I don't know what to do with myself, so I thought I'd write a little.  Brian is gone for the day, to Pullman to watch the WSU vs. UNLV football game, which was a wipeout, last I heard.  Ah yes, it's 52-0 right now.  In WSU's favor, I should add, which is a miracle considering how abysmally awful they are.  Maybe there's hope for them yet?

Anyway, I didn't go to the game to, because Karen is having her last pre-wedding party today, and I missed all of the previous three of them.  So I felt I should stay and go.  Now I'm just waiting to go to my mom's to drop off the kids.... Grant is sleeping, so I'll have to wake him up, whch he'll love.  Ah well. 

I was thinking about how Madeleine had thrown a fit last week, and she wanted me to do something (that's what all her fits tend to be about; she wants me to do something for her, help her in some way, and I won't, because she's being lazy and spoiled and wants to be in control of me; now, don't get me wrong, I help her all the time, it's just that sometimes she really needs to start helping herself).  Anyway, she told me that if I didn't do what she wanted me to do, she was going to spank me.  Really?  I just said "no you won't" and went on about my business, which mostly consisted of not doing what she wanted me to do, and then ignoring the resulting tantrum.  Spanking just makes her worse, and it really never seems to solve anything.  My current strategy is to not give in, ignore her for awhile, and then hold her in my lap to get her to calm down, without actually doing what it was she wanted me to do.  She threw a killer tantrum at my grandma's yesterday, because I asked her to put her shoes on by herself.  She's fully capable and does it really quickly when she wants to go somewhere quickly, but sometimes she decides she needs me to do it, and suddenly she's too tired to do it, or her fingers are too tired, or the tongue is too hard for her....  I got home and she was screaming and Brian asked if she had misbehaved in some way so that I wouldn't help her with her shoes, and I just said that she could do it and should be expected to.  I even told her she didn't have to put them on; she could go home in her socks.  But she wasn't happy with that either.  Last week during the most awful tantrum she laid on a chair on her belly (an uncomfortable position) for something like 20 minutes or more, screaming and screaming that she was too tired to get down by herself.  Really?  I would think it would be much harder to sit their in an uncomfortable position screaming and screaming. 

Ah well.  I hope it's a stage. 

Grant really loves to use "ing" words now.  He put a block onto our big pony tower and enthusiastically exclaimed, "helping!!"  I still love how he says "mommy doing now-ing?"  Madeleine thinks that's funny too, so we all go around saying, "doing nowing?  Grant doing now-ing?  Madeleine doing now-ing??" 

I guess it's time to get ready to go.  I've been procrasting building anything for the lego convention, and I'm starting to feel all stressed about it.  Ah well. 

Better get going... 

It's before bedtime, so I asked the kids if they wanted to read a book, and Grant answered, "I do."  Yay, pronouns!  He's been using them some, lately, including "I want" and some other things like that.  Then Madeleine said she wanted to read books, but she needed help doing one thing first.  I asked what, and she said her ponies were going to go on a sleepover, and she needed help making them a bed.  So I got an empty DUPLO box and put a baby blanket in it, and then we got more baby blankets to put over the top, and she's out there talking sweetly, to her ponies, I presume, who I am sure are getting all bundled up. 

Grant's eating yogurt by himself, and he's doing the whole "bumblebee around the tree" thing to himself, complete with circling of the spoon on its way into his mouth.  It's so cute.

In other news, Madeleine has been throwing a fit for about two hours now.  It started when we came downstairs for the day, and she was too "tired" to go down the stairs.  I carried her upside-down and she laughed and I thought we were good, but downstairs it was more of the same.  She was too tired to walk anywhere, and just sat and screamed about it for hours.  I'd say more, but Grant is attacking me.  I must defend myself!

I've been rather tired lately.  Brian went out of town last weekend and I still feel a bit like I haven't recovered.  On Monday afternoon when I had my free time, I spent all of it asleep, for four hours.  But then Grant slept terribly that night too...  I don't know, but it sure is hard to get him to sleep well.  If he takes a nap he's up too late; if he doesn't he goes to bed early but sleeps horribly and is cranky to boot. 

