? something about the wagon wheels and the dirt was equally fascinating. we finally came home at 4, and i managed to cook a roast with potatoes, broccoli and mushrooms AND get the kids in bed on time. and moreover, i managed to do that with a broken oven! just call me mrs. cleaver.

oh, and also:

ava is afraid of the dark. suddenly. perhaps it has to do with the recent power outage, but she was FINE when that happened. i think it has more to do with the fact that it has been light out when she goes to bed for the longest time, and prior to that, it never occurred to her to think about the dark in any concrete way. now that the sun sets earlier and it is often dark when she is going to sleep, she is now pondering the darkness. and she is not too thrilled with it. but she will go up to the window and stare out at it, then retreat with a big shudder. last night i tried to entice her out onto nana's porch, and she made it a few feet then ran back inside. i wanted her to see that her eyes would adjust.

but the other issue is that she knows that a bear broke into the porch at upper saranac the other night. however, she has not said anything about bears per se.

( it made a remarkable mess. )

it is interesting how some facets of one's child are there at the start, and never go away, but other personality traits/predilections/issues/mannerisms etc emerge and then disappear entirely. it speaks to the importance of not assuming anything about your children, and definitely not labeling them. the minute you do, they might completely prove you wrong, or even more dangerously, you might permanently etch a way of being onto their person that could possibly have been entirely transient.

carter likes to be a cat..."meow, meow meow...nummy num?" and then i hold out my hands in a cup shape, and he pretends to eat.

or, he runs up to you, growls "rrrrrraaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!" and then points to himself and says "bea." which = beast.

we are having a blast at the gym in the mornings when ava is in school--we swim for a bit, and then today tried a mommy and me exercise class. HA! i lay down on the mat and he was on my like a fly on peanutbutter. though he did manage to destroy the four foot tower of steps (the exercise-class step lifters that are about a foot square and stack nicely on each other) that the other kids made. he totally ignored them, then when it was sufficiently high enough he ran over and pushed it hard. BAM! CRASH! i think every mother in there had a heart attack.

the teacher said "your house must be really childproofed."

tomorrow we go to see laurie berkner in concert. the level of excitement is stratospheric. though i am afraid ava is assuming that we are going to MEET her. i have been trying to explain the magnitude of the event, particularly comparing it to the size of the audience at the lion king, but i think she is still holding out hope that we are going to go hang out with the band. but the neat thing is that she knows all of the lyrics.

i cannot even begin to capture all of the imaginative play -- it quickly escalates to the point where i have no idea who she is, where she is going, who is with her (deer? rabbits? her sister?), and what they are doing. but one of the easiest ways to entertain her is to provide her with a bunch of bowls/cups (plastic or paper, obviously), and some interesting dry goods (herbal teas were a big hit) and let her "feed" her deer/rabbits. this can occupy her for more than an hour.

today they washed the playground at school. with buckets of soapy water. when i arrived, they had a line of kids hauling buckets over to the window, passing them through to the kids outside, who were rinsing the playground. you could not have found 18 more completely absorbed and intent kids. ava finally came inside, found me, tackled me (her new form of greeting), and announced "mommy, i got DRENCHED!"

and yet, for all her verbiage, she has suddenly started employing double negatives. i know this is her effort to sort out grammar, but it is like nails on a chalkboard. real nails. not just fingernails. i wince every time. and all one can do is gently correct--i cannot explain that a double negative makes a positive. she has not taken algebra yet.

it will be over soon, i am sure. and then we will be on to the next challenge.

we went to the "Great Adirondack Corn Maze" the other day. it was so so so fun. nervewracking, as little kids can slip out of sight quickly, but totally worth it. more on that later, but my essay on the outing should be published soon.

in short, we will be returning.

the other night, i woke up and something felt weird. i was lying on my stomach, and finally came to the realization that Carter had draped himself over me, like a blanket, and was sound asleep with his head in the nape of my neck. this was a conundrum. very endearing, but how was i to move? i had to, becasue my arms were asleep. i slooooooowly unearthed myself, like a giant spatula.

he has caught ava's cold. i can only remember one other time of illness for him, when he was 8 months. he is really really stuffed up. and he has this odd rash on his cheek--sort of like his sinuses are mapping themselves for me. but he is in good spirits. just gooey.

