Proud papa

Happy mothers day! The birthday march of April and May continues; papa's birthday was last weekend. Mima and papa had retreated to a lovely island inn, but this weekend we got to come celebrate with them for mother's day brunch. The boys ate alarming numbers of chocolate chip pancakes while we had slightly more adult (and super tasty) fare courtesy of papa.

Afterwards, of course it was time for a park adventure. The boys' current obsession is this one, and we've even already booked out the covered shelter location for Z's upcoming birthday party. The park's namesake rhododendrons have started to flower, and one of Z's favorite activities is to circle through the "forest" (sometimes he describes it as a tunnel) and spot the various colored bushes. O for his part enjoys burying and digging up treasure in their giant sand beds (when other kids happen to bring or abandon shovels) and spinning dizzily (alternating between asking to be spun faster and slower) on a rotating playground disc. Today a bunch of the dandelions were in full fuzz mode, and he was picking them and making wishes. O: "I made a wish. I actually made lots of wishes. They were all about cars."

L continues to enjoy morning and afternoon time to both interact with her family and get to check out her toys. We've been seeing increasingly frequent and successful partial rolls; here she made it from her back onto her side to say hi to some friendly stuffed animals:

Everything is awesome

O and his school friends have been continuing to try to find opportunities to play outside of school, which has been wonderful to see. He and friend A have playdates frequently on Friday afternoons, and friends M and A have either booked, or expressed interest in booking, future playdates too. When I speak to their parents, they mention their daughters have also apparently started declaring their intent to marry O. When I ask O, he always insists he's going to marry friend J instead. Oh, those pre-school love triangles. Anyway, friend J proactively invited us for dinner last night while I was picking up O -- while I correctly presumed his parents didn't actually know about the invite (and I politely declined), we did go ahead and make plans for today at their house for playing and watching the Lego Movie. Of course, Meh and I were enjoying the bits and pieces we could see (in between interacting with the boys, fetching snacks, negotiating toy sharing, changing L, etc.) more than Z and O were, so into the Netflix queue it goes!

While L was conked out on Meh's shoulder, we noticed that she even sleeps daintily -- notice the extended pinky.

Two month stats

Eleanor's two month well-check was yesterday. The gratuitous stats:

• 11 lbs 1.5 oz (25th-50th percentile)
• 22 1/4" length (25th-50th percentile)
• 14.9" head circumference (25th percentile)

Meh reported that L even started to coo a bit yesterday morning -- though alas, that was followed up by several shots at the doctor's office that had her sad for much of the rest of the day. As the boys would (and do) say: "It's okay, little lady." Poor pretty and super cute girl!

Birthdaze

We're deep into birthday season here; last weekend was of course mommy's, but also one of Z's bus-mates invited him to a (for me) sensory-overloading affair at Chuck E. Cheese. While I remembered the animatronic music band, I don't think I recalled that restaurant staff would intentionally rile up the kids for a countdown to the live action appearance of the mouse, literally for the last minute telling the kids to scream as loud as they could. Z did great, and he also discovered the joys of skee ball, eventually redeeming a fistful of tickets for laffy taffy. This weekend there were three more parties (alas, we only made it to two of them) for friends of the boys. Yesterday, O's friend J celebrated his fourth birthday at the School of Rock. It was great fun (and mass chaos, as one would expect) celebrating with electric guitars, keyboards, microphones, shakers, and oh so many loud drums. I felt for the teacher, who was trying to teach/explain while the kids were clearly pretty ready to just get on with the singing and dancing.

And today we had an indoor bounce house birthday party for O's school friend D; both boys were invited (and L as well!), and had a blast jumping and running -- though I really need to start to remember lighter clothes for the high energy parties, as O was a sweaty mess whenever he came to check in with me.

On the topic of L, she's started having a bit more quiet alert time especially first thing in the morning when we come downstairs. She seems to enjoy occasional tummy time along with time on her back looking up and smiling at her sheep mobile, pull toys, and her always interested/interesting brothers!

Daily planner

In addition to an awareness and interest in the goings on of the day, Z is really into days and months. When he gets on the school bus, he often will cheerfully say "Happy Monday!" (and yes, when it's Monday) to the driver. In the morning, he always checks in with me - "Today is Monday. Yesterday was Sunday. Tomorrow will be Tuesday." He also distinguishes days of the week based on whether "we'll make lunch" (Monday through Friday) or "we'll do something fun together" (Saturday, Sunday). And new months are a point of interest as well - "Today is May; yesterday was April." (Close!) Anyway, Meh thought Z would enjoy having his own calendar of day-by-day activities. He's been checking it every day this week and talking about what's on tap for the day -- but this morning we noticed he had a pen out and was at the calendar making his own modifications. And indeed we were able to (hopefully?) make that appointment work; next I'll have to show him how to make it a recurrence. Nice job, Z!

Sound the alarm

Transitions can be hard for all of us, and Z has often shown concern or gotten upset when transitions near; on Monday mornings, he's sometimes a bit anxious about getting ready for school and the yellow bus. On days when Meh or I have an evening rehearsal, he'll sometimes fall apart a bit when we get ready to leave (though it's interesting to see that he often tries to cope "rip off the Band-Aid" style: as soon as we say we're going to be leaving, he waves/yells "bye" and tries to coax us out the door).

Anyway, we've long used the "two minute" warning rule for any transitions for the boys, where "two minutes" can, in wall clock time, be equivalent to anything between 10 minutes and 30 seconds. In speaking with some other parents at a recent birthday party, we're not alone in this particular time dilation technique. But lately, Z has been increasingly been interested in time (and days, days of the week, months, etc.), so we've used various countdown timers so he can watch the two minutes pass or have some kind of alarm when the time is up. The other day, when I said it was time to get dressed for school, Z said "...and Z's going to set his alarm!" A few minutes later, he said "beep! beep! beep!", and immediately grabbed clothes and started putting them on. Go Z!

I thought that was just him imitating a generic alarm, but the next time he "set his alarm", when it went off, he said "ching, dah di-dah di-dah dah, ching, dah di-dah di dah dah...", which I eventually correlated back to my phone's musical alarm sound. He's also used Meh's different phone alarm sound for a third variety. He alternates between those and the beeps (which I've realized are quoting the kitchen alarm). All in all, these (plus the actual alarms) have really helped him deal better with transitions - nice work Z!

A circus atmosphere

We picked up the boys from their sleepover at mima and papa's house last night (everyone had an excellent time, and there was apparently even sleep!), and headed onward to meet up with O's friend J and J's parents R and M for Mercer Island's apparently long-term annual circus (a preschool association fundraiser). It's held at the high school, which is tucked away (and huge - the only one on the island?), but when we approached we knew we were at the right place from the crowds and over capacity parking lots. Finding a side street, we walked over to the fair, and were greeted with everything from ponies and monster trucks to a school bus bounce house (the boys impressively recognized it from a previous encounter last summer), a dunk tank, and more. Then we walked inside and got to hear some musical acts (the "Bus Boys" were on while we had snack -- a band composed of school bus drivers) and wander around a giant set of carnival games. The boys of course flocked to the vehicle themed ones, where O test drove a balance bike, both boys won several obstacle course "races" on tricycles, and got to bounce on a large contained trampoline. A very fun if exhausting morning!

After that, it was time for lunch. Sushi, of course.

Personal space

Happy birthday to Meh! When I asked the boys a few weeks ago what they wanted to get her, O replied "flowers". Z supportively added "yes". A very nice thought; when I asked what colors we should get, O immediately replied with his favorites -- green and blue. Then he thought a moment more and added: "and also purple and pink. And also black." I took all of these suggestions (well, minus the black) to the local florist, who was a big fan of any order being transcribed from 4- and 6-year olds' instructions, and O and I got to pick them up last night on our way to meet up with Meh and Z for birthday dinner at mima and papa's house. He was very pleased with the results, though he was concerned that he couldn't see the (green) vase while it was in the box for transport. Anyway, birthday dinner was a splendid affair, with yummy food, the boys singing "Happy Birthday" (in between repeated performances of "Let it Go" and "What Does the Fox Say", of course), a tasty cake, and then capped off with a birthday present that everyone could enjoy (hopefully even mima and papa) -- a boys slumber party at their house.

I had illusions of taking Meh and L out for dessert, but we were all so tired that we just went home for a quiet evening, likely to be followed soon after by bedtime. Action packed! I will share this e-mail from mima of her conversation with O soon after we left:

Mima: Where is Owen?
O: I am in the bathroom. I want some space.
Mima: Can I come in?
O: Yes, as long as you don't talk to me.

Rollover plan

A first for L today -- Meh was giving her some tummy time on a play matt in her room while organizing and hanging up more of L's clothes (yes, the collection continues to grow), and when she looked back over, L had rolled over onto her back. Go L!

Redress Number One

The milestones continue for L, with today's being a fashion one: she got to wear her first dress. Five minutes after being put in it, she had a blowout - but it was luckily mostly contained to the pants; the dress itself remained intact long enough for the five of us to go have a nice family trip to the park. L slept and then had a snack in the car while the boys ran around a bit, but mostly opted to exercise daddy's arms with constant swinging.

Yesterday was an always popular visit to the Museum of Flight. The boys had a grand time, making a beeline for the chopped half-737 fuselage and sitting down in seats (O asked where the seatbelts were, as if expecting this front half of the plane to just take off). This visit's art activity was the building of a kite from a paper cutout, straws, ribbon, and string -- they did an excellent job, and we'll just have to wait for a dry windy day to get them a whirl. After much running around (and sometimes into) airplanes, it was snack time; alas, the cafeteria at the museum had pretty poor offerings (no fresh fruit? really?), and we ended up offering them a bagel and a cookie -- happy Passover indeed!

It would have been enough

We've now started entering the high season for birthday parties; O had one on Friday night at a bounce house, with a "Frozen" theme (they blared the soundtrack on a loop the whole time, as well as having an excellent Elsa/Anna/Olaf-decorated birthday cake with ice-chip looking rock candy). Needless to say, he had an excellent time -- though I've got to start remembering to put that boy in short sleeves for these things, he was a sweaty mess! We've gotten about 5 additional invites for the upcoming weeks; it's going to be a busy but fun season!

Happy Passover! We had two(-ish) nice seders with the kids; L wasn't quite ready to ask the four questions, but Z was super pleased to be eating matzah again (who knew?), even if the floor around his chair looks like we've been putting down peanut shells or something. For the first night, we met up with friends D & D and their sons N & B; it was a high energy affair to say the least, but everyone had a good time running around and cruising through my one-pager siddur. For the second night, we attempted to have mima and papa over. Alas, the boys were ready to go at, like, 4:30. We ended up doing a split seder, with the boys doing some of the traditions before their bath, and then mima and papa joining us for the festive and tasty meal once the boys were in bed. The boys' rendition of dayenu (complete with dance interpretation by O):

Electronic report card

Grandma and J's visit wrapped up nicely, and they're back in Michigan -- soon to head to New York to meet their other new grandchild! We all had such a nice time and were sad to see them go. Z said it best: "we'll definitely see them another time". The boys have been wearing their new grandma and J-gifted Cars pajamas nearly constantly too. Other than that, it's just been back to our regular schedule around here.

Today I received an interesting e-mail -- it was a hyperlink to O's "report card" for his recently completed set of swimming classes. Because he takes lessons at his preschool, I've only gotten to see him swimming once, so it was super cool that they actually provide some documentation. And it was actually a very nicely formatted web page, with quotes from the teacher interspersed with photos, which I of course scraped for our own archival purposes. O will be continuing his lessons next quarter, as well as adding an additional class in "gymnastics", which he insists is "like 'nastics', but with 'gym'". Mrow?

The name game

Today we did a formal baby naming for L -- and by "formal", I mean pretty informal: I put together a short service, the family went out to a beautiful new lilac bush that Meh had picked out and planted (O had to go inspect it in person, of course happily stomping right through the fresh dirt - ah well), we announced Eleanor's full Hebrew name, said a few words, and then we ate, natch. Her Hebrew name is בתיה שושנה (Batya [daughter of G-d, named for Meredith's grandfather] Shoshana [Rose, named for my grandmother]).

Everyone did very well with the ceremony, including little L who was wrapped in my tallit. Afterwards there was a giant and decadently rich chocolate cake courtesy of mima (and Costco), and the grandparents all got to catch up for a bit. Of course with all of the standing around, the boys were mildly stir crazy, so it was off to the park from there. As usual, I think the adults got more exercise than the boys, who insisted on extended sessions on the swings.

We've been having a very nice visit with grandma and J. The boys had a fabulous slumber party at their hotel last night, and it sounds like there was actually even a small amount of sleep involved. As suggested, we all ended up meeting for breakfast -- though for the boys it was apparently second breakfast, as they enjoyed a lovely continental breakfast at the hotel of froot loops, cheerios, and bananas.

First cousin

Yesterday was L's one-month checkup. Amazing to see just the deltas from just three weeks ago:

• Weight: 8 lbs 15.5 oz (25-50%)
• Length: 20 3/4" (25%)
• Head circumference: 14.2" (25%)

Much big news in the family -- the boys and L have a cousin, and Meh and I have our first nephew! Aunt J and Uncle B welcomed their son M this morning, and we're so excited for them!

Spring break begins with grandma and J visiting from Michigan -- the boys have been talking about seeing them "on Friday", and today was the day. O was particularly excited to introduce them to L, and we had a nice family dinner before grandma and J helped field bath time for the boys. There's even talk of the boys having a sleepover at grandma and J's hotel (which is temptingly close to one of the boys' and our favorite breakfast places -- I'm sensing a brunch in our future).

Hallmark moments

O has been getting into the act of writing thank you notes for his many birthday presents -- and he's liked doing it so much that he's started to want to thank people and give them gifts for no apparent reason at all. Yesterday he informed Meh and myself that he wanted to give a thank you present to one of his school friends "for saving the whole class" (perhaps when they were role-playing?), and he proceeded to make a card for her with his name on it and a picture of "the beanstalk from Mickey" (he saw this short film a month or two ago). Then when we were at the store, he really wanted to get her a present. I wasn't quite sure how to handle a present for a single person in the class, but one of his teachers helped us through the adorable exchange this morning, where O and M went out into the hall, O gave her the present (he seemed as nervous and excited as if he was receiving the gift) and she was super happy to have received both the card and the cute little elephant. Nice job O!

For his part, Z has been watching O working on thank you cards, and suddenly I think he decided he wanted in on the action as well. Today while cleaning the play room, Meh found an adorable card he had quietly made for his school teacher -- and when I picked him up from his after school program, he had just finished coloring an oversized card for one of his school aides as well. We'll put them in his folder tomorrow to take to school; it's great to see such spontaneous and relevant giving from both of our sons!

Sleeping like a baby

This week is the annual Game Developers Conference in San Francisco. While I've been there nearly every year for the past 14 years, this year with our due date right in that window, I opted to not attend -- probably for the best, as it's been a whirlwind of adjusting to L's sleep schedule (or sometimes lack thereof) and coordinating for the boys so the ladies can get some good quality (hopefully sleep-involving) time together. That said, L and I did put together a proposed late lecture to add to GDC -- I indicated to the event planners that we could probably make any time in the 1:30 to 4:30 am window work. No response as of yet, but we've still got three days of the conference.

New milestone today: for the first time, L took a nap in her own crib (not pictured) -- and for two hours no less! Yay! The baby monitor is back up and running, so we're once again getting used to that gentle whoosh of white noise coming from a little speaker in the corner of our room. We had a number of visitors today -- R stopped by in the morning, and O had a play date with his 5-year-old friend J, who was being watched by friend I while his parents were at work. The boys for the most part played very well (the only incident being a highly sought after green Candy Land player marker), and J was super awed by the hidey hole. O also has been talking about just how nice one of his friends has been at school, so he wanted to go buy her a present -- I indicated that he certainly could using his allowance, or we could get her something for her upcoming birthday. He opted for the latter, thoughtfully perusing the store before selecting a cute little elephant figurine. He complemented the gift with a nice card today. Nice, Mr. O!

The grand experiment with family mealtime continues to go mostly successfully (when we can keep the boys at the table); tonight it was my turn to cook, and Z watched with eagerness as I made their favorite (pasta), and then concern as I transformed some of it into homemade mac and cheese. Both boys stuck with plain and wouldn't venture even a taste, though mommy assured me it was yummy.

Brotherly love

At last today I captured some footage of Z's very positive interactions with L! She's quite clearly got both boys by the heart strings; when she cries, I'll hear Z echo something I've been known to say: "What's wrong, little lady?", although on occasion lately he's morphed it into "What's wrong, old lady?" Close enough? Anyway, she was sitting in her little springy chair today ("that's for babies", says Z), and he once again brought over his favorite blanket to tuck her in all cozy.

Of course then O saw the attention she (and Z) was getting, and had to get in on the action as well, bringing both of his blankets downstairs to drape her in. Then both boys decided they had to lie down on the floor and take a "nap" next to her, so out came couch pillows and more blankets, and our three children sprawled out in a line -- alas, no photo of that one, but super cute even if a bit silly.

Doctor Doctor

O had his four-year check-up already booked for today, and as it happened to be just over a week since L's birthdate, Meh phoned the doctor last week to see if we could do a two-for-one. Thankfully it worked out and we were able to get both appointments done in a single sitting -- both of them are in great shape! The gratuitous stats:

For L:

• Weight: 6 lbs 12.5 oz (25th percentile)
• Length: 19.3 inches (25th percentile)
• Head circumference: 12.8 inches (<5th percentile)

And for O:

• Weight: 37 lbs 2 oz (50th-75th percentile)
• Height 39.8 inches (25th-50th percentile)
• BMI: 16 (75th-85th percentile)

I was really impressed with how well O did listening to the doctor's and nurse's instructions - he answered all of the questions very politely, laughed a lot at the doc's silly jokes about dinosaurs in his ears and frogs in his tummy, and even got to do his first eye test; we tried letters but he was a bit shy and/or unsure, so we flipped over to shapes. And he was super brave for the two shots as well; L had her second PKU foot prick and got slightly angrier, but all in all I was pretty proud of them! L gets to come back for her one-month appointment in three weeks; O visits again in a month for his second flu vaccine booster, but we were told he shouldn't need another shot until he's 11 years old (!).

Third fourth birthday

Happy *official* birthday to O! He had a busy and action-packed day. We gave him his birthday presents: an excellent ukulele from Uncle B and Aunt J, which he was performing on almost immediately, though he wasn't quite patient enough for me to show him how to hold and care for it, so we may have to work into that a bit; cars from grandma and John, and a car carrying case from us -- partially with the hope that this will be the beginning of instituting a rule to limit the vehicles in the house to those he can actually travel with. Then his friend J (and his parents R and G) came over to both welcome L and celebrate with O; J and he did this through a combination of running, jumping, giggling, wrestling, and loud talking.

Mima and papa had graciously invited us over for a birthday dinner (O: "and presents?"); alas, things went a bit south when he and I went to go pick up papa from work and O completely conked out -- I couldn't get him awake again throughout the birthday dinner, so mima and papa's lovely preparations were mostly enjoyed by O's parents and brother. Naturally when we got back in the car to go home, he woke up and was completely confused and upset that he'd missed cake and presents. Fear not, mima had packed up a piece, and when we got home, he had a late last celebration, complete with cake and the opening of his two last presents (shock of shocks, they were cars).

Yesterday was his school birthday party; after dropping him off in the morning with supplies for his birthday class "activity" (Froot Loops and landyard gimp to make necklaces), I arrived back for their lunch and saw this poster on their classroom door. When I walked in, a few kids had necklaces already around their necks and others had clearly already eaten theirs -- but it was still fun to get to see O interact with his class, and of course we all sang a raucous chorus of happy birthday. Afterwards, O posed with two of his best friends and his birthday poster for the school's daily documentation -- so cute! Oh, and his birthday necklace? Green and blue Froot Loops only, of course.

Once more, a very happy and busy fourth birthday to O!

For patron use only

I forgot to mention that when we got home from the hospital, I noticed a sign taped up outside of the downstairs bathroom door; when we went upstairs to give the boys their bath, there was another one outside of that door. Z has been making signs for a while (occasionally I'll see them in the front or rear window of the house), but while he and O were with Mima waiting for us to return to the hospital, he apparently decided to start labelling the restrooms. The stick figures smiling on the toilet are my favorite part by far. This morning, another similar sign showed up just outside the master bathroom -- way to be thorough, Z!

O returned to school yesterday, and his sister was the talk of the class -- I spied them working on a giant greeting card for her, but it wasn't quite ready to bring home. Today when I went to pick him up, first the entire class seemed to say "awwww..." with disappointment that I hadn't brought L with me -- soon kids, just give her more than 2.5 days! But they presented us with the finished card, featuring a bold "Welcome to the World Baby Eleanor! (Tiny)" cover, and opening to display color drawings from most of his classmates, annotated by the teachers with what the students said they meant or were thinking about. Super cuteness all around; a sampling:

• Dear baby Eleanor, Are you coming to see us? I am making you letters!
• Dear Eleanor, I drawed you a race track. You are special because you are a baby.
• Dear Eleanor, I drawed you Smog's Mountain. I want you to learn to talk. You are cute! [Clearly this came from the kid who got O interested in The Hobbit, right up until we started to try to read a few pages...]
• She looks so cute. I drew a bed.
• I have a baby brother too! I drew sleepy eyes.
• I'm good at drawing arrows. We will see you soon!
• Dear Eleanor, I drawed you a tooth fairy.
• Eleanor, This is a slide. I love you.

And from her brother, the note read: "Eleanor, I think you will like it. I love you. I hope this card is going to be cool to you. Love, Owen"

When mima came to visit today, she brought a sampling of pictures of Meh from her own first few days -- there's certainly a resemblance, though L also reminds us both of what O looked like. As far as the crying from Meh's picture, we haven't been seeing too much of that except that L doesn't appear to like getting her diaper changed. Here O helped try to sing her through it: