A Mooooooving Experience

The other evening we were all coming back from a hike, and so we were tired, hungry, and more than a little grubby.  Our route took us past the local Hindu temple, and I noticed they had a huge inflatable cow set up right next to the street.  Drawing the baby's attention to it, she was looking up just as we passed by.  That thing must be two stories tall.  The look on her face was first fear, then amazement, and finally excitement.  Then she frantically tried to figure out which baby signs would mean "bring back the huge inflatable cow."

Waving Bye-Bye

Being nearly eighteen months old means that the baby is very nearly grown up (or so she claims), and that equates to doing many more things on her own.  She wants to feed herself no matter how messy she gets, she wants to climb into the chair by herself no matter how many bumps this may entail, and she wants to make her own choices about all sorts of things.  The problem is how to express yourself when your vocabulary is all of maybe twenty words.  This is where you have to get creative.

Getting people to do what you want is always though.  Often she uses the sign for "more" to mean "do this service for me."  For instance, she uses that sign when she wants you to open the door, lift her up, open something, or even take her around the hippie fair so she can listen to more music.  The problem comes from not knowing which service or item she wants at a given time.  I spend a lot of time saying "do you want x?" then she will shake her head "do you want y?" and so on.  At least she knows specific signs for books and hungry, so those most important topics are covered.

Then there's also the problem of saying when she doesn't like something.  The "all done" sign works for some things, such as finishing food, but it doesn't really cover everything.  After quite a bit of frustration she's settled on waving bye-bye when she wants something to be over.  Thus she will listen to music in the car and then wave "bye-bye" when she wants me to change the song.  It's quite the sign that she's never waved at Mr. Darby or Caspar Babypants.  She waves at things that are scary or boring or just not her style.  I'm guessing that as she gets older, the opinions will only get more strident. 

The Very First Funny

Last Sunday, Delphinium and I were hanging out together as we are wont to do in the early hours just after she wakes up.  She drinks milk. I drink tea and milk. She plays with her babies and stuffed toys. I "play" with the dishwasher and the broom.  She builds with blocks.  I build breakfast.  She reads picture books.  I read the internet or the paper.  It's a highly satisfactory arrangement.

Only sometimes, more and more in fact, she wants to do what I'm doing.  Not just something near me, but exactly what I am doing.  This morning it was reading the paper.  I tried to get her interested in other activities, but she would not be denied.  Then I remembered the comics.  Sure enough, I dug them out, and she was very happy to sit on my lap and admire the children and pets sprinkled among the pages. 

Then we came to "Red and Rover" where a dog was filling a swimming pool with beach balls.  Then she laughed.  Because that dog with the beach balls was just SO funny it made her laugh.  Which is a totally everyday event except that it was probably the first time she's ever laughed at a comic.  I hope that was the first out of maybe 10,000 or 20,000 times she will get to laugh at the comics. 

Over-Booked Kids

Here is a fascinating article about the over-scheduling of children in modern parenting.  It's certainly the fashion to sign your children up for every type of sports, music, arts, and drama activity, but are all these fabulous "opportunities" really beneficial?  Steven Levitt says no.  As far as econonomists can tell, there is no correlation between the number of activities and the later success of the child.  The article also suggests that perhaps parents frantic scheduling is really about trying to find your child's hidden talent so that you will have a clear marker of your parenting success. 

The Discipline Debate

I recently overheard a conversation in which a mother of a maybe one year old baby described her attempts at discipline. The child is not even walking yet, but she was concerned that she nip problems "in the bud" before it became a major concern. It seems that her baby has been doing all sorts of very troubling things such as throwing food on the ground, wiggling while being dressed, and trying to pull things of table tops. Shocking I know! Did you ever meet a baby who did such aweful things?! It gets worse.


At a loss for how to stop her, she talked to her sister who suggested smacking. Yes, smacks were proscribed to cure wiggling. She tried smacking the next time she did something wrong, but she just laughed. Then she decided that she needed to "study" how much force it would take for her to stop laughing. Every time she did something naughty, she hit the baby a little bit harder until finally she seemed to "notice." At last, she got her baby to cry! Success!

I just cringed when I heard all this. Whacking my child has never seemed like an option to me. I spend so much time trying to avoiding her coming to harm that I can't imagine causing it on purpose. I also don't think a one year old child is capable of understanding why they are being smacked. Sure, they may learn that certain behaviors result in pain, but if they don't get why then it doesn't really work. Maybe when my child is older I will feel the need to spank her, but so far it just seems barbaric to me.

I really do believe that children model everything they see us do. I know this because I've watched her "brush" her teeth, "read" magazines, and want to try every bit of food on our plates. Why should we think that this one area, hitting, would be different? If I use force and pain to get what I want in life, why shouldn't she do the same?

