Prayers by Madeleine

Madie has been saying our mealtime prayers for us for about two weeks. If one of us starts praying she stops us in the beginning and declares that she will "Heavenly Father." So we let her. She does a decent job, but it's fairly formulaic--I mean, she's two, so that's alright. They basically include an address, "fant you," "bess food," and amen. If I suggest anything else too loudly I'm told to "sop" and she must start the prayer all over.

At lunch today though I suggested near the end that we bless Dad. He's been sick since last night and wasn't eating lunch with us, which worried Madie so she willingly threw in, "bess Dadda" without getting upset at me. Then she paused for a moment. Finally, she said, "Merry Hissmass" ("Christmas") and closed the prayer. Hahaha! It was priceless! I just had to write it down!

O Tannenbaum

One of my favorite Christmas traditions was heading up to the Santa Cruz Mountains to cut down our Christmas tree a few days after Thanksgiving. We actually did this the weekend after we returned from Saipan. Thank you Weltz family for joining us and sharing your pictures! Our friends are from Germany, and have never cut down their own tree before. Ironic because that's where the whole tradition began. Afterwards, we had a picnic. 

We found a 15 foot tall noble fir for just $30! It was discounted because of it's height. Not too many people are buying  the bigger ones I guess.

More Saipan

With our camera dying in Saipan, we have been very grateful for our friends and family who have taken the time to send us pictures from our outings this last month. Hopefully Santa brings us a new camera for Christmas...=)

Fooling Children

I'm reading John Lithgow's memoir, Drama: An Actor's Education. I'm only about 90 pages in, but wow--if the rest of it is as good as it is so far I'm going to love it.

But this post isn't so much about the memoir as it is about something he says in the book. Allow me to preface it: in his 20s, Lithgow took up guitar as an excitedly expectant father. He never learned it well, but he can play well enough to come up with little children's ditties and such (which is all he was hoping for). Eventually he started putting on children's shows--he's even performed for 2000 kids in Carnegie Hall. It's a one-man act filled with all sorts of silliness and songs and games. Here's what he says about performing for children versus adults:

"The more I perform for children, the more I love it. They are a sensational audience for a stage performer and an exhilarating change of pace from adults. The goal of theater is a suspension of disbelief. With grown-ups, you never completely achieve it. Adults never entirely forget that they are watching actors pretend. You can certainly have an impact on them, move them, shock them, and make them laugh. But you're not fooling them for a moment. Adults always sit in a theater with the unwavering knowledge that they are watching a calculated piece of fiction.

Not so children. ... For them, there is little difference between artifice and reality. ... Their disbelief is in a constant state of suspension. Over time I've invented all sorts of tricks to take advantage of their innocence. ... They play the game passionately, over and over again, blithely unaware that I'm doing anything to manipulate them. They absolutely love to be tricked in this way, And in their response you can see the first stirrings of a grown-up's appetite for entertainment. Deep down, adults long to be tricked as well" (pg. 82-83).

Last night Mike, Madeleine, and I went to a performance of The Nutcracker. She stood, entranced, for an hour and when we suggested near the end of the intermission that we leave then instead of after the second act, she threw an enormous fit because the orchestra had just started retuning (not formally, only plucking a few strings, etc.) and we couldn't leave without hearing the rest of the music. Did she believe what was happening on stage? With all her heart. I'm sure she realized it wasn't happening to her, but I am also sure she believed it was happening to Clara. Watching Madie made it clear I was missing something.

So, as for adults wanting to be fooled in that way--now I do. Do you?

Potty Problems

You have to remind Madie to go sit on the toilet, and often she will complain, but once she's on there, it's like she's building a city. She's been on there for the past 20 minutes at least and this conversation went down between us in the living room and Madie on the toilet:

Me: "Madie, are you done?"
Madie: "No!"
Mike: "Are your legs asleep?"
Madie: (after a pause) "Yes!"

Oh my, Madeleine...

"Uh-Oh Manny!"

Madie makes me laugh so hard every single day. The photo above, exhibit A: While we were in Saipan we decided to go to a buffet for lunch with Casey and MariLou. Food was great, it was a lot of Asian. After the meal we all got a little ice cream, Madie got her very own bowl of chocolate ice cream which she was ecstatic about! After she finished it, she asked for more, or "maw-ey peas". We try to control sample sizes of sweets as much as possible with her, so Mal and I immediately said "No, all done for now." Her face in the photo above was her response. For about 30+ seconds, she had this tense/quivering-lip thing going, clenched spoon, and would close her eyes for three seconds at a time in disapproval of what we just said. Oh, and completely silent while doing all this. We all just started laughing. I was even able to get out my camera to snap this shot! About 5-10 seconds into it, Grammy got up and ran over to save the day with a second bowl of ice cream. Phew! Crisis averted! When we tell her "No" or "Madie be gentle", she will often close her eyes in disapproval an do the same thing. But this incident at the restaurant was priceless!

Some of you may be wondering what the title of this blog post means? Whenever something goes wrong, like dropping a cracker onto the floor, or her sock not being perfectly onto her foot, or almost anything....she says "Uh-oh manny! Uh-oh!" without fail! Now we don't know where the manny came from. It's definitely not Madie, because she can say her own name perfectly fine. She is actually getting pretty good with her pronunciation.

One more thing about Madie that cracks me up but at the same time drives me up a wall is how we have to confirm we understood her by repeating the word back to her correctly. Often times she will point out the moon, a bus, or a horse. If we respond "Yeah, isn't that neat?" or "Yup", she will continually repeat the word with a more frustrated tone until we repeat back the word she is trying to communicate. She is a very persistent girl! I'm smiling just thinking about these Madie-isms.

Happy Birthday Mike!!

We love you!

Easy Advent Calendar

Sorry about not getting the other pictures from our trip up yet. Our camera's batter got wet and Mike thinks some of the inside of the camera did too, so it's out of commission right now and we just haven't taken the SM card to the store to get any pictures put on a disc and the other pictures we took while we were there are on my mum's camera so we're waiting on her to email them to us--hint hint.

In the mean time, I was able to get a fairly decent snapshot of our Advent calendar that I FINALLY finished. (It is not at all what I was planning on--many mess-ups later and this is what we have.) It was taken on our Flip video camera and snapped on the computer so it's not as good as an actual picture.

Anyway, I'm pretty pleased with the outcome, even if it's not what I was going for in the first place. And I really like that it adds a little more to our Christmas decor. We don't really have much in that collection. Basically, right now we have stockings up and the advent calendar and a string of poinsettia lights around our kitchen window that I got as a Christmas decor-deprived single college student. Oh, I guess I did also pay $1 on a little bell ornament for our doorknob. I'm desperate here.

Things will get better on Saturday when we go get our Christmas tree. Most of our decorations are for trees and wreathes.

So I cut out these little squares of patterned cardstock. I used the scraps (cut to size) to stamp the date and write a scripture on. Mike went through and found a scripture to be read every night for Advent, ending with Luke 2 on December 24th. I punched holes at the top and bottom of each card and strung 1/4" ribbon through. Then I just wrapped each end of a string of florist's twine around a piece of candy (Lindt chocolates and strawberry hard candies) and then hung it on the ribbon strung between the cards. Easy-peasy, if you're looking for a last-minute DIY Advent calendar.

Merry Christmas!

Saipan: Week 1

We've been here about a week now, so it's time for a recap. The first big event was Italian Night at the Conner house. Dad likes to throw these little Italian nights every once in a while, and on Tuesday he had a special guest star: Nadia Richards brought her pasta maker over to teach those who were interested how to make pasta. (Actually, the dough was all made, but I guess it's really easy. But she taught them how to roll it.)

Dad and Mike were both in heaven. 

And I'm pretty sure I know a future gift I'll be giving. If he doesn't get it for himself first--which is usually what happens.

Mmmmmm....passsssssta.

Wednesday, Mum, Dad, Mike, Madie and I hit up Townhouse beach. It is a lagoon-side beach, so it was really shallow for a long ways out. The water is also pretty calm, despite the wind we've had since we've been here, so it was bearable for the Fi.

I like to look at this picture and think of my favorite 007 ever. 

I guess now I just need to get him some of those shorts...

Modeling the latest in toddler swimwear.

I never thought my dad would look tan. But I was so, so wrong.

Thursday night we hit up the street market. We don't have a ton of pictures, but here's us eating dinner.

And if you haven't watched Madie's mad dance moves, you're missing out.

Today Madie hung out in the hammock and watched movies while Mike and I went to check out some historical sites. She loved it! And, surprise, we found out she can start movies on her own. After Winnie-the-Pooh finished, Mum said she heard another movie playing looked to see that she had somehow gotten Robin Hood playing. Scary.

We saw the Last Command Post. Like many of the sites on Saipan, this is a tragic one. 

WARNING: THE FOLLOWING STORIES ARE EXTREMELY TRAGIC. 

Briefly: the American soldiers landed on the south end of the island and pushed the Japanese further and further north until the commanders who were left holed themselves up in this rock-and-concrete bunker past Tanapag. When they realized they would not ever celebrate a victory on Saipan, General Saito, working under the direction of Emporer Hirohito, ordered those left under his command to join him in seppuku--or samurai-style suicide.

These next few pictures are at Banzai Cliff, another tragic spot. The Japanese were pros at national propaganda and had successfully convinced their people their fates would be worse if they were captured by the Americans than if they died an honorable death. Thus the only option aside from capture or murder was suicide. Whole families jumped (or threw each other) from the edges of cliffs. Banzai and Suicide were the most popular. Despite the tragedy associated with it, Banzai is one of the most beautiful places on the island. 

It's covered with Japanese memorials and shrines like these.

Behind the statue is Suicide Cliff, the other popular spot Japanese "saved" themselves from dishonorable deaths.

The view from Banzai.

The Jet to Saipan

We left Livermore at 5:00 am for San Francisco to Seattle, to Japan, to Guam, and then to Saipan. We arrived to Saipan at 9:00 am PST. That's 28 hours of traveling which includes the drive to the airport! Madie did surprisingly well on the trip. There were about 45 mins on the 10 hour flight to Japan where she was throwing a fit, but I really couldn't blame her. We were getting a lot of frustrated looks from people around us, but their frustrated looks quickly changed to "Sorry I looked your way" when I met stared right back at them with a stern look. This guy would even play peek-a-boo and would glance over every few 10 seconds. He finally stopped when I locked my eyes on him for a minute straight. We were joking with my parents afterward that I should have drawn some tats on my face to look more intimidating. A lot of people already assume I'm in the military, so that's good enough I guess.

Saipan is very beautiful, green and humid. We will be here through Thanksgiving and are glad to be with family. I know this is probably weird to hear, but in the 3.5 years of being married, this is actually my first time visiting my in-laws home.

We were given these leis when we showed up to church.

Madie really liked the lei. She spent her first day in Saipan in her underwear.