The Real Santa

It's Christmas eve and we have two very differing opinions on the subject.

Sophie is having the traditional Christmas conniption fit.  She's excited.  She's having meltdowns. She's writing a Christmas list. She's 210% committed to the spirit.

Ava, on the other hand, is channeling the Grinch.  We don't know why, but Ava DOES NOT LIKE SANTA!!!

Here's a quick summation of her recent thoughts on the subject:

On leaving a snack for Santa...
"Santa not hungry!" A few minutes later she tried to eat Santa's cookies.

On stockings...
She said nothing, just pulled them all down...twice.

On going to bed so Santa can come...
"I NOT tired!  Santa tired!!!!"

And finally...
"Santa hit me!"

Ho ho ho...Merry Christmas!

The Poop Trampoline

We have made amazing progress on the poop front. Sophie is still a holder, still has to have Miralax every day, and still has "scrats" (her coined term for a skid) in her undies pretty regularly, but we are otherwise done with the insanity.  She poops (and pees) on the potty.  She almost never has real accidents.  I feel like a new woman. 

She even tells us when she has to go when we're not at home. Today we were at the beach cafe and she peed before we headed back to the sand.  Then, about 4 minutes later, she told me she had to go again...

Sophie: I gotta go!

Me: Okay. Do you have to go poo poo?

Sophie: I do. It keeps going back up and then coming back down.

Me: And now it's time to head to the potty because it needs to come out.

Sophie: Well not right now.  When I get to the potty.

Me: Right.

Sophie: But I wonder why it keeps going up and down.  Maybe it's just jumping on a trampoline.

Yes. A little, fecal trampoline.

The Dark Master

We are in Hawaii for two weeks and let me say that it is completely awesome. It's warm and sunny and the kids are exhausted at the end of every day.  I never want to go home.

The day before yesterday we were on the beach and Sophie made a friend. They played for a long time, and toward the end, KC and Ava joined in...

KC: (running after them with Ava in tow) I'm going to get you!

Friend: (running) The monster is coming! 

Sophie: (running and doing some air fencing with her makeshift sword) Yeah!  And The Dark Master is with him!!

Ava is "The Dark Master."

KC and I think the name is sort of fitting.  Last night she got a time out after walking up to Sophie and smacking her, open palmed, on the forehead. (Let the record stand that Sophie was laying on the couch, watching TV and minding her own business.) Who knows why she did it.  And she wasn't even particularly upset about being carted off to her bedroom. She just stood there and waited for KC to pick her up like, Yeah...I smacked the bitch...no pain, no gain.

The Dark Master. She is tiny and fearsome.

The Christmas Concert and Boogers: Parts II & III

The Christmas Concert

Tonight was Sophie's holiday concert at school.  The kindergarteners and first graders sang a series of holiday songs. It was at 7pm in the school cafeteria and the kids were supposed to wear "semi formal attire". It was a big deal.

Sophie was in the second row, just in front of the kids standing on the risers. She was wearing a brand new, very stylish, semi formal outfit and she was psyched.

There were about 7 songs in all, and the first three or so went great. She sang her heart out complete with all of her most earnest "actress" expressions. Then, I looked away for one second, and when I looked back she was crying. She made a valiant effort to get a grip and even sang through her tears, but it just wasn't happening for her. It was like American Idol when someone gets voted off and they're forced to sing "one more time for us". Painful.

I made my way around the back of the crowd and her teacher (who I love) fished her out from the group and handed her over to me...

Me: What's wrong, honey?

Sophie: Noah touched my nose and I did NOT like it!

(Fuckin' Noah. I never actually got to the bottom of what happened, but in fairness to Noah, no one saw any untoward nose touching.)

Me: Well, do you think you can go back up there? You were so great.

Sophie: Yeah, I know.

There's a long pause, then she heaves a great sigh and wipes her eyes on her new, pink, sequined sweater. We take a few deep breaths together and she heads back on stage to finish the concert.

DO NOT TOUCH MADONNA'S NOSE WHILE SHE'S SINGING DON'T EAT A POINSETTIA!


Boogers: Parts II & III

In other news, Ava is still a booger eater...

Part II
(I'm holding Ava and she starts to pick her nose.)

Me: Do you need a tissue?

(She fishes out a booger and looks at it.)

Me: Don't eat that!

(She eats it. Then she smiles at me like satan.)

Ava: Yummy in my tummy!

Part III
(KC is holding Ava and she starts to pick her nose.)

KC: Don't eat that booger.

(Ava holds the booger finger up to him.)

Ava: You want it?

Goals, Snow and Comments from an Angry 2 Year Old

Lots of catching up to do. I'll start with...

Goals
Sophie's school has something called "student-led conferences". According to the paper they sent home, it's a time when "parent, student and teacher are able to work together for your child's education!" When I saw it the first time, I thought it was interesting, but I assumed it was for the older kids. I was wrong--even the kindergarteners are supposed to "lead" their parent teacher conferences. Anyone who has a five year old in their life knows how that will turn out...

Sophie: I'm really excited about my student led conference!

Me: I'm glad.  I'm excited too.

Sophie: Except I don't really understand it.

Me: Well, when we get there, we can explain it so you'll understand what we're supposed to do.

Sophie: Well, I understand the goal...and, Mom, it's not like a soccer goal.

That's right. And hopefully they won't have those really loud horns either.


Snow
In the end, it snowed here--enough to shut everything down for a couple of days--and the student led conferences were postponed. But the kids in the neighborhood had an awesome time playing in the snow. Sophie, Ava and Lucy geared up at the first flakes...

I love the purple marshmallow

Day 2: midget snowman

After about three days, Sophie had had enough. We were in the car driving to pick up a pizza after ballet class. She was disgruntled about having to put on clothes over her leotard...

Sophie: Mom, some day I think we should move.

Me: Okay. Where would you like to move to?

Sophie: Hawaii.

Me: Well, we probably wouldn't move to Hawaii.  I love it there too, but it's really far away and it's hard for moms and dads to find jobs there.