I feel kind of disconnected from the world, and seem to have a hard time remembering what's been going on.  But I guess I do remember that Madeleine had her first ballet/tap class on Wednesday, and she loved it.  At the end of the class the teacher called us into the room to talk to us a moment.  Then she asked if anyone had any questions, and Madeleine raised her hand to say she did.  So the teacher asked her what her question was, and Madeleine started saying all her filler words that she says when she can't quite spit out the thing she wants to say.  They're words like "so" and "I guess" and "well" with lots of ellipses following them.  Then when she went on to say "yes indeedy" (which still cracks me up to no end) I said we'd ask later.  Then when I quietly asked Madeleine what her question was, she hemmed and hawed a bit to me, and then said she couldn't remember.  I'm not sure she actually had a question; my suspicion is that she wanted to tell about her ballet class, right then, while she was still in it.  The rest of the day she told everyone she met, even strangers at the grocery store.  It was hard to get her to stop telling people, even when it was past time to stop talking and let them go merrily on their way.

Anyway, a few things to write down:

Grant is at a super-cute stage of talking.  One of the things he says a lot is, "Mommy doing now-ing?", or even "Mommy do now-ing?"  Which means, "What is Mommy doing now?"  But I love the learning of grammar, and how he sticks the "ing" on the end, even if it's not appropriate.

Madeleine also had a moment when she asked where the "old grandma" was, while we were visiting my grandma's house and my mom was there, too.  Then she said, "That's what I call her sometimes, the old grandma."  My mom is thrilled that by default that makes her the "young grandma". 

Speaking of my mom....  Well, first I should say that I cut my hand pretty badly on the bread cutting knife on Thursday.  It's still sore, but getting better.  Then we had my mom and brother and grandma and dad and andy over for dinner.  Mom tried to toast the bread in the oven, but the oven door closed and she (okay, we) forgot about it till it was burning up and smoking up the house.  So Brian took it outside.  Later my mom got it back and tried to use the same bread-cutting knife to cut off the burnt parts.  But she ended up slicing her finger, and it bled and bled and bled.  The same stupid knife that cut my hand just two days ago.  Seriously, we should just throw it out or something.  Last I saw, she had gone to get stitches.  Now I should call and see how things are going. 

Mom does admit it wasn't one of her finer helping episodes. 

Grant is wanting attention, so more later, I suppose.

8-13-11

The kids are out in the little swimming pool on the deck.  We filled it up this morning and now the water is really warm and they’re having a great time.  Madeleine is excited that she has toys that float; Grant is excited that he himself can float.  I’m not sure if he really is floating, but he thinks he is, and that’s good enough for him. 

Grant had his two top front teeth pulled yesterday at the pediatric dentist’s office.  They had gotten cavities (perhaps from nursing at night) and then he kept hitting them on furniture and they chipped out.  Then the remaining bits were turning black, and it was an ugly mess.  So they got pulled.  Hello, mommy guilt.  But anyway.  He was really great at the dentist’s office.  They took us to the room and said Grant could sit with me on the bench for awhile, but he just climbed up into the big chair and looked happy.  I offered him yellow bear or the black pod (iPod touch), but he said no and was just happy.  Then they had me give him some medicine in a small cup, and he drank it perfectly.  (I ask him how many sips he thinks it will take, and then we count the sips to see if he’s right, and it makes the whole process really easy.)  The medicine was Motrin mixed with the stuff that makes you really loopy and forget the whole experience.  Then they sat him in the chair with an oxygen reader on his finger and also a blood pressure cuff, and put a blanket on him.  They put the chair back and gave him headphones, and there was a TV on the ceiling, showing Diego.  (Later it went to Wonder Pets and then Blue’s Clues, all favorites.)  So he just sat there (for 20 minutes) watching shows while the medicine started to work.  Then they gave him some laughing gas over his nose.  (He did do some funny smiles after that; perhaps it really is a “laughing” gas?)  After that the dentist has some banana flavored cream that took three minutes to numb the gums.  Then it was time for the shots to deaden the whole area.  Grant jerked a bit for those, but it was over fast.  That’s four layers of different medicine things they gave him.  Then it was time to pull out the teeth, which was fast.  I was a little sad to see the leftover holes with the blood welling up in them.  They put in a foamy substance to clot the blood, and then they were pretty much done.  They said he might be like an angry drunk as the medicine wore off, and that he might not walk the rest of the day (the nurse said that; I’m not sure if that was completely correct).  The nurse walked us to the car, perhaps a policy because the kids can’t really walk when they’re done?  She carried my bag for me.  As I put Grant into his chair she was telling me that if he took a nap, make sure to keep him on his back and perhaps use a small pillow under his back to keep his airway open.  And then Grant said, “air-way” in a really drunk sort of voice, and it made me feel like laughing. 

All the way to my mom’s house he was doing okay, telling me about things he saw (which he always does…  listing things like grapes, tractors, trucks, corn, straw, straw stacks, “bumpy!” (the canal bridge), airplanes, etc.).  When we got to my mom’s, he started getting mad, because he wanted to walk.  I told him he couldn’t and he really fussed about that.  So I put him down (with support) and he collapsed to the ground (gently, as I was holding him), and he was really mad.  The next hour-and-a-half weren’t fun.  He kept wanting to walk and was mad that he couldn’t.  He wasn’t happy.  My mom held him a bit while I got towels on our bed, so he wouldn’t bleed on the sheets.  (It didn’t work that well; there were still pink spots later, but oh well.)  After a bit I took him to bed and tried to give him milk, but he was too numb to latch on and was soooo mad.  He kept saying “hard to do!” angrily, and then tried to go to my other side, but he couldn’t even roll by himself, and he was angry angry angry.  I was starting to think it was going to be a very very long day.  After awhile we went downstairs and I turned on the TV to Strawberry Shortcake (it was the first kids’ show I found, and Madeleine likes it, what she’s seen of it), and it calmed him for slightly longer bursts.  He’d fuss, want milk, have troubles, get angry, and then be calm for a minute looking at the TV.  And finally he fell asleep.  I moved him, and he woke up and yelled all over again, but after I took him upstairs to bed he managed to fall asleep again.  After that he slept for three hours.  Then he was like a different kid.  Suddenly everything was pretty fine again.  He could walk, he was pretty happy, he ate some pear baby food that Brogan had left at my mom’s.  It wasn’t too long before he was running around, chasing Madeleine and trying to whack her, which is their new favorite game.  Well, it’s his favorite game, and Madeleine likes it for awhile, until she doesn’t.  She whacks him, too, because I gave her encouragement to defend herself if Grant was getting her and I wasn’t there immediately.  Then it was a game they both liked, but then sometimes Grant doesn’t know when to stop and Madeleine starts screaming.  Later on we came home and the neighbor was walking by, so we talked to her a bit.  While I was doing that, the kids got their scooters out, and Grant was scootering back and forth on the sidewalk, with no indication he’d recently had his teeth out.  By night time he was asking to eat pretzels.  I told him it would hurt, but he kept asking.  So I gave him one to eat carefully, and he did fine.  So I gave him a few more.  After eating a few, one got him in the sore spot, and he started crying.  I took him up to bed then, and once we got there, he said in a very hurt tone, “pretzel hurt Grant!”  Of course, this morning he was asking for pretzels all over again, and I had to remind him that they hurt him.  “Remember, pretzel hurt Grant?”  And then he seemed to remember and understand. 

Grant wasn’t supposed to eat or drink anything for 6 hours before getting his teeth pulled.  I worried about this because he wakes up a lot at night and wants to drink stuff to go back to sleep.  I was afraid he’d scream about this and not sleep.  But it worked out that he had a late nap, and then we stayed up till 12:30 a.m.  Then he went to sleep, hoping he’d sleep through all the time of no drinking allowed.  But he woke up at 3 a.m. (but went back to sleep immediately), and the same at 4 a.m.  At 5 a.m. he wanted a drink, and fussed about it.  I explained about waiting till after we went to the dentist.  I don’t know if he understood at all, but it calmed him a little.  But he didn’t go to sleep.  So we watched videos and played ipod games and got up to make lego creations.  Then I cleaned the house for the housekeeper and got the kids ready and finally we got to leave to take Madeleine to my mom’s.  He kept asking for milk, juice, water, pop, anything… and I kept saying after the dentist.  Of course, after the dentist he could hardly drink.

What else?  We all went to the park to play pickleball tonight, with Matt and his friend Tony.  The kids bring their dirt digging toys and dig next to the pickleball court, and we bring chalk and draw pictures.  There is a playground there, too, though we didn’t go there today, because Madeleine was having too much fun building sand castles.  She had some broken sand dollars that we got at the beach, and she put them on her sand castle with some sticks, and was really pleased.  The full moon rose, much to the kids’ delight, and it got dark, much to Grant’s chagrin.  He does NOT like the dark.  I had to turn the light on in the van on the way home, because he was fussing about it.  It’s okay when we’re in bed, but not outside. 

I know I had more to say, but I got interrupted in the writing of this, and now I don’t remember so much.  I guess I’ll be done for now.  I’m grimy and need a shower, anyway.  Pickleball mixed with digging in the dirt will do that to you! 

Oh, and a few links for my mom:

http://godbricks.blogspot.com/2011/08/star-and-crescent.html

http://remocable.blogspot.com/2011/08/blog-post.html

http://roomthily.tumblr.com/post/886768067/7-31-10-007-by-eilonwy77-lego-illusions

http://one-theme.tumblr.com/post/8579060740

http://legoleaks.blog28.fc2.com/blog-entry-1383.html

http://remocable.blogspot.com/2011/07/flowers-i-hate-flowers-i-paint-them.html

http://tweeaffect.blogspot.com/2011/07/were-gonna-save-world-tonight.html?showComment=1310330470398#c436735864663950531

http://www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?s=781ff46f77da2eec31612786fd00b5fc&showtopic=58412&st=0

I put two little jelly bracelets together in a slip knot, and Madeleine told me, "Very creative!"  (She had gotten the bracelets from Grandma Ellen, who had them left over from Karen's bridal shower.  Each bracelet takes on the shape of some princess-y item, like a crown or wand, and Madeleine loves them.)  This reminded me how I have recently acquired some new clothes and shoes (highly needed; all my old stuff was sprouting holes left and right), and when I wore some of them, Madeleine told me, "Very stylish!"  Ah, I love getting compliments from her:  they're sweet, they crack me up, and they make me wonder "how did she learn that?"  The sad answer, I think, is probably from television, at least for the "very stylish" comment.  She loves watching Max and Ruby, and Ruby and Louise love to put on fashion shows and be all stylish. 

Also Brian thinks the country is falling apart and we should stop investing in the stock market.  I say he's paranoid.  Good times, good times.  I swear the stock market will rebound some day.  Brian is just frustrated because it's down over the last 12 years, and that's about the time he started investing.  We'll all be living in poverty, he says, but he also thinks we won't starve.  I say those little ragamuffins of ours can keep us out of the poor house, if need be. 

Madeleine, Grant, be prepared for Mommy and Daddy to be living in your basement someday. 

8-8-11

Last week we went on vacation to Portland and to Seaside, OR, with a side trip to Canon Beach.  We did lots of fun things, especially things that would be fun for our kids.  The quick summary is that we went to Multnomah Falls two times (the second time we walked up to the bridge and saw Smokey the Bear), the Oregon Zoo, the Portland Children’s Museum, the Beaverton LEGO store, the beach in Seaside and Canon Beach, Mo’s for lunch, the carousel and train ride in Seaside, Haystack Rock to see starfish, sea anemones, etc., two times to the pizza restaurant attached to the arcade (Grant loved air hockey), the Seaside Aquarium, the park in Arlington on the way home, where we saw the Weinermobile at the gas station…  what else?  We played a lot on the beach and got all muddy.  They have swings on the beach, and we used them several times.  There was a family that had spent several days digging a pit into the beach by our hotel, and we went there and they let our kids play in it.  Madeleine had a dirt slide down into the pit.  If you got into it and bent down so that your head was below the level of the rest of the beach, it got really quiet.  The sound of the waves just disappeared.  It was also a little bit warmer out of the wind.  In true Oregon Coast fashion it was pretty cold at times, with occasional drizzle out of the low clouds and fog.  But then if the low clouds would burn off it would heat up.  It was hard to dress the kids for all the changing conditions, especially since they were trying to play in the mud and get wet in the waves while also trying to stay warm and avoid sunburn.  It was tricky.  I packed about 3-4 outfits for each kid per day, and we went through just about all of them.  I tend to upload my photos to Facebook now, or to flickr, but maybe I’ll put a few here and describe them, for future memory’s sake.  Maybe.  I’m rather unmotivated in the blog category lately. 

