this, that, and some other things

First thing: We took the kids to a pumpkin patch on Sunday and had a really nice time. We took a hayride out to the pumpkin field and all the paying customers got to pick a pumpkin to take home. The only rule was that you had to be able to carry your pumpkin out, so some of the dads hauled out some ridiculously large gourds. I picked out a respectably-sized but not stupid-huge one that MB was nice enough to carry for me, and then we let Nico pick one for himself and one for Elliott. Nico also got to ride in a barrel train and dig in a sandbox full of seeds, so he was happy. Other than having a nice time, my only goal for the day was to get a photo of my cute baby sitting in front of some pumpkins. Accomplished!

Second thing: I don't usually listen to podcasts, but a friend sent me a link to this one and I really enjoyed it and now want to read the book:

99% Invisible: Wild Ones Live

Third thing: Nico has definitely inherited my uncanny knack for memorization and recitation. We checked out a great kids' book of poems about construction equipment, called Digger, Dozer, Dumper from the library. He loves it and can recite the entire book, big words and all. I haven't managed to record him "reading" the whole book yet, but here are two of the pages from last night…when his Ls finally come in someday, I might have a quiet cry over it.



Fourth thing: MB was trimming his hair with clippers in the bathroom earlier tonight while I rocked the baby to sleep in his nursery. From his bedroom in between Nico called out, "Daddy, I have something to tell you! You have been SO brave. You're being so good right now." It's sometimes hilarious to hear our words coming out of his mouth, like the time I gave him a little kid-sized broom and he went to the living room to sweep the floor after sternly telling the baby, "Elliott, stay out of my dirt!"

Fifth thing: I bought this on a bit of a whim at JoAnn at the beginning of the month. It was pretty expensive but then it was on sale for 50% off and I had a coupon for an additional 15% off so I went for it. I'm so very glad I got it because Nico loves it. Each day he flies the little wooden owl around, makes it say "whoo-whoo!" and carefully places it in the new pocket. Then he tells me, "On the last pocket, that's the day we go trick or treat!" I know I've said it before, but holidays are so much more awesome with kids.

Sixth thing: Brothers. Have mercy. 

Reading:  The Dream Thieves by Maggie Stiefvater

Playing:  The King is Dead and Long Live the King by the Decemberists

baby's first road trip

During the summer of 2012 I hit it off with the mom of one of the kids who attended my work's summer camp. Our kids ended up in swimming lessons at the same time at the Y for 12 weeks running this past spring, so we spent a lot of time chatting on the bleachers outside the pool. Their family moved to Indianapolis in May and she insisted that we needed to come up and visit once they were settled. We took the boys the last weekend of September and it was so much fun. It was baby Elliott's first real road trip and he rocked it. We had a four-hour drive each way, and he slept all but thirty minutes each time. He slept well in the strange pack and play in the strange room in the strange house and was chipper and cheerful during our day trips out. All the ponies are now on order for him, so I hope no one else needs any. Unfortunately I didn't get many good pictures of him…since he's still not mobile he spent most of the time in the double stroller or in the Beco attached to me. Nico was awesome, too -- patient and pleasant in the car, well-mannered and polite at our friends' house, friendly to their six- and three-year-old kids.

On Saturday, we spent pretty much the whole day at the zoo. It was really big and really nice and the weather was nearly perfect. Elliott pondered life from the front seat:

Then later he rode along for a nap on the go:

Nico asked to feed the budgerigars in the walk-through aviary and then he actually did it. Trying new things is kind of a big deal for him so this was very exciting for me and MB.

We went back to feed them again later and he got spooked when a greedy one got a little too aggressive and hopped onto his hand, but I'm just so glad that he did it at all. I'm keenly aware these days that Nico is finally at an age where some of the experiences he has might find their way into his long-term memory, so every time something fairly awesome happens I feel like success baby. Also, fattest budgie of all! Hee!

Nico's favorite part of the day was reportedly the dolphin show, which was pretty neat. He kept asking why we couldn't swim in the pool. He was also very interested any time an animal had a big ball or toy in its cage.

Cheetah race:

Oh, just sitting up in a high chair at dinner…no big deal!

Playing with pizza dough:

We went to the children's museum on Sunday, reportedly the largest and best in the world. Unfortunately Nico was exceedingly tired from the day before and we didn't last long. It was really great and we barely scratched the surface of what they had to offer. We spent most of our time in the new, awesome playscape for kids ages 0 - 5. We tried to breeze through the dinosaur exhibit but there was a big docent presentation going on that we knew Nico wouldn't sit still for, so we ended up pointing at some skeletons and then going to to the cafeteria for lunch. One of my favorite moments of the day took place there, as I was carrying the lunch tray across the room with Elliott in the Beco. I had the tray held up as high as I could reach, but he had spotted it and was determined to grab it. So imagine me walking with a baby strapped to me, holding a tray out at arms' length, and the baby stretching his arm up as high as he can, swatting tater tots off the tray one by one. It was fairly hilarious. Luckily one of the employees saw us and took pity and carried the tray the rest of the way for me. I'm already thinking about taking the kids back to Indy, and next time I want to go the the children's museum for our first day / all day adventure.

Nico really hit it off with our friends' little daughter…here they are killing me with cute on the way into the museum:

Water clock:

This real Indy car is parked right in front of the elevators on the playscape level…when Nico saw it he absolutely lit up. It pretty much blew his mind that he was allowed to sit in it.

Seems low to me:

Reading:  Imaginary Girls by Nova Ren Suma

Playing:  The King is Dead and Long Live the King by the Decemberists

since you've been gone

While I'm sure you were all utterly captivated by my scintillating monthly to-do list, I didn't intend to leave that up as the top post for this long. I had a holiday weekend post sitting in drafts that I just flat-out forgot to finish and now it feels a little late for it, but I also don't want to delete it all, so here's a mishmash.

holiday weekend

We ended up with no plans on Saturday of the holiday weekend and used the opportunity to get some errands done. It wasn't the most relaxing thing we could've done, but it wasn't bad. It was too hot to do anything other than hang out inside or move from indoor location to indoor location, so our options for fun would've been limited anyway. MB wanted to get a pair of casual shoes (I hate calling them tennis shoes since we don't play tennis, and I also hate the word sneakers.) since his actual running shoes / trainers died a while back and he only had his huge heavy work boots to wear. I decided since my trainers date back to before I was pregnant with Elliott and have holes in them, I should probably look for a pair, too. I usually buy expensive Saucony shoes from the running store because I'm prone to shin splints at the gym, but since I'm not going to the gym right now I decided to scale down and just buy some comfortable bargain version trainers. I'm sure this will sound like blasphemy to some people, but I don't really care about shoes. It would be nice to have cute shoes or sassy shoes or cool shoes but I have wide feet and toe problems, so I'm pretty much limited to the very few options that fit my feet correctly. Since having my babies, any amount of heel is too much heel. In typical man-shopping fashion, MB found, tried on, and bought one pair of shoes. I tried on three pairs. The pair I liked best didn't fit, the pair I liked second-best wasn't that cute once it was on, and the pair I liked third-best ended up being just fine so I bought those. Nico has two pairs of brand-new shoes in his closet that I had bought on clearance so I'd told him he could look but not buy. But then MB let him try on kid shoes to pass the time while I was trying on my shoes, and we ended up buying him a pair of terribly tacky but somewhat hilariously cute Lightning McQueen shoes. They didn't have a price tag on the box, so we went with the "how expensive could they possibly be?" strategy. We're now afraid to look at the receipt.

Interesting factoid: Nico has never actually watched Cars. We bought the DVD for him shortly after Elliott was born, but it was a little too intense / talky for him and he only got about 20 minutes into it before asking us to turn it off. He loves all the characters, however, thanks to the ubiquitous Disney / Pixar marketing machine. We managed to resist it until he was about three, but he now has Cars stickers, toys, dishes, pajamas, underpants, a Cars backpack, a Lightning McQueen camping chair, and (thanks to clearance rack luck and Goodwill) several Cars T-shirts. Good thing we like Pixar, I guess.

Poor Elliott got diapers and wipes and no shoes at all. I did buy him this adorable T-shirt at Target, though, since it's awesome and Nico would never agree to wear it due to a complete lack of vehicles:

On Sunday we went to a cookout at my cousin's house. Nico got to run around in the yard with my cousins' kids and while he definitely still has some learning to do when it comes to how to play with other children, I'm so happy that he's trying now.

On Monday we did our third annual theme park visit with my friend Julia's family and it was awesome. Nico was eager to go on rides with and without his buddy Nathan and he looooved the water park. I couldn't convince him to try the big kid slides, but once MB decided to join us in the pool I think they were on the slides together about 30 seconds later. They rode the slides nonstop for at least an hour. Nico's favorite thing overall was the antique car ride, just like the past two years. Elliott got to spend the whole day being spoiled by the grandparents and while I missed him, I was glad we decided not to take him with us...it was so hot. Luckily for me, the park added a really swanky nursing room this year. It had air conditioning, rocking chairs, free lockers for breast pumps, a sink, and even a mini fridge for milk. It was fabulous.

Gigantic three-year-old ahoy!

Just because I feel like getting a little teary, let's compare this to Nico of two years ago:

shopping interlude

After a very, very long time away I went to Goodwill this past Sunday with evilducky. This is unheard of, but I found three pairs of jeans (three!) and a pair of cords for myself. I also got a good handful of shirts for Nico, three pairs of nice Nico pants without the knees already half worn through, a pair of Chucks for Nico to grow into, and a pair of sweet, very well-sewn homemade pajamas that I couldn't bear to pass up. They looked like they'd never been worn and it plucked my heartstrings to think of someone's mom or grandma working to make them only for them to end up on a thrift store rack.

baby interlude

Let's check in with baby Elliott who has also become gigantic all of a sudden.

heading off to college

rare (but cute) crankyface

normal state of being

His new thing this week is to make this face while whiffing air in and out his nose. It may actually be the cutest thing ever.

not-a-baby-anymore interlude

My sweet Nico had preschool orientation last week and his first day back to school this week. His classroom is warm and bright and happy, his teacher seems eminently capable of herding a passel of three-year-olds, and Nico seems quite happy to be back. I have hopes that it'll be another really good semester for him. And he'll get to go on field trips this year!

He refused to smile for his official back-to-school picture. (Yes, he is wearing socks with his knockoff Keens. He insists and I figure it's not worth fighting over.)

brothers, slaying me daily

Reading:  Keeping the Castle by Patrice Kindl

Playing:  Long Live the King by the Decemberists

Slide

The weather was amazing on Sunday and we were all a little cabin-fevery, so I walked the kids down the street to the little playground on the corner. I parked the baby in the shade in his stroller and pushed Nico in the swing for a little while, then retreated to the shade myself. Nico had brought along his lovey, the blankie formerly known as Bee and now usually called Tiny. "Tiny loves to slide!" he informed me, and then he climbed right up the little slide and went right down. Like hey, no big thing, just going down a slide as if I haven't been too nervous to try it until this very moment! And then I offered to go on the bigger slide with him and he went ahead of me and right on down. I think he meant to wait for me at the top and slid down by accident, but once that happened he was set. I didn't put this on a summer goal checklist or anything, but it's pretty rad. As I've said before, Nico is not a physically daring child, so any new display of playground bravery is kind of a big deal.

And then we got home and I turned around to find that the baby had hilariously thuggified his little ball cap all by himself. Oh, kids. Bringing the awesome, one step at a time.

Reconnect

I had some errands to run today and even though I kind of wanted to go by myself for speed's sake, I offered to take one or both kids with me. MB said he'd keep one and I could take one, and he wasn't picky about which. It turned out Elliott was asleep when I started to get ready to go, so we offered Nico the chance to go with me. That ended up being the best thing that could've possibly happened. I realized somewhere along the way that other than his ill-fated swimming lessons, Nico and I haven't really hung out, just the two of us, in a very long time. I won't say he's neglected and he has taken the transition from only to oldest child in stride quite well, but hanging out, just me and my little dude without baby brother along, that's a rarity these days. We started at Old Navy because I had a coupon and wanted to buy a few baby gifts. I made Nico's day by buying him a pair of orange socks and he made mine by chilling patiently in his stroller while I shopped, by agreeing to wear the new sun hat I picked out for him, and by actually trying on two pairs of pants. The cashiers were handing out balloons on sticks and Nico proudly carried his yellow balloon out of the store. "I'm making you yellow, Mommy!" he announced, peering at me through the balloon once we were back in the car.

We had lunch at Panera, probably Nico's favorite restaurant, and he behaved beautifully and ate his whole lunch, even though I didn't bring a kid-sized fork or a sippy cup for him to use. We stopped at Target to buy diapers and Nico did not throw a fit when I explained that it wasn't a buying day for toys. He asked to see the toys, but accepted that we were just going to look at them in the aisle and not take one home. We ended our errands at the grocery store, where he helped push the cart and insisted on putting items into it for me. "What happens if I give Daddy his food when we get home?" he asked. "Will that make him happy? Will that make him smile if I give him his food?" I told him yes, of course.

