hair-raising good time

Haircuts and kids are always an adventure. Oliver has gotten better about it over the years, which is a very good thing since his hair grows fast and looks best very short. Eleanor mostly gets hysterical when I even mention cutting her hair. We've done a few bang trims at home without much of a scene but otherwise it's been kind of uh, hairy. There's a place around the corner that does a passable job so that's where we go most of the time.

Once or twice a year we go to Little Snips, a really cool hair salon specializing in kid hair cuts. Most of the chairs look like vehicles such as tractors or taxis or firetrucks. Each station has a TV and toys that help kids look down, or up, as needed. Their prices are very reasonable and we'd go there for every cut if the place were closer and I had more time.

A trip to Little Snips was on our agenda for this morning. I talked to Oliver before we left and asked if he was okay going first, so he could show Eleanor not to be scared. He was cool with that. Going first is always his preference anyway. The opportunity to display a little bravery was just a bonus.

Oliver's haircut went mostly without incident. He declined sitting in the tractor, opting for one of the non-vehicular chairs. He looked very grown up. I had to say, "No, shorter. You can't get it too short. Really." a few times but he ended up looking good and didn't complain. Eleanor was next. She chose the taxi to sit in and Dora on TV. That was a rare treat for her since Oliver has mostly lost interest in Dora (praise the deity or whatever of your choice). Her cut went well too. It was just a trim to clean up her ends and bangs so it didn't take long.

I sent the kids to the play area while I paid the bill. They got so absorbed in playing with the toys that it was hard to pry them away. It was snowing harder than when we arrived and I knew the traffic back into the city would be ugly so I really needed to get them moving. One threat to leave without them was all it took. The put on their jackets and we headed towards the door but before we left Oliver stopped to hug Eleanor. He said, "I'm so proud of you," and I melted into a big puddle of goo.

a gorilla and the best banana ever

a gorilla and the best banana ever
Originally uploaded by clumberkim

Here's the annual photo of the kids on the front lawn, just prior to embarking on a little Halloween fun. (see also last year's photo, and the year before that)

Once again, Oliver chose the costumes back in August, but I think it is the last year he is going to choose for his sister. For the last few days Eleanor has been telling me she wants to be a spider again and I should put that banana thing in a bag. We had a couple of traumatic attempts to try it on and I was sure she was going to have none of it when the moment of truth came.

Trooper that she is, she let Mr C get it on her, then I took over with some encouragement. I told her how cute it looked and took her up to a large mirror so she could see. Wide eyed, she liked what she saw. I told her she was the best banana ever and she ate it up with a spoon. Just another parenting problem solved.

I want my, I want my, I want my NPR

In an effort to break the monotony of Music Together CDs in the car I finally broke down and bought Songs from the Street, a 3 CD set of classics from Sesame Street. It's great, until we've listened to it for two weeks straight. At that point, R.E.M. and Hootie & the Blowfish make me want to scratch my eyes out, even if Eleanor does declare each track her favorite.

But there's one song I don't tire of, probably because Oliver looks so darn cute singing it. He asks for Number 6 on the third disc all the time. (I swear it takes him all of one time through a CD to memorize a playlist.) Unfortunately, I haven't dash-mounted a video camera to capture it. This will have to do.

I look forward to the time when the kids are old enough to tolerate what they call "mommy moosic" (aka WDUQ, our local NPR affiliate), but for now, we'll talk some trash with Steven Tyler & Oscar the Grouch, slide with the Goo Goo Dolls, and sing with the Dixie Chicks.

ladies and gentlemen

Pardon me as I ease back in to this blogging stuff. Apparently I have a bit of a performer on my hands. A ham, even. Though he left his old school a couple of weeks ago, he was invited back for the end-of-year party and puppet show. His teacher gave him the emcee and stage manager duties. He introduced the show and manned the lights.

Learning the lines was pretty simple, giving us a few days to work on his delivery. I just wanted him to speak slowly and he accomplished that. The rest? All Oliver.

click clack coma

It's been forever since I posted a picture of the kids. Bubba got in there as a bonus. Eleanor's hair is long enough for pigtails now, and Oliver looks more grown up every day.