Tide To-Do

It seems that many people are upset recently due to a new TV ad from Tide. The ad, which features a pink clad mother complaining about her daughter's love of cargo shorts and hoodies, seems to be poking fun at children who do not follow traditional gender roles. Now I'm sure Tide would say that they intended to poke fun at the mother's discomfort, but I'm not at all certain that's the way it appears. For the last time, let's please lay off of kids who don't conform. Pink and blue are not uniforms, and it is grossly unfair to suggest that they are.

Art and The Kid

When summer first arrives in the Pacific NW, all I want to do is be outside. We walk, we play in the backyard, and we visit parks and playgrounds with our friends. We generally just worship the sun since we don't see it so much around here. However, as summer wears on, and it gets hotter, I start to want those occasional afternoons "off" from the heat and the glare. This is why we found ourselves heading to the Bellevue Arts Museum on a recent Friday.


The Seattle Art Museum has its free visitor day on the first Thursday of every month, but Bellevue prefers to offer Free Fridays. Either one is fine with me. Now you might think that an art museum with a toddler is a crazy idea, and you could certainly tell, from the looks in the elevator, that's exactly what some other patrons thought. Perhaps our baby is unusual, but she really seems to enjoy museums. Think about it, there are many things to look at and lots of them are huge and/or colorful. What's not to like? I think she was a bigger fan of all that modern art than I actually.

We all like the Michael Cooper sculptures in wood and metal that made us think of bicycles meet Da Vinci machines. Only the little one enjoyed the modern jewelry, and I think that was only because of the life-size banana necklace. The baby was also the biggest fan of Midway by Cathy McClure because she liked the elephants. The big people found the strobe to be nauseating within about three seconds. All through the museum we saw sculptures by Wanxin Zheng. These were declared "interesting" by the grown-ups and "fascinating" by the small fry.

On the whole, we enjoyed our trip to the art museum. I would go back depending on what the new exhibits might arrive. Don't worry about taking kids to places like this. They are people who are capable of enjoying culture too. Museums should not be hallowed places where only snooty, silent people are allowed to go and say things like "ah yes, I enjoy how he frames the negative space with that blob of engine oil!"

BIG Teeth

Quick update: molars!  Well one anyway.  It was not exactly an easy time cutting this tooth, and she had a lump the size of a pea for several days, but finally it is through at last.  Now perhaps the drool will let up, and cheerfulness will return.  We're up to nine teeth with the addition of that one, and one day soon the baby will have grinding skills.  Nuts, raw food, and other tough things here we come!

Even Awesome Teachers Need Help

I have to thank my friend, C., for sending me a link to this article.  It's all about how the current "magic bullet" in education is the idea that there are superstar teachers who will fix everything.  Everything she writes about her experience with that was true for me as well.  The only part I would disagree on is the idea that wealthier schools somehow escape the problem of over-crowding. 

I would also like to mention the one part of the education equation that is simply never mentioned in the discussion:  parenting.  You would not believe some of the parenting failures I've seen over the years, but nothing is done or said about it because that is a difficult and painful topic.  Therefore we just leave it alone entirely.  News flash politicians!  If a child's life is falling apart at home, they do not care how stellar I am in the classroom each day.  At that point all I can do is damage control.

Discovery of Witches Review

I'm guessing this is what happened: the author of Discovery read the Twilight books, looked at how popular they are, and said to herself "I can do this better and for grown-ups." And that's just what she did. Well, maybe not the "better" part. This book is a romance featuring a vampire and a mortal girl who also happens to be a powerful, if latent, witch. This author used her personal expertise in history, mythology, yoga, and wine appreciation (nope I'm not kidding) to flesh out the story. The results are lush and interesting half the time, then forced and even embarrassing at other turns.


I loved the idea that a vampire would have seen so much history and have connections in so many places. I did not love the lame romantic moments (just skip those pages unless you have strong appreciation of cheese) or the parts where she goes rowing or to yoga again and again. I know they tell you to write what you know, but there is a limit.  I'm not sure if this was a good book in need of a better editor, or a bad book in need of a re-write. No, no, calling it bad is not fair. I did like the book, and I am not sorry I read it. I just think it shows that this is her first work of fiction. Perhaps the follow up will be stronger, and perhaps they will find her a very experienced and opinionated editor.

Cup Cuddle

I've posted before about how cute it is when the baby cuddles her dolls and stuffed animals. She tucks them under her chin, pats their back, and gives them kisses. Sometimes she even rocks them and sings a "song." Sometimes she asks us to cuddle her baby too. We didn't specifically teach her to play this way; she must have just picked up the idea based on the way we take care of her. However it happened, she's one sweet little "mama" to her dolls.


