Heads!!!

Journal highlights:

On St. Patrick’s Day Dangerboy made a leprechaun trap.  It was a cup baited with dried garbanzo beans and lentils(?!?) with a ladder made of straws and pencils leaning against it.  After they went to sleep, I tipped the cup over and left a trail of St. Patrick’s Day confetti around the house ending in a pile of gold chocolate coins behind a bookcase.  DB was thrilled (though a little disappointed it wasn’t real gold)!  He was so excited, he drew a really cute picture of a leprechaun and taped it up on the wall, hoping the leprechaun would leave more gold.  Unfortunately, I was fresh out, and he was disappointed again.  But it was fun.

PDaniel and I made it to New York!  (Many thanks to my parents, who watched our kids for us!)  PDan's conference went great.  I wrote about the trip lots in my journal, but here are some things we did:  The NY Public Library, the Empire State Building, The Metropolitan Museum, the Guggenheim, MOMA, Central Park (two gorgeous walks), saw Memphis and Freud's Last Session (about the hypothetical meeting of CS Lewis and Freud), saw The Daily Show taped, walked up Lexington avenue for, like, 60 blocks, visited 30 Rock and St. Patrick's Cathedral, had pizza in the Village, had amazing Greek food, had tea and scones in a shop called Alice's Tea Cup Chapter Two, walked through Times Square (once was enough).  Had my first creme brulee doughnut.  Had mediocre barbecue (felt sick, went to see The Hunger Games afterward.  Made PDaniel more sick.) Hung out in The Strand Bookstore on a rainy afternoon for, like, three hours.  Ate pie for breakfast.

Loved it, had so much fun.  I can't wait to go back!  PDan may go to this conference every two years, so I've already planned some of it...the Cloisters, more of the Village, I can see it all now...

We went to a live Radiolab performance in Salt Lake a couple of weeks ago.  Radiolab is a podcast I listen to on NPR…it’s science-tainment.  Amazing stories, and Dmitri Martin was HI-larious. It was great, but just as great because my brother Shaun and his friend Mandy went with us, and PDan’s friend Matt from BYU.  We drove to SLC together and went out for delicious pizza afterwards.  It was just fun to spend a night with friends, laughing lots.

Now all my music stuff is over.  Last week was spring break, and PDan had a conference in Dallas.  He had a blast there, ate some really good BBQ (WAY better than what we had in NYC, apparently).  He also found a painting he thought I’d love, and I do.  It’s beautiful…of two birds, with collage pieces of music notation and other pages, but it’s non-cheesy.  I really like it.

I’ve been trying to work on flower and veggie gardening.  I’m determined to get something to grow.   

Cutenesses:

 

Cookie-Nut:  Mom, can you balance books on your head?  (Yes).  Like the ladies in New York?  (I had images of beautiful models practicing runway walking.)  With food on their head?  (Turns out she was getting New York mixed up with Africa…we talk a lot about travel in our family!  It’s easy to get places mixed up.)

 

In a very (eerily) quiet Primary in my mom’s ward: 

Teacher:  (holds up a bicycle helmet for an object lesson)  Now, what’s this for, boys and girls? (I think she was looking for "protection" or something.)

Clara:  (at the top of her lungs) HEADS!!

 

First of 2012!

We went to AZ for Christmas. It was mostly low-key…watched a lot of movies and Dangerboy played lots of video games. Slept in, etc. PDaniel's family is sweet and laid-back. And generous. We went on a couple of family outings…one to an art museum in Tempe and a gingerbread Whoville, and one to an ostrich farm and Picacho State Park, then out for Mexican food. The kids (especially Cookie-Nut) loved the farm. CN was scared of the ostriches, but she loved feeding the greedy goats and deer. One little donkey became her special friend. There was also a lorikeet aviary where the birds slurped up nectar from little cups we held for them and they perched all over us. DB’s favorite part was a hand-cranked conveyer belt he used to ship food pellets to a pen of goats in a big cherry-picker-type thing. He stayed there for a long time.

The other day we went with the cousins to see the Muppet movie again, which we saw over Thankgiving. It’s pretty funny, and the kids enjoyed seeing it again. The songs are my favorite part…they’re by Brett from Flight of the Conchords, the one and awesomely only parody musical sitcom. Both Muppet movie and Flight of the Conchords (disclaimer--the latter is a solid PG-13) I highly recommend.

It snowed this morning. I went to go pick up our Bountiful Basket (-o-produce) and what should I see but K shoveling the snow off our front stairs. It warmed my heart. (K’s our neighbor kid…one of DB’s older friends. Has a reputation for mischief, but really a good kid.)

Kid quotables:

DB (refusing to get a haircut): “I want to have a beard and be hairy like Uncle L.” (Uncle L has long Jesus-like hair and a beard).

CN, after watching the movie preview for “Tintin”: “That’s a great boy because he has to do a really brave job!”

CN: “But Jesus doesn’t love Santa Claus.” Why not? “Because Christmas is Jesus’s birthday, and he wanted presents.” But did Santa bring Jesus presents? “Yes!” So I’m confused, but somehow the whole birthday/present/Christmas/Santa relationship has her confused too, I think.

We were in the car, talking about a trip to the zoo that she doesn’t remember:

CN: “So you lift me up and I see the elephants?”

Me: “Yes.”

CN: “But I can’t see my eyes.”

Me: “That’s right, we can’t see our eyes, except in the mirror.”

CN: “But I can see your eyes! And I can see all the things that I can see! Anyways, I don’t like the sun.”

Me: “Why don’t you like the sun?”

Clara: “’Cause it’s sunning in my eyes!”

Journal Excerpts

The other night I went to a RS conference at which Claudia Bushman spoke. She really motivated me to keep some sort of journal! Someday I may not remember anything, and it would be nice to be reminded what happened in my life. She focused on recording the truth, no matter how un-pretty. But I want to record plenty of the pretty things too. So, here are some excerpts from the journal I've kept over the last week or two.

...

One thing Claudia Bushman said in her talk last week was something like, “Journaling is a zero-level activity. No matter what you do, it’s better than nothing.” I got to thinking, I worry about not being good enough at music, or writing, or mothering…but maybe all those things are zero-level activities too. Anything I do, any effort I make, is better than nothing; it puts something positive and creative into the world that wasn’t there before. So why not make the effort? Even mothering, which is the hardest…I may not decide to have tons of children, because I don’t think I’d be good at it, but I can do my best with the two I’ve got, right? Of course right.

...

Today we went to a Faded Paper Figures concert at a club called The Mint in LA. We took the kids…it was a short afternoon concert, very family-friendly. The music was a little loud for the kids (Cookie-Nut wouldn’t wear her earplugs), but we all had a blast! The kids danced with their friends the Romney boys and PDaniel and I sang along. It helped that we all knew the music from listening to both albums in the car. The band members (whom I can take credit for introducing to each other) are our friends John Williams and Kael and Heather Alden, who used to be our ward. And now I can actually say that we went to a smoky little club in LA. I admit the whole atmosphere appeals to me. Much better than the overcrowded Dave Matthews Band concert Pete and I went to in AZ. Much more “atmosphere.”

...

PDaniel and I tried for a while to stop watching TV at night so we could do more productive things, but apparently it’s how we reconnect. When we stopped we got kind of depressed.

...

I had a much-needed “day off” yesterday. Now that C-Nut doesn’t take naps any more (and hasn’t for months and months) I really have no alone time. I really need it—it definitely helps me be more sociable when I AM around people. It’s funny—I didn’t want to be an English major because I missed people too much and hated being alone all the time, reading and writing. Piano accompanying was a nice balance, because I had alone time to practice, but the rest of the work was with other people. And music departments can be really nice, supportive communities (like ASU was) so that was great too. Now I am constantly around people—mostly my family, mostly kids—and ache for time alone. And my poor husband is alone all day and aches for together time! So in order for me to be happier together…I need to get away sometimes.

...