Tuesday nights require Scholastic DVD since CD has a conference call during the time he usually amuses the kids while I cook. Tonight I left the job to Randy Travis and his excellent narration of Click Clack Moo. I wish I had audio of Oliver's imitation. "Cows that type? Hens on strike? Whoever heard of such a thing?!"

nom nom nom

My boss shared Wilbur Buds with us at our holiday party on Wednesday. Wilbur's is an interesting story. I look forward to taking the kids to the factory in Lititz, PA someday.

helpful

Sorry for the lack of photographic evidence tonight. I was too busy trying to figure out how to properly adjust my MacBook so Aunt Suzy could witness local events. Oh how I long for the old iSight cameras that clipped on and were nicely adjustable. What the heck am I going to do at Christmas? But I digress...

It was the dogs' turn for a present tonight and Oliver was sure they needed lots of help. Bubba slept through the whole thing but Penguin was sniffing around. Still, she wasn't interested enough to dive in so Oliver happily did the honors. He's such a helpful boy.

In lieu of photos from tonight, I offer an interesting comparison: Oliver and Eleanor pictured at the same age, or as close to it as possible. In this case, both kids are about 19 months old. Eleanor is significantly bigger but both know how to enjoy themselves.

day 12, the video edition

It's day 12 of the 24 days of Christmas. Due to the nasty weather in the northeast, Aunt Suzy experienced an untimely power outage so she was unable to join us for the present opening activities. At the time I didn't know why she suddenly logged out but I made an educated guess and shot a little video. The quality isn't stupendous but my little point and shoot camera does the best it can.

He was not coached in who the Steelers are playing this week, or anything else. You can hear CD, Eleanor, and me in the background, and the music was not added. It was part of our dining experience. I will come up with a prize in the gift card realm for the first person who identifies the music correctly in the comments. 

fancy!

Day 2 of the 24 days of Christmas was a present for Eleanor, Fancy Nancy and the Posh Puppy. As you can see, this made her very happy. [More photos on Flickr.]

Aunt Suzy, architect of this 24 days thing, has this book in her bag when she takes her dog Maggie to her public library. Maggie is a READ dog, and once a week, children read to her. The local paper recently did an article about them.

adorbable

Oliver and I had a perfectly delightful hour this afternoon, one of those "nothing special" hours that I need to write about so I can preserve it forever. He was more than a little peeved when I took Eleanor to Trader Joe's this morning. I decided a post-nap outing was in order, and I'm fortunate that the kid is ALWAYS up for a little Starbucks with his mum. 

We have no less than four possible Starbucks locations nearby. I let him choose first, but said if parking was a problem we would have to try another one. No arguments from Oliver. We were indeed foiled at first, but tried a second location and had better luck. Oliver totally did not mind the parking garage, the "evelator", or being trusted to remember where we parked. 

Though he had hot chocolate on Wednesday and liked it, he opted for cold milk today. Our chosen Starbucks was packed but we found a place to sit, a couple of armless squishy chairs pushed together and the size of a loveseat, right in front of the fireplace. Oliver snuggled right up with his milk and "long cookie" (aka biscotti), and told me he was the best date. I could only agree. He has told me before that he's "amazing and adorbable" and that one is right on the money, too. We had a nice little chat and he even asked for "more cuddles", telling me "I have more cuddles in my tummy." At which point I melted into a puddle of goo.

cheerio nekkit boogers

As previously reported, Oliver discovered running around the playground and yelling "nekkid" gets quite a rise out of teachers and classmates alike. One of his teacher's valiant attempt at redirection has caused the phrase to morph into "cheerio nekkit". He still has no idea what naked means, though the different answers have stopped. He says it means "outside" consistently now. Tonight at his school's book fair the twin girls in his classroom were shopping when one of them started in with the, "nekkit nekkit nekkit" thing. I fessed up to her mom that she had my son to thank for that. When I mentioned Oliver has no idea what it means she said her kids know and have probably told him! I guess it just hasn't sunk in yet.

Somehow, it has all morphed again. One day last week he stated emphatically, "I am boogers!" at pickup time. I mostly succeeded in not bursting out laughing (since I'm just a 12 year old boy inside) but now he likes to say "cheerio nekkit boogers" with a giggle, just to see how I will react. And he still seems to think he IS boogers on occasion. (Don't we all?)