nevertheless, we went to octoberfest at whiteface today. pony ride, teeny tiny ferris wheel. pony ride, teeny tiny ferris wheel. pony ride, teeny tiny ferris wheel. pony ride, teeny tiny ferris wheel. pony ride, teeny tiny ferris wheel. pony ride, teeny tiny ferris wheel. pony ride, teeny tiny ferris wheel...

oh, a jumpy thing...woooo hooo! oh, a maze made out of hay bales....

it was upon exiting said maze that ava managed to misjudge the distance between her forehead and the huge plywood entrance that you had to duck under and WHACK! it was a massive thump. she never cries in public, and she immediately sobbed. the mark on her head is impressive. i expect it will be blue and green and yellow soon. we all crumpled into a little ball of crying and comforting, with carter rubbing ava's back and giving her a kiss, while i held her and tried to see the extent of the damage.

fortunately, she recovered, and off we went to the pony ride, teeny tiny ferris wheel, pony ride, teeny tiny ferris wheel, pony ride, teeny tiny ferris wheel, pony ride, teeny tiny ferris wheel, pony ride, teeny tiny ferris wheel, pony ride, teeny tiny ferris wheel....

finally we went on the gondola. carter did not like up, but he did like down.

we left at 6:15, home by 7:15, asleep by 8:15. i am getting a LOT better at the evening routine. though feeding them cheese and yogurt smoothies and whole wheat mini-bagels in the car cuts down on the kitchen chores considerably.

as i write this, ambulances and fire trucks are zooming by the house, a very unusual thing on this road, particularly after labor day, and especially at this hour. and to top it off, they are using their sirens, making it particularly unusual--they almost never turn those on after dark. huh. very distracting.

last night the power went out. i was out in the woodshed rummaging around for kindling and wood when the flashlight died. both kids were waiting for me in the dark dark house, noses pressed against the glass, monitoring the movement of the little beam of light. when it went out, i am sure they were terrified, but they were remarkably composed. i picked my way back to the house through the utter monsoon, told them that i was going to turn on the car for light, and everything was ok. and they were fine. i managed to start a fire in the dark, we curled up by the hearth, and they fell asleep. when the lights went on, i eventually moved them back to their bed, but reluctantly. it was cozy. there is a picture at the end of The Runaway Bunny -- where the mama bunny and the little bunny are curled up in their nice warm den--and i have often coveted the coziness in that picture--last night, i felt like the mama bunny.

ballet was today. i have no idea how it went--ava was happy when she went in (with 10,000 other little girls) and she was ecstatic when she came out. no further information was provided.

carter was distraught when she marched off to go dance and he did not get to go. we had been talking all day about it, ballet this, dance that, and when we got there he clearly thought this was for him too. he was running around doing his chimney sweep dance, and very happy. and then the crushing realization that this was for ava. and only ava. he was not alone in his 2-year-old disappointment--there were about 5 other teary kids--but that did not help.

we played outside, and periodically he would go up to the window and holler "AAAAAAAAAAAVA!" -- fortunately the studio was nowhere near that window.

it will be much easier when he is 3, and there are things for him to do.

tonight, after he fell asleep, ava and i had "spa night" -- this is an idea that i got from mothering magazine, of all places. she was allowed to stay up late, provided she read quietly while i put carter to sleep, then we went into the bathroom, lit a candle, and settled in for an evening of lotions and potions. it was a very nice way to have a little mommy and ava time, and she was remarkably open and willing to chat. she did not let me wash her hair, because she likes her ballet braids, but i was able to do all of the maintenance that she usually balks at (namely nail clipping and flossing) with no fuss. at the end, when we were all clean and smooth and soft and toasty warm, we did our nails. ava decided that her right foot and right hand should have pink polish, and her left foot and left hand should have purple polish. she did not understand why i did not want polish on my fingernails, but i finally made her understand that it feels funny to me--like my nails are stuck in a sleeping bag and they can't breath. after that she was ok with my choice.

when we were all finished, we turned off the lights, watched the candle for a minute or so, said our blessings and blew out the candle. a few minutes later, as i was hanging wet towels, i glanced over at her as she was standing in the kitchen waiting for me and i noticed that she had her hands clasped in prayer, her eyes were closed and she was saying something under her breath. when she opened her eyes, she looked embarassed, then she smiled and said "i was just thanking god and mary and jesus for my nail polish..."

did i mention we have a new refrigerator? did i mention how absurdly happy this makes me?

school continues to go well--carter might get expelled before he is even actually enrolled if he does not stop drawing/painting on other people's artwork in the few moments that we are there for pick up and drop off, but other than that, ava seems to be perfectly fine. the difference between this year and last year is amazing.