It's true that three and a half is frustrating, maddening, challenging. But it's also inquisitive, funny, and downright wonderful. It was so nice to be reminded.

And so it goes

So, hey! Summer! I can't go into great detail, obviously, but my supervisor at work quit right before our first of three summer camps started. The leaving wasn't entirely unexpected, but the timing was and I suddenly found myself on the hook for planning and running three weeks of day camp instead of one. Two are done (and went really well) and one is planned out and starting tomorrow. One more week! Let's do this thing! Anyhoodle, it's gone about as well as possible considering the complete lack of lead time, but it has seriously eaten my brain. Then after work there's the kids and whatever needs to be done at the house and washing at least half of this by hand (or all of it every other day)...so by the end of all that, I'm just done.

I've also been reading actual books again, which I didn't realize I missed so much until I started doing it again. I've read and enjoyed Cinder by Marissa Meyer, A Curse as Dark as Gold by Elizabeth C Bunce, Hidden America by Jeanne Marie Laskas, The Book of a Thousand Days by Shannon Hale, and The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman. There might've been another one in there somewhere. I also went to Nashville on July 10 and saw Neil Gaiman on his book tour. It was seriously incredible. You wouldn't really read his books and think of him as a funny guy, but he is so funny. He read from the new book (which I had already read and really liked), answered pre-collected questions from the audience, read from another new book, and then signed for all 1700 people in attendance. The signing was kind of the least cool part of the whole thing just because there were so many people that he literally just had to sign the books and move on, but I am glad we stayed. We were only allowed to have one thing signed other than the new book so I had him sign my copy of Odd and the Frost Giants to both Nico and Elliott. I guess they'll have to fight over it one day. If I could do it all over again, I'd stay overnight in Nashville instead of making the drive back afterward so late at night, but otherwise, no complaints. It was a fantastically cool experience. Here's part of the reading that someone posted online:



The boys are awesome, awesome. Elliott charted in the 90th percentile for weight at his three-month well baby visit and was off the chart for height (17 lbs 11 oz and 28" tall). He's SO big, basically the size of some people's one-year-olds. He's still the happiest and most sunshiney baby on Earth. He can roll back to front and then eventually gets mad that he's stuck on his tummy. He's grabbing toys with purpose and putting them into his mouth. He has also figured out how to bounce his own bouncy chair and will do so with great enthusiasm.





Nico seems to have shot up several inches just in the past few weeks. His ankles catch serious breeze in pajamas that have fit him forever and (sadly) in his very favorite bright orange pants. The other day MB let him wear his orange long-sleeved car shirt, the one he wore on his first day of preschool in January, and the sleeves were a good two to three inches too short. He still constantly asks me "what happens if" and the scenarios are getting more complex and more fun to hear. The other day he asked me, "What happens if I was the grownup and you were the kid? What happens if I put you in the car and buckle you in and then I buckle me in and I start the engine?" He has finally started building with Duplo blocks and is really good at assembling cars from the pictures in a kids' K'Nex set he got for his birthday. He's still stubborn and resistant to change and I'm still feeling a little sulky over the swimming lesson debacle, but for the most part Nico is pretty great.

I took both boys to a reptile encounter yesterday and then to the children's museum. It was the first time Elliott has shown any interest in the goings-on, and when I put him on my lap in front of the Duplo table he was very keen on getting his hands on the blocks. Nico was very sweet and brought him a little pile to play with before turning his attention to building and embellishing his own car. (This reminds me of the other day when he built a very elaborate vehicle with very obvious and deliberate wings. "Oh, look! You built a plane!" one of us exclaimed. Witheringly, Nico said, "It's not a plane. It's a flying truck." OBVIOUSLY, geez.) Eventually Elliott fell asleep, exhausted by the intense workout of flailing excitedly at blocks, and Nico and I puttered the rest of the afternoon away. I didn't get a single thing done at the house, and I don't regret it one bit.

This happened the other night and it made my heart hurt with happiness:

And look! Look! Finally a photo proving that my bald baby does actually have a tiny bit of hair growing in...I'm not sure how I feel about how much he looks like a non-baby kid in this one, though.

I hope everyone is having a nice summer...hopefully it won't be autumn before I'm back here again.



Reading:  Stuff: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things by Randy O Frost and Gail Steketee

Playing:  the Brave soundtrack