Yes, I know this is only the beginning. Now that we have boogers, farts (known at our house as "a bit of wind") are surely on the horizon, followed by who knows what else. Can't wait.

sharks and spiders

Photo courtesy of CD. We had a great Halloween. Both kids were in good spirits and adorable costumes, and we had lots of help from Aunt Suzy to make our Halloween a festive one. She decorated the house and helped kid-wrangle during trick or treating. She also looked mah-velous in her spider jeans.

Two more photos are on Flickr.

are you shaking me off?

All of this baseball stuff with Oliver has had some unexpected consequences. Take this morning, when I asked Oliver to clear his dishes from the table. He looked at me and shook his head. Not being entirely awake, I just looked at him. He shook his head again. When I still didn't respond in what he felt was an appropriate manner, Oliver said, "I'm shaking you off, Mummy," just like a pitcher who doesn't like the catcher's sign. Then he laughed hysterically, of course.

To add insult to injury, whenever Oliver shakes his head like that Eleanor joins in, giggling all the way. She doesn't know what it means yet, but anything that makes her brother laugh must be good.

wordy wednesday

Eleanor's new words, all before 8am!: waffle, bubble, Boo Boo (a small blue gosling who likes to eat)

And a few more that happened after CD and I went out for the evening:  Poop! (an announcement of her mad multi-tasking skillz during dinner) and bath (a post-dinner activity)

Not to be outdone, Oliver had some words for us as we were leaving. He was having dinner so we said a quick goodbye and I told him to have fun. He said, "You guys have fun too!" (And don't let the door hit you on the way out, perhaps?) Oliver has never had a problem with separation so this wasn't much of a surprise. At his various day cares he has barely noticed when we leave, or has pushed us out the door so he can get to the real business of the day, playing with his friends and teachers.

Bacon Wednesday will be back next week.

so many moments

There are so many small moments in my kids' lives that I want to capture and use to embarrass them later on keep forever. Yet I never have the video camera handy, and I have never watched any of the video we have already shot, except for a couple of little clips that CD loaded on our website. Not even the ultrasound videos that I'm not entirely sure I could locate quickly.

Another of those moments happened during dinner tonight. Eleanor has been playing with fake phones at school and here at home, but she decided to improvise. She held the half ear of corn she was eating up to her ear and said, "hi" over and over. If I recall correctly, the first glimmers of pretend play happened a bit later on for Oliver. Either that, or I wasn't terribly observant. (No need to answer that.)

I would say that I hope I never forget how unique my kids are, but there's no danger. They find ways to remind me every day.

open mike

I heard Michelle Obama referred to as fearless today, not so much for her speech at the convention last night, but for letting her young daughter near an open mike! Four years ago, I would not have understood. Today? Different story entirely.

While we're on the subject of the things kids say, Eleanor is in the midst of a little language explosion. She's gone from saying about six words for the last couple of weeks (mummy, daddy, bubba, baby, byebye, uh-oh) to more than ten almost overnight. There were at least two new ones just today (see below). I almost forgot her big one from last weekend, "swirl" (which translates to "squirrel").

In an effort to keep better track of her words, I'll be adding notes at the bottom of my daily posts with any new words. I didn't do a very good job as Oliver started talking. He had a bizarre word for elephant and none of us can remember what it was. Lots of his words required translation. Some still do, but his word for elephant was not anywhere close to being recognized if he had not said it while pointing at elephants consistently.

Eleanor's new words for today:  thank you, dancing

iBib

Matching the carseat was an unintentional bonus.

root root root

Before I took out the camera, Oliver was singing his way through dinner, making up new words to old songs. My favorite was a variation on "Take Me Out To the Ballgame" when he said "root, root, root for the Ma-mas" as I was getting Eleanor's tray for dinner. I will have to make hot dogs more often.

When the camera came out his inner ham took over. I am going to have to start being more sneaky and hiding the camera. I never seem to capture the really good stuff. Still, not bad for a kid who is barely 3 years old.

poo. in a bag. from the store.

One of my favorite Marys has a fabulous tale of bare-handed poo (and tots!) on her blog this morning. Go read it. It made me laugh on a day I didn't think I would find anything to laugh about. 

There's not likely to be anything interesting here today, unless we make ice cream later in this.

Tissue? I hardly know you!

This is what happens when a 13 month old (tomorrow) is left alone in her room for 30 seconds and she discovers the tissue box.

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