swim lessons started tonight. it was going to be just carter, but ava decided at the 11th hour to attend, and she did wonderfully. so, now she has school, skating, swimming, ballet, and soon skiing. carter has swimming. i cannot get over how much personal management i do. the infancy years were tough in their own right, but i swear this is harder. we have 6 daily bags that get packed. plus a snack bag, plus the now necessary cold-weather gear. for a person with my temperment -- ie, go to work/school, sit down, start working/studying, get up 8 or 10 hours later when the mental effort is complete -- this is VERY taxing.

but...we have a new refrigerator. i find it amazing that my life could be improved by such a order of magnitude simply by the presence of a large appliance. it says a lot about my domesticity, i suppose, but only now do i realize how vehemently i hated the old one. it was a side by side, and impossible to find anything/keep clean/fit anything in/exist with. now we have a lovely up and down one that makes me smile inside every time i open it. it is organized, clean, and spacious, and it makes every morning just a little brighter.

and it has a water filter, just perfect for little hands.

"mommy! i know how to spell movie!!"

"really? how?"

"D--V--D"

the stories ava makes up. incredible. complete montage from all inputs in her life.

she has a "sister" -- all of her stories happen to her sister. she also has a varying # of baby deer that she rescued from a river where they were drowning b/c there was a hurricane and their mother died (she has not seen bambi) and she was driving a boat and found them--all 42 of them. she had to accept that we just did not have 42 containers to feed them.

she took elements of the "grandpa and the panther" story from Little House in the Big Woods, mixed it with a bit of Oz, plus a little of this and a little of that, and pretty soon there was a story about a panther that wanted to eat her sister but then her sister in her infinite cleverness made friends with the panther and redirected its ire towards the wicked witch of the west who was so bad and the panther caught her and took a big bite out of the witch and suddenly spat it out and said "blech! she is made of salt! (remember--the witch melted, i told ava it was as if she were made of salt) I wanted meat!!"

all this from the back seat.

today, ava had a good day at school. when i got there, she dragged samantha over to me and said "this is samantha--she is my best friend. we hold hands"

then on the way to ballet sign up, she asked if samantha was going to sign up too, and i said that i did not know, and then lo and behold--samantha arrived. i was very pleased with the forces of the universe for that one.

carter has an OPINION. all day, every day. when denied, he gets mad. and today he responded with true fury at me when i told him he could not get down at the ballet place--he whiped around in my arms, grabed a fistful of hair (mine) and pulled it hard to the left, then the right, then the left again. fortunately i have some reserves, because that fistful came out in large measure. i was completely shocked. he is definitely 2.

today, ava had two moments with carter--he did something not so nice each time, though also not so deliberate. the first time, she responded by whacking him over the head with her hand. she was removed proptly from the playground, much to her dismay. the second time, she responded by walking away from him. i told her she got a gold star for that and gave her a big hug, lots of praise, lots of positive reinforcement, etc.

then: "mommy, what kind of a gold star?"

then: "actually, can i have gold money instead?"

some totally random thoughts and observations i want to write down so that years later the kids can know what they were like...probably not all that interesting to the average reader.

ava does not like goat chese, maple syrup, or honey anymore. however, she now likes bananas and milk (separately).

she has these new facial expressions that totally change her appearance--i cannot do them--they are expressions that are exactly her father's. i swear there must be a gene. most involve her jaw, and i cannot figure out what she is doing. but it conveys the message "i am thinking about this and am wondering what your reaction is"

it is weird.

we hosted 4 monarch caterpillars this year, with a 50% success rate. both butterflies emerged on the same day, and both were girls. the other 2 appeared to have liquefied in their chrisalyses.

carter loves daddy longlegs -- DADDY! and he grabs them and carries them around in a pincher grasp, finally relocating them (usually) outside.

if he sees something interesting (usually a backhoe), he says "Ava! ava! ava! ava!" over and over until she looks. if she is not around, he calls me. the other day, there was a sunset that was remarkable, and he stood and called Mom! over and over until i finally emerged from the bedroom, and there he was standing and pointing at the beautiful sky.

he likes to come over to you and take your hand and say "daddy." -- as in, "hello, my name is daddy, it is nice to meet you.."

he knows his letters, so he is on track. i think that while he is staying silent, he is secretly teaching himself to read.

ava seems to think school is an ok place to be. not superb, not awful, simply acceptable. i think this is the year that the teacher may lose some of her mythical status, and her friends might become more important.

she keeps asking me when she can do math, and so i keep saying that she already does, and then we do a little number game or something (we are usually in the car for this), and finally she said "mom, i thought math was writing your letters..." and so i clarified. she is very into practicing her letters. and she has become quite good at lining them up left to right and keeping them the same (approximately) size. but if i give her that lined paper used in grade shcool--the big lines with the middle dotted line--she balks.

the other thing about school is that she has suddenly taken interest in the parts of the room that barely got a passing nod last year. you could have blown me over with a feather when she decided to go to the easel and paint on monday. last year she produced 1 painting, and all of her other artwork was 3 dimensional. if is was impossible to make it into a sculpture, say for example, they were decorating a paper teddy bear, she would stick one piece of tissue paper on her teddy bear cut out and call it a day. the enthusiasm was overwhelming.

but she also likes the dressup box, the blocks, and the reading couch. it is amazing how different she is.

we went on a walk on the brewster peninsula nature trails on monday after school. unbelievably perfect for little people. safe, no cars, no drops, no climbs, just woods. some roots, some rocks and of course, lake placid lake, but manageable. we will be visiting it again. very pretty. and we found a slug.

Nana has been helping me by taking the kids every couple of days in the afternoons, so that I can keep up with work, and this is a true godsend. Several days ago, while the kids frolicked with her, I did some work at home, then went on a mad dash into town since the next day was Peter’s birthday, and with everything going on, I pretty much forgot. As I was driving into town, I realized that I was going to get to go to the bookstore with no kids. In other words, I was going to get a chance to enjoy the bookstore, as opposed to spending the entire time putting it back together again. So, I parked the car and made my way through the municipal parking lot to our small, independent store. As I was walking through the lot, I suddenly had a rush of self-consciousness that I had not felt for years.

Throughout much of my life, all the way to the moment I was obviously pregnant with Ava, I was acutely self conscious. I hated being observed, I hated feeling like I was the center of attention—I always felt that there must be SOMETHING wrong—either my clothes or my appearance or my walk or (if, god forbid, I had to talk) my words (often there was something wrong with my spoken words, since it is hard to talk when shaking with fear), or even just my aura. In short, often I felt inclined to sink into the ground. I was a student that sat in the back of the classroom. So, as I walked across the parking lot, on my way to the store, with no one but myself—no little hands to hold, no little person to hoist onto my hip, no small people to distract me from my own awkwardness—I felt that awful feeling come right back. I swear I felt like I was a neon goliath. A person drove by and glanced at me, and I realized that I was no longer obviously a “MOM.” I was simply a not so terrifically dressed woman with fuzzy grey hair tripping over a crack in the sidewalk with nothing to do with her arms (fortunately, as I needed them to prevent myself from opening my forehead in the course of that fall…) and having a bit of difficulty breathing. It was not a welcome feeling. Not only that, but I kept feeling like I had forgotten something. Like clothes.

Now, there are 2 explanations. One: I am hiding behind my children and my role as a mother to avoid dealing with feelings of awkwardness. If that is true, I am capitalizing on the kids, which I am not so thrilled with as a possibility, and I truly don’t think I am doing that. Two: my children are so inherently a part of me, a very true part of me, and a very secure part of me, that their presence has finally allowed me to feel what it is like to be without self consciousness (of course, that is all lost when they start arguing in the store, but that is beside the point). This sounds very sentimental, and it is, but I also think it is true. Pre-children, you would never have caught me singing and dancing in the grocery store. Post baby, a review of the security tapes will reveal a 30-something woman crooning and swirling her way through the aisles with a baby bjorn hiding all but some tiny legs and arms. And I never even thought about it, until I was almost finished and thought, gee, here I am, making a scene. And then I thought, well, who cares? So, what this boils down to is that becoming a mom has focused my existence on something that is in sync with me. That may make no sense, but it always felt like I was flinging myself through life, searching for some sense of who the heck I was, and without that sense, I felt like I was walking around naked, and I always felt the need to escape. But now, I feel right in my skin, so to speak. No need to escape.

