Como Chameleons

Tempting fate, Shannon and I made plans with some wonderful but too-rarely-seen friends to take our collection of offspring to the Como Zoo today. Our last outing in St. Paul, a Memorial Day party at a friend’s place, was itself tons of fun, but led to three days of horrible sleep and terrible behavior on the parts of the girls.

But an outing to the zoo? On what turned out to be a beautiful spring day? With great friends and their ridiculously cute toddler? We’re in.

But Vivi didn’t get the memo, choosing – instead of having an easy morning of getting ready for the “yong wide” to St. Paul – to throw what even Shannon said may have been her biggest-ever meltdown. (The highlight: half an hour of screaming, “Mama, PUT IN MY WIP [hair clip]!” even though it was already in her hair.) We were thisclose to canceling, but miraculously Vivi collected her manure in time to hit the road. The girls were so tired of making and listening to noise that they were silent the entire ride up.

And the zoo was great. We saw a whole bunch of the big-name animals: giraffes, lions, a tiger, and many kinds of monkeys and apes, including a baby orangutan whom I’m sure never has meltdowns. The girls enjoyed it all a lot, though I think Julia (who pretended to be a snow leopard all the way back home) most enjoyed hanging out with our friend’s baby, who’s practically the prototype of the round-cheeked babbling toddler. And of course the grownups enjoyed talking with each other, at least in the broken-up way that you can when also minding three sets of kids’ feet and hands.

What the girls did not enjoy, though, is posing for a picture. These are the best shots I could get: one of Julia refusing to look toward the camera, the other of the two of them shaking hands with a man dressed like a tooth. (Long story.)
Broken Pose

Tooth Guy

We will definitely have to go back to the zoo soon to see more animals and do some of the other fun stuff, like ride the carousel or explore the conservatory, which was gorgeous.
Como Conservatory Pool

Unclear on the Details

It’s no secret that I think the girls are pretty smart and interesting, which makes me all the more surprised to discover some gap in their reasoning or knowledge – not just the usual gaps that kids always have, just because they’re kids, but gaps that turn out to exist right in the middle of some otherwise settled area of knowledge.

On Sunday, I found two such gaps. Julia asked me to read a book which we’ve had for a long time and read dozens, if not hundreds, of times before. Not two pages into it, she stopped me, putting her hand on the page and pointing out a detail that’s fairly crucial to the story – just the sort of thing that she usually gets during the second reading of the book (after getting the main plot down in the first pass). “What is that?” she asked. I explained what it was, and she asked a ton of follow-up questions which indicated that she not only didn’t understand the detail, but didn’t understand the plot of the book, either. All those times though the book, she had just been listening to the words, not connecting them up into a coherent story.

Or maybe she was just forgetting. I’ll assume that, for now.

I few hours later, at naptime, I found myself trekking up to Genevieve’s room for the fourth time in fifteen minutes. The first time, she needed to pee. The second time, she needed to poop. The third time, she needed me to retrieve her Dora the Explorer pillow, which had apparently leapt from the crib, probably to get away from the howling. The fourth time, she said, tentatively, “Is it morning time now?” I told her that it wasn’t. “It’s naptime, honey. It’ll be snack time when you wake up.” She looked out the door. “But it’s vewy wight out.” “Yeah, it’s light out because it’s the afternoon. You’re supposed to be taking your nap.” “Den have yunch?” I was boggled now. “No, we just had lunch, remember? Eggs? You take your nap now, and then we have snack, and then we will go outside.” She started to tear up. “But it morning time! I wanna have bwekfest!” I gave her a hug. “Oh, honey, no, it’s not breakfast time. But we’ll have a nice snack as soon as you wake up from nap, okay.” She sniffled, “O-hay,” as I put her back under the covers. She went to sleep right away, probably dreaming of a nice bowl of cereal.

I guess that experiencing a thousand individual days hasn’t yet instilled a clear sense of just how a particular day goes.

Oh well. That’s why they call it growing up.

Noopy Woot Nacks

Genevieve, specifying which kind of dessert she preferred, last night said she wanted “Noopy woot nacks,” known to the rest of us as “Snoopy fruit snacks.” The steady decline in the number of baby words made this reversion even more adorable.

On the other hand, a couple nights ago she had a titanic meltdown when I couldn’t understand what she meant when she drew a sleeping person and told me that the person was “waying.” Playing? Laying? Staying? Naying? No, no, no, no! Scream, cry, try to punch me. Turns out, after much coaxing and calm talk, that the “waying” person was “praying.” Ah. Gotcha. Eyes closed, praying.

Five Years Old!

After considerable buildup, Julia turned five today – a milestone which she happily and shyly announced to everyone she could. Beyond an evil lingering cough, the actual birthday featured a wonderful picnic lunch with Genevieve, Shannon, and me at campus, lots of bike riding (before lunch and before dinner), making a new friend at the playground, a dinner of her choice, cake and ice cream, quite a few presents (including a Disney Princess tiara which went right onto her head), and then nearly an hour of playing baseball and rolling down the hill in the backyard.

As I pitched the oversized white plastic baseball toward the oversized red plastic bat in Julia’s hands, I couldn’t help but think – predictably, sentimentally – about how she has grown up. Here’s photographic proof: a few pictures of her (and the rest of us) on (or near) all five of her birthdays.

Shady Charades

The girls and I unwound this afternoon by playing a game of kids’ charades. Julia is actually quite good at it, even if a good half of her physical hints involve the same up-and-down motion with her two hands. (This stood in for “hanging up a coat,” “cooking,” “digging,” and a bunch of other items.) The game had two especially good moments.

The first one came when I drew the card for “hairdryer.” I had to think about this for a minute, and then when I stood up to assume the tipped-head stance of a person using a blowdryer, Julia yelled “hairdryer!” I said, “Honey! That’s amazing! How did you know that?” She smiled shyly and said, “I looked at the card while you were thinking.”

The second good moment came a few minutes later. Vivi drew a card and showed it to Julia, who was helping her interpret the cards. Julia leaned over to Vivi and loudly whispered, “It says, ‘cow.'” Vivi nodded sagely and went, “MOOOOOOO!” Pretending I hadn’t heard Julia’s help, I said, “Uhhh… Horse?” Vivi scowled at me and yelled, “Cow, Daddy!” So much for patience.

Sisters in Action

Start to finish, today was a day for the sisters. As far as I can recall, they spent a maximum of 75 minutes apart – the time when Julia was napping. Beyond the usual things they do together – three meals and two snacks, bathtime – they played at home in the morning (Legos, blocks, play kitchen), helped out at Menards while we bought flowers for the patio, played again at home right after nap, rode bikes and generally laid claim to campus in the afternoon, and then wound up the evening with, first, a second round of Shannon’s brilliant “Activity Lottery” and, second, Julia handling all of Vivi’s bedtime routine (reading a story, singing her songs, even tucking her in!). And except for a couple brief spells, they got along great. So great, in fact, that they both looked at me when I tried to take their picture.
Sisters

Placing Orders

As long as they’ve been in the same room at bedtime, the girls have made a habit of placing their breakfast orders as I’m leaving for the night. Since they never want anything but peanut butter and honey on toast with banana on the side and milk and water to drink, there’s pretty much no point to this little routine. That doesn’t stop them, of course. Lately Vivi, ensconced in her crib, has changed things up a little by reciting her order at top speaking speed, so that

“I want peanut butter and honey on toast with some banana and milk and water to drink and I want to sit at the table. Night-night! I love you! See you in the morning!”*

becomes, quite intentionally,

“Iwanna peanabuttahoney toast withanana enmilkenwater adrinken I wanna siddatabuh. Ni-ni wuvyou seeyouinnamornin’.”

Cue the laughter from the other bed, which doesn’t help ease things off to slumberland.

*”sitting at the table” as versus sitting in the high chair, months and months ago

Teletubbies in My Subdivision

As it often does, the internet reacted hilariously to my blog post and photos about the girls riding their bikes up the slope at the end of our neighborhood park. Some preliminary comments on the blog about how the hill can be a tough little incline gave way on Facebook to chatter about how the park looks just like Teletubbyland, the place where the Teletubbies live.

All the talk was summarized neatly by my friend Doug, who used his Photoshop skills to… To… Well, to make me laugh almost to the point of tears, and to put Julia and Genevieve in Teletubbyland:

Jefferson Parkway Teletubbies
Jefferson Parkway Teletubbies

Well done, Doug!

Queens of the Mountain

The Tour de France awards a polka-dotted jersey to the rider who does best in the mountains. The overall leader of the Giro d’Italia wears the maglia rosa – the pink jersey. Blurring the two, I think my little cyclistes should wear pink jerseys for their new interest in climbing the short and shallow “hill” at the end of our neighborhood park. For all the effort they put into it, you’d think they were climbing the Tourmalet or Mont Ventoux or l’Alpe d’Huez. But like true climbers, they enjoy reaching the summit.

Vivi on the way up; Julia waiting at the top.
The Girls, Climbing the "Hill" in our Neighborhood

Heading away from the hill, on a high-speed descent to the next corner.
The Girls, Climbing the "Hill" in our Neighborhood

Imaginary Families

Vivi is imagining an elaborate game in which she, as “Big Boy,” is using her Elmo phone to call her two friends, a brother named “Mommy” and a girl named “Gommy.” Mommy is three (“ree”) years old, and Gommy is ten years old.  Their daddy’s name is Christopher and their mommy’s is Shannon. Mommy and Gommy love to eat ham sandwiches with spreadable cheese for lunch, as long as they can also have blueberries. They both have faces and bodies and tummies, but Gommy has red hair – “just like Ariel” – and Mommy has hair that is green, no; pink; no, yellow; no, white; no, brown; no, purple (“purble”). Both have green, yellow, and white eyes.

I dunno about you, but I’m gonna have nightmares.

Nursery Schooled

Today was the last day of Julia’s preschool career. I won’t recite all the clichés about how it seems like she just started preschool yesterday, but they all apply. Instead, I’ll say that she has thrived at school, especially this year, when she has had one of the best teachers I’ve ever known, someone who has been phenomenally patient, creative, and engaging and – perhaps more importantly – has imparted a ridiculous amount of actual knowledge to Julia (and I hope, other kids)

I was lucky enough, this year, to participate in several school activities such as visitor’s day and the field trip to the nature center earlier this month. Here’s what we looked like, heading back home. Ain’t she cute? 

Congratulations on a successful start to your academic life, Julia Charlotte! 

River Bend Field Trippers

Fish to Water

I took Vivi to her first swimming “lesson” this evening. She was insanely exciting about it, chanting “I so ess-cited!” before and during the drive to the pool and then (after a minute-long freeze-up when we actually saw the pool for the first time) again until we got in the water.

Once we were wet, she intermittently reminded me to hold on to her, but mostly just enjoyed everything we did: floating on her stomach, floating on her back, putting her chin and mouth in the water, blowing bubbles in the water, putting her ears in to “listening for fish,” and of course jumping off the deck into the water over and over and over.

In short, she did great. It’ll be fun to see her get even more comfortable in the pool.

Vivi and Me

One nice and unexpected side effect of Julia’s penchant for riding her bike is that I get to spend a lot more time alone with Vivi, who is rounding into quite an interesting little girl. I mean, she was always interesting, but there’s less screaming and shrieking now, which makes it easier to actually talk to her (favorite topics: her ability to use the toilet, favorite colors, her alter ego “Big Boy,” and dogs) and to do things with her.

While tooling around Carleton’s campus on Saturday, for instance, we stopped and played at various spots while Julia rode ahead and then turned back. Vivi especially enjoyed climbing up on the boulders and wooden beams that make up the “Sticks and Stones” sculpture thingy at the southeast corner of the Bald Spot. No big sister trying to climb on the same stones, or jump off the same sticks! She was pretty proud of her ability to scramble up to the top of the biggest boulder – from which I had to say that she could not jump (even wearing a snazzy bike helmet).

Vivi Up High