Let’s see… my kids have said a few fun things lately.  They’re just so fun now, and easier.  The trip was soooo much easier than previous trips.  We would just put on a DVD on our portable DVD player in the car, and the kids were happy for long periods of time.  Yay!

Anyway, on the way to church yesterday, Grant saw a boat, so he enthusiastically yelled “boat!” He’s so enthusiastic about so many things, and especially about trucks and buses and other things that he sees on the road.  I asked him if he saw a car pulling a boat, and he loudly told me, “No car!  Truck!”  So we asked if it were a truck pulling the boat, (Brian was telling me that a car couldn’t do it, and I said some could, and we were almost arguing… but not quite), and then Grant butt in, “Yes, truck!”  Yes, it was a truck, pulling a boat.  He’s also saying longer words much better now, including “Madeleine” which is almost said perfectly now, with perhaps just a bit of a nasal sound around the “d”. 

As for Madeleine, she’s understanding humor a bit more.  The other day Grant said, “Hungry!...  Pretzel!...” (telling me he wanted pretzels), and then Madeleine said, “I didn’t know pretzels were alive!”  (Using the logic that if a pretzel was hungry, it should be alive).  I had to double-check and make sure that’s what she meant, and indeed it was.  I think. 

I’m pretty tired today and haven’t gotten much done in my time away from the kids.  They are at their grandparents’ house today, and I’ve just fiddled around with a whole lot of not much.  I suppose I’ll get into a more energetic mood again after being home a few more days.  Tomorrow we’ll go to my mom’s for some of the day, and Thursday too.  Then Friday we take Grant to the dentist to have his two top front teeth pulled out.  Poor kid.  I’m really worried about the six hours beforehand (starting at 2 a.m.), because he can’t eat or drink.  He’s a bad sleeper, and he drinks when going back to sleep.  There is probably going to be screaming and more screaming, and a whole lot of not sleeping.  Gah.  I suppose a lot of people would give me the advice to let him cry it out (just in general and just for dental appointments), but I really hate that approach.  The last time I let Grant cry is the time that he fell into the desk in his room trying to get my water glass, busting out his two front teeth and spilling water all over everything in the process.  The baby advice philosophy that I like the best says that if you are going to let a kid cry, at least be there with them while they are crying.  But dang it’s hard. 

I forgot to mention that we took our kids to their first movie in the theater ever two weeks ago.  We went to see Cars 2.  I had read it wasn’t good for little kids, but Brian loved the first movie so much he really wanted to take them anyway.  We went and gave it a shot.  Grant was enthralled, but Madeleine was really really scared.  She kept asking to go to the bathroom so she could leave the movie, so I told Brian she probably needed to leave.  So we did.  It was just a really violent movie, not at all like the first.  Talk about a misstep by the Pixar people.  If you’re marketing to preschoolers, you should probably make a movie appropriate for them. 

The kids will be home soon, so I’m going to go enjoy the last of my free time. 

Toodles!

7-28-11  (Grant is two-and-a-half years old today)

I just woke up from a decently pleasant dream.  How’s that for a minor miracle?  We were going on vacation, on a car trip to somewhere in California, perhaps.  The scenery was beautiful, and we went on several very long bridges that seemed to be going over bays and inlets from the ocean.   We kept stopping at game arcades and I kept finding lots of coins and paper money on the ground.  I grabbed lots of it up.  We went to eat at a restaurant and I ordered clam chowder in a bread bowl and all-you-can-eat corn cakes (they were part of the clam chowder order – it was like they were the side dish) and that seemed good to me.  Now there was a table of four guys right behind us, and they weren’t saying anything at all and they made me nervous.  I was showing everyone the money I had found, but felt like I should keep it hidden from them.  But nothing ever happened.  And then we went to a hotel and there were lots of legos there.  Brian apologized for playing so many video games (now, I want it to be clear that in real life, he does not play too many video games; this apology from him is more of a sign of how he feels guilty sometimes playing games, when he really doesn’t need to feel guilty at all).  And then Grant and I were going to take a nap.  It was great.  Usually my dreams are so negative and stressful, and this one wasn’t at all.  So even though it’s early in the morning, I decided to get up and write it down, and also to write down some things about the kids.  And I probably get to take a nap this afternoon, so yay. 

I’m feeling a bit clunky in my wording this morning; I’ll blame it on the fact that I didn’t sleep very long, although perhaps the truth of the matter is that I’m getting out of practice with writing.  Or maybe I just need to warm up. 

Recently, perhaps starting in the past few days, Grant has started saying, “Mommy going now?”  It’s very clearly a shortened version of, “Where is Mommy going now?” and yesterday he said it to me a bazillion times (or at least 20).  Every time I wandered away from him he would run after me, asking, “Mommy going now?  Mommy going now?”  And I’d say, ‘Where is Mommy going now?” and he would say, “Yeah!” and I would say something like, “I walked to the garbage can to throw something out.”  Which was just a few steps away from where we had been together, clearly in sight.  He seems a bit anxious about me leaving, even if it’s a few steps.  Or maybe he’s just delighted with communication?

Yesterday the neighbor girl had a birthday party, and I took both kids over.  After we were there for a short time, Grant wanted his sippy cup, which we’d left at home.  So I told Madeleine (who was having fun digging in the dirt – it was a backyard play party) that Grant and I were going home to get it, but we’d be right back, and Madeleine told me, “I’ll keep an eye on myself.” 

There were lots of kids at the party, and I found myself feeling quite protective of Madeleine.  There were a ton of little girls there, and Madeleine couldn’t tell which one was her friend.  She went over to some kids and asked which one was her friend (she called her by name, but I guess I’m getting a bit more selective about names in blogs now), and I imagined the kids laughing at her for not knowing.  But they didn’t (I don’t think).  But I was nervous.  Then they had a slip and slide, and the kids waited in a line, but I had to show Madeleine how to wait in the line, too.  She seemed unhappy; she said she was “tired” (which is what she says when something is wrong or she is unhappy) and flopped in the grass.  And then I worried again that kids would make fun of her or something.  I worried about her being lost in the large group of kids and not having fun because she didn’t know anybody, etc, etc.  Talk about projecting my own issues onto my kid.  I think this is a prequel to a whole world of emotional discomfort as my kids get old enough to go to school and venture out into the wide world….  I am NOT looking forward to it. 

I thought I had a ton to write down, but now I’m not thinking of it.  I guess I could complain for a moment.  My neck hurts a lot; I got tense and then pulled it and it’s hurt for 5 days or more now.  I suppose a massage could help, but I only had a prescription for 16 and I’m not sure how many I’ve used, but it is definitely most of them.  I need to go back to the doctor and have the whole annual checkup and then maybe get more, but even with a prescription it costs money ($25 copay now, up from $20) and I’m feeling guilty about money, perhaps especially because I washed Madeleine’s pink iPod touch in the laundry on Monday…. And after that happened my back went haywire too, though it’s gotten mostly better.  I just get super-tense and pull the muscles and it’s all very uncomfortable at times.  Going to the gym helps some; we’re going again tonight, which is good. 

Yesterday we went to McDonald’s for dinner (I hardly ever go there anymore, and felt the desire to get out of the house), and Brian decided to take the kids to a park afterwards.  He was going to drop me off at the house for a bit of free time (and then when he came back, I stayed with the kids outside for quite awhile, so he could have free time).  On the way home to drop me off, Madeleine said to me, “It’s so funny when you take a bath.”  That was strange and seemingly out-of-the-blue, but then I figured that the last time we had gone to McDonald’s for dinner and then Brian had dropped me off at the house (quite a long while ago now) I had taken a bath, and the kids had come in to find me there.  I asked Madeleine why it was funny when I took a bath, and she told me it was because I was too big for the bathtub.  Great.  I must be like a beached whale.    She just likes to lie down in the tub all the way; must be nice.    (She said something else funny and slightly insulting on the way back to the house, too, but I can’t remember right now.  Sigh.)