Of course, I probably should get used to holding onto that feeling while walking around without them. Then maybe I won’t trip on the sidewalk anymore. In the meantime, I think I will be sure to always bring a bag and clutch it to my chest. That always helped in high school.

background information necessary for this story: pea = please, and det-do = credit card in carter's language.

we went to the olympic center to watch the junior international figure skating grand prix competition, very fascinating to ava, not so fascinating to carter. this is also where we go for ava's skating lessons, thus it is our home away from home. during a break, i took both kids out of the big-deal arena, and let them run around the halls. we ended up in the not-such-a-big-deal area, where the rinks are not as snazzy, but where we are very familiar with the available amusements like squishy blue (BLUE!) gym mats. there is also a gumball machine. one of the big ones, where you put a quarter in and the gumball travels down a transparent spiral in the base of the machine around and around and around until it finally appears at the bottom. both kids adore these gumballs (i bite carter's up and give him 1/4, if that, and i insist that ava prove that hers is squashed before she is allowed to move), but i rarely have any quarters on me.

on this day, carter ran up to the machine. "eh? mamma? nummy num? eh?" -- tap tap on the machine.

"no carter, i am sorry, i don't have any money for the machine."

"eh? nummy num?" tap tap tap "pea?"

"sorry, honey, no money."

pause…

"det-do?"

we had an earthquake last night. 3.2. those of you in or from CA are laughing, but get this: we were ON TOP of it. the epicenter was horseshoe pond, and that is basically next to our pond. it was at 11:30, i had just turned off the lights and there was this incredible--and i mean incredible--BOOOOOMMM!!! if someone had told me a plane had just crashed in our front yard, i would have believed them. and everything shuddered violently for about 2 seconds. and then quiet. like no other earthquake i had experienced. it was like the ground literally cracked open under us.

the kids never noticed it. of course, when i told ava about it, that prompted an all day discussion of earthquakes. the questions never ceased. she is incredible. she must know EVERYTHING there is to know about something. you cannot just say, "oh, an earthquake is when the ground shakes." or "mommy is going to do some work now" or "we are going to go to the airshow"--or you will be me with "why? where in the ground? how far down in the ground? do things get damaged? is it dangerous? do other people have earthquakes? is it like thunder?" and "what work? for whom? why? do you have to email? is it important? do you have to go to a meeting?" and "what planes are going to be there? will the hurt-helicopter be there? (lifeflight) Can they save someone that has been stung by a jellyfish? how do they help people in the water? what color is the emt's life jacket?..." and she will not stop until she is completely satisfied that she understands. when i told her about michaela standing in the red ant's nest, she had to know every detail, down to what kind of medicine she had to put on the bites later that evening.

in other news, carter may not talk, but he sure can count--he tripped and fell today, then he did it again about 20 minutes later, and i said "carter, you did it again!" and he looked at me, smiled, and held up his 2 index fingers and nodded.

we had an all day marathon today--up, get ready--pack diaper bag, sippy cups, snacks, bikes, helmets, skate bag, wallet, computer, and files, drive to the grocery store (45 minutes--it eats up a lot of time), shop, drive into lake placid, get the bikes and bike helmets out of the car, ride bikes in the speed skating oval in lake placid, bring bikes back to car, change carter's diaper, put him in the car seat while i load the bikes and helmets in the car, get skate bag, more snacks and sippies, and warm clothes for the rink, get carter out of car, walk to skating rink with carter and ava and rolling skate bag (thank god for wheelie bags), go upstairs to the '32 rink, get ava out of summer clothes and into skating clothes while carter runs all over the place, retrieve carter 50 million times and ask him to sit quietly, finally get ava into tights, leg warmers, skating dress (very cute), skates, gloves and helmet, bring carter, bag and geared-up ava into cold rink, hand ava off to skate coach, chase carter around stadium seats of rink for 1/2 hour, retrieve ava, repeat the process of dressing ava, but in reverse, pack everything up, go downstairs and walk to car. drive home, tell stories about earthquakes while carter sleeps in car, pull into driveway, leave kids in car and unload groceries, put perishables away (as if they weren't already spoiled and/or melted), brush teeth, grab more snacks, and drive 1/2 hour to dentist's. mom in dentist chair first, then ava, went smoothly, then drive to nana's. have a cup of tea. ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. say thank you, drive home, get ready for bed, discuss earthquakes some more, put the nonperishables away, feed the dog, the guinea pig and the fish, make a good night snack, put the kids to bed. go to work.

and that is where i am now--going to work and not writing another word!

