Carter has just fallen asleep for his morning nap, and he doing that unbelievably cute scrunchy-bottom thing where they tuck their knees underneath them and stick their bottom up in the air. This is the first time he has ever done it (or at least that I have witnessed). So cute.

This morning Ava and Carter woke up at the same time, and she was pretty groggy, but open to the idea that I had to change his poopy diaper instead of snuggling with her, so she stumbled out into the living room with me where Peter was perusing the computer. He looked at her and said “good morning kiddo” or something like that, and she stomped her foot and said “DON”T say that Daaaaaaaaaaadddy! I am still sleepy and I have to nurse!” This roughly translates to “don’t speak to me until I have my coffee!”

Yesterday she slept til 8AM though and woke up all sunshine-y and pleasant. She has officially given up her nap, and as a result has become a connoisseur of sleep. All around this is a net positive, despite some rough awakenings. Naps were just a big old pain for both of us, as far as I am concerned. It was a battle, both to go to sleep and to wake up, not to mention the scheduling nightmare. And then it was 40 minutes at most, so it is not like I am really missing out on quiet time.

So, Rose (the dog) draws the line at eating boogers. She relishes a good frozen turd (both of the feline and canine variety), but will not eat Ava’s mucous. Go figure.

We went to Little Dippers yesterday—this is a very fun and very crunchy gathering of moms and tots (sometimes a dad), and it all went well. It is basically a structured playgroup, with circle time in the beginning where we sing songs, then free play for the kids and some sort of crafty project for the adults. I usually bow out of this part, since I am just not all that crafty and I do not like demonstrating exactly how unevenly I sew. Free play is always fun but slightly dangerous. The program is based on the Waldorf philosophy where natural materials are used for making the toys and a lot of them are a bit amorphous, so as to cultivate the imagination. This means a lot of wooden toys. Plus a few logs (I am serious) and a lot of silk scarves and some cloth dolls. The danger is in the wooden part of the experience. They make good (intentional and unintentional) weapons. More than one child has emerged with a huge knot on their head. Plastic looks pretty good to me. After free play the bread dough comes out, and the kids get to mold it into little rolls, eating most of it in the process and getting ridiculously covered in flour. This is Ava’s absolute favorite part. She will park her bottom in a little chair at the table as soon as circle is over and wait quietly and patiently for the bread to be ready, occasionally approaching Vanessa (the teacher) to ask her if the bread is ready. She totally ignores all of the action around her, and would sit there for a half hour if I did not tempt her with the play iron and ironing board. She can usually be convinced to play house. After making the bread and washing up, there is more free time and then we have a snack of cooked bread with butter (another favorite) and closing circle. There were no huge dramas yesterday, save for little Lena’s assertion of her dominance over all of the kids. She is having some aggression issues, and walked around to each boy and clunked them on the head, causing a domino effect of crumpled toddlers yowling and holding their heads. She then spared Ava the clunking, perhaps in gender solidarity, but did not let her off entirely, grabbing a fistful of Ava’s hair. This was not the first time she did this, having once attacked her at tumbling, and fortunately Ava was a bit prepared and dodged the worst of it. I hate to be judgmental, since I know a lot of kids go through this, but it is a bit frustrating.

We then drove home and I realized that I had very nearly overheated my car. Thank god we were at home and not on the side of the road.

Ava is watching Sesame Street, despite my recent frustration with PBS. I know that I should not get mad at public television, but I am. I do not appreciate the rescheduling that they did, moving Sesame Street to the middle of the morning, thereby rendering my “we don’t watch TV after 9 AM” rule obsolete. This was all done to accommodate a new show that has the prized 8:30 AM spot: “It’s a Big Big World” -- this is a show about the natural world, and by all accounts is pretty good—it is aesthetically pleasing, has a good concept in that all these wild animal puppets are all in a big tree talking about zoology/biology, but there is just one thing that bothers me. The lead character is a sloth. Not only that, he is a stoner sloth. He looks, talks, and dances for all the world like, well, a total pothead. He has the “I’m wasted and am going to float and spin slowly around with my arms out to the side” dance down, has a sort of half-baked expression, and greets his television audience with “heyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy.” Nothing against pot smokers—generally they are pretty nice people, but I am just not too keen on having one as my child’s role model. And he is a SLOTH to boot! Could we have a more, um, active animal? A monkey perhaps? There is a really cute tree frog on the show, why couldn’t he have been the M.C.? At least he jumps around.

We are off to tumbling today. Ava looks really cute—she decided that she wanted to wear a scarf around her head, and so she looks like a little swiss milkmaid. She was intrigued by the concept of braids, but decided that this was too much interaction with a brush, and opted for just the scarf.