Hello ladies

Everyone is home -- hooray! All five of us are mildly exhausted and I suspect it will take a few days for everyone to adjust back, which will take us right to Z's pending birthday party and grandma and John visiting this weekend; as I said, a very busy summer! Meh reported that L was amazing on the trip -- very social, smiling at everyone she met, and making cute happy sounds in the morning that made her all of Meh's choir-mates' favorite roommate. Oh, and L started rolling over on the trip as well; I was sent a video of her just barely almost making a back-to-front turn.

What happened in Vegas

stays in Vegas, of course. But suffice it to say that, of my family, O and Z came out the winners, with cute little car-shaped tins and poker chips made of chocolate that I brought back with me. My primary success was finding one of the toy cars' price to be mislabelled - win. Regardless, it was good to spend time with J and get to catch back up with some friends and friends-of-friends, and to get to see some of the newer sights there (I hadn't been in more than 15 years). And it sounds like the boys had a very nice time with mima and papa (including young friend K's birthday party with a slip and slide) in my absence. Z had been announcing to his counselors all week that "daddy's going to fly to Vegas", so I think most of the camp may be ready to ask me about it when I drop Z off tomorrow.

Special guest blog

Meh and L have posted their very own blog entry for their adventure in Bulgaria -- just not here. :) Go check it out on Dunava's blog here. We've been getting a steady stream of pictures (frequently of Bulgarian vehicles) and occasional Skype calls as the dramatic time difference allows, but we're emphatically looking forward to seeing the two of them in just a few days.

And speaking of travel, the travelling parents finally overlap -- today I'm off to help celebrate close friend J's upcoming wedding with a bachelor party in Las Vegas. It's a quick weekend (I'll be back on Sunday), but will definitely miss the boys -- huge thanks to mima and papa for watching them, and looking forward to the entire family being back in the same house in four days (yay!).

Double Play

The boys continue to have a fun if exhausting time while mommy and L traverse Bulgaria (and appear live on national morning TV and even a cooking show airing in another month or two apparently?!). O's early afternoon park tour has continued this week, even despite the weather finally backing off from the unusually warm; on Tuesday, O was insistent that we find a park with a water feature even though it was overcast and in the 60s; here's a shot of him enjoying the spray hoses for, oh, about five seconds before asking for his towel. From there we reverted to a more standard park, where he and I had a delightful time (re-)discovering the joys of whirlybird maple seeds.

Thursday was O's teacher M's last day of class before moving to Arizona - she's been a fabulous teacher and the two of them have been so close, we'll miss her! She left a very cute goodbye note for all of the parents at the sign-out sheet, and she also made a custom card for each of the kids featuring a picture of them with her and a very sweet and child-specific note. We wish her the very best in her next advenutre! After school (and before camp was over), the rain was coming down, so O and I headed over to the trendy Seattle combination indoor play area/restaurant. While he was a bit shy and made me climb around in tubes and tunnels clearly meant for 4-6 year olds, we had a great time and then a very civilized nice snack together before looping back to Mercer Island to pick up Z.

Z for his part has been continuing to love camp and has really developed a solid friendship with his counselor E; as so many of his teachers are women, it's great to see him having a guy role model and talking about both E and camp, having big smiles as he's dropped off (and picked up), and overall clearly enjoying every minute of his days at Camp Kef! Z even shares at bath time some of the songs he's been learning ("boker tov" means good morning in Hebrew):

Boys (2), Man

While we've been missing mommy and L a lot, the boys and I have certainly been filling the time effectively! The week featured school for O and camp for Z; O gets out of school earlier on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so he and I got to have some quality time at a variety of parks. And maybe got ice cream one or two times. One of the parks had a piece of playground equipment that reflected some of the city's sister cities around the world; it was amusing to think that two of these cities were far closer to mommy and L than we were, and O was asking what direction mommy was from each of them. We also had a sushi dinner and guys' evening at the beach. And the boys have had renewed bathtime interest in their foam vehicle and robot stickers; when I tried to coax O out the other night after the tub had already been drained for like 10 minutes, he very seriously commented, "No, daddy. I have to build my robots."

Yesterday morning we started the day by Skyping with mommy and L -- it was so good to get to talk to them, and both boys were very happy to see the girls. As an added bonus, we got a mini-tour of Varna, as, while video conferencing with us on her phone, mommy walked from her hotel room down to the Black Sea with L to quickly dip her toes. O of course dominated the conversation so Z and I couldn't really get much of a word in edgewise, but it was still good to get everyone chatting together, and it sounds like the two of them (and Meh's entire choir) are having an excellent time!

Bon voyage / Довиждане!

(I like that the most appropriate English saying is French. Go figure.) The girls' Bulgarian adventure begins today! We dropped off the boys at camp/school and then it was off to the airport to drop Meh and L to begin their nearly day of flying to Sofia to start their whirlwind choir tour. Impressively, she has packed for two weeks for herself and a baby in precisely what you see in this picture - one roller bag, one backback, and the stroller. After school, the boys were asking where mommy and L were -- like, literally, where the plane was currently located. So we popped up the flight tracker and watched the little plane icon traversing Greenland during dinner. Our first day of bachelorhood concluded mostly successfully with the boys asleep and me likely to follow them pretty soon. Hoping the girls have an amazing, wonderful, and, dare I say, even maybe vacation-like experience!

Magic Z Ball

One of the many items that came home with my from my conference was a small kitschy magic eight ball. O loved it, but couldn't be bothered to try to read it himself, instead insisting that I ask it variants of whether monsters were going to come to our house, whether Lightning McQueen was faster than a monster, whether the monsters were good guys, etc. Z has been enjoying it as well, and I've been noticing him incorporating its cryptic responses into his own vocabulary; earlier today I asked him a yes/no question and he responded "outlook unclear".

Yesterday was friend K's second birthday party, and they went all out with a Richard Scarry Cars & Trucks & Things That Go themed celebration of cuteness -- so clever and original, and the boys had a blast hunting for goldbugs (drawn on paper and artfully hidden throughout a full model cardboard city outdoors), painting trains, eating individual-sized chocolate cakes shaped like vehicles, and much more. K opened his presents at the end of the party, and I was amused to see there's already a printed book of the viral hit "What Does the Fox Say?", complete with spelled out noises. In the meantime, the boys sat front and center at rapt attention, like it was some kind of close-range live action version of the toy unboxing videos they used to obsess over, while K opened an impressive number of increasingly large construction vehicle toys. Z and O both got their own new cars as part of their goody bags -- win all around!

Today's birthday party (for O's close school friend J) was an outdoor sports affair (complete with multiple coaches/referees/kid herders) -- the boys had lots of fun at a sports field kicking balls with friends, while L was first in the stroller snoozing and then later was on me making her familiar happy cooing and screeching noises. I thought the party was winding down after snacks when all of the sudden we heard a familiar musical noise out on the street, and J's mom told the kids to come around to the parking lot. Voila, an ice cream truck awaited, serving up perfectly cool desserts on a very hot day. O first picked one option, then changed his mind (thankfully before opening it) when he saw what the birthday boy had; both he and Z (and O's shirt) ended up sharing a rocket pop. The after party (yes, there was one) was at the adjacent school playground, where both boys played and played some more while L enjoyed her second nap of the event. A thoroughly enjoyable and exhausting day for the boys and littlest girl!

It goes to eleven

Tomorrow is Meh and my 11th anniversary! It's still incredible to consider how much has happened and how the time has flown since we stood under the chuppah. Since Meh has work on the actual day, and the kids and I will be at an afternoon birthday party, tonight we celebrated last night with some excellent sushi at a local restaurant that we just don't get to often enough. Special thanks to one of the boys' favorite non-mima babysitters S; apparently everyone had a decent evening for her, though L woke up sad as we were heading home. A very happy anniversary to the most amazing wife, mommy, and my very best friend - I love you!

Brighton beach memoirs

The family's hectic summer travel season continues -- this week I've been in the UK for a conference. Alas, didn't get too much time in my favorite (favourite?) city, as the event was down on the coast in Brighton. Somehow I managed to miss the actual beach (it was actually a bit chilly and very breezy) and the landmark pier, but the conference itself was certainly productive and thought provoking. And I did get to have one lovely London afternoon with N, S, and their kids R and J, followed by an excellent dinner for the grownups. It's always fun getting to interact with the kids, as they're only slightly older than my boys, so it's sometimes a bit like looking into the future. In addition to the event itself, I did have a day of meetings back in the city, and visited not only Meh's favourite market for a lunch get together, but also checked out a replica tall ship docked in the port -- as usual, I've been keeping an eye out for fun vehicles that the boys would enjoy pictures of. Of course, the one I most like taking a picture of is the plane that takes me back home to them!

Freedom Flapjacks

Hope everyone had a good fourth of July! We had a busy one, starting with breakfast: Meredith made some amazing US flag pancakes for the boys. They were very excited to have them on their plates, though Z wouldn't actually eat his (though he talked about it all day). Then it was time to go visit our favorite local parade. As in years past, there was an excellent collection of classic cars, big trucks, military vehicles, motorcycles, and more. And as a bonus, mommy and L were in the parade, joining up with friend L! The boys and I got a spot on the opening corner of the route to watch mommy -- and by "got a spot", I mean I was able to get everyone to sit for about 5 minutes to eat snack before they were running around again (thankfully out of the path of the actual parade route, though often a bit too close to the boat load-in dock), occasionally watching both the various vehicles in the parade and the many boats approaching the beach. We did catch mommy's eye and wave hello, but not enough free hands to grab a picture.
Exhausted from all of the outdoor sun exposure, we came home for a quiet afternoon. By which I mean O got L giggling for a good fifteen minutes.

Mommy and L weren't up for it, but the boys had been obsessing about fireworks for some time (Z in particular kept asking when we went to Michigan when we'd be seeing them, since the previous visit had been for the fourth of July), so I'd been looking for a close-by show that wouldn't start and end with us sitting in a heavy traffic for an hour or more. Thankfully our adjacent city's display was super close to the house, so the boys and I hopped in the car about 30 minutes before the show, and eventually found a creative parking spot near the top of the lake, then walked to the pedestrian/bike path where we set up shop with a blanket and late night snacks overlooking the giant parking lot of airplanes at the air harbor. There was much discussing of the planes (and parked vehicles) while we waited for the display to start; the boys had a fabulous time, though O was clearly exhausted and a bit loopy by the end. Happy Independence Day!

Four months a lady

Happy four month birthday to L! The time has flown, though perhaps not quite as fast as we thought; I accidentally took her to today's four month appointment last week. The receptionist shook her head sympathetically and said to come back, but no worries - we were back there today, and L was happy and cooing the whole ride over. Once she was down to the diaper, she got a little more angry, and an oral and two injected vaccines didn't help things. But all's well that ends well; she has two cute band-aids and a clean bill of health for her big international trip in (eek) 11 days! By the numbers:

• 14 lbs 3 oz (50th percentile)
• 24" length (25-50th percentile)
• Head circumference: 15.6 (25th percentile)

The weather has emphatically flipped to summer; we hit 100 earlier this week, which is pretty unusual overall for the area, let alone in early July. We've been trying to keep everyone cool through fans, blinds, open windows, and juggling our two portable room air conditioning units among three bedrooms, but it may be time to pick up a third so everyone can sleep comfortably. In the meantime, sunscreen and hats for both boys as they spend so much of their days outdoors at camp and pre-school!

A bit of perspective

Z has long enjoyed drawing, and has pretty much drawn his way right through about four magandoodles (I don't think I knew before that they could actually wear out), as well as multiple reams of paper with a variety of sketching media (pencils, pens, markers, crayons). The subject matter varies a bit -- buildings, people, lots of interest in vehicles, roads, traffic signals, and (for some reason) utility poles are among his favorites. This weekend we went to a party at friend J's house, and Z was intently using her oversized (and more or less pristine) magnadoodle. When I checked in on his masterpiece, I saw that for the first time, some of the roads were at an angle and seemingly disappearing in the distance -- Z has discovered and started using perspective. Go Z! Once he's done, he's quick to erase and move onto the next picture; thankfully I got this shot a few moments before he started a second (also perspective-aware) drawing.

Hot pants

O wanted Elsa pajamas; Meh found "sisters forever" fabric featuring both Elsa and Anna, and made a pair of fabulous pajama bottoms. With his choice of top from his existing collection, O has declared that he is now "Lightning Elsa Anna McQueen."

Work back schedule

The day has finally arrived -- maternity leave has wrapped up and mommy is back at work! I'm taking my full leave in August when the girls are back from Bulgaria, so I'm taking intermittent vacation days to both watch L and chaperone the boys to and from school for this week. We of course had to organize a visit (both so L could get a snack and to let her say hi to mommy's co-workers). There had actually been a few library visits during Meh's leave, most of which for whatever reason seemed coupled with massive diaper explosions -- at one point Meh had to dash to the bathroom to change L, and a coworker who thought she was leaving apparently got on the library PA system requesting she return to the desk! Thankfully, today's visit was a bit less eventful diaper-wise, and L was all smiles and coos as she met various coworkers. Then we went back home for a nap before heading out to pick up the boys from camp.

Planes, trains, and automobiles

The boys' big cross-country road adventure has come to its conclusion, with two successful 4+ hour flights interspersed with excellent fun times with grandma, John, their dog Winston, their boat, four playgrounds, and much more! On Wednesday, the whole family piled into the car and drove to the airport, where mommy and L said goodbye to us with hugs and kisses, before the boys each took our own backpacks and bravely walked into the airport and through security. I left in plenty of time for a snack (O had to grab some French fries from the classic Seattle fish and chips outlet) in the airport's excellent windowed promenade, where the boys watched and commented on various airplanes and ground support vehicles.

Then after some playtime at the indoor playground and two loops in the subway car around the terminal, it was time to board the flight. The three seats they got us together were in the very last row, which while originally seeming like a nuisance, was actually a blessing when O needed multiple trips to the restroom and I could trust that Z was going to be literally on the other side of the wall from us). The boys did great entertaining themselves with their various toys and snacks, and the aforementioned car cases were a particularly huge hit. (And bonus: the felt road had enough traction that even through some turbulence, the cars didn't roll off the tray tables and onto the ground.) My favorite was the notes that Meredith had packed in their bags; Z liked his so much that it found an honored place on his armrest, where he re-read it several times during the flight and talked about the airplane she'd drawn on it.

We had an excellent time with grandma and John! There was of course a trip out in the boat; the boys brought snacks (and insisted on wearing their slick new sunglasses, also courtesy of mommy's backpack packing skillz) and talked about everything they saw from the boat (especially, shock of shocks, cars driving by on the roads). O insisted on paddling, while talking a mile a minute about which direction he wanted to go, what was an island, why that bird was swimming away, and so on. Z joined in on the paddling as well -- it was all fun and games until O accidentally dropped his paddle in the lake, and Z thought that was so funny that he let his go as well. Thankfully they floated and I was able to fetch them (over a slight O tantrum when I wouldn't let him climb halfway out of the boat to scoop them out with me).

In addition to many excellent hours of reading and playing games with grandma and John, we also made multiple visits to what O and Z described as "four parks!" -- the local elementary, middle, and high schools are co-located, and all of their playgrounds are adjacent; so when the boys got tired of the elementary school one (or O got too concerned about a spider he'd seen up in the play structure), they kicked it up a notch and went to the middle school edition, which had this strange seesaw-like contraption to play on.

I think we can emphatically say that a highlight of the trip for the boys was a visit to Greenfield Village. Despite the on-again/off-again rain, they had an amazing time there, and it was so fun to see kids responding to it, well, probably about the same way as I did when I was their age. We even were able to coordinate roughly 5 minutes of conversation with my good high school friend J, his fiancé J, and his parents J and J, who were all visiting the grounds at the same time. (That's a lot of J's.) hobo-style. J's dad even had some kind of season ticket that got us discounted rates - thanks J! After riding the train halfway around the perimeter, we exited, declined lunch at the fun period restaurant Meh and I had enjoyed last time, and instead had lunch at a cafeteria-style restaurant that served perhaps the cutest preparation of a kids meal -- a sandwich, cookie, and fruit all wrapped up in a handkerchief attached to the end of a wooden stick, Once I explained what it was, the boys almost immediately associated it with their favorite current book, and O had to turn his handkerchief into a bandana before the tour of the park grounds could continue.

But the big win of the day was the park's spacious new playground, with a class Ford model T (that made noises when you pumped the pedals or adjusted the gears), toys to climb on, a metal tube tunnel, slides, swings, a tilt-a-whirl thing, a large water toward to climb, and giant sandpit with pivoting canisters to fill and dump -- all with horse drawn carriages and Model T's cruising by outside the white fence. The boys easily spent more than an hour here; while I was able to get O to come with me and ride the excellent carousel, Z stayed in with grandma and John and just played and played and played on the playground. Speaking of the carousel, there were a number of animals to choose between riding; O opted for the dog "because it looks like Winston"; while initially shy, he and Z really got to be good friends with their doggy step-uncle (?!) over the week.

The class reunion was a lot of fun as well; it was wonderful to catch up even briefly with friends from high school (a surprising number of folks had actually become teachers -- some even within our own high school's school district) -- and at one of our culinary classmate's excellent and tasty new restaurants to boot. The class video (I forgot we even had one) was rolling in the corner, there was a photo booth for grabbing pictures, photo albums, toasts, class memorabilia, and all in all a fabulous evening.

More pictures of the trip can be found here. A huge thanks again to grandma and John for being such wonderful (and patient!) hosts!

Trip planner

Tomorrow the boys and I head off for a new milestone -- a boys' plane trip (4 hours no less) without mommy or L. We're visiting grandma and John in the Great Lake State for a brief summer holiday, along with my 20th (well, actually 21st) high school reunion. Mommy has been hard at work getting some amazing stuff into their travel bags; O continues to ask when he can open his backpack, and I too am looking forward to seeing them discover a wealth of legos, snacks, drawing books, stickers, and (my favorite) these adorable little car cases Meh created complete with 4 pockets and a little road for the cars to drive on. Plenty of snacks and a few movies as well -- overall a wealth of entertainment options. Let's