i have been working in the evenings, work that requires serious computer time, and thus i have been very proprietary regarding my hours spent child-free. now, that is not an exact statement--not child-free, rather child-asleep. as such, bedtime is now an entirely different event. before i felt compelled to start working no later than 8 pm, i would lie quietly with both kids til they were both asleep. this would be preceeded of course with reading and quiet reflection on the day, but after books were over and it was quiet time, then i would get my book and read while they settled down. then, before i started to work, carter suddenly developed a need to be rocked to sleep in the glider. i have no idea why. if i suggested snuggling up on the bed, he would sob and wail. this coincided with ava wanting me to make her a little nest on the floor--several blankets laid on the floor for her to sleep on, with a pillow and a blanket to go over her. so, everything changed--carter and mom in the rocker/glider, ava on the floor of her own volition. then i started to work. and several days into it, i told ava that i was not going to be rocking next to her, that i had to work. no protest, she was fine with that--as long as i was in the room with her, she was happy. and my desk is in the room. but then what to do with carter? i cannot type with him in my arms, and he won't lie on the bed, let alone without me. so, one evening when he was resisting sleep, i just looked at him and said "mommy has to work now--you can sit next to me for as long as you like, but you have to be quiet and still" -- lo and behold, he nodded. so i plunked him down next to me, and he did exactly what i told him--he sat and watched me work -- without moving a muscle -- until his eyes slowly closed and he leaned against me and fell asleep. it was very endearing. life is getting easier in teeny tiny increments.

There is such a fine line between autonomy and disobedience when you are four, and apparently, it is very easily crossed. Our days are filled with events that fall into the category of “I can do it myself” or “That is NOT how I wanted you to do it, Mom/Carter/Rose/Dad”…or other similar expressions. It is extremely difficult terrain to get through, because yes, you want to let her learn how to do things, you want her be her own person without dictating what her personality/likes/dislikes etc should be, you even want her to learn from her mistakes. But oooooohhhhhh, you want her to do all of this and express all of this in POLITE terms. It is very hard to tease out the parts that are ok (yes, you can make your own snack/get Storm out of his cage/dictate every moment of your day) from the parts that are not – i.e. it is not what you are asking for, it is how you are asking ...believe me, I have to count to 10 a lot.
She is devoted to Mary Poppins. She plays Mary Poppins, she practices Mary Poppins dances – and has declared herself the best chimney sweep dancer (“I can do it better than they can”)—anyone familiar with the Step In Time routine knows that it is a rather impressive dance number. Carter always has to be Bert, and I always have to be the Mother. Easy role—all I have to do is holler “votes for women!”
We finished reading The Secret Garden—she liked it, but the plot complexities were a bit lost on her. She got the general idea, but the psychological analysis was a bit much. We moved on to The Little House in the Big Woods, and just finished that tonight. She LOVED that one. Completely age-appropriate and fascinating – how they lived in the olden days compared to all of the similarities—what Laura liked to do, how she played, how she felt about some things. And then there were the discipline sections, where it was simply a given that not only were kids spanked, but hit with something along the lines of a whip or a switch. Wow, did that give her pause. I’ll bet it was the same reaction I had when I learned that the mother of one of my friends in first grade hit my poor friend with a wooden spoon. Not only was I shocked and astonished, I was extremely relieved and grateful.

so, i read in Oprah's magazine (my secret addiction), that there is new research on interval-based workouts. apparently, if you exercise for 30 minutes, alternating very intense -- VERY intense -- segments with rest periods (think 1 minute intense, 2 minutes rest), this makes you a lot fitter than 90 minutes of endurance-type exercise.

since i have completely given up on exercising becasue i cannot figure out how to get my stroller-adverse kids to sit still for a minimally effective workout, this was great news. why? because that means we can exercise together!

it is impossible to do a conventional exercise routine of any sort with kids unless you are prepared to completely ignore them. they are a constant stream of wants and needs, and no matter how much you beg, they will not leave you alone for more than oh, a minute.

which is precisely the length of time needed for those intense intervals. when the interval is over, you can stop to recover and get a child a glass of water or clean a mess or find a toy.

moreover, the guilt of ignoring the chores in order to exercise is mitigated by the fact that you can do chores in the recovery intervals...