So, while PDan took Dangerboy and C-Nut to a primary activity and (when they got home), played with non-Newtonian fluids, I worked on my stories; exercised; tried a new Ramen restaurant for lunch and finished the book Michael K; hit a sale at JCPenney and got a new Easter Dress for Clara (black with white flowers and green trim) and some new sneakers for Caleb. Then we had a nice family evening, ate biscuits and gravy and smoothies, watched some Scooby-Doo; and after the kids went to bed, we watched the Firefly movie Serenity. A good day.

Who's your mummy?

Our last "home school" week was almost a flop, but we got one cool field trip out of it, at least! I had rather half-baked intentions of doing cool projects and such that just never got done. Oh, well.

Dangerboy wanted to study mummies. After looking at the picture books l=the library had to offer, I was a bit trepidations...mummies are basically dead people. And pictures of them can be pretty harrowing. But DB was fascinated by them, and not too scared at all (at first, mwahahaha). So we read lots of books on mummies around the world, cat mummies, pyramids, and the terra cotta Chinese warriors (totally different, I know, but I needed another topic).

And we watched movies: the Tutenstein cartoon, not my favorite, but kinda cute; Night at the Museum; Prince of Egypt; and Scooby Doo episodes with mummies in them (this stuff is strictly for fun).

I got a cool book from the library with fun ancient Egypt-themed projects in them, none of which we did. They involved making play-dough mummies, moving heavy books the way ancient Egyptians moved bricks for the pyramids, writing in heiroglyphics, and making a decorated mummy collar. Sounds fun, right? We totally missed out.

I was at a loss about snacks...the book suggested cucumber salad with yogurt sauce, a Middle-Eastern dish. My kids would never have eaten it, but I almost gave it a try. And cheese-block pyramids. Wait, I think we actually did that, come to think of it!

Our field trip was cool though--we went to the California Science Center's exhibition "Mummies of the World." Actually, it was a bit pricey, so PDaniel and DB went while CN and I explored the Ecosystems exhibit, and the boys joined us there later. PDaniel said DB didn't love the mummy exhibit, actually; seeing dead stuff in pictures is less threatening than seeing it in real life. So, it was a bit scary. Understandably. But DB used to be a little scared of mummies, and he no longer is, so there you go. Knowledge is power.
The Center is enormous and technically free, though there is a place where you could (and should, what you can) donate at the entrance. We only had time for the Ecosystems exhibit, which I loved! It is huge, and a really cool blend of fun interactive exhibits and a dose of art/design. I'm too tired to describe it all, but all ages, from toddlers on up, could enjoy it. There's an aquarium area with a touching pool, a "rot" room with all sorts of bugs, an awesome tree room with a tree house and lots of pretending opportunities, an ice room where you can take pictures on a snowmobile and touch a wall made of ice, a huge sculpture made out of fast-food trash...there's a lot to see and do! And we were only in a fraction of the museum. I highly recommend!

Bungle in the Jungle

Well, I want to chronicle the last two weeks of home school that turned into, basically, themed summer-camp (very little school-type work actually getting done). But it's so long ago that I don't remember everything. Here's my best reconstruction.

Week three was rain forest week. We broke it up into several different categories, and every day we studied books from the library about that particular topic:

• Fruits of the rainforest: the kids were blindfolded and asked to guess what rainforest fruits and spices they were tasting--there were obvious ones, like mangoes and bananas, and ones you wouldn't immediately think of, like chocolate and cinnamon. Then we ate rainforest fruit salad for a snack.

• Amphibians of the rainforest: I got a Beanie Baby shaped like a tropical frog and we played "poison frog hot potato" with it. We shaped fruit roll-ups like snakes for a snack (yeah, I know they're reptiles, but they're close, right?)

• Rainforest trees and plants: we went around our apartment complex and collected various leaves to see how their shape affects the way water rolls off of them. We actually nener got to this part, but we did collect the leaves! We talked about how many decorative plants we have actually come from the rainforest, and how many trees there have large leaves to collect as much sun as possible, and yet how they're shaped so that they direct water right to the forest floor. We also painted pictures of the rainforest using a leaf stamp I got at JoAnn's. We were going to collage with real leaves, but alas, we didn't.