Sophie: Well, I really don't like having to put mittens on.

Me: We could move to southern California.  It's warm and sunny there too, and then we'd be closer to our family.

(Sophie considers this for a few moments.)

Sophie: Nah.  It's not as good.


Comments from an Angry 2 Year Old

Ava is a more terrible two than Sophie was. She's hot headed and she's very, very loud. These are some of her favorite protests:

Maaa Muh! (this is said as two words, usually in total exasperation)

Mama, why you do dat?!?!?! 

YOU...Mama! (like, "No, you go to bed, Mom." this is sometimes said in jest)

and, of course...

NO!!!!!!

She's also cultivated a very loud roar that we're used to, but that alarms other parents.Two nights ago we were having cocktails with a group of neighbors and the kids were all downstairs playing when Ava roared. Conversation stopped and the is-everything-okay-or-did-someone-accidentally-amputate-their-own-arm moment started when KC said, "Oh, that's just Ava. She's being scary." (Let it be known that Ava is the youngest child in the group with Sophie as the next youngest.)

I also recently had a friend and her two kids over, girl is Sophie's age and boy is 3. Ava was roaring at him and I overheard my friend saying to her son, "You need to use your words to let her know that she's scaring you."

I, too, am afraid.

Angry Birds and Boogers

Angry Birds

We've discovered Angry Birds at our house. If you have an iphone and you don't yet have it...I can only say that I was up until 2am last night playing.  It's goooooooood. And it's also fun for the whole family...

Sophie: I'm going to make a new version of Angry Birds.

KC: Oh yeah?  What is it?

Sophie: Well instead of the birds and pigs, it's going to be me and Lucy [who lives across the street]. It's going to be Jewish against Catholic!

I actually think Sophie's concept would outsell the original. Rovio, you are about to be usurped.


Boogers

Ava is a savage. She does every gross thing that Sophie never did (note that we've had 2 more poop smearing incidents since the one I wrote about a couple of weeks ago). Among those gross things is booger eating. I am constantly telling Ava not to eat her boogers. Most of the time she looks at me and says, "Yum!" but yesterday we made some progress...

(Ava is sitting on my lap, facing me, while I play Angry Birds. She picks her nose and eats it.)

Me: Don't eat your boogers. Yucky! Do you need a tissue?

Ava: No mama. (She digs in for round 2, holds it out to me and then wipes it on her shirt.) There!  All better.

Fear and Candy

It's been a very Halloweenie time here at the Bonnem/Friedman household. These are the highlights:

La Mariposa
On Thursday, I pulled up to Ava's school only to discover that she was the only one NOT in costume (I am a model parent). I promptly drove to the Bartell's down the street and bought some wings and a wand/crown combo—50% off...bad parenting has its perks. She loved her wings so much, we had to pry them off of her body so she could go to sleep that night.

The cutest princess butterfly ever

Noodle Grave
On Friday I made carbonara for dinner but with insect-shaped kid noodles instead of spaghetti. Ava ate none of it. Sophie at about half and then asked if she'd eaten enough to qualify for dessert.

Me: You need to eat a little bit more.

Sophie: I ate half!

Me: Well if you're hungry for dessert, you must be hungry enough to eat more dinner.

Sophie stuffs a series of bites down her gullet.

Sophie: (Showing us her bowl. She's eaten a trough down the center of her pasta.) There. I made a little grave in my noodles.

So creative!


Fear and Candy
We started the night of Halloween at a neighbor's house up the road and trick or treated our way down the hill back to our house. About half way there we got to one of those houses that was completely decked out—crazy Halloween people. As we were walking up the driveway, a life-sized, plastic skeleton popped up from the ground and made a creepy sound. Sophie screamed bloody murder.

Me: Don't worry.  It's just pretend.

Sophie is frozen in place. I pick up Ava who is getting ready to cry.

Me: Some people like to make their houses all spooky, but they still give you candy.

Sophie and Ava consider this, then...

Sophie: I'm not scared!

Ava: (clinging to me like a cartoon jelly fish) I nah scare!

We go get the candy.

A Pleasant Discovery. A Funny Discovery. A Shocking Discovery.

A Pleasant Discovery
Yesterday, Tyler and Bryce (her fiance) took the girls to the pumkin patch...voluntarilty...on a Saturday. They were gone for like 5 hours and KC and I realized that it was the first time we'd been alone together in the house since Ava was born. It was completely awesome.

As soon as the door closed, I started throwing things away. When you have kids, no matter how anti-clutter you are, crap starts collecting. I have two kids, one of whom is a hoarder, so we have lots of crap and I can never get rid of it without Sophie going ballistic.

I cleaned out all of the junk drawers in the house and in the process I discovered that one of our ovens came with a meat thermometer built in. There is literally a jack in the oven, you plug in the thermometer, hit start and it cooks a perfect chicken. Yes!  A built in meat thermometer! 

What a great day.  The girls had an awesome day too...


I call this, "I didn't have to go to the pumkin patch"


A Funny Discovery
As if 5 kid-free hours in the middle of a Saturday weren't awesome enough, one of our favorite babysitters called at the last minute and asked if we wanted her to come. Hells Yeah!

We went out and saw The Other Guys at the second run theater (wonderfully stupid).  We got home at 11 and the kids were asleep. The babysitter reported that Ava had stripped off her pajamas and refused to put them back on so she put her to bed in a diaper. Who cares? I was just impressed that she got her in bed before 10 (9:50).

When I went in to check on her, I found her buck naked, sprawled across the crib, on top of her blankets, with a diaper wedged in her armpit. It was a funny discovery mostly because it happened before she'd peed.


A Shocking Discovery
Tonight I inaugurated my built in meat thermometer. It was every bit as awesome as I dreamed it would be. We don't eat a lot of "chicken on the bone" because KC isn't crazy about it. So when I started to carve it, Sophie came up and we had this conversation:

Sophie: What's that?

Me: It's the chicken.

Sophie: Is that from the animal chicken?

(As opposed to Robot Chicken?)

Me: What do you mean?  It's a chicken.