AND one-minute intervals are superb for revving up your kids--i cannot explain how much they loved it when i put one of their favorite CDs on and said "now we are going to play a fast-slow game! first we are going to dance s-l-o-w-l-y...now we are going to dance REALLY FAST!" and so on. and believe me, it was one heck of a workout.

so, oprah has come to my rescue and provided me with a way to exercise, do chores AND take care of my children all at the same time. she is my hero.

perhaps this chance to exercise will cure my insomnia, and i am also on to something regarding my, um, tummy issues. i think i may have found the cure. i think, and no, this is not exactly a revelation, that i cannot eat sugar. in pretty much any form. for me, this sucks. i practically live on sugar these days. fruit, crackers, sugar in my tea, cheddar bunnies, juice, blah blah blah. but i am fairly certain that those simple carbohydrates are doing some pretty complex fermenting in there, and i am so over all of that.

we'll see.

we went to see a theater performance of sleeping beauty today. ava sat with her mouth hanging open the entire time. i don't think she even moved once, other than to get on michaela's lap during the scary part. even carter was awed. it pretty much touched on all of the themes ava has been incorporating into her imaginative play--witches, sword fights, princesses, dancing, fairies, and the all-encompassing good vs evil.

the best part was at the end when the prince had to kiss sleeping beauty, but he did not know this, and was hesitating and the good witch begged the good citizens of the kingdom (aka the audience) to help him by shouting "kiss her! kiss her!" -- the whole theater was yelling "kiss her! kiss her!" and then the man behind me yelled "RUN AWAY! RUN AWAY!"

So, this whole toy issue is giving me plenty of food for thought. When the kids were born, I read tons of different child-development books (otherwise known as guaranteeing yourself a near constant anxiety attack about your performance as a mother), and there are literally hundreds of theories about what sort of play kids should be engaging in, and which toys are the best for them. There is a backlash against all of the educational toys, there is an anti-plastic brigade, there is a lot of fuss being made over toys that do not allow any imagination, and then of course there is the whole parallel and intricate issue of television.

TV on its own is an entirely different debate, but there is a lot of concern about all of the characters in a child’s toy box originating from a show that has a plot provided. In other words, if a child picks up Dora, some people are concerned that he or she will simply reiterate a show’s story line, instead of making up their own. I see the point, but I am not sure if that is entirely true. I think perhaps the shows may prompt ideas, but I really don’t think they stifle them entirely. Assuming the child has not been pickled in that cool TV glow.

My issues with TV are different: First, I tend to find most of it depressing. Not because the content is depressing, but I just think it is depressing to sit inside and watch it if the sun is up. This is primarily due to my own personal need for UV light. Second, there is a bit of condoned attitude among some of the “children’s programming” that I find distasteful. Even on Sesame Street there are wise-cracking brats. Oscar was one thing, but when you have a cartoon character mimicking the attitude of a grown up for comic effect, I have a big issue with it. My kids do not need to know how to say “talk to the hand.” Third, the materialism cultivated by TV is something that I know I cannot escape, but I can keep it as minimal as possible. The fewer commercials, the less susceptible they are to the global machine.

I don’t know what impact our no-TV policy is having, but I do know that when they do see television, it is like giving them speed. The shows are loud and glaring, and the commercials are even worse. They visible wince. As adults we are able to tune it out, but as kids they are sucked into the chaos and they cannot get out.

I digress. I am not trying to sound judgmental—I know that Ava learned her ABCs so early because of TV, and so I know there are benefits, but I feel like watching children’s TV these days is forced complicity with the WalMart agenda.

Anyway, back to toys. I have been concerned with the toys that the kids had, ever since they were little. I saw the point that researchers were making about overstimulating—simple is better, keep the noise and the lights to a minimum, etc. So, my vague policy has been to keep the toys as simple as possible, avoid licensed characters, and minimize the plastic (HA!). But I quickly learned that allowing a child to become proficient on the computer by letting her play PBS games is not tantamount to eschewing ones responsibility as a parent to teach her pre-reading and math skills. Sometimes they just don’t want you to hover over them. If she is going to push me away, then by all means PBS, go for it. Also, remote controlled toys are a riot. Especially when you have a dog.

Toys that I assumed they would love often sat ignored for months, even years. We have an outdoor climbing thing, with a little slide and a hideaway underneath. Ava played on it occasionally, but it pretty much collected pinecones for the last two years. Carter was a bit more interested this summer, but not by much. Then suddenly, they discovered that IT HAS A SECRET SPECIAL HIDEAWAY! And I cannot get them to leave it alone. I have to lure them inside with ice-cream sandwiches. I only have four years of experience, but I have concluded that children’s interests develop in no particular pattern. All children will like almost all toys, but on their own schedule. Carter LOVED puzzles in his first year. Ava? Not so much. Now, at 4, she adores them. The weird thing about them is that she puts them together based on shape only, not by looking at the colors and how they need to line up. Ava had a profound fear of balls for a long time as an infant. Then it was over. One consistent love for both of them: books.

