The Questioner

The questions never stop coming from Dexter's mouth.  Most of them are questions he knows the answer to.  Why do we wash hands before dinner?  Why do I have to pee some times?  Why do babies cry some times?  All those questions make me insane, so I turn it back to him.  Well, what do you think, kiddo?  And he provides the correct answer.  We think he's just trying to have a conversation.  He just doesn't know how.

But I've had some doozies recently, that have made me think.  Such as:

Mama, why did you decide to make me a boy when I was in your belly?
(Followed by my explanation that I didn't choose.  The baby inside my belly chose all by itself.  I can't decide to have a boy or a girl).

Mama, what was I before I was a baby in your belly?
(Well, hon, you were an egg.  And a sperm crashed in to the egg, and then that turned in to a baby).

Mama, is there a nest?
???  WTF?
Inside your belly, for the egg.  Is there a nest?
(Mind you, this was a FULL DAY later, after the egg turning in to a baby discussion.  OOOOHHH!  No, there's no nest inside my belly.  The egg was in my ovary.  Which, I guess, is kind of like a nest.  But it's inside my belly.  Birds lay eggs in a nest outside their belly.  People keep their eggs and babies inside their bellies).
And then the egg cracks open, and a baby comes out inside your belly.
(Well, sure.  OK.  Kind of.)

Mama, do people come back alive after they die?
(Holy hell, child.  You are killing me here.  Where did THIS one come from?  OK.  Think for a minute. Well, some people think you come back to life after you die.  And some people do not.  I, personally, do not think you come back to life after you die.  I think you just die.)
Well, I think people come back alive after they die.  And when I die I am going to come back alive as a kid. In your belly.
(Ummm.  That's really going to hurt me, kiddo.  It's hard enough carrying a baby in my belly.  I am pretty sure a kid is not going to fit.)

Mama, what's your favorite thing?
(My favorite thing ever?  Well, I guess you and Erin.)
My favorite thing is ice cream.
(Wait.  Your favorite thing ever is ice cream?  Even more than Mama and Daddy?)
Yep.  My favorite thing is ice cream.  And this time I am going to get cotton candy.  Last time I got bubble gum, and I said that the next time I was going to try cotton candy, because I read they had cotton candy on the ice cream list.  So this time I am going to get cotton candy.
(Mind you, he has not yet asked if we can go to the ice cream store.  He is simply talking about going there, assuming that we're just magically going to go.  While the baby is napping.  When I explained we could not, he said he would go by himself.  When I asked how he would get there:)
I can drive the car.  I just have to lean really far forward so I can reach the gas pedal.
(We compromised.  I gave him some ice cream from the freezer.)

Because This

The other day John was lamenting that he was way behind on his house work.  The lawn mowing.  The deck cleaning and staining.  The garage organization.  The power washing.  The mulching.  The setting up of the swimming pool.  Etc.  Etc.  Etc.

I told him it doesn't matter.  I told him I don't care.  Because why?

Because this:

Because you're an awesome, amazing, wonderful dad.  And that's really all we need.

Happy Father's Day!

The Most Amazing Thing

Every Wednesday this school year, or at least since December or so when Dexter lost his everloving mind for a while, I have come downstairs and hopefully looked out the window.  Hoping for clouds.  Rain.  Fog.  Snow.  Anything to cover up the sun.  Anything to keep the "wiggly sun spots" from appearing during swimming lessons.  Anything to help make things just a little bit easier for my boy.

I don't know why those sun spots were the cause of such fear and consternation.  I do know they caused some tears.  Screaming.  Non-participation in swimming lessons.  I tried logic.  I tried brute force.  I tried re-creating sun spots at home to get him used to them.  I tried bribes with peanut butter cups.  The last option was the most successful, but the only thing that really made swimming lessons tolerable was summer, and the sun being higher in the sky when we were there, and therefore not creating those nasty old sun spots.

And then we got a pink swimming pool.  And sat it under the awning.  And guess what was on the awning, right over Dexter's head?  And guess what caused him absolutely no fear or consternation at all?

Can you see the sun spots on his shirt and ON HIS FACE?

I TOOK VIDEO FOR PROOF (click for link)

Sigh.  This boy.  He is a puzzle.  I wish I knew how his great big brain worked.  His teacher is convinced that he simply tolerates all the less intelligent people in the world.  He is smart, and he knows he is smart, and he knows the right answers and exactly what to say in certain situations.  Because he memorizes everything.  And he just puts up with all the people around him, because they are not as smart as he is and he damn well knows it.  At least the kid is cute.

So I spent eight bucks on a plastic pool at Toys R Us, so Erin could have something to easily splash around in.  They had pink pools and blue pools.  Dexter, of course, chose pink.  But, hey.  If an eight dollar pink pool is going to get the kid over his fear of wiggly sun spots?  I consider it money very well spent.

Erin was amused for half an hour or so.

Save for the pink pool, this could be Dexter four years ago.  It's his swim shirt.  And the balls he used to play with.  And his shape sorting dump truck.

Erin is trying to figure out how to remove the ring from Dexter's head.  It's his hat.  He gets the pink one, of course.

The Graduate

Yesterday was Dexter's last day of preschool.  We are now officially on summer vacation.  For, like, three weeks.  Until summer school starts.  Dexter wants to know why we have to have summer vacation some times.  He likes school, and he'd much rather go to school than stay home with Mama.

Mildly anti-climactic last day of preschool photo.  Let's just call it "last day til July" photo.

On Wednesday Dexter's school had a graduation ceremony.  About half his class is going to Kindergarten in the fall.  The rest will come back to school for another year.  But everyone got to participate in the ceremony.  Parents were invited, so John took the day off work, took Dex to swimming in the morning, and then went to graduation with Erin and I.  Dex looked mildly apprehensive, but he participated in all the songs, Pledge of Allegiance, etc.  Apparently he didn't want to wear the white smock everyone was wearing, and didn't put it on until the very last instant.  And completely unbeknownst to us, he had been having a difficult time with practicing the songs with his class, because he thought the singing was too loud.  So his teachers were very proud of him on Wednesday that he kept his shit together, stayed with his class, and even sang along.

Here's a few pictures, and a (way too long) video.  I'm going back to Vimeo for videos.  Sorry, Dad.

HERE'S THE LINK to the video of some really terrible singing.  Dexter gets a kick out of watching it, though.  He giggles every single time.

Eight months

Erin is eight months old today!

She and I hung out in her room and played for a while this afternoon.  It's the first time I've seen her really roll around on the floor.  I think she's more willing to do so upstairs on the carpet.  She won't roll at all on the hardwood downstairs.  She would desperately like to crawl, I think, but can't get things working properly to make it happen.

Erin was a grumpy lady this afternoon.  I'm not sure what was wrong.  Fortunately a good afternoon nap seemed to fix the problem and she was her normal chipper self this evening.

Enjoy some eight month baby pictures, and a video.  Apparently the two people who actually watch videos here have been having issues with the Vimeo video hosting site, and viewing the videos posted there.  So I'll try today's video on Picasa to see how that works.  Let me know.  (Editor's note - it's a pain in the ass to upload video from Picasa, so it'd damn well better work perfectly)

Erin looking just peachy.  She LOVES peaches.  Devoured this one at dinner time.

After a very sad and scream-filled lunch, we went outside to distract from whatever was making the baby sad.  Apparently orange cones make her somewhat happy.

Which is good, because for most of the rest of the afternoon she looked like this.

Perhaps because she attempted to poke her ear out with a cone.

Even grumpy, she's still cute.

After dinner Erin ate her favorite dessert - a shape, with a little tiny hole in the middle of it.  Erin has mad skills, and it makes me giggle every time.

Behold, Erin's first instrument playing.  She's got talent!  (Video above, click to play)

Happy Anniversary tomorrow, Nonna and Grandpa!  54 years.  Craziness.

Just an Ordinary Day

Here's some video and pictures from last Tuesday, June 4.  Thought you'd like to see what 7.5 month old babies do in our house these days:

Click here for video of Erin

What?  What did you expect?  Something exciting?  Cartwheels and somersaults?

I Used to be Braver

I'm not sure how to convince Dex of this, but I used to be brave when it came to amusement parks.  I did roller coasters (with the standing agreement with Kathy that I can sit on the side where the railing is, on the way up the big hill).  I did pirate ships (so long as I could sit in the middle and not on an end).  Waterslides.  Bumper cars.  Things that go upside down and make all the change fall out of your pockets.  Whirly things that stick you to the wall and then drop the floor out from under you.  I did all the rides.  Except the ferris wheel.  Cuz... no.  Just, no.  Tall things that go slow freak me out.

And then I got old.

Now when I ride up glass elevators I have to turn and face the wall so I don't see out.  Now when my child goes on the ski lift thingy at the amusement park I tell him "Daddy can go with you" because Mama don't do that shit.  Now when I decide to grow a set and just GO on the swing ride, I have a death grip on the bar the entire time and I call down to John about how much I really don't like this.  Now when I get off said swing ride, my son tells me "Next time we can find you a less scary ride, Mama."

Despite my bravery shortcomings, we all had a perfectly fantastic time at Dutch Wonderland yesterday.  It was Dexter's first amusement park experience and I do believe he loved it.  He said the only ride he didn't like was the "boat ride" (the log flume) because it went too fast when it went down the hill.  But he did say that when we go back (tomorrow, he said) we can ride all the rides he likes.  We stayed for a couple hours in the rain in the afternoon, and it paid off nicely for us as we got free "rainy day" tickets to come for another day.  Thanks, Dutch Wonderland!

Here's some pics from our awesome day:

The Turnpike ride was probably Dexter's favorite.  He steered (not well, but it didn't matter) while someone with longer legs pushed the gas pedal.  I think he was most intrigued by the camera that took pictures when you drove by.  He also kept going back in line to see if he could get a different color car the next time around.

Dex can tell you what every single sign on the Turnpike said.

He went down this big huge slide BY HIMSELF.  Gripping the sides so tightly that he had to actually push himself down the slide at the bottom because he was going so slowly.  He went down 4 or 5 times and was actually going kind of fast by the last time down.

I caught up to the boys just as they came down the big hill of the log flume.  Dexter was, I think, unimpressed.

Dex bounced back and had fun again on the "Crazy Airplane."

Yay!  Mama got to ride some rides, too!

Yeah.  Mama don't do this.  Somehow, though, I am ok with a chair lift when I go skiing.  Weird.  The boys got off at the mid-point and walked back.  Dex said it was "too slow."

Found some plasma cars!  There was a tunnel to drive your car through, and a maze to navigate.  Dex was wicked fast and was the example the parents used when trying to explain to their kids how to make the cars go.

Erin spent most of the day doing this.  She was a trooper, really.  She slept in the stroller for about 30 minutes, but the rest of the time she was awake and chipper and highly entertained with watching all the rides.

"There's no seat belt on this carousel" says the boy.  I don't know how he remembers everything he does, ever.

Judging by the giggles and grins we got out of Erin on the carousel I'd say that she's going to be our dare-devil child.

She loooooved it!

My excellent driver back on the Turnpike.

Turnpike self-portrait

This driving stuff is serious business.

Nap time.  Glad we brought this stroller.  I brought it in case Dex got tired, because he can just ride on the step.  But it was great in the rain because I pulled down the rain cover and Erin stayed 100% dry the whole time.

Bumper cars!

We found the Cranky Cars, and there's where we stayed for 45 minutes.  Dex was, I am sure, driving the nice worker person crazy.  Now he wants to drive a black engine.  Now a green one.  Now the other black one.  At the end, when we just wanted him stop riding this ride another time OMG, there was no line.  And the green engine was in front.  And he wanted black.  Sorry, kiddo.  You get green, or you get to be all done.  You choose.  Green it was.

The swings were right next to the cranky cars.  I suppose that 45 minutes of watching the swings go right over his head got him interested.  And he wanted to go on.  Are you SURE, I asked?  He was sure.  I was freaking out.  Not because I was worried about his safety.  But because I was worried about his mental ability to ride that ride.  What if he gets up there and decides he hates it?  Can they stop the ride for a freaked out kid and let him off?

My panicked self was texting my fears to my sister a million miles a minute.  I needn't have worried.  He went on three times and would have stayed on as long as we'd have let him.  But it was raining and he had goose bumps all over his little body.  John rode with him twice and then I decided I'd man up and go up there with him.  I shall not decide to do so again.

We shall return some time this summer.  And next summer, when Erin can ride a couple rides.  Perhaps next time we will go when it's hot, and do the water park portion, as well.  We didn't need a water park yesterday.  We could have used some hot chocolate by the end of the day.