Sophie: That's a dead animal? Are those its bones?

(I live in fear of a household of vegetarians, so I hesitate and contemplate lying...)

Me: Well...it is an animal (notice I don't say "dead") and those are its bones.

Sophie: Well I don't want to eat any feathers.

Me: It doesn't have any feathers.

Sophie: Oooooh. (points at the drumstick) I want to eat that piece with my hands straight from the bone.

That's my girl.

Busted! Parts 1 & 2

Busted—Part 1

Last night I did a little bit of work after dinner. While I was downstairs, Sophie came to visit. She was in her monologue mode.

Sophie: (pacing in circles and occasionally rifling through the things on my desk) ...We're going to put on a play and I need you to sew me costumes that are Chinese or Asian and there should be one for me, one for Lucy and also one for Ava plus there will also be snacks and the twins will come but I'm going to tell them that they can't talk or the play will have to stop and one time they tried to hit me with their sword but it's only plastic so it wouldn't hurt but they're not supposed to hit people with things, right? And I want to get Squinkies to use in the play because they'll be pets, like little pets and we should sew them costumes too...

Then I let a teeny, tiny fart.

Sophie: Squinkie costumes will be Chinese too and we'll have to make them a bed where they can sleep and maybe we should get the Squinkie house too and you need to say, "excuse me," because I heard it.

BUSTED!!!


Busted—Part 2

This morning when we got to Sophie's school, Hazel (our ancient, evil dog) made a jail break. She has been coming to school all year and has never once tried to get out of the car. Today she went running around the parking lot and made a beeline for the playground. She totally ignored me—because she's both insolent and deaf—and then proceeded to take a giant poop on the school's grass. Thanks Hazel.

I left it there, raced Sophie to her classroom, and cleaned it up later with a spare diaper. Hazel then passed noxious gas all the way to Ava's school. It was so bad that we had to ride with the windows down even though it was about 50 degrees outside. By the time we got there, I was ready to hurl and I was a little bit afraid of what would await me when I got back from taking Ava to her classroom.

Me: I hope Hazel doesn't fill the car with her toots.

Ava: Hayo toot in tar. (Hazel tooted in the car.)

Me: I know.

Ava: Hayo poop Fifi tool. (Hazel pooped at Sophie's school.)

Me: She did.

Ava: DAT NAH NIE!! (THAT'S NOT NICE!!!)


Ooooooh...Hazel gets schooled.

Tuna for breakfast

This morning Sophie ate a tuna fish sandwich (on a mini bagel) for breakfast. The sandwich part was my idea. The girls slept so late, that I wanted to make them something they could eat in the car on the way to school.

Me: I'm going to make you a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

Ava: PEANUT BUTTER!!!!!

Sophie: I don't want peanut butter and jelly.

Me: Well what do you want?

Sophie: I want tuna fish.

Me: I don't have any made.  I'll have to make you something else.

Sophie: Dad made some for me yesterday.

Sure enough, there were the dregs of yesterday's tuna fish in a bowl in the fridge. I made her a sandwich and she ate it.

The other day she had a slice of cold pepperoni, mushroom and onion pizza for breakfast. Later in the day, in front of our new Tuesday/Friday nanny, we had this exchange...

Sophie: You never gave me breakfast this morning!!

Me: Yes I did. You had a piece of pizza.

Sophie: That wasn't breakfast!  That was just a snack.

And then I realized there was no point in trying to defend myself since what mother feeds their child a slice of cold pepperoni, mushroom and onion pizza for breakfast before kindergarten?

The same mother who feeds their child day-old tuna fish on a mini bagel for breakfast, that's who.

Poop Smearing and Disco

Sunday night, while Sophie was having her "potty sit" and I was hanging out with her in the bathroom, I heard this:

Ava: I have poo poo too.

KC: You do?  Did you poop?

Ava: I HAVE POO POO!!!!

Then I hear the unmistakable thwrip of diaper tabs being torn open followed by some yelling and scuffling about by KC and Michael (our friend who's the lucky house guest that got to witness the smearing).  Then I see Ava's 2-year-old tush pass by, covered in poop, as KC tries to wrestle her to the changing table.  Then I hear this:

KC: Don't touch it.

(Some complaining by Ava.)

KC: Don't put your hands in it!

He cleans her up and they head back into the living room.  Then I hear this:

Michael: I think she' might have smeared some on the chair.

KC: EEEEWW!!!

Then I went in and cleaned up the chair, KC put Sophie to bed and I tried to put Ava to bed in her new toddler bed.  Her initial excitement turned to panic and I had to retrieve her about 30 seconds after I left her room. She wouldn't go to sleep,  stripped off her PJs and then this happened:

Ava's Joke: V3

Ava has discovered potty humor. I don't know how it happens, but it does, and now she thinks it's funny to say, "poo poo".  Really, really funny. She started saying it at the dinner table and I said, "No potty talk at the table!" So then she proceeded to say, "No potty talk...POO POO!!!!" Then she laughed and laughed.

Tonight she took it to a new level, incorporating her new bit into her old one, thus forming the 3rd iteration of her famous knock knock joke. 

Here it is...

Ava:  Knock knock

Me: Who's there?

Ava: Poo poo!

Me: (first attempting to look angry and then totally failing and giving in) Poo poo who?

Ava: Poo poo in my pants!

It's actually kind of funny.

What's not funny is that she will no longer go to sleep at night. We're in that horrible stage where she still needs a nap, but then she's not tired at night.  We try to shorten the nap and then she's a wretch all afternoon. So we let her nap for about an hour and she's still up at 10pm.  It's not good.

For those of you who are thinking, "just let her cry it out," I promise that we have tried it to no avail.  We did it with Sophie and the first time she screamed for maybe 20 minutes and then passed out.  I think we did it 2 or 3 times, max, and never had to do it again. Ava can stand there and scream bloody murder for an hour. We've never tried it for longer than that.  Maybe she'd fall asleep after 61 minutes, but I doubt it. She is a uniquely "spirited" child.

Behold...