What this all boils down to, is: you never know what is going to be a hit. Moreover, something they love at school or at a friend’s house may lose its luster once they have one at home.
Worrying about whether or not a toy is developmentally appropriate is perhaps a good exercise, but really, if you are the type of parent who worries if a toy is going to help or hinder their neural map, your kids probably have such an advantage already that the difference a toy is going to make is infinitesimal. All of the emphasis on toys in parenting theories—say for example the Waldorf and Montessori philosophies—is interesting and certainly valuable, but those authors never considered how much anxiety they could provoke in a neurotic mother.

And then, after all of this mental anguish about providing a stimulating and fun learning environment, after all of this observation, careful tracking of their cognitive development via play, after all of that, it turns out that the toys are essentially laced with poison. And then, if you are frantic about heavy metals poisoning your kids, and you tend to be a bit on the extreme side (some might refer to it as the all or nothing approach), you cull everything that might have been painted in China.

After the first wooden toy painted in China scare, I removed everything that might have been painted, but I left the plastic things—I still cannot tell when plastic has been painted. This left us with a seriously reduced number of toys.

Neither child even noticed.

I mentioned the issue to Ava, because she had been given some jewelry and I told her that she could not keep it. When questioned, I simply told her why. Some may chafe at the idea of being so forthright with a four-year old, but she is just the sort of kid that has to know exactly why something is happening. Telling her some fib or worse yet, some fairy tale to explain it gets you nowhere. She looks at you with “yeah, right” and then continues with her line of questioning. Now, wherever we go, she asks if something is made in China. This is probably going to embarrass me someday, but I am glad that she understands, because I can say “no, we cannot have that, because it may not be safe.” In turn, I promise not to abuse that and tell her that we cannot buy ice cream because it might have been made in China. Too easy.

Then I had to remove almost all of the remaining toys for Ava’s birthday, partly to make room, and partly to protect them from the flock of preschoolers I invited into our home. After her birthday, I kept putting off the toy restocking, glancing at them piled in the basement, thinking, I really need to take care of this, but not having any need because most of our days were spent outside. And as the days went by, I noticed that the kids were not missing them. They do spend most of their time outside, where it must be said there are TONS of toys—rakes and shovels and buckets and so on—that are in heavy rotation. I am not sure what would have happened if this experiment had taken place in the winter. However, when they were inside, they would do one of several things: art, run around with some crazy made up game using whatever props they could find (fly swatters, empty boxes, ribbon, dress up clothes) or no props at all, play intently with some of the toys that did remain, or flip through books.

The toys/playthings that I kept upstairs were all of the stuffed animals, all of the dress-up clothes, the wooden barn with little horse figurines, the cash register, a plastic bus and a little wagon, the tent, the blocks, all of our books, the games, and some indestructible things that live in the toybox—too tedious to list—basically little things. But essentially, that was it. And they have been perfectly happy. I did get the little scooters that they love, and the little grocery carts back out of the basement. Those are big favorites.

What I have realized is that they have finally reached the age where art supplies, books, puzzles, games and props are really all that is needed for HOURS of fun. When they were little, most of those things were not an option, and those that were an option were dropped after the small-child-attention-span limit of fifteen minutes. You add up the fifteen minute stretches in a 14-hour period and you find yourself needing 56 toys. And you had better hope that some of those 56 toys have lights and music and buttons and all of the things that violate the ‘simple is better’ rule. Between the ages of 0 days and 2 years, anything—ANYTHING—that stops crying meets the criteria of being a wonderful toy.

But now that their imaginations have been launched, it is all different. Toys are great, obviously, but the type and quantity necessary is totally different. A few caterpillars in a box with dirt, moss, and a few rocks (otherwise known as a terrarium, I think) occupies Ava for hours. One small stuffed horse and a roll of curling ribbon (closely monitored) has occupied Ava for two weeks now. And blocks are all Carter needs for the afternoon, especially now that he has stopped chucking them at the sliding glass door. Granted, they have each other, and they do a pretty good job of playing together, and that helps a lot, but if we are inside, they are either pretending or creating.

This is a good lesson to have been forced upon us by the free market. I hate the way in which it occurred, and it absolutely kills me that companies and countries are blithely risking our children’s health in the name of profit, but I really don’t see any other solution other than to keep my kid’s environment simple and local. At least they don’t seem to mind.