Then the other morning she decided to cuddle her cup. There she was sitting her high chair and enjoying some breakfast. Suddenly she tucked her little sippy cup under her chin and started to pat. Soon the singing began. In between kisses she was taking nips of milk! As if that wasn't odd enough, she wanted us to cuddle the cup too, and she wouldn't take "no" for an answer. Generalizing skills is supposed to be a good thing in the developmental game, but this is taking things a bit far. What might she be trying to cuddle next?

Baby Names 2010

One of my pet topics, baby names, is in the news once again.  Given that Natalie Portman named her son Aleph, and David Beckham named his daughter Harper Seven within a few weeks of each other, names couldn't help but make headlines.  For the rest of us, the government recently released were the top baby names of 2010. According to the Social Security Administration, who keeps track of all these brand new people, the top baby names of the year were not quite as exciting as those noted above:


Girls-

Isabella
Sophia
Emma

Boys-

Jacob
Ethan
Michael

Of course that isn't the whole list, so if you're interested you can see at least the top 1000 names for each gender. Having picked a baby name in 2010, I was not surprised to find that it was one that increased in popularity. It seems that people of my generation prefer classic names that have not been popular in a long time. While I tried to choose a name that was not in the top 100 list, I was ultimately unsuccessful.

Why, might you ask, would I care about my child having a popular name? Because in my other life I was a teacher. I once had a class with five children named Alex, both boys and girls, and it was a headache for me and for them. A co-worker had a class with six boys named Jacob. It meant that half the boys in his class had the same name. Oy vey! If I may be allowed to borrow the phrase!

Hooray for Gay Marriage in NY

Over the weekend, the first legal gay marriages took place in New York state!  Such an incredible range of sweet stories from young couples with small kids to elderly brides and grooms some of whom had been engaged for decades.  What a fantastic step for NY and for the country as a whole.  Can you imagine falling in love with someone, and then being officially told "No, sorry, YOU are not allowed"?  Now we just have to work on the other 44 states.   

BTW, did you know that Mormons were one of the single largest factors in the proposition eight battle in California?  I didn't realize they'd poured quite so much money and organizing into that issue.  Now there's a new movie about their sometimes covert participation.  It seems the church even had to pay a fine for failing to report the extent of their involvement.  Public opinion just keeps moving left on this issue, and eventually the time will come when full legalization will simply not be blocked.  I just keep thinking of all the white churches who fought so hard against the civil rights movement in the '50's and '60's.  You can't hold out forever.

Chairs for Baby

The baby's latest trick is climbing up on chairs. Actually, she's not able to get on all chairs (yet!) just a few extra low ones we happen to have in the family room. She starts by laying her upper body on the seat, and then she tries, tries, tries until she gets a knee up as well. After that, it's just a matter of scrambling the rest of the way. It takes huge effort on her part, but she's happy to do it over and over again. The squeals of satisfaction are proof of her success. Fortunately, I was also able to teach her to come down again backwards. That had to happen since she was trying to dive off nose first.


Just to add cuteness to cuteness, she's also realized that you can pile up a great big stack of books on the chair BEFORE you climb up. Then they're up there waiting for you when you finally arrive! She cheerfully sits and reads her books like a big girl for minutes on end. The only part I've left out of all this is the screams of frustrations (and one or two bonks) we all had to endure as she learned how to do it by herself. I believe we're getting another early look at toddlerhood, and it is noisy.

Annoying Food Words

I love, love, love the food website CHOW which is a fun combination of recipes and articles about everything cooking. They recently featured a discussion about food words that must be banned from menus and reviews due to their chronic over use. Some are fussy and over the top such as "annealed" and "eponymous" and "revelatory." Others are simply too stupid for, well words. Examples include "bad boy" and "sammie" and any form of "yummy." Last are those words that are just dreadfully trendy including "locavore" and "gastropub" and "sustainable." What in the world would the restaurant review section of the paper be without all of those? Every industry has its own vocabulary, but it never hurts to avoid the trite and cliched.

Baby Books: 15 Months

For as long as she could focus her eyes, our baby has enjoyed books. The first one she noticed was soft, quilted, and made many different animal noises. Ever since then, she's been fascinated. She will sit for half an hour at a stretch just turning pages and admiring the pictures. Then there are the several times a day when she demands that we read to her. At first it would be one book that would catch her eye, but now she's figured out that you can make a pile of books, and then the parental reading session will last longer. I love, love, love that she is a book fan, but sometimes I do have to struggle a bit when she want to hear the same book for literally the ninth or tenth time that day. Here are a few of her current favorites:


1. Mr. Brown Can Moo by Suess
2. The Little White Rabbit by Henkes
3. The Bunny Book by Scarry
4. The Potty Book by Patricelli
5. The Ox-Cart Man by Hall
6. Bunny My Honey by Jeram
7. Knuffle Bunny Too by Willems
8. No, David by Shannon
9. David Gets in Trouble by Shannon
10. Neighborhood Mother Goose by Crews

Honorable mention goes to those books that used to be huge favorites when she was younger:

1. The Very Hungry Caterpillar
2. Mimi, Mimi Look and See
3. I Am a Bunny
4. Goodnight Gorilla
5. Elmo's Valentine Book
6. The Monster at the End of this Book
7. That's Not My Monster
8. Two Little Gardeners
9. Great Day for Up
10. Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See?