Last night, when she was up again and terrorizing us, I said, "Are you naughty?" and she said, "No.  I happy." 

We're doomed.

Independent Play and Canadian Pirates

It's been a busy week and a half--visitors, birthday parties, our first kindergarten play date, Tyler's first week back at school (not fun). It was also a very busy week for the Ninas (Ava's dolls).  They saw a lot of action that included the first official Nina Time Out (Nina!  No!!  You get a time out!!).

Ava has always been very good at "independent play". Sophie needs a lot of interaction and wants to chat constantly ("That's funny, right?").  Ava wants to play with her dolls and they are a very active, talkative lot. She's got a routine down that involves banging, a constant dialogue and occasionally some shouting.

Behold...

In other news, Sophie is really loving school.  She no longer soils herself (involuntarily or otherwise); she's making friends and she went on her first field trip (to a farm). She is very focused on Halloween and has been a tiny bit preoccupied with pirates.

Behold...

(Sophie, Ava and I are in the car. They're watching The Wiggles.)

Sophie: Mom, are pirates real?

Me: Not exactly. Not like Captain Feathersword (the friendly pirate). Nowadays when people talk about pirates, they mean something different.

Sophie: So they're not real.

Me: Not anymore.  But a long time ago there were pirates like Captain Feathersword.

Sophie: Yeah.  In Canada.

Argggggh, eh?

Indignant Toddler

Last night, at about 3 in the morning, I heard Ava on the monitor reprimanding her father...

"No Daddy!" (followed by some unintelligible Ava speak.)

This morning she woke up in a surly mood.  She demanded that I sit with her to watch Franklin. She hit Sophie when she wanted a toy that Sophie was playing with, and she cried when the headphones in the minivan didn't stay on her head. I dropped her off at preschool and she didn't even give me a second look.  It was like, "God, just get me to the crayons!"

I totally know what happened. She had a bad dream about KC, it seemed real, and she woke up pissed off at him. It happens to me all the time.

Do not mess with me!!

Poop Update: 9/24/2010

But first, a picture. I actually came into the kitchen to find Ava laying, full body, on the counter, trying to block Sophie's view by shoving her face against the screen. I took this just as she saw me and hurried to get down...

Sisterly Computer Battle

News on the poop front is good. We ditched the pullups for everything but bedtime. Magically, Sophie has neither pooped nor peed in her pants at school since.  Seriously.  After 9 months of using her clothing as a toilet, she has gone cold turkey...at school. She's had a few accidents at home, but nothing major. It's kind of amazing.

In other news, and equally amazing, Sophie loves school. Last night was her school open house and it was totally cute...dramatically different than her last school which was a terrible mismatch for us. She's making friends, learning things and thoroughly enjoying school lunch.  She's even made her first contact with a bully who she has, in perfect Sophie fashion, neutralized with her constant chatter.

Here are some of my favorite quotes:

On lunch
"Their corndogs are better than yours. But that's because you don't make corndogs."

On academics
"My favorite is 'Math Matibuliffs'" (We spent a few days thinking that this was some made up name the teacher had created and later discovered that it's called "Math Manipulatives".)

On the bully
"She put a yellow crayon on my nose and tripped me on the carpet by holding my pants. I think she's jealous because my hair is so much longer than hers."

The Family Bed Sucks

People around here love "the family bed". Not us. When Sophie was first born, we tried to sleep with her once or twice and it didn't work out—for any of us. We were afraid of squashing her and she was very sensitive to noise and movement and woke up constantly. Whatever comfort she was supposed to be deriving from it was not happening and she was much happier in her car seat, where she slept for the first 2 months of her life.

As she got older, she became even more protective of her sleeping turf. We took her to Northern California for a weekend of "glamping" (glamor camping) and she was very annoyed at having to share not only a room, but a bed with me.  "Where's my room?" she asked when we brought her into the little cabin/tent. I told her we were sharing. "But you snore!" she said and got ready to cry. The horror!

But in the last several months, she's been changing her tune. She wants to have sleepovers, share a bedroom with Ava and, every so often, climb into bed with us in the middle of the night. The first time it happened, I thought it was kind of cute and cozy. Now, I dread her midnight visits.  Here's why:

1. She always comes to my side of the bed and wakes me. Never KC.
2. She wants to sleep on my side and is a total bed hog.
3. She wants to press as much of her body against mine as is humanly possible.
4. She brings her giant, stinky, insanely hot fleece blanket and insists it goes under the covers with her.
5. She is wearing a nighttime pullup filled with pee.

I love my child, but I don't want to sleep with her. That's why I bought her a bed.  It's not personal. If KC insisted on bringing a giant, stinky blanket to bed or wore a fat, pee-filled adult diaper, I wouldn't want to sleep with him either.

The Psychiatrist

We took Sophie to the child psychiatrist on Tuesday. It was a very pleasant appointment with the final diagnosis being that nothing is wrong with her and she'll grow out of the whole pooping thing.

He also suggested the following:

1. That she no longer wear pullups, "Because that's like giving her permission to poop in her pants."
2. That we switch her from laxatives to stool softeners,"Have you ever taken a laxative? It's like Whoa!" (makes face like he's going to poop his pants).
3. That maybe the reason she doesn't always relate to her peers is because they're dopes, "One of my teenage patients said, 'I just can't stand stupid people.' And I told her, 'Yeah, and there are a LOT of them.'"

So she's back in undies and she's really excited.  She's making a genuine effort, but that said, we've re-initiated the shit sink.

Ninjas and Vaginas

But first, a picture...

I call this, "In cardboard fort with helmet"

Sophie had her first great day at kindergarten yesterday. When she got home, she was bouncing off the walls with excitement and Tyler reported that she told her all about the kids she played with and the "club" they're in together.  Tyler also reported that Sophie said the following:

"Charlie and Abe only want to come over so they can talk about my vagina."

I hear you, sister.