Today Grant came up to me and said, "teeth hurt" and then "medicine"  (pronounced 'menh-sin') and then "feel better".  He very clearly was telling me he his teeth hurt and he wanted medicine so they would feel better.  Man, I love it when kids know how to communicate. 

Also, last week Madeleine told me, "I noticed that the dish washer door was open and I assumed that you wanted it closed, so I closed it for you."  Yay, big words.    She's been using some other big words too.  Let me see what I can remember...  "I wasn't expecting that!"  though that's not so very big.  "Thingamajig", "contraption" (she brought us three lego creations made with the simple machines tools; one was a toy for me, one was a toy for Grant, and one was "just a contraption")  ... bah, I can't remember them all right now.  I'll try again later. 

July 10, 2011

Madeleine has just been on fire with the funny verbal things, lately. She's such a storyteller now. During her monologues she tends to repeat phrases she's heard elsewhere. Last night she was eating hamburgers, and said something like, "Hmmm. Something's missing. I know! Ketchup!" It was funny because she knew exactly what was missing the whole time, whereas normally that phrase is used if you don't actually know what is missing, just that something is. She also told me yesterday to finish something "lickety-split".   I had to run upstairs to tell Brian that, because it amused me so much.  It’s just a near constant stream of funny and cute things coming out of her mouth. 

Grant says lots of stuff too.  One of his favorite phrases is “come you!”, which usually means he wants me to go somewhere, and he’ll often pull me to where he wants me to go.  But sometimes it means that he wants to go somewhere with me.  He also likes to put the word “time” after things that he wants, such as “milk time!” (that’s a big one).  He sort of put two “sentences” together, though I am struggling to remember exactly what it was.  We were upstairs and I wanted us to go down to eat dinner last night, and Grant said something like “No eat.  Milk time.”  I think that was it.  I know it was two two-word phrases in a row to make it very clear that he did not want to go downstairs for dinner, but wanted to stay upstairs and have some more milk. 

Back to Madeleine… she will repeat word for word lots of things that I say to someone else.  She’s a little parrot, copying a ton of what I say, and usually repeating it to Brian or someone else, as if they hadn’t just heard everything I had said. 

We went on a little adventure the other day.  On Friday we went to have lunch with Brian, and on the way I saw an overpass that went over the freeway.  I had always assumed it was a ramp to the highway to Kennewick, but this time I noticed that there was a train crossing right next to it.  I noticed because there was actually a train going through the crossing, and the gates were down.  I had never realized there was a regular road there before, and wondered if that was the way to the interesting place down by the river that I sometimes see from the freeway.  So after lunch we went back to explore, and found that indeed, it was the way to that  place.  It was the Chamna Natural Preserve (http://www.tapteal.org/pages/chamna.html), and we had fun walking around a little.  The kids were excited by the river and the mud and the dragonflies, the trees and the hidden spots and the berry bushes.  It felt a bit like someplace over on the west side underneath some of those trees that grew up along the Yakima river there.  So today we went back after church and took Brian with us.  It didn’t go as well this time, as the kids were whiny and Grant needed a nap, but it might be nice to go there sometime when we’re better equipped and explore the trails some more.

We watched the women’s world cup soccer game today, the U.S. against Brazil, and it was crazy.  I was so incensed at the screw job, and then took a shower during extra time, and Brian told me it was over because Brazil had scored… but then it wasn’t, and… yeah.  We were excited. 

Anyway, I have a new list of links for my mother to look at.  I’m sure you’ve seen some of them before, but here ya go anyway:

http://tweeaffect.blogspot.com/2011/07/were-gonna-save-world-tonight.html

http://www.bricklink.com/messageThread.asp?ID=115618&nID=554315

http://plug.pt/forum/index.php?topic=370.1200  (translate that one)

http://www.brothers-brick.com/2011/06/19/ive-told-her-to-stop-but-she-wont-listen/

http://maodeabs.com/arte-com-pecas  (translate that one)

http://angrylegonerd.blogspot.com/2011/06/bigger-but-not-better-fixed.html

http://www.mocpages.com/moc.php/275867

http://www.flickr.com/photos/ltdemartinet/5889374057/in/photostream

http://www.flickr.com/photos/antimatterthegodly/5885746317/in/photostream

There’s probably more, but oh well.