no pictures because:

--my camera-to-computer cord is missing. Again. The last person I saw with it was O, while I was on the phone last week and didn’t have much time to monitor whether he minded me when I told him to go put that back.

O has always been one of those kids who is into everything. Even when he was just barely standing unassisted he was finding keys and trying to stick them into locks, putting small toys into the heating grates, reaching waaaaay under the couch for some tiny forgotten choking hazard. I suspect that he has a bit of an engineer in him, wanting to understand how things are put together so that someday he might be able to put them together himself instead of just take them apart. I see much evidence in this with his current Lego fascination, and I think he’ll be very happy when his rather good fine-motor skills start to catch up to his vision. One of his quirks is the habit he has of moving objects to unknown-except-to-him locations, and while occasionally entertaining, it more often drives us a bit nuts. He’s been doing this since he could crawl. I find my toothbrush in a kitchen drawer, my underwear in the bathtub and a bra around his neck (the drawer is in the hallway next to the bathroom), and my keys in my shoes. We lose important items for days at a time until O wanders into the room with whatever was missing, oddly mute when we ask him from where it was retrieved.

N, for his part, is more likely to grab things from high places simply for the feat of figuring out to get to them. He moves along the kitchen counters on his tippy-toes, craning his neck for something interesting. If he knows we’re watching, he’ll refrain from actually grabbing (“I’m not being grabby, Mama, I’m not!”), but instead request something or make some justification for why he needs it. He’s very aware of what he needs permission to do, and while he crosses that line at times, he’s more likely by now to say, “may I” and request things verbally, though sometimes with a hand already reaching towards what he would like to have in his possession. I was seriously trying to get used to the idea that we might be facing a childhood of children that need very close supervision, but these days, I am more likely to know where my toothbrush is, and less likely to find boys on top of the kitchen table or destroying something than was the case of few months ago, and this is a relief.

Still, there are exceptions. Yesterday, I was looking all over for a hairbrush or a comb. O asked what I was doing. I told him, and as N wandered by, he said, “You could take a comb from a chicken, Mama!” They both giggled for a long while at that one, and even harder when I asked which chicken I should hold upside down to comb my hair with. Later, I found the hairbrush in one of my boots.

Both boys are doing very well. They have been a lot more fun to live with lately, after a couple of months where both J and I were regularly having some pretty frustrated days with both of them. They love to draw, craft, and watercolor right now, but their very favorite thing seems to be talking. Rhyming, singing, describing, arguing, yelling, whispering, talking, talking, talking. In two weeks, I will take off for a weekend solitary retreat like I did last year. While I truly love to hear my boys explore language and all its joys and particulars, the silence will be welcome.

O has had a bad cold that started with a high fever, but is slogging fairly happily through it. I did get some extremely unwelcome news yesterday: It turns out that we are on the waiting list at our chosen preschool after all, though we are at the very top 1 and 2 slots. We’d received some verbal reassurance last month that we were “in”, but as it turns out, there were an unprecedented amount of returning families that wanted 5 days for next year. The coordinator was extremely apologetic, and said there is hope, but it means that our fear has come true: we may not know what the situation is until the end of the summer. It is possible that we may not get in at all, or that only one will, which essentially means neither. We have a call in to look at one more not-so-in-demand school, but most of the deadlines for any schools have passed, and I just don’t know what we’ll do if we don’t get in anywhere. For previously stated reasons, I think that two years of preschool would be a good thing for our boys, both as twins and as individuals. I am a little like N in not liking change and uncertainty, so this is all just a little bit torturous.

