Inescapable patterns

Most of us, I think, are creatures of habit. We run our daily lives along familiar routines, sliding effortlessly into mundane patterns of behavior and relationships. Habituating ourselves makes sense, on some levels, because it means that we don't have to consciously think and rethink our daily actions (although some of us do that anyway). On the downside, such habitual patterns of action can be difficult to break.

In fact, some patterns seem pretty near inescapable. (I should note, here, that what follows is meant mostly facetiously, and should in no way diminish the efforts of peoples struggling with truly damaging patterns of behavior). I've been noticing, recently, that some of my interactions with my daughter are falling into old, almost forgotten patterns from my adolescence.

You see, in our family we had this rule. Well, we had lots of rules, but this one was rigorously enforced by my father. This rule was: no singing at the dinner table. Outside of mealtimes, the rule evolved (through my sister's creative genius) into: don't sing anything that Rosalyn knows the words to. She might sing along.

(I'm sure my sister would have more to say about this--in my defense, I don't think I'm that horrible a singer. I'm not a great singer, that's for sure, but I can read music and I can at least tell when I'm off tune. But anyway, clearly my family didn't appreciate my efforts.)

What does this have to do with patterns? I'm getting to that. Recently, this same disinclination for my singing has emerged in my daughter. I've always sang to my kids--hymns, primary songs, fragments of Broadway tunes and, more commonly, nonsense that I make up myself. Andrew never seemed to mind (although in retrospect this may say more about his musical lack than anything else). But Evelyn, whose little body can be so effortlessly stirred to action by a few choice beats, is more discerning.

Along with her other recent linguistic acquisitions, she has started telling me in no uncertain terms when my singing displeases her. Usually it goes something like this: "Singing. Stop. Mommy stop singing!" She does occasionally deign to let me sing--usually if it's one of her favorite finger plays (for the record, her current favorites are "Once there was a snowman," "Popcorn," and "The Eentsy Weentsy Spider"). But with increasing frequency, my musical efforts are met with that implacable announcement: "Mommy, stop singing!"

Somewhere, I'm sure, my siblings are laughing.

Come to Zion

This has been a good week, occasional snow flurries notwithstanding.

For one thing, this was the last week of the semester. The more I teach, the more I find that, no matter how much I enjoy teaching and interacting with students, I'm always grateful for the end of the semester. (And I think most teachers feel the same way). Now I'm currently facing a pile of papers that need to be finished before the final exam on Thursday, but that in no way dims my appreciation of the end of classes.
Friday afternoon was possibly the highlight of our week. We took advantage of National Parks Week, with its free entrance into all of the national parks, to spend the afternoon in Zion National Park. Driving into the canyon, with the massive rock walls and impressive landscapes, it was easy to understood why the early pioneers might have called this strangely verdant place "Zion." It really was beautiful--the clouds, which looked vaguely ominous as we drove toward the park, dissipated almost as soon as we boarded the park shuttle. We took two hikes--a short one toward Weeping Rock (Andrew called it "raining rock") and then a longer hike/walk back to the visitor's center. It was only 1.5 miles, but it's amazing how long that seems when you're either adapting your pace to short legs or carrying said short legs on your back. I loved it--the beautiful, breezy weather; the incredible vistas; the chance to get away from the rest of our life for just a while; and the chance to just be together as a family.
Evelyn was happy just to hang out (although she didn't like being restrained on the shuttle), but Andrew got a little bored. We'll have to teach him to enjoy nature better. At one point, on the way back from Weeping Rock, Andrew kept trying to run ahead of us on the trail. I reminded him that the point of a hike is not necessarily to get to a destination, but to enjoy the journey. Andrew paused for a moment, looked around with an air of satisfaction, and said: "Wow! I'm really enjoying this! Now come on, let's go."
Unfortunately, despite packing the camera into the park, I forgot to take it with us, so all you get is pictures of the kids in the car and the view from the visitor's center parking lot.


Yesterday, by contrast, was much quieter. I got up early in the morning (for once, earlier than the kids!) with the intention of volunteering at Bountiful Baskets (our local vegetable coop). I got there a little after six (yes, that's a.m.), only to find that they already had enough volunteers (two other women just ahead of me were also turned away). While I'm pleased to see such a strong volunteering spirit in the community, I have to wonder, who are all these people who are up before six a.m. on a Saturday?

Andrew went to our neighbor's birthday party in the afternoon, and I went with him while Dan stayed with our napping baby. Our neighbor went all out for the party (in a good way) with a slightly gruesome body themed party--the cupcakes had bones painted on them, there were x-rays decorating the windows, and the kids got to put skeleton stickers into the outline of a human form and decorate themselves with band-aids. (I think this last was by far the favorite--my neighbor found some cheap band-aids at the local dollar store and the kids all thought they'd died and gone to heaven to have unlimited access to as many band-aids as they desired.)

And that, my friends, pretty much sums up our week.

Optimism

I've always thought optimism was kind of over-rated. Sure, it helps to look on the bright side of things now and then, but with a healthy dose of skepticism and pessimism you're seldom disappointed. Take my last post. I should have realized that I was tempting fate by saying that I was "cautiously optimistic" that spring had finally arrived. I suppose that's why it's snowed twice this week (it's snowing lightly right now, as I type this). And of course, fool that I am, I packed away most of the winter stuff earlier in the week (not the kids coats, luckily, because I couldn't find Andrew's at the time). I do still have faith that spring will arrive for good.

Just not this week.

In other news, Evelyn has discovered, among her many new linguistic discoveries, a favorite word. It was cute at first, now it seems to me to have ominous overtones, as it presages her emergence into full-scale two-year-old toddlerhood. Her new word? "Self." As in, I'll do it myself. And she's started saying it for everything: putting her clothes on, opening doors, putting shoes on, taking clothes off, turning pages in books--pretty much anything she thinks she can do.

Luckily, she's not entirely self-sufficient. She still knows enough to stop and say "help" if she gets stuck doing something herself. But these occasions are getting rarer. And while I know that part of growing up is developing a strong sense of individuality and individual purpose, I'm not looking forward to the contest of wills that are sure to follow. . . .

Today, for instance, what should have been a simple exercise of putting on a coat and shoes prior to leaving the house turned into a good fifteen-minute exercise, as first Evelyn rejected the shoes she'd already been wearing in favor of some "sandals" (remember, it was cold today! I made her wear socks anyway), and then rejecting all of my suggestions for a jacket. When she finally settled on one she was willing to wear, she insisted on putting it on herself. "Self," she declared rebelliously. And if you've ever watched a toddler try and put on a coat, you know that, while they get the first arm in pretty well, trying to get the other sleeve to hold still while they turn in circles trying to catch it is a whole different story. She finally managed it by wedging herself into a corner by the bookshelf, where the wall obligingly pinned her loose sleeve in place until she found the opening. (I'd tried holding the sleeve in place for her, but of course, that only led to some angry yelling). And of course, by then we were late for story-time. Oh well.

Spring

I'm finally cautiously optimistic that spring has indeed arrived for good. I wasn't so sure at the beginning of the week--Monday afternoon a snowstorm blew up and the weather was generally so disagreeable that I talked our neighbor and her kids into coming with us to see How to Train Your Dragon. This was Evelyn's first time in a theater, and I think she did okay--she liked the dragons, but she lost interest about two thirds of the way through and was more interested in climbing on and off her chair. Andrew is still processing the movie--parts of it (the dragons) he really liked--parts of it he found frightening. That didn't prevent either him or Evelyn from enjoying some dragon themed towels I found on clearance. To be fair, I thought the towels might be useful for bathing, but they're hardly long enough. Still, they make a cheap addition to the dress-up box. (Oh, and if you were wondering about the matching SUU gear, all I can say is that their dad dressed them on this particular morning.)


The big highlight of the week was the arrival of my parents early Friday afternoon. (Here's Evelyn on the phone with grandma prior to the arrival). It was nice to have them here--even nicer to have them play with my kids so I could make dinner without any distractions. As I mentioned previously, we spent a lot of time outside doing yardwork, but my mom and I did manage to sneak in a trip to SG Friday night so that we could check out the outlet mall.

My parents left around naptime yesterday; after they left, everyone either slept or rested. It was an almost picture-perfect Saturday: the weather was warm, but not hot, we got a substantial amount of yard work accomplished (I even sanitized our sand-box with a chlorox wash!) and still had time to play.

Today has also been nice, if unfinished still. I stayed awake during Relief Society (something I struggled with last week) and even got some answers to prayers (convenient, since the discussion was about prayer to begin with.) Here's some pictures of the kids in new Spring clothes. You may have to peek closely at Evelyn--we tried a new look for her (two spouts on the top of her head).

Sleep-ache

My parents were in town yesterday and today, which was a (mostly) undiluted pleasure. My mom's idea of fun is to help me straighten out the mess that is our yard (beautiful, but high-maintenance!). I am deeply grateful for her help and her enthusiastic attack on the weeds, but it must be confessed that gardening is not on the top of my pleasurable activities. But it did feel good to work out in the sunshine.

At any rate, by the time my parents left this afternoon, Andrew was worn out. We won him over to the idea of laying down by suggesting that everyone would take a nap. While Dan put Evelyn down, I lay down next to Andrew. He fell asleep so quickly that I almost thought he was faking it. When I told Dan about this later, Andrew overheard.

He took up my narrative, adding, "I fell asleep so fast, I almost got a sleep-ache!"

Stories by Andrew

This is just a quick post for those of you who aren't on facebook and so didn't see my status update about Andrew's latest story. Yesterday, while Evelyn slept, Andrew decided that he wanted to write a story. Specifically, he dictated the story to me while he illustrated. (What's funny to me is what the story reveals about Andrew's world-view, especially since it's mostly drawn from his own routine). Without further ado . . . (oh, except I should note that this is pretty much word for word what Andrew told me).

* * *

Once upon a time, a mommy made a pie. When it was done, it smelled so good that she wanted to take a bite. But her son said, "No, no! Not yet. First we have to give some to our neighbors, then you can taste some and we'll have lunch."

"What are we having for lunch?" The mom asked.

Her boy told her, "Mangoes and macaroni."

"Mangoes and macaroni? That sounds mango-licious!"

* * *

(The story goes on a little from there--mostly to describe Evelyn's nap. But this was the most pertinent point. I love the "mango-licious"--I have no idea where he got that from.)

In search of adventure

This week has been unusually busy, and with good reason. We've had not one, but two sets of cousins in town to play with, thanks to Spring Break up north.

Tuesday night, my sister swung into town for a short visit. Our initial plan was to take the kids to a swimming pool/center to the south, but it didn't open early enough in the day, so we opted instead for a dinosaur museum. I have to admit, we were a little disappointed, as the promise of the website was not quite fulfilled in actuality. See, this museum is mostly a museum of dinosaur footprints, which, while cool, don't quite have the same compelling quality as full-scale replicas of dinosaur skeletons. Needless to say, after a forty minute drive to get there, we spent less than ten minutes looking at the exhibit (probably longer in the gift store portion). At one point, while trying to herd our collective children out the door (five under the age of six), Jeni rattled off some names, "Emi! Enoch! Evelyn! (pause) Why did we do this to ourselves?"

"This" wasn't, as you might think, the dinosaur museum--"this" was the unfortunate alliterative effect of our children's names. It's funny to me, actually, since after my siblings named their eldest children Jacob, Julia, and Joshua, respectively (this coming in the generation after mine, where my siblings are Jared, Jeni, and Justin), Dan and I decided *not* to give any of our kids J names. And we didn't. But no one proscribed E names, and so now my family has Emilia (Emi), Elizabeth (Eli), Enoch, and Evelyn (a full 40% of my parents' grandkids). At least they're all cute, even if we can't get their names straight.

After the museum, we had lunch at Andrew's favorite restaurant (Red Robin) before heading to the park and then home again. Jeni headed back north that afternoon, and you've already heard about the evening's debacle, so we'll move on.




Saturday dawned with the promise of Spring weather (finally) and an ambitious outing for the family. Trisha was in search of desert flowers, so we loaded up in two cars and drove out into the desert in search of them. Unfortunately, the colder-than-usual temperatures seem to have delayed the flush of spring, and we only found a few blossoms. The weather, however, was gorgeous and the sky above the desert was deep blue, so we enjoyed ourselves anyway. (Aside from the few minutes where Andrew was insisting on going back because he was scared of rattlesnakes. Not that we saw any.)



Here is the only bunch of blossoms (not even full bloomed) that we spotted on the Joshua trees. (And, while I'm not usually much of a photographer, I tried to pay more attention to the composition on this particular trip and I think this picture turned out nicely.)


After our walk, we headed to a nearby town and had a picnic lunch on the elementary school grounds. The kids enjoyed the playgrounds and the bubbles that Trisha thoughtfully brought for all of them. Evelyn loves bubbles--even if she did spill a good 2/3 of her bubble fluid on her clothes, and even if she only manages to make bubbles one time out of five. (If you're wondering why there are so many more pictures of Evelyn than Andrew, it's not (just) because she's so cute--mostly it's because Andrew wouldn't stay still long enough to get a decent picture of him, while Evelyn posed obligingly.)

Finally, to round out our day of sunlight debauchery (I haven't spent so much time in the sun in months!), we went to a local watering hole. The kids loved it, even if all the grownups did was sit around and talk. (Well, not technically true--I deputized Dan with the camera, and he took *lots* of pictures--too many to post--and I wandered around after Evelyn, who's big enough to want independence and not quite big enough to fully get it).





This last picture is purely gratuitous (but then, I suppose the last several have been): I wanted Evelyn's grandparents to see and appreciate her truly gorgeous thunder thighs.
A good--if tiring--day. Both kids wiped out on the ride home, which made bedtime a pure pleasure (we just put them into bed, fully dressed). This morning Andrew wondered why he was still in his clothes from yesterday . . .

p.s. You'll notice I changed the format of the blog. Let me know what you think--is it too busy?

New blog!

You probably thought I'd forgotten all about my resolution to start a new blog. I haven't--I've just been stewing about what to call it. (I'm still not 100% satisfied, so I'd love to hear any input on the new title--does it sound too pretentious? Too serious? Just about right?).

It's called "An Equivalent Centre of Self" (bonus points to anyone who recognizes the reference before reading the first post), and you can access it here.

adventures in parenting

My sister came down to visit us yesterday--hooray for cousins! We had a fun visit (more on that later), but that's not the particular adventure I had in mind.

Here's what happened. I was peeling some yams for dinner, thinking the kind of disjointed thoughts I imagine most of us do when we're prepping for dinner. Evelyn and Andrew were playing in the next room. All of a sudden, my concentration was shattered by a blood-curdling scream, only this scream didn't stop. It preceded Andrew into the kitchen, where, bouncing up and down in pain and wailing, he handed me the spray-on sunscreen (which he had, apparently, just sprayed in his face. In his right eye, to be more accurate).

I think I panicked just a little--I knew I was supposed to flush his eye out, but I couldn't think what to use (we don't have any eyedroppers). Finally, I settled on a washrag, which I used to drizzle water over his face. But he kept screaming, he wouldn't open his eye, and he kept telling me I was making things worse. Wondering if I was, in fact, making things worse, I called the pediatrician's office, who suggested I call poison control. Ominous words--but it turned out to be a good thing. The woman I spoke with gave me a good suggestion: put Andrew in the bathtub, and pour water down his entire face--enough of the water should get in his eye to flush it out. Poor Andrew. He cried during the entire process (I admit: I wanted to cry too), but toward the end, he finally seemed to understand what I was trying to do and he kept pulling at his eyelid to try and keep his eye open. I tried to tell him that he was being very brave, and the funny boy just gulped and asked, "Is this brave? Do I sound very brave to you?" (In his mind, apparently, one cannot be brave and cry at the same time; his gulping denial probably touched me more than anything else).

Andrew seemed much better when we finally finished--I sent him off to bed with tired eyes, but no undue redness, and, thankfully, no more pain. Still, not an experience I want to repeat any time soon!

Easter Sunday

Happy Easter! We hope everyone had a lovely week, the cold weather notwithstanding.

This has been one of those weeks where I feel more tired at the end than at the beginning. I'm starting to think maybe I'm not meant to run 5ks. I've only run two, and both times I've ended up *sick* the full week after the run. It can't be the distance--I run that far one a weekly basis on the track. Maybe its the whole outdoor thing. Fresh air can be so unhealthy. (At least, that's what the old Hungarian aunties (nenis) used to tell us). In this case, though, I think the real culprits were my kids, who are finally starting to get over colds that have dragged out for more than two weeks now.

Being sick, coupled with cold weather, meant that we stayed indoors a lot. And dressed up. Evelyn didn't much like the pirate skull cap, but she looked cute.

Mid-week, after a long phone call with the newspaper company (about a weekend paper that, five weeks after our initial subscription, still hadn't come. Turns out they had the wrong address--I thought--but then it didn't come again this weekend either. Even after I'd called. Urgh.), I went downstairs to find out why Evelyn was being so quiet. This is what I found:


Poor tired baby. My kids almost never fall asleep outside of their beds--unless they're in their car seats and the car is moving.

I already posted about the unseemly amount of snow for April Fools (see post below). Dan had Friday off school for Good Friday, so we spent the day hanging out with the kids and getting some chores done around the house: I finished the curtains for Andrew's room that I intended to make last fall; Dan hung up the shower curtain in our (finally) finished downstairs shower and put up a towel rack.

Oh, and my guest post appeared at Segullah (you can see the link in my last blog entry). It's nice to write for a site with a pre-established readership: I never get that many comments here. (Of course, I don't usually spend as much time crafting my post either).

Yesterday was busy (probably busier than it should have been for a conference Sunday). I'll say at the outset that we didn't see much of conference (although we have it recorded and fully intend to watch what we missed during the coming week or two). In this case, family trumped sitting down to watch conference. You see, this weekend was also Arts Fest down south, and a traditional reunion time for much of Dan's extended family. (His uncle is an artist with a booth in the festival--his booth serves as the unofficial meeting point for the family).

The day started pretty early, with me volunteering for the local Bountiful Baskets co-op delivery. After picking up our weekly supply of vegetables, I had just enough time to go home, load up Dan and the kids, and go to the downtown park for the City's Easter Egg hunt (actually put on by one of the university fraternities). It's a bit of a zoo--Dan's favorite thing--and it keeps getting bigger each year. We'll see if we go again. We've been the past couple of years (both as visitors and residents), and it was fun while Andrew could still go to the little kids' hunt. Now that he's graduated to an older age bracket, some of the fun has disappeared as the competition has increased. Sarah brought her kids too, so it was fun to be with cousins, if crazy. And cold. (Yes folks, that is snow you see in the background).

You can tell how happy Evelyn was to wait for the hunt. She seemed to enjoy it once it started--it probably helped that we'd played some pretend "Easter egg hunts" the day before so she got the concept of putting eggs in a basket. (Dan was with Andrew at another field, so I don't have any pictures of them).

Here's a picture mid hunt.


Afterward, we went home, regrouped (showered, in some cases), and then headed south, listening to what we could of conference on the way down. In SG, we met up with Sarah and family at Bubby and Poppy's condo before heading to the Arts Festival. Over the course of the afternoon we saw Dan's aunt and uncle, three or four different cousins (and assorted children--I can't remember the exact count), our across-the-street neighbors (and English department colleague), another friend from the English department, and one of Dan's colleagues in the chemistry department. I guess it was the hot place to be on Saturday.

Afterward, Katie and Lydia (who both have birthdays around this time of year) got to open their scooters from Bubby and Poppy. We'd been warned to bring wheels for our kids too, and it was fun to watch them all tear around, although Andrew's radio flyer was no match for Katie and her new razor.

Today was a little more leisurely, but today also saw us heading south to spend the afternoon with the family (who were still at the condo). We did, however, get to watch conference (Evelyn obligingly napped for most of the afternoon session). Between sessions, we had a lovely walk to the temple--however cold it may be in our neck of the woods, it was truly gorgeous down south.

My guest post is up!

You can read more here.

What kind of prank is this?

The forecast for today was snow: one to two inches. I knew and was resigned to that, thinking it would quickly melt. Instead, we got a good 7-8 inches, just in time for April.