Pre-School Preview - Not

At the farmers' market the other day, Delphinium and I spotted a booth for a local pre-school. I would like to find something that she can attend next year for just a very few hours because I know she would have a ball playing with other kids. I'd heard good things about this particular place from a friend of a friend, so I thought I'd go over and take a look. This was in spite of the fact that the school is housed in a church. I screwed up my courage (I am not so good at this type of thing) and went to chat with the very shiny director.


After declining to make a Froot Loop necklace (keep that away from my kid!) we were handed a brochure. Upon first glance at their materials, it seemed like a nice, friendly kind of place. I liked the focus on play and stories, and the pictures of the outdoor area seemed promising as well. When you throw in the part where they have a brief (two day per week) schedule for kids younger than three, it seemed like a real possibility. It was also quite close to our house (not quite walkable, but still), and the price was reasonable. What could be wrong? Where's the waiting list?

I almost just walked away to think about things further, but I realized that would be counter productive. I needed to address the main concern and there was no easy way to bring it up. I screwed up my courage even tighter (I hate conflict!) and asked what role religion plays in their program. The shiny lady practically began to sparkle as she told me all about chapel time that she herself got to teach (it is her ministry!) for twenty minutes each day. It was a place for the kids to learn about the love that Jesus has for each of us, and how we are the most special in His eyes. I could feel my smile growing fixed.

I know, I know, you go chat with a church school and you are likely to get churchy answers. In my defense, I've known more than one pre-school that was housed in a church, but did not espouse anything more than play-dough and sandboxes. I guess this is not one of those. Nevertheless, if this place offers an older two class, then another, less theist, school may offer it as well. I will be sure to not pray on this matter.

Don't Buy The Sims Medieval

It happened just like this: EA Games sucks.  Please insert your favorite curse words and phrases here.  We will be getting all our money back or heads will roll. 

Monkey Shirt

Delphinium is, as I'm always repeating, getting bigger at quite an astounding rate. It seems like she's more of a toddler and less of a baby all the time. Practicing with having an opinion is something she does all the time too. It used to be that I could pretty much choose her food, toys, and surroundings without much complaint. These days, however she wants to eat THOSE berries, play with THOSE blocks, and GO OUTSIDE RIGHT NOW!

One major symbol of her independence is her passion about clothes. Some mornings I still get to grab something quickly, put it on her, and be out the door. Most of the time this is not the case. She wants to pick, she wants to take her time at it, and she doesn't really understand the concept of "dirty" or "too small." A perfect example is the monkey shirt. It really is a cute little onesie in blue and purple polka dot with a girl monkey on the front. It says "introducing me" which seems just right for our girl. She loves this shirt, and any time she spies it, there is a major to-do over putting it on. Once on, she can happily spend the day pointing out the monkey and making tiny little "ooo! ooo! eee! eee!" noises.

The only trouble is that the shirt is a nine month size. The snaps barely meet, and the neck is too tight. It's time for the beloved monkey to go, but how can this be managed? Should I get an embroidery hoop and frame the monkey for her wall? Should it just disappear all of a sudden and hope for out of sight out of mind? I've already checked on a replacement, but that monkey (and all like her!) are only found on baby clothes (up to nine months). Oh dear, oh dear.

Summer Danger

Our little family was lucky enough to attend a very special first birthday party the other day. It was beautiful outside, they'd opted for a bbq in the park, and oh what a park they picked. Right on the lake with a real sand beach, it also had the classic green fields, shady nooks, and play areas for kids. Delicious foods were eaten, bubbles were blown, and many, many small sandals filled up with sand. In short, it was a picture perfect day. Then, just as everyone was standing near their cars to go home it happened.


The little three year-old riding on someone's shoulders slipped somehow and tumbled, headfirst, onto the concrete. The sound was the most sickening thing I think I've ever heard, and it actually made me feel like I was going to throw up for a moment. Ambulances were called, and all the rest of us could do was stand around gripping our own kids for all we were worth. It was one of those moments that really makes you think about the possibilities, and not the nice kind.
The good news is that the little girl seems to have escaped any harm from her fall. Her poor mother will probably never be the same. It serves as such an incredible lesson about becoming too comfortable and trusting that nothing bad will happen. We let our guards down and stop being careful, and that is when accidents rear their nasty heads. Now if we can just figure out how to do this without going mad from worry, we will be in great shape.