love and loss

I wrote the following post over a couple of days, before I received some terribly sad news today. When I got home from work this afternoon, I opened my in-box to find an e-mail from our pastor to the whole congregation. If you live in the Fargo area, as I know a few of you do, you may have heard that a pedestrian was struck and killed there today as he was walking along a road. That pedestrian was Mike Schr*ock, a long-time member of our small church. He was struck by a car and killed as he was walking from his hotel to his mom's house in Fargo, where he had been visiting with his family to be with his mom after his Dad's own untimely and unexpected death. The Sund*seth family members that were on the Boundary Waters trip we took a several years ago might remember meeting him when we ran into him and another couple of church men portaging on a lake in the middle of nowhere along with the church's middle school youth. He was the blond guy with the huge grin that yelled, "Heeeey! Min*ke!" when he first spotted our group. Mike and his wife Erin had two kids in college. He was young, and healthy, and full of life, full of commitment to God and to his family, full of love for the outdoors and soccer and probably lots of other things I don't even know about. They are an incredibly close-knit family, and a big part of our church. I hope that we can do a good job of supporting the family in the ways that they will need us to. It is just so unbelievably sad, I can't seem to wrap my head around it; I just kept wishing I could shut the computer and start over and have that terrible message not be there. Our pastor is with the family. I am also a bit concerned for her, as she herself lost three members of her family when a boat capsized less than 2 years ago. This must bring an awful lot of very difficult memories back for her. The world doesn't seem to make a whole lot of sense today, but I do believe that Mike is with God.

Since this post has a lot in it about how much I love my kids, I suppose it isn't inappropriate to post. Just know that I also dearly love my husband and the rest of my family, and that I'm grateful for every day they are a part of my life!

___________________________________

Oh, I am so in love with my kids right now. They are an awfully big handful at times, maddening even, but my goodness, are they sweet, and the conversations they have with us and with each other just kill me. They are kind of obsessed with rhyming right now, and poems are a favorite. They nonsense rhyme everything, and when they hit upon a real rhyme of two actual words, they are delighted with themselves. We are one language-obsessed family, it would seem. Besides that, what I especially love lately is watching these little glimpses of maturity start to emerge. They can be very polite sometimes, with us and with strangers, and I can’t help but think that this unprompted politeness might become more frequent in the future. Whether it was the 15^th or the 16^th million reminder that did it, we’ll never know, and maybe it’s fleeting, but whatever it is, it’s wonderful and an added reinforcement to our efforts to teach them some manners. Sometimes a stern “no tantrums!” while looking a boy in the eye actually works, before I lead him to the nursery and tell him to have it there or not at all. And the sweetness—these little glimpses of emerging empathy that catch me by surprise and make me swoon with a mixture of pride and relief. I hadn’t realized what a joy this would be—to see your extremely self-focused two-year-old suddenly be able to put himself in another’s shoes a little. After a few years of intense one-way empathy, it is like water in the desert to receive an “it’s OK, mama, let me kiss it for you” after stubbing your toe.

This age, combined with certain issues of temperament, definitely has its difficulties, and I’m pretty darn sure they’re not going to magically go away when they turn 3 in a few weeks. As I was reminded yesterday, when we had to swim in a different pool because the leisure pool at the Y was unexpectedly closed, the boys are fairly good at remembering the rules and sticking to them, but they still lack the ability to reliably generalize a set of rules from one situation to another. At this age, it’s still more about rule-following than actual good judgment. They know, for instance, that they can’t climb in and out of the leisure pool or run on their way into it, but in the new setting, it was like starting all over. It’s easy to forget that and get into the trap of assuming that they should just “get it” and behave in a new situation without our outlining our expectations. Our Early Childhood teacher says that this is a real benefit of the maturing three-year-old, having that ability to generalize from one place to another better. I can’t wait. Hopefully the boys will be a bit further along in this a few months from now when we take them to the Netherlands.

I think O is really only starting to hit the tantrum phase, and my goodness, can he pull out all the stops sometimes. He had a tantrum last week that left him hoarse for the whole next day. We ignore him completely when he does this, since his tantrums are pretty clearly of the attention-seeking, I waaaaaan’t something sort, and I’m pretty sure that’s helping keep his fits to a minimum, as he’ll often stop when he realizes we’re not paying any attention to his drama. Nonetheless, they’re still happening some no matter what we do or don’t do. This may get better once he’s better able to manage getting through the day without a nap. When he’s better rested, he’s really very charming, all smiles with a sing-songy way of talking that cracks me up constantly. O loves structured group activities, the very thing that tends to be hard for N, and for this reason, we’ve enrolled just him in a tumbling class at our neighborhood rec center on Mondays. He loves it, and hams it up for the whole class with his enthusiastic dancing and competent somersaults. It is such a joy to watch him thrive in a setting like this when he used to have a hard time with gross motor stuff before going on preventative asthma medication. Now he’s not only running well, he’s actually quite good at the stuff they do in class. J and I take turns taking him, and get to then spend some time alone with once boy each week.

N, for his part has an intense need for control that isn’t all part of being two – by now it’s pretty obvious that this is a part of his temperament. He really doesn’t like change or uncertainty, and he deals with that by becoming rigid and resisting transitions. This tendency isn’t always obvious while he’s in the midst of whatever new or different thing, but he tends to fall apart later. At times, this can be very challenging to deal with for both J and I, but we are learning. We’ve been even more consistent with him—this is just absolutely essential with N—and trying to make sure that we don’t throw too much new stuff at him at once. With N, a new person and a new place would be a double whammy that’s guaranteed to leave him upset and difficult to manage, so we would never, for instance, have a babysitter take him someplace he’s never been before. As he gets older, we’ll do our best to help him learn some strategies to deal with change and transitions, and even now, we try to get him to stretch his comfort level and learn to become more flexible. I predict that preschool may be a rocky adjustment for him at first, but the small, nurturing place we’ve selected should be a help with this too. I think that having two full years of preschool will be good for him in learning to better handle transitions and change within a group before the demands of kindergarten.

N also has so many strengths—he’s very imaginative, expresses himself well and clearly, and learns easily. If he’s in his element, he’s generally a delight. He has a tendency to overly direct his brother, and O isn’t putting up with much of that right now. O put up with N’s bossiness without much complaint for months, so this has been a bit of a blow to N’s sense of how things ought to be between them. Sometimes he’s using some great language to try to negotiate with O, and it’s a lot of fun to watch them try to figure it out. He’ll say “O, maybe I will have that in a minute, OK?” About 5 seconds will go by, and then N will say, “O: It is almost a minute, I think.” Two more seconds go by. “OK, it is a minute, so I need that now, please.” O usually relents, but sometimes he runs away. When they fight, it usually amounts to some verbal sparring (and O tends to know exactly how to get N going, telling N to his horror for instance, that he not only wants the yoghurt in N’s bowl, but also the yoghurt in his tummy that N already ate!) or some pulling at a toy they can’t figure out how to share. They thankfully don’t get terribly physical with each other, and their motivation to get along and play together is larger than their frustrations with each other by a long mile. What’s changed recently is that they’re able to really hurt each other’s feelings. Along with this new skill is a realization that they don’t really want to hurt each other’s feelings—part of that emerging empathy—and sometimes they’re very sweet in trying to make things right with each other. The other day, they spent about ten minutes just cuddling together on the couch, giggling and hugging.

One area where our boys are very different is in how they give and prefer to receive affection. I remarked to J the other day that O seems to need as much affection as he demands and N seems to need as much as he puts up with. O demands and gives a lot of affection. I don’t mind that at all—it’s pretty easy to cuddle O whenever he asks for it, and he’s a sweet little hugger and kisser. He’s not usually whiny about it. N’s needs are a little harder to meet. I know instinctively that N needs lots of hugs and reassurance too, but N’s intense need for control often trumps his drive to ask for affection. I’ve always been fairly conscious of this with him, making sure we cuddle when we read books, that I pick him up for hugs and kisses, or rub his shoulders when I talk to him. If I don’t do those things, it shows – he starts pushing at me with his head, or getting wild and uncooperative. Finally, though, at almost-three, he seems to be maturing enough to ask to have his needs met when he wants affection, and this is a bit of a relief. When I drop him off at MOPS (which isn’t easy for him because it’s two whole hours only every other week, not quite often enough for him to really get comfortable with the routine), he tells me he needs two hugs and a kiss, and that the second hug should be a really, really big one. No problem—I am so proud of him when he takes care of himself in this way instead of just getting tense and falling apart later.

Every night now at bedtime, he says quietly, “rock me a little minute”, and we rock in the rocker in his room for a few minutes while I sing him a hymn or two. To be able to do this, I put N in his room after story-time and tell him I’ll be right back, go upstairs to put O down, and then come back onto N’s room, at which point he’s usually sitting on the edge of his bed waiting, sitting on his hands with his little legs swinging back and forth. This time together is so special for both of us, his whole long-limbed body draping over me as I sing to him, both of us relaxing at the end of whatever kind of day we’ve had. The boys are getting so big, barely both fitting into my lap together at story time, me having to regularly remind them to move their heads further apart so I can actually see the book. These might be the last months I ever rock a child of my own at bedtime, and I’m happy to oblige. Since he rarely naps now, O has been asleep within minutes of his early bedtime, but he just wants an “extra-long-big hug” while sitting on my lap, his head on my shoulder, arms around my neck. Somehow, the time of day that was very difficult a couple of months ago (and still often is, until we get everyone into pj’s) has become one of the best parts of my day.

Since the boys were about 18 months old, I’ve said the same thing to them as they clamber up onto a knee each, ready to listen to the 3 or 4 stories and several poems we read together before bedtime each night. I say “this is the favorite part of my day, sitting here with my boys”. They love hearing it, and wait for me to say it or remind me if I forget. Last night, as I was rocking N, he said, “this is the favorite part of my day, rocking here with my mama” and then giggled at his own cleverness. My heart melted into a puddle on the floor, and I’ve been trying to put it back where it belongs ever since.

how we play

The boys are still really, really into puzzles, and the other day they took it to a new level by figuring out how to do a fair bit of the ABC train puzzle on their own. Sometimes O sang the ABC song to figure out the next letter to find--not an error-proof method quite yet-- and N tended to look more at the box, but it was really amazing to see them trying to figure it out. There's some confusion about the uppercase and lowercase letters sometimes, but they know most of them pretty well, and they're starting to figure out a few of the sounds. Yesterday, O said "M is for Mama, and moose, and mouse!" Interestingly, N knew all of them by the time he turned 2, then forgot many of them due to general disinterest for about 6 months, and now knows most of them again. They both know all their colors really well, and can count a little, but are not very interested in numbers right now. I don't know if they can recognize any of them except 2 and 3. They are able to group by three or four, though - as in, they can give you between 1 and 4 blocks if you ask for an amount of 4 or under.




We went to our favorite train store on Saturday, followed by Chinese food at the restaurant next door.

N was kind of getting pushed around by a little boy of about 4, and he said "excuse me, please". The boy said "you don't say that to kids, just grown-ups!" I later told him quietly that this is not actually the case!




Omie, aren't you proud of how N is learning to view the merchandise with his hands behind his back? This was a cardinal rule when I was growing up, mostly because my mother had a tendency to frequent antiques stores. I distinctly remember informing my mother that I was old enough to be allowed access to my own hands in a store.




The boys were great in the restaurant - here O was playing with his reusable Tho*mas the Train sticker kit. I cannot believe how much mileage we've gotten out of this little kit. It has two picture boards and re-positionable stickers, and the boys play with it in church and whenever we have to wait anywhere for a long time. They have all kinds of conversations about what's going on in the picture.



We ordered enough for 8 people somehow, and I didn't have to cook the following night either. Heaven!

By the way: O tested "equivocal" for peanuts at age one (when both boys were also tested for celiac disease, which I and my mother have), and so we've been holding off on peanuts. The AAP recently changed its recommendations about holding off on potentially allergenic foods, so now that O is well and while J and I were both home in case anything went wrong, we tried peanuts on both boys today. No symptoms of any kind. I'm so relieved about this, because peanuts are a nasty, dangerous allergy, and it can really limit where you can go and what you can do with your kids. So, no celiac, and no peanut allergies, and while N was indifferent, O seemed to love a good old peanut butter sandwich.

winter fun

No*ah likes to drag his brother around by the corded glove that dangles from his jacket. Oli*ver put up with this once, even allowing N to drag him four blocks to the library that way once, but recently he said "you will have to pull on your own gloves now, No*ah."


The boys had great fun making Daddy a berf-day sign a couple of weeks ago.


True to form, N was quite unhappy that there was "goo" on his fingers.


Daddy was very pleased with his sign, as well as the soap and aftershave he received.


And the "berfday hug".


On the first warm day in ages that we haven't had a pollution advisory, I took the boys to our favorite nearby Nature Center. We've had a lot of pollution advisories here lately, mainly because there's so much snow on the ground, and when the temperature gets above the freezing point it creates a lot of evaporation that keeps the pollution stuck in the air if there isn't a lot of wind. Unfortunately, O's asthma diagnosis has been down-graded to "severe", and that also means that he's really affected by the pollution. So for the last month, it's been either too cold to go out, or too polluted. The boys were kind of unsure what to do outside after nearly a month of going only to and from the car, but they soon got into it, and walked about half a mile before getting back into the jogging stroller.






I don't have any pictures of it, but a really kind woman stopped by and talked with us and pointed out different animal tracks to the boys. They were really excited about this, especially the fox track. They're still talking about it.


Having a hearty snack in the stroller after their walk. I was worn out myself after our walk - it's not easy pushing 70 pounds plus the weight of the stroller in the snow, even in a jogger.


We warmed up in the interpretive center. The only not-so-great part about that was N running into the men's room, and me having to try to figure out how to retrieve him. I was really nervous about going in there and having some guy be standing at the urinal. He did eventually come out when I yelled for him, and when he had a time-out underneath a case of stuffed birds, he said "Mama does not have permission to go in that bathroom. Those birdies say I didn't make a good choice to go in there. "

for my mom only

This won't be of any interest to most of you, but I just bought this chair at Saver's for $7.50. I'm wondering if my mother, the former antiques dealer, can tell me anything about it, and I figured the easiest way to get her a bunch of decent pictures to look at without sending her a bunch of huge files was just to post them here. The chair is worn, and has had a couple of unfortunate repairs, but I wonder how old it is. I could be totally wrong, but it looks rather old to me. in any case, it's very comfortable, it fits well in our living room,and it was $7.50! I'm going to sell the little (rather uncomfortable) 1920's Mission rocker we had on Craig's List for the $100 we bought it for.

I promise my next post will be more interesting!









Look, no gum!

itchy for Spring

N also had a little Only Boy time the other day, since he got sick next. I gave him some snow to play with in the bathtub, and he really liked it. We missed church on Sunday because they were too sick, but they received a visit from Grandma and Grandpa to break up the monotony.




On Tuesday, we walked all the way to the library and back. It was a pretty warm day for once.


N calls this table at the library his "desk", and he calls the library "my library".


Daddy is much better at playing "dump twuck" than Mama is.







Yesterday, we were leaving to go to our Early Childhood class, and O noticed that a bird had pooped on our car. He said "Dat birdie should not do dat! Dat is wude!" N responded, "Dat birdie should not be awowed to poop again until he apowagizes!"

This weekend should be fun - we're going to the Railway Museum in St. Paul on Saturday, and J and I are going out to dinner to celebrate his birthday (which was today) on Saturday night. It's going to be really cold again, though. I am so very, very sick of winter. The boys have been particularly cranky and difficult lately, probably due to illness, and we all feel a bit cooped up, I think. It's been an especially cold and snowy winter, and I'm itchy for the first signs of Spring, still weeks away.

preschool? already?

We just signed up for our last trimester of Early Childhood Classes and have been busy visiting preschools. One of those milestones that is often different for families with multiples is that of enrolling in and attending preschool. Minneapolis is no New York or LA—things are still fairly relaxed here, there are a lot of decent affordable options and “interviews” or waiting lists that start at birth are almost unheard of. The really in-demand places do lotteries, the rest do some version of first-come-first-serve. Still, to even get in the lotteries, you have to start touring the January before in order to apply in time. The stakes are high when you need two spots at once.

We had some ideas about what we wanted: play-based, nurturing, a school that would be a positive first school experience for our boys to start out in together. We suspect that we will choose to separate the boys for kindergarten, so we want a place that will be sensitive to preparing them for that, by encouraging them to branch out from each other a little. We weren't set in stone on a particular philosophy, but we did want a place that had a decent child/teacher ratio and did some goal-setting with each child.

We visited a Nature Center Preschool that I thought would be perfect, but it was quite a drive, and then, through a friend, we heard about an neighborhood preschool that is run as a co-op, is right in our neighborhood, and is known by word-of-mouth only. Compared to the Nature Center school, this school wasn’t much to look at. There were no adorable statues of children as you come in, no airy skylights or expensive wooden toys and no parent lounge with fireplace and WiFi, just a church building lobby and a marked door to the preschool room. Inside, though, the place had a cheerful and orderly coziness. There were lots of collaborative and individual projects on the wall, all different interpretations of a theme. The toys were well-worn and even dated, but the spaces were organized in an inviting, kid-friendly way. The teachers were warm, and had a friendly, easygoing manner with the boys. One of them has been there 17 years, and is clearly beloved by both the parents and the students, and I also really liked the teacher that has only been there for one. The boys seemed right at home. It was clear that while this preschool is definitely “play-based”, the teachers also do a lot of work to help kids learn to function in a group setting, get along together, actively work on some of the concepts they’re starting to be able to understand. Because it’s a co-op, the teachers are very well taken care of and don’t have to do much administrative work. The parents do all that, through monthly all-parent meetings, committees, and individual volunteer positions. Because of the co-op model, this preschool is also quite cheap. I liked the schedule they keep – adding an extra half-hour to the day for a couple of parents to watch kids at the attached playground so that kids can burn off a little energy before coming in and parents don’t have to turn around and come right back by the time they get home. On the way out, we ran into Lisa, our local librarian, who had wonderful things to say about sending her little boy there.

My head was spinning as we left. Here I’ve been researching this at least a little since the summer after the boys’ birth, and I go and fall in love with a preschool that’s a mile from my house, which I didn’t even know existed until a few days prior. The Co-op Preschool was supposed to be a possible back-up for the Nature Center Preschool, but we actually felt like it might be an even better place to send the boys. We put in an application, but didn’t get any promises about the possibility of our getting in.

That was a month ago. We had another couple of possibilities to check out, but I thought it was likely that we’d apply at the Nature Center Preschool and at the Co-op. we looked at two more schools, both nice, but not in the neighborhood. I kept thinking about N, who has a pretty tough time with separation and transitions. I’m not sure he’d really like being driven across town to an unfamiliar neighborhood and dropped off somewhere, versus being biked somewhere and running into his buddies, both adult and pint-sized, from Early Childhood classes, our church, the library, and our local Y. He’s the kind of kid who has an early appreciation for context and community, because they help him feel safe and connected. And the more I thought about that, the more I thought about the fact that most of us have some flavor of that need, the need to feel like we live within a village. The longer I live here and participate in all the places there are to bring little people, the more I run into the same likable loosely connected tribe of folks who are also bringing up little kids around here. That's a wonderful feeling. I am not daunted by the idea of putting in some volunteer hours at a co-op preschool, especially if I can bring my kids and get to know more parents right in my neighborhood while I’m doing it.

I was still worried about whether we’d get in to either of those schools though, and I thought maybe it was time to visit some more neighborhood-based preschools near us to see if there might be any other neighborhood gems to have as a back-up. I had a few leads—a big school with several classrooms that a lot of kids we know in the neighborhood go or have gone to, and a couple of tiny church schools.

We visited one of the tiny one-classroom schools this morning. I can honestly say that I’d rather my kids didn’t do any preschool than go there. My goodness, this school was depressing. The place was operated with military precision, with every minute scripted out, kids spending tons of time being drilled in letters and numbers, being told exactly what to do and how, standing on little of pieces of tape in the gym, doing calisthenics, and following directions every minute. Predictably, for the entire 5 minutes the kids were allowed to have “free play” in the gym, they screamed their bloody heads off. They had no art on the classroom walls, just a whole lot of those kit punch-outs about what season we’re in. There were maybe 15 books in the room, and no art easels. When I asked about art, the director told me that they don’t do art per se, they do crafts, and that the purpose of doing it was to teach sequences of steps. As in, there’s one way to do it, and only one way. The teacher’s assistant had a whistle around her neck, and a manner that she seemed to consciously soften for our benefit when she notices we were listening.

On the way home, we told the boys that they will not be going to school there. I was so frustrated at that point. We’d already looked at five schools. Nature Center Preschool was out, because they have it set up that you can only apply if it’s your first choice, since they let you know in March and expect the deposit a week later. We could not worry about it and apply at one of the less in-demand schools in late Spring or early summer if Co-op Preschool doesn’t come through with two spots, but the waiting list slots only come up one at a time. What if only one boy got in, or we were left hanging for weeks? Does it really need to be this complicated? I’ve met a twin mom whose daughter was accepted in May and whose son didn’t get in until the first week in September. They had to spend the whole summer worrying about it.

When I got home, I called the parent from the Co-op preschool just to get an idea of where on the waiting list we stood. “Oh, you’re in!” she said right away. “I was just waiting to call you to see if I could get In*grid (my friend Carrie’s daughter) and your boys in on the same days." We don’t know about that part yet, and it would be nice if Carrie and I ran into each other there regularly and maybe even carpooled, but we know we’re in, and we are so relieved.

And I am so glad not to have to think about any of this for a while anymore. If you’ve read this far, you probably are too.

Only Boy

Oli*ver woke up from his nap with a high fever yesterday. Jo*el took No*ah to the Global Ma*rket to get us all some food and run off a little of N's abundant energy, and I stayed home with O. He was kind of miserable, but happy enough to lay around with books and puzzles.

If you look closely, you'll see that a little chocolate cookie didn't hurt either. Did you know that at our Early Childhood classes, we mamas are all total hypocrates? For the kids we bring things like sliced apples, peapods, cheese cubes and whole wheat crackers. For each other? Bundt cake. Oreos. M&M's. Bottles of Dr. Pepper. So far, nobody has brought wine, at least.

Initially, O was pretty happy to have the bathtub all to himself, but then he got the chills, and I got him out and gave him some Tylenol.

This morning, Grandpa picked up N and brought him swimming, and I got to hang out with my "only boy" (as they put it when I have only one with me) for most of the morning. We had a nice time together, and I got three loads of laundry folded, the vacuuming, and some e-mailing done. We also went to the library in the "only boy stroller", and replaced one heap of books with another. O stayed in the stroller the whole time so he wouldn't get anyone sick.



O said,"I like to be your Only Boy and be in da Only Boy stroller and go to the Only Boy library" Then, at lunch, he said, "I want to see my No*ah now, please."

N seems to have had a really nice time at the Y and got to see Auntie Em*ily and baby Aug*ust there along with Grandma and Grandpa. At lunch, O said "I was missing you a widdle bit, bruddah." N said, "I was swimming, Oli*ver."

sniff

Sorry it's been so long since I've posted - Oliver ( I suspect) made off with our camera battery, and I've been unable to take pictures for a few weeks. I just found it in a drawer, and I'm snapping away, so I'll get some nice pictures up soon.

Meanwhile, a few of you have met my parents' wonderful black lab, Jake, and I have some sad news about him. Here is the e-mail my mom sent out this morning:

Dear All,

We have some very sad news to share with you.
Yesterday afternoon we had to put our dear Jake to sleep.
After starting the year as his usual energetic and enthusiastic self (see
picture taken on New years Day),in recent weeks he started limping on his
right front leg. When we had this checked out further by specialists and to
our shock we were informed that he was suffering from a very aggressive and
irreversible form of bone cancer.
There were no dignified options for our friend and we had to make a very
difficult decision. Jake had a wonderful life almost to the end.
Of course we will miss him dearly and cherish fond memories of a great
hunting dog and family dog, of how he loved the farm and his friends in the
park and of what a warm and thankful companion he was..

Hein and Elisabeth.

Jake was ten years old. He was one of those dogs that everyone just falls in love with, and he made friends wherever he went, whether it be in upstate New York or the Upper West Side of Manhatten. He had this big, beautiful head, and he'd just lay it on your lap and look up at you. He was very calm and gentle, even for a lab, and wanted nothing more than to run around outside and be with his people.

RIP, Jakey.

Christmas 2007

We had a really nice Christmas in Minn*apolis this year. J’s family opens gifts and shares a meal on Christmas Eve. On Christmas Eve morning, I left the boys with J and went over to his parents' house to do some major cooking. It was very relaxing to spend several hours cooking without interruption. We enjoyed a huge, amazing meal together, and opened gifts for the kids afterwards. J and I spent some time beforehand rehearsing the "giving" part as well as the getting, and they were pretty good about saying thank you.

(I totally stole the picture above from cousin Au*gust's blog) Auntie Mea*gan made the boys beautiful kid-sized aprons. They do a lot of cooking with us, and they're always wanting to wear mine. Here they're unpacking some train table additions.

I was glad that they were so grateful for their wonderful gifts, because they’re capable of being brutally honest by now. The other day, N said, “Oh! We read this book at MOPS!” I said, “You did?”, and he answered, “I didn’t like it then either.” Well….

It was so nice to do everything in one place and not have too much running around. There were four kids under age three, and everyone stayed happy. The meal was amazing. I made three dishes and everyone else brought something, and there were so many delicious dishes on the table that not everyone even got to try them all. Before dinner, we put together some bags of groceries for the food shelf and J said a prayer for all the folks who don’t have enough when we have so much abundance. The boys sat pretty long and happily to eat, though on opposite ends of a table that was as full of people as it could possible be. After dinner, the boys got quite a pile of gifts, and all the gifts were thoughtful and useful. Floor puzzles are very popular right now and they now have 4, and they received some nice train set additions and books. J had to go and play piano at church for the candlelight service at 7:30, and I went home to put a couple of very content, very exhausted boys to bed.

On the way into the house, the three of us stopped and stood in the front yard to look at the just-past-full moon, which had a beautiful ring around it. It was completely silent except for our breathing, there were Christmas lights on all up and down the block, smoke coming out of the chimneys, everything covered with thick, white snow. After I got their pajamas on, we read three nativity story books before bed, and from what he was saying, I think that O seemed to really kind of get it for the first time – at least that Jesus was the Son of God and that he grew up and did amazing things. He said, “That Baby Jesus is gonna get bigger and growed-up and he’s gonna walk on the water and he’s gonna give everybody bread and fishes!”

The next morning, we had a nice breakfast together, and opened a few gifts. J and I didn’t get them much, and besides a few books, the biggest hit was a pair of $3 mini Magna Doodles for in the car. J and I both took boys shopping for each other the week before so that the boys wouldn’t think Christmas was only about getting stuff, and that worked surprisingly well. After breakfast, we played with some of their new toys. They love all their new puzzles, and J and the boys have been putting them together every single day.

Then we took a walk in the neighborhood.

A snow angel:

The boys have been playing "David and Goliath" lately. N pretends to throw a rock at O, and O falls over backward, kind of like the Sunday School version of "Ring Around the Rosy".

Here they are acting out a scene from one of their very favorite books, "A Day On the Farm". O is the pig, and N is scratching his back with a stick. O got tired of this game pretty quickly.

These are real Minnesota boys: they don't seem to mind the cold a bit as long as they're well bundled. That evening, our good friend D came by and we lit the fire and had a nice dinner of leftovers together.

Here they are in their new Christmas pajamas.

Happy New Year!