Oh, and we had "Venus fly traps" for a snack, made as shown with cream cheese (colored green) and raisins. DB was obsessed with carnivorous plants for a while, mostly because he thought they were people-sized. They actually grow in swamps, but the rainforest has other carnivorous plants, so we lumped them in. (Shown with our real Venus flytrap, mentioned below).

• Mammals of the rainforest, including people. I broke out a pan flute and a recorder (South American instruments) and we tooted around on them for a while. We may have created a band. For snacks we had frozen chocolate-covered bananas. Yum!

We went on two awesome field trips. One was to the Sherman Library and Gardens in Corona Del Mar (free on Mondays--inexpensive any other day). They are lovely--great for a date, you can even eat lunch there--and they have a greenhouse full of tropical plants! We saw some cool ones and asked if they had any carnivorous plants, as I had remembered them having. They didn't on display, but they did in their shop! So we took one home, and DB was thrilled. It perished not long after, but it was good while it lasted.
We also managed to get free-day tickets (available once a month online) to the Huntington Library and Gardens, which have a jungle section outside AND an awesome greenhouse full of rainforest/cloud forest/bog exhibits (including carnivorous plants! Yay!). Those are right next to their children's garden, which is so fun to explore. I have more pictures, but my computer is not cooperating right now. This was a fun week, now that I remember it!
Oh, and for movies, we watched Ferngully, clips from Planet Earth (the birds of paradise are soooo cool!), and Diego. And we could have watched Jungle Book and the Curious George movie, but (curiously) we didn't. :)

I am the walrus?

Well, I'm getting behind on my blogging, as usual. But I do want to report on what we've been doing! I've been worse and worse at making time for "school" as our vacation and DB's actual school gets closer and we are so busy. But our large-ocean-animal week was fairly successful, so I'll report on that.

This week (which was a couple of weeks ago) we focused on sharks, dolphins, walruses, penguins, and manatees--basically all the stuff I planned on seeing at Sea World on our field trip (we have passes--thanks Mom and Dad!). As usual, we checked out a bunch of nonfiction books from the library and had a few fiction-y ones on loan from my mom ("Tooth Trouble" was cute, and a good one for preparing to go to the dentist). We did some reading and rhyming, and a little bit of writing (I've been bad about practicing writing :(--he's going to forget all his lower case by the time kindergarten rolls around! Oh well).

And we did some projects: We made penguin costumes. OK: I did. (It was a hard morning to begin with, and the costumes were a bit under-appreciated. But I got a cute picture out of it.)

We made a sand/shell collage with sea critter drawings.

And I bought some diving toys shaped like some of our animals for a day the kids went swimming (DB's learning to dive for stuff).

A couple of our activities were also our snacks. We tasted nori (dried seaweed--"this is what manatees eat!")--but I knew they wouldn't like it. So we made fruit makizushi--that's a sushi roll. Only we used fruit roll-ups, rice prepared with coconut milk and sugar (I think--I can't find the recipe now), and fruit in the middle. They failed because my rice was too soupy--I forgot to refrigerate it--and the fruit roll-ups were super sticky--I should have used wax paper between the rolling mat and the roll. But they tasted really yummy!

We also made peanut butter balls (no-bake) and rolled them in coconut to make "snowballs." We ate "boats" for lunch one day--peppers with tuna inside.

And had shark-shaped fruit snacks for bribes, of course.

For movies we watched parts of March of the Penguins (it was a bit long), A Shark's Tale, and Atlantis. Free Willy was another one we could have watched (I'm saving some of the other fishy ones like Nemo for when we study fish, maybe in the fall).

Then we had our field trip! I really like Sea World--the vast majority of the population won't ever get this close to these animals in the world--aquariums are not rich enough to house them--and I really think it helps a species to have publicity and interaction. I never realized how obviously intelligent dolphins are, for instance, until I saw them interacting with people from inside their tank.

You could do a whole unit just on their Arctic area, which is really a transporting experience all on its own. I love the beluga whales--they look like moving, floating marble sculptures.

So beautiful. We got a really good looks at a GIANT walrus this time too.

And found out from our books that it isn't unusual--they just look like that~! The thing was at least 15-20 feet long, body the girth of a redwood, with a little pinhead. Weird creature.

No more manatees, though. They got shipped back to Florida. Pity. CN got a great pic with her idol, Elmo, though. She couldn't WAIT to see him, and when she did, she couldn't stop hugging him! Or rather, she stood there solemnly, all snuggled into him, until it was time to go. And she went happily, satisfied. Cookie Monster tried in vain to get her attention!

So that was our ocean week. Next time: a trip to the rainforest.

Stars in our Eyes II

On our observatory trip last week, we found ourselves stuck in an intersection in LA. I looked out my window and saw a guy standing at the crosswalk, talking on the phone and waiting for the light to change. It was Michael Cera! I immediately turned to PDaniel and said, "Hey! It's that guy! Look!!" PDaniel also recognized him at once. I tried not to look back again, but I had to before we drove away. He noticed us recognize him, and had leaned up against the pole so we couldn't see his face. Can't blame him. He wouldn't want people taking pictures of him with their phones, and posting about him on their lame blogs, right? Right?

Just kidding, I didn't take this picture. His hair was much shaggier than this.

We enjoyed his characters in Arrested Development and Juno, and I just watched Paper Heart recently, so we were pretty excited. It was my first current-celebrity sighting.

Stars in Their Eyes

Home-pre-school, second week:

When we did dinosaurs, the kiddos were sick and we couldn't go anywhere. Thusly, we had more time. This week, the "school" thing is rapidly turning into more of a "camp" squeezed into the spare minutes between swimming lessons, trips to playgroup, beach day, the store and the dentist. And our field trips. All of which are pretty darn important too!

But, last week we studied space: You know, the final frontier. Every day we read our "research" books on the planets; stars--constellations, and also where they come from; rockets and the moon landing; and comets and black holes. The whole topic seemed a little more inaccessible to both of them, the pictures in the books harder to understand. (We liked the astronaut's toilet though, haha.) We did our rhymes, and DB persevered in his reading, though it was harder to get him to write any letters. Oh, and we danced to "Age of Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In," 'cause it's fun, and 'cause it's got lots of planet and constellation words in it.

Here are some of our projects: we made a model of the solar system, using our dining room light as the sun. We even labeled a few of the planets:


We also made a "black hole" bean bag game, with the help of PDaniel and his jigsaw. Then we filled up some old socks with beans and tied some sparkly ribbons to them for tails--Voila! Comets. I totally used it in my little-kid piano class too--I quizzed them on their notes while listening to Holst's "The Planets," and they got to toss a comet through a black hole if they got it right.

They also played outside with DB's old stomp rocket, which all kids love.

For treats, we had starfruit,

jello jiggler stars, sun chips and space dogs ( which were....hot dogs), "rocket ships" (which didn't look much like rocket ships, but oh well. They still thought it was cool):

Oh, and on the last day we watched ET and ate Dippin' Dots ice cream (which I called "moon ice cream"). I found some astronaut ice cream at REI, but didn't want to make the drive. Maybe another time. They liked ET, though it was a bit long. CN really liked the John Williams soundtrack.

Then we went on our totally cool field trip to the LA Observatory. It was fun! The observatory is free. If you go during the day, you can see the sun through a special telescope. We'd like to go back in the winter, when we can see through the night telescope at a reasonable hour. DB and CN sat through the Planetarium show quite well, and DB was impressed by it; it was about $15 for the four of us (PDan a student and CN free). DB totally appreciated everything more because we'd been talking about it.

Ancient Voices of Children

So, the week before last Dangerboy and Cookie-Nut were banned from being around any other children because of what I've come to call "the spots." But they didn't feel sick, so I was left wondering what we should do for a week. I decided to start my summer-home-preschool experiment early.

I had a wonderful mission companion whose mother home-schooled all of her siblings in a way that sounded amazingly fun--each year had a theme, and involved lots of field trips and applied learning. I'm not sure I'm up to quite that level of commitment, but I wanted to try some of the ideas, so I've figured out some field trips that are feasible for us to take, and planned home activities to keep us busy based on them. When the kids were sick, we did dinosaurs and the ice age.

Almost every day, we opened with some music (some familiar ones, but DB is also learning his address and phone number based on a little ditty I threw together). Then we danced to "Jeremiah Was a Bullfrog" (frogs, dinos--they seemed to go together somehow) and sometimes a few others. We did "research" online and in library books on the topic of the day--dinosaurs and their skin, dinosaur eggs, volcanoes, the ice age, and tar pits. I read to DB, he read to me, he read some topical rhyming words (tar, far, car, etc.), DB did some writing in his journal or on a letter worksheet, and we did an activity. Oh, and had a themed (more or less) snack. Then, when the kids were better, we visited the La Brea Tar pits, which they really liked. Especially the tar. (Well, CN just liked running around.)

Here were some of our activities and snacks:

We made dinosaur cookies one day, and made them into ice cream sandwiches the next--super yummy.
We decorated "dinosaur eggs" and went on a dinosaur egg hunt. We learned that some dinos laid eggs in a line, or just on the ground, or in holes, or maybe in trees. So we hid them in places like that.We"exploded" the volcano DB and PDaniel made a while back.
We made "fossil pops" with fruit (the fossils) in frozen juice, just like fossils are found in ice.
We made a big bowl of chocolate pudding in which I hid various animals and plastic dinosaur bones. It was our "tar pit."And we went on our field trip. It was fun--it cost us about $20 for all four of us, including parking. We saw lots of cool bones and a real excavation site. As a bonus, LACMA next door was having its free day, so we had a quick look in there too. It didn't turn out to be a terribly kid-friendly experience for us, but DB was actually interested in a lot of the art.

This week we're doing space. It's been kind of a busy week, and we haven't done as much as I'd have liked before our trip tomorrow (to the observatory) but I'll let you know how it turns out.

Anne to the Rescue

Last week the bambini and I flew to Utah to visit family. We had a good time--the kiddoes ran around with their cousins; we visited "the bouncy house place," Pirate Island (it's in Orem--a cross between the Pirates of the Caribbean ride and Chucky Cheese's), both McDonald's and Del Taco's playgrounds; we played in a tiny bit of snow; the grownups got lots of sweet toddler hugs, and a good time was generally had by all.

Then the inevitable occurred, which was that (most of) the kids got sick. It started with Cookie-Nut's cough and fever (she was also teething, I found out later). I got up with her in the middle of the night our last night there, and had just settled back into bed when I heard a strange noise, which I eventually recognized to be a cough, a barking, hacking cough that sounded like a braying dog. I was lying there, wondering foggily what to do, when the bedroom door opened, and in walks Dangerboy, tears streaming down his face, gasping for air, his voice wheezing as he tried to take breaths. He was terrified.

And so was I. Is this croup? I thought. But where did this come from? I remembered he'd been coughing a little during the day, but nothing serious. I remembered two things--the Anne of Green Gables episode where Diana's little sister Minnie May gets croup and Anne saves her, and what I'd read in my "What to Expect" book about treatment for croup, which I'd read in my paranoid days as a new mom.

I'd always wondered why Diana's parents left her with such a sick little sister, but now I realized that croup could come on with no warning at all. My book said that you could try taking the child into the cold night air, so we tried it, but after a few seconds of cold coughing, it didn't seem to be working fast enough. Anne instructs that water be boiled, lots of it; and I remembered that my book said you could sit them in a steamy bathroom, so I put the shower on hot and had DB sit on the edge of the bathtub. I gave him a puff of albuterol just in case it would help, and tried to call PDaniel.

No answer. No answer again. And again. (He's a sound sleeper) DB kept coughing. I tried to call a nurse at Kaiser, but they wouldn't help me because DB's not insured through them (arghhh!). He currently has no insurance, scarily enough. I was imagining astronomical ambulance bills, then the dreadful cost of NOT getting him the help he needed, when finally I got ahold of an urgent care nurse at Bristol Park.

She casually told me to put him next to the shower, exactly as I'd done, and said that croup is actually swelling of the larynx (who knew?), which could be brought on by a virus or dry heated air (the air in Utah is very dry). By this time, thankfully, DB's coughing had slowed. By the time I hung up, he was sleeping on the couch, and my poor Granny was awake, wondering what in the world was happening. I put DB back to bed--then CN woke up, and refused to go back to sleep until noon the next day. Sigh.

I told my Utah cousin and her husband about it, and they said it used to happen to their daughter all the time; they just take her outside until she stops coughing, no big deal. Anne used ipecac, but apparently this just makes you throw up, and probably doesn't help the underlying problem. But the steam would have worked. So now I know, and you do too!

We were indoors all week, fight a nasty case of what the pediatrician said yesterday was most likely RSV. I got it too, in the form of a devious head cold that's left me unable to smell or taste anything. What with RSV, our vacation, and hand-foot-and-mouth the week before, DB hasn't been to school in three weeks! His mind is fried on television! Wahoo!! And this is Cookie-Nut's third bad cold since Christmas, not counting aforesaid hand-foot-and-mouth and a sinus infection. We are sooooooooo ready to be back among the land of the living.

But, we're feeling a bit better now. Please, please, please, let us get back to boring old everyday life again! And soon!

Note: I just read on Wikipedia about croup, and it says that inhaling hot steam hasn't been "shown" to be effective in treating croup. It says steroids are better, but it seems as though there's a lot of common wisdom that says a hot shower does the trick. Of course, if the croup is severe, and the child starts to be lethargic or is turning blue, then it's a 911-emergency. Just sayin', because you never know what you'll read and then remember later on.

Happy Birthday Cookie-Nut!

Cookie-Nut's birthday was on the 8th. So smiley, so curious, so amazing. The day after this, her first birthday, I left her alone for a minute and came back to find that she'd used a small chair to climb onto another chair, up to her booster seat, and was standing on the arm of her booster seat with her hands on the counter (presumably ready to climb up there!). So scary. Today she got into the toothbrush drawer again and PDaniel found her sucking on a tube of toothpaste...had to call Poison Control just in case...she's fine, of course, but Dangerboy was not this climb-y or into things. Gonna hafta watch this one. (BTW, Poison Control is going away in California. Gone the way of budget cuts. What is this state coming to? This seems like a pretty basic service to me.)

And she is soooooo loud! On July 4th we went to Ruby's for dinner. PDaniel stepped away to take Dangerboy to the bathroom (which turned out to be a messy experience, yuck) and she let out a screech of displeasure that literally made the whole restaurant fall silent and look our direction. As in, "What are you DOING to that child?" I paid the check as quickly as possible and skedaddled. (PDaniel went back for shakes, of course).

(In other July 4th news, we went swimming with our friends, braved the ward breakfast, and tried, with extremely modest success, to view the fireworks at Huntington Beach. Maybe I'll write more about that later).

Anyway, for Cookie-Nut's birthday, we went to Wild Rivers, a water park here in Irvine. Cookie-Nut had fun, I think. Her favorite part was the section with the fountains that came out of pipes and the ground...meaning we probably could have gone to the Spectrum Mall and she would have been just as happy. And we went in the evening, when it was cheaper, so it was kind of...cold. But Dangerboy had a blast and would love to go back, even though he could only ride the tiny waterslides. He and his daddy loved the wave pool too. (Sorry, we didn't get any pictures--should've got a waterproof disposable).
Then we came home and had cake. Cookie-Nut was pretty tired, but since we presented her with the whole cake, she mustered enough energy to dig in. She poked it a lot first, though. With one finger. :) It was a pretty boring-looking cake, if tasty--some random organic white cake mix from Sprouts (I ran out of time), with homemade lemon buttercream frosting. I could eat that stuff with a spoon! And did!

She opened presents in the morning--she got books, yay!

Anyway, in tribute of Cookie-Nut's birthday, here are some things she has come to be able to do since I wrote last:

• Walks well
• Says "uh-oh," "hi," and "flower" (wow-wow)
• Signs: bird, dog, cat, bear, more, all done, fish, drink, milk, and music
• Has shrieking contests with her brother--they've started to play together
  
• Rolls a ball back and forth with me
  
• Tries to put on clothes over her head (she did it once but cried)
  
• Readies herself for diaper changes (basically comes and sits down on the diaper mat)
• When she wants to be read to, she brings you a book, throws it down on the floor, and sits on you.
• All her first-year molars have come in!

She's really growing up, no? This first year has gone so fast.

Mama said there'd be days like this...

Lows:

• Getting up with Cookie-Nut at 6:00 AM.
• Stripping Dangerboy's wet sheets.
• Losing Dangerboy at the farmer's market today while I was paying for perfect apricots.
• The kids not sleeping in the car as much as I'd hoped this afternoon.
  
• Having too-optimistically agreed to babysit tonight (alone, post-bedtime), having to deal with an exhausted son and baby. The latter screamed intermittently for periods of time, and when she finally settled down, the boys all ran back by her bedroom and woke her up. (If you're reading this, parents, your kids were really fine--it was mine who gave me problems!)
  
• After several time-outs through the course of the evening, hearing DB scream, "I don't love you anymore!!!" at me when I told him he couldn't have another graham cracker. Really wanting to spank him, or something. (Mom, you said this day would come).
• Making my dear husband feel bad for having a decent day (he's in Davis at a dissertation workshop). It was after 10:00; I was tired; I was cleaning smeared graham crackers of the chairs and ground-up popcorn from the carpet. It was hard listen to him talk about his day, but I should have tried. I'm sorry honey.
  

Highs:

• Playing with Cookie-Nut on my bed from 6:00-7:00 AM.
• Finding perfect apricots at the farmer's market.
• Finding a tearful DB at the farmer's market (after losing him, of course--a nice mommy was helping him look for me).
• Watching Cookie-Nut walk and push her stroller all over the El Dorado Nature Center (which was fun, BTW, and cheap). She walked more than I've ever seen her. Just charmed everybody.
• Reading Dangerboy this book at the Nature Center while Cookie-Nut walked around.
• Praying for patience, knowing that DB was just exhausted tonight and didn't need me to punish him; he just needed me to understand. Snuggling up to him for a bedtime story just a few minutes after his little outburst; his kiss on my cheek goodnight.

Arrrrrrrrr!

So the other night Dangerboy and PDaniel headed over to the ol' Pirate's Dinner Adventure for an evening of swashbucklin' swordfights, seafarin' vittles, and, apparently, shirtless pirates singing, among other things, "YMCA." (We didn't quite understand the connection either...was there a pirate in the Village People? Even so...)

Anyway, DB loved it, though he didn't quite get the fact that these were actors. Why would he? It all looked pretty realistic to a three-year-old. Most of the pictures didn't turn out 'cause it was dark in there, but here's the prow of the ship: Gotta love that stage makeup! Note: if you ever go, 1) don't pay extra for good seats, they're all good; 2) if you join their little pirate e-mail club they'll send you deals; and 3) don't pay to get pictures taken with the pirates beforehand--just get some afterwards. Also, toy light sabers are way sturdier than the sword pictured with DB...just take our word for it. Sigh...

Father-Son Outing

We've started taking Dangerboy on little "dates" with either P. or I. It's been fun to have a little one-on-one time with our firstborn, who's probably been a little neglected the last few months. I took him to see Madacascar II last week (he didn't love it, but I thought it was kinda funny). The week before, P. took him to Disneyland for the last time in a while, since P.'s pass ran out this month. (DB's is still good, if anyone would like to take him, haha).

This pic is DB on the Nemo ride--P. caught him at a perfect point of excitement!

Sunday on the beach with P.