Last night KC went out with his friend, Rich, to watch some football and be manly.  (Sophie said, "He always goes out with Rich when he goes on dates.") I hung out with the girls and had a lovely evening.  Then, when it was time for bed, I realized that we were all out of milk.  CRISIS!!!  I told the girls that we had to go to the McDonald's drive through up the street to get some. They were excited because it was dark out and I didn't make them wear their coats (or, in Ava's case, pants).

Here's how it went:

Me: Okay everyone, let's go make a stealth trip to get some milk.

(They get their shoes on—matching patent leather mary janes—and we head to the van.)

Sophie: It's dark!

Ava: Mommy, mommy, mommy, mommy... (this is a song she sings to the tune of Twinkle Twinkle)

Me: Very dark.  It's late.  Now we're not getting food or toys.  Just milk. This is a milk trip.

Sophie: Yeah. We're like ninjas!

Yes we are. We're like minivan-driving, patent-leather-mary-jane-wearing, milk-seeking, pantsless ninjas.

An update on poop

But first, my new favorite picture...

enjoying some quiet time

Tomorrow, at the suggestion of the Poop Lady, we are taking Sophie to a psychiatrist. The thinking is that maybe the issue is some form of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (or something else) that can be treated with pharmaceuticals.

Unlike many of our fellow Seattle-ites, KC and I are huge proponents of western medicine.  If there's a pill I can take that will solve the problem without giving me flipper babies, I want it.  And if there's a pill that can help Sophie (of course, without giving her flipper babies) I want her to have it. Honestly, I don't understand NOT giving your children medicine that will help them or ease their suffering. I remember a woman in my PEPS group (and I am one of the few people who truly loathed PEPS) saying that her baby was crying and she didn't know why, but she didn't give her infant's Tylenol because she didn't want to "just jump for the medicine." Good thinking.  "Hey infant baby. Teething hurts and you just need to push through the pain. I gave birth naturally, on the floor of my living room, while in downward dog, eating a gluten-free, locally grown muffin."

Anyway, tomorrow is the appointment.  This morning Sophie pooped on the potty during her morning potty sit (and that hasn't happened in a really long time).  Here's how the conversation went when I went in to check on her:

Me: How's it going?

Sophie: I made tons of poops!

Me: That's great!

Sophie: I made one big poop and lots of little kids.

Me: Little kid poops?

Sophie: I just like to call them that. (gets up and starts to put on a new pullup) Maybe I'm almost potty trained again.

Me: I think you're on the way.

Sophie: Maybe every time I go in the potty you should give me some money.

(we have a poop kitty as a reward system, per the Poop Lady's suggestion, but it's nearly empty)

Me: Okay. I'll get your poop kitty out.

Sophie: And each time I go you can give me a dollar!

Me: No. It was a quarter.

Sophie: Oh yeah. I thought it was a dollar.

Nice try, kid. Of course, I'd pay the dollar, but she doesn't know that yet.

2 reasons my kids are more awesome than other kids

1. They love babysitters
Provided the babysitter is young, female and cute. Homely babysitters don't go over well. This weekend we had a new babysitter--a friend of one of our other babysitters--and the girls immediately loved her.  She came in the house, Ava ran to get her dolls and then this conversation took place:

Julianna (the babysitter): Your doll is pretty!  What's her name?

Ava: Nina

Julianna: Nina!  What's the other one's name?

Ava: Nina

Then Sophie, who was trying to poop while playing with my iphone, called out, "I'm on the potty if you want to come see me!" Julianna went in and Sophie made her introductions.  Then we left and neither one of our children even said goodbye to us.


2. They are tiny adventurers
I'm convinced that if we were living in the 15th century, and Sophie and Ava were male, they'd be explorers. Ava is actually less inquisitive than she is bold.  She regularly flings herself off of the furniture and on to the floor, and she's always covered in scrapes and bruises.  She's torn every fairy figurine off of her Tinkerbell big wheel and rides it up and down the street with the boys Fred Flintstone style (because she's too small to reach the pedals). She would also make a good pirate.

Sophie is the super curious one. Today we went on a walk together to pick berries and go down to the beach. Here's a picture of a jellyfish Sophie found:

This was the size of a medium pizza

We looked at it and poked it with a stick. Then Sophie said, "Can we eat it?"

I love her. And here is one of my all-time favorite pictures of her:

At Toy Story 3-D

Another attempt on Sophie's lady parts

I've mentioned before that there is a pack of kids that play together on our street. There are mostly boys in the pack and two girls, Sophie and her best friend, Lucy (and Ava, of course...so 2.5). The boys in the pack are:

Charlie and Abe--6-year-old twins
Joseph--Lucy's older brother and Sophie's not-so-secret crush
Donovan--Ava's favorite who's moved to Vashon and is now an honorary member of the pack
Sal--lives around the corner and only has a time share in the pack

The girls are seriously outnumbered, and most of the time it doesn't matter.  The boys ride their bikes up and down the street and stab each other with sticks, and Sophie and Lucy play endless fantasy games about princesses and vampires. But every now and then the worlds collide and a little badness happens.

Tonight the twins came over to play in the backyard. The badness started when Charlie came upstairs to tell us that Ava was doing a lot of potty talking (and I commend him on his ability to understand her). Then I started to do the dishes and KC went outside on the deck to watch over the madness. I heard him say, "Hey! None of that kind of talk here!" Then about 3 minutes later he came in and told me he had sent the twins home.

Apparently, KC overheard the twins trying to convince Sophie to show them her "vagina".  And they actually used that word which, to me, sort of takes the oomph out of the taunt. Then, when KC reprimanded them, they sassed him a little. Then, when he sent them packing, one of them flipped him the bird, but with his index finger.

Of course, I had to tell their mother. For the record, we love the twins.  They're actually very sweet and totally spastic and funny.  It turns out they've just returned from a weekend spent with older cousins, hence the "vagina" and the unpracticed index finger bird.

Sophie was totally unfazed by the event, and this was one tiny moment when I was glad that she was wearing pullups. The showing of private parts may very well take place one day, but I'm thinking that the presence of poop-filled pullups are going to put the brakes on that for a while.

That's my silver lining.

The First Day of Kindergarten

Sophie is in turquoise

Yesterday was Sophie's first day of kindergarten and she handled it like a champ. She picked out her outfit which included turquoise leggings, red and white striped Hello Kitty knee socks and an additional pair of lavender fuzzy ankle socks on top.

When we got to school, she got out, grabbed her lunchbox, put her backpack on and said:

Sophie: I look Christian, don't I?

Me: No.

Sophie: I mean with my dress and my backpack.

Me: You look like you're going to school, but you don't look Christian.

Sophie: No, I mean Catholic.

(I realized that she was thinking of her friend across the street who goes to Catholic school and wears a uniform.  Sophie's dress was a pleated, plaid skirt attached to a turquoise cardigan with rhinestone buttons. Sort of Catholic school girl meets Jersey Shore.)

Me: You're right. Your dress looks like Lucy's uniform.

Sophie: Yes! (pause) Now don't hold my hand. You can look out for cars, but don't hold my hand.  Okay?

Already she's too cool for me.

"Nina" Revealed

In an earlier post entitled "Nina", I wrote about how Ava calls all of her dolls by that name.  There has been a lot of musing in this house about it.  Why Nina?  Who's Nina?  Where did she get that name? What does it mean?

Behold the answer...

Ava: (playing with dolls) Nina! Oh Nina...

Me: (to KC) Who is Nina?

KC: I don't know.

Sophie: (looking up from the miniature Buckingham Palace she's building out of magnetic blocks) Oh that's just Spanish.  "Nina" means "girl" in Spanish.

The mystery has been solved...by Sophie.

All I can say is, "Ahhhhhh."  And, "duh."

Sophie's Songs

Sophie has been freaking us out for a long time with her frequent bursts of unnatural smartness. We had her tested this year—not because we were planning to put her into a "gifted" preschool, but because her teacher thought she might be autistic—and it was confirmed that she is freakishly smart. (As an aside, we also think that her freakish intellect is somehow conversely linked to her inability to use the toilet.)

We're not sure exactly what her "gifts" will consist of, but we're thinking she's going to be some sort of thespian. She is also a total task master and regularly demands that Tyler take dictation on her various creations: there was a play written in Sunriver, a comic book, a series of maps, and some songs.

This is one of my favorites:

The Rock/Straw Song aka "We Like Notes"

Up High

I can totally remember my older brothers teaching me how to high five. That's one of those cute pet tricks that much older siblings and parents love to do.  KC and I are totally guilty of doing it and today we overheard this:

Sophie: (raises arm) Ava...up high!

Ava: Up high (sounds like uh hi)

Sophie: (lowers arm) Down low.

Ava: Down low. (sounds like dow lo)

Sophie: (raises arm again) In space.

Ava: In space.

Sophie: In your face! (smacks Ava's face)

Ava laughs and laughs and asks to do it again.  They do it about 4 more times until, finally, Ava gets annoyed at getting slapped. 

Let it be known that we did not teach Sophie this version of high five.  It was the 8 year old across the street.  We did let it go on for a while, though, because it was funny.

Chipmunks from Heaven

So we're staying in KC's brother's house in Sunriver.  It's a beautiful log-ish home with really high, knotty pine, vaulted ceilings. Yesterday, KC and I were sitting around when we heard a soft thump. We thought it was the work of a child until I heard KC say, "Oh my God!  It's inside!"

I turned to find a teeny chipmunk frozen on the floor of the kitchen, looking completely freaked out.  I screamed, everyone jumped up (KC, babysitter, kids) and the chipmunk ran into the kitchen and climbed up into one of the cabinets.

KC eventually shooed it out the door with a broom, but there were more. In the last 36 hours, 5 or 6 little chipmunks have fallen from the ceiling into the kitchen. One of them is in the house right now. As it turns out, they spend a lot of their time trying to chew through the vent screens on the roof.  They want in, and they finally got in.

Tomorrow the pest guy comes to fix the screens. KC says he won't kill any chipmunks, but I'm thinking that's what pest guys do.  I'm excited to see what the pest guy looks like.  I'm thinking Jed Klampett meets Boss Hogg.

Abuse

We have been on vacation in Sunriver since last Monday.  We're having a lovely time, but we have had a few rainy days.  On one of those days, we went in to Bend and took the girls to Target.

We spent most of our time letting the girls look at toys (they ultimately chose baby Zhu Zhu pets).  Sophie roamed aisle to aisle asking me if I would buy her things for her "6 year old birthday". Ava spent almost all of her time in the Dora aisle.

She had found a Dora that talked and danced, "We did it!  We did it!"  (For the record, we will never buy her that toy.) She took all of the dancing Doras off of the shelf and put them in a circle on the floor.  Then she sat in the center of the circle and went around pressing each one's button, creating a horrible dancing Dora chorus.

When it was time to go, Ava told KC that Dora hit her.

This is one of her themes lately. She regularly tells me that KC hit her and since we arrived in Sunriver, she's been telling me that a bee hit her.  I'm pretty sure that KC isn't hitting Ava.  I do think it's possible that she got stung by a bee.  She had a nasty bug bite when we first got here, so maybe that's what she's referring to. As for Dora, I can only say that their scuffle in Target hasn't affected Ava's love for her.

The Sadness

But first, a photo...

Work it.

Most of the time, when things seem to good to be true...they are. The poop is back. The goodness only lasted for a few hours. The donning of underwear lasted a few days and was officially put to rest today when Sophie took a giant poop in her undies and we had to throw them away.

Why?

Reports on Poop

But first, a picture...

Suspicious in the Pantry

We have big poop news...

Two critically important and, I think, integrally linked things have happened:

1. Ava peed in her little potty.  It happened yesterday and I missed it.  I have a sinus infection and was at the Saturday walk-in clinic. KC mentioned it in passing later in the way only a father can, like it was nothing. Like we haven't spent the last 3 years trying to get our other daughter to do just that with little to no success.

2. Sophie put on underwear and voluntarily peed and pooped in the potty.  Yes.  It's true.  It's too soon to bust out the pinata, but she did tell me that she thought she was "ready". Then she promptly went into the bathroom and took a crap the size of a 6" Subway Club. I wept.  For real.

What happened next was less happy.  She and I had a little moment of joy together, then she went outside to tell her news to the her friend, Lucy, and the pack of 7 and 8 year old boys that play on our street.  "Guess what?!?!?!  I'm wearing underwear and I peed and pooped in the potty!!!!"  Lucy was very happy for her.  The boys, of course, tormented her and then suggested she show them her underwear.  Which she did.

Then I went outside and the boys and I had a thoughtful discussion about what it means to "take advantage of" someone. Here's how it went:

Me: You guys are old enough to know better.  Sophie is only 5 and you're supposed to be looking out for her, not taking advantage of her.

Charlie: What's "taking advantage"?

Playdate Boy: (He is visiting my neighbor's kid and I can't remember his name. He is older and, thus, wiser.) It's like when you go to one store to buy something and then you go to another store where it's on sale and you buy it at the store where it's on sale.  You take an advantage.

Me: Um...
Sal: No!! It's kind of like bossing around.

Me: Right.  It's sort of like that.  So don't do it.

WTF?

Fashion vs. Nudity

   Ava in her preferred state.      Sophie in her preferred state.

Sophie loves clothes. Ava hates them.  Both attitudes present challenges in the morning.  With Sophie, the conversation goes something like this:

Me: Time to get ready for school.

Sophie: I want to wear my purple dress.

Me: Okay.  Go put it on.

Sophie: (from her room) I need my _______ (fill in the blank with needed accessory).

Me: No you don't.  Just put some shoes on. 

Sophie: (from her room) No!! I need my wrist warmers-green-sunglasses-hello-kitty-ballet-slippers-pink-babylegs-candy-necklace!!!!!

Me: Sophie, we're going to be late.  We'll look for those later.

Then there's some anguished crying over not looking her best; then we go to school.

Ava starts her day in a diaper and nothing else. If the world was a kind place, she'd stay that way.  Here's how school prep goes with her most mornings:

Me: Ava, time to get dressed.

Ava: NO!!!!

Me: (holding up an article of clothing) You need to put on some clothes.

Ava: NO!!!!

Me: You can't go to school in a diaper. Don't you want to go to school?

Ava: NO!!!!

Then one of two things happen:

1. I threaten to leave her home while Sophie and I go to school. She lets me put her clothes on, but with great protest.

2. I threaten to leave her home while Sophie and I go to school. She says, "bye bye." I put her clothes on, with great protest.

Jesus

Tonight I put the girls to bed while KC was out shopping (he returned with a sweatshirt that I'm pretty sure he stole from Usher). They got in their pajamas, brushed teeth, got their various beverages (milk for Ava, warm--NOT HOT--ovaltine with mineral oil for Sophie) and both got into Sophie's bed for a story.

Tyler often takes the girls to the library which I think is so cute.  They went recently and got a new crop of books and videos for our, now postponed, trip to Sunriver. It was Sophie's night to pick and she chose one of the library books entitled, "On that Easter Morning".  Here's an excerpt:

"There they nailed Jesus to the cross and raised it into position on the the hilltop.  Two criminals were crucified on either side...As he hung there, the sky turned dark and the air grew cold."

Night night, kids!

I should note, that although we are technically Jews, we're really Jew-ish. We celebrate the non-religious version of Christmas. We went to an easter egg hunt. And I haven't been inside a temple in years. So I was not initially afraid of "On that Easter Morning". I was envisioning bunnies. Not Jesus.


We only made it about 2 pages in before I had to stop, against much protest from Sophie.  Then I gave a totally lame, wannabe PC parent explanation about how the book was "not about including different kinds of people," when what I should've said was, "we're not reading that crap."

Seriously, though.  Jesus or no Jesus, is that really a bedtime story?

We read "Martha Speaks" instead and afterwards I got online and bought a bunch of books to read to her that don't include the lord.

A Discussion About Boobies

There's been a lot of talk about boobs in our house lately.  Sophie has finally discovered hers (my previous mosquito bite post  is evidence of that) and has a very healthy interest in the subject which prompted a good conversation last night.

But first, a fond booby memory. Every winter we vacation in Hawaii and one of our rituals there is to walk to Starbucks in the morning.  Just after I had Ava, and had particularly large nursing breasts, this conversation took place:

(I am in line at Starbucks chatting with the handsome gentleman in front of me. Sophie is wandering around, checking out the merchandise. She comes up and stands between us, facing me.)

Sophie: (pointing up) Are those your giant boobies?

Me: Yes they are.

Last night's conversation was much more enlightened. I was buying a bra on Amazon on my iphone. Ava was watching Dora and Sophie was swinging on the treadmill safety bar. This is actually an abridged version of the conversation:

Sophie: What are you doing?

Me: I'm buying a braziere. That's a bra.

Sophie: For your big boobies?

Me: Yes.

Sophie: Do you like wearing a bra?

Me: Not really.  I wish I didn't need to wear one.

Sophie: Well, I don't need to wear a bra.

Me: That's true. But some day you'll grow boobies. So will Ava.

Sophie: Yes! But now I just have little kid boobies. (to Ava) Ava! Do you have little kid boobies?

Ava: NO!!!

Ava's Joke

Ava has a knock knock joke that she loves to tell. We're not sure where it came from, but here's how it goes:

Ava: knock knock (sounds like na na)

Other Person: Who's there?

Ava: Do do (sounds like dough dough)

Other Person: Do do who?

Ava: A do do!!!

Then she laughs like "isn't that a riot?" and inevitably, anyone who she's telling the joke to laughs too.

Recently, though, the joke underwent a revision. It happened when we were in LA last weekend and she heard Sophie tell the banana/orange joke ("orange you glad I didn't say 'banana'?").  Here's how the joke goes now:

Ava: knock knock (sounds like na na)

Other Person: Who's there?

Ava: Do do (sounds like dough dough)

Other Person: Do do who?

Ava: Beeoooooo!! (an attempt at 'banana who?', I think)

Definitely not as funny as the origianl version.

Losing Money

Sophie's "hot" face

The girls slept in this morning—Sophie until 7:30 and Ava until 8.  It was awesome.  I actually had time to make coffee and fold some laundry.  When I was folding said laundry, Sophie called to me...

Sophie: Mooooooom!

Me: What?

Sophie: What are you doing?

Me: I'm folding laundry.

Sophie: Doing chores, huh.

Me: Yup.  I'm doing chores, but you know what?

Sophie: What?

Me: I don't get an allowance.

Sophie: That's because you're the adult who's supposed to pay the allowance.

Me: Right.

Sophie: You're losing money, huh?

So true.

Nina

A striking similarity

For a 2 year old, Ava is very good at playing by herself. She's especially interested in her dolls and the Dora dollhouse that we've had since Sophie was her age. It's hard to know exactly what's going on in her games—there's a lot of unintelligible conversation—but one thing is a constant: the dolls, all of them, are named "Nina".  We work downstairs in a dedicated office and throughout the day we hear, "Oh Nina!" or "Nina no!" or just, "Nina!".

We're not sure where it came from. The only person I know named Nina is my massage therapist and Ava has never met her (she doesn't yet need massage). When I was a kid, I called my mother's friend "Joanna" "Apple". It took them a long time, but eventually they realized that I had thought her name was "Banana" and since I couldn't say that, I substituted the next best fruit. 

So lately I've been wondering if "Nina" is not a name at all, but some identifier she's using, her word for "doll" or something. And I'm a tiny bit afraid that we'll realize she's saying something awful that she learned from us like, "not now," or "nimrod," or "numb nuts."

mosquito bites on her nipples

Tonight, as she was getting ready for bed, Sophie put on a bikini top.  Here's how the conversation went:

Sophie: Is it okay if I wear this to bed?

Me: Underneath your nightgown?

Sophie: Yeah. Under my nightgown.

Me: Why are you wearing it?

Sophie: (pulls down the front of the bikini top and fingers her nipples) I need it so that the mosquitos won't bite these.

Me: Your nipples?

Sophie: Yeah.  My nipples. Is it okay if I wear it?

Me: Sure. Now go put on a nightgown.

Then we read the Lorax and she fell asleep.

Just before that conversation, I almost killed her.  She had pooped in her pullup and wanted me to clean it up.  The policy around here, per the poop doctor, is that she is supposed to clean it up herself.  She knows that and yet any time she has to do it before bedtime, she throws a fit, complete with tears and her special form of of ranting to herself. She did it last night too, and KC just ignored her.  But tonight it pushed me over the edge and I chewed her a new one.  I didn't raise my voice, but I told her to "get in the bathroom, clean up, and don't say one more word about it" in my most serious, pissed off mom voice. She looked at me, walked into the bathroom and the next thing I knew she was all cleaned up, ready for bed, wearing a bikini top and singing to herself.

It was at that moment I realized that she is totally yanking my chain. The poop doctor keeps saying, "don't comment on it," "make it a non-issue," "leave the room if you have to," but there is a growing part of me that thinks this method won't work with Sophie. It is possible that of the hundreds of children she's seen, mine is different.  I'm contemplating just laying down the law, and seeing if Sophie magically gets it together. This "turn the other cheek" crap isn't working.

Poop

Sophie is a poop holder.  As a result of this, she has given herself "encopresis", a condition that is characterized by "involuntary soiling". Translation: she poops her pants.

The pants pooping started a long time ago.  We took her to the pediatrician; he told us to give her Miralax for a week; we did it; she stopped pooping in her pants.  But this January, she started again and with a vengeance. We ended up at the Encopresis clinic where we were given a strict regime to follow that includes "potty sits", bowel charting and enough laxatives to make a horse explode.

It's been 7 months and she's not really any closer to just pooping in the toilet.  In fact, the poop lady suggested that we put her back in pullups. Her thinking was that Sophie would object and get her act together, or that Sophie would experience some peer pressure and get her act together, or, at the very least, we wouldn't be washing poopy undies all the time (we had renamed our utility sink the "shit sink"). She was right about that last part, but only that last part.

Here is a conversation I had with our nanny about it shortly after we re-instituted pullups in our house:

Tyler: I think we've taken a step backwards.

Me: How is that possible? I'm pretty sure my back is against the wall.

Tyler: Lucy asked her mom if she could wear pullups like Sophie.

Me: Awesome.

Sophie is perfectly happy to wear pullups and NEVER use the toilet unless forced. Everyone keeps saying that one day she'll just stop, but I'm thinking of that woman from NASA who wore adult diapers so she wouldn't have to take potty breaks as she drove across Texas to shoot her boyfriend's fiance.

I'm worried about insanity.

Comments

The Cousin Visit

There's a lot of talking in our house. Sophie talks constantly and when she isn't talking, she's singing or humming.  They say that some kids are verbal and some are physical.  Sophie is as much the former as she isn't the latter.  She's been talking in complete sentences since she was two but regularly wipes out on her bike (which still has training wheels on it).

Ava talks constantly too, but no one can understand her. She says a few words perfectly--mama, money, McDonald's--but the rest sound like "jooooooo".  She's all vowel. That said, she's incredibly coordinated.  She's a tiny person (25th percentile) and can't reach the pedals of her Tinkerbell big wheel.  But she's faster on it Fred Flinstone style than Sophie is on her bike.  She's a climber.  She can dribble a soccer ball. She'll probably be the next Pele.

So who cares?  You would think no one, but people comment.  When Sophie was little, one of our babysitters always mentioned how "tentative" she was.  And my mother constantly comments on Ava's inability to use consonants.  Other people mention it too, albeit less directly. "She may not talk, but she makes herself known," kind of thing, and the underlying suggestion is that something is wrong. 

Are you a child psychologist? Or a speech therapist? Did I solicit your opinion? Maybe there is something wrong, but seriously, shut up about it. 

Sophie's First Dance Recital

Note: Sophie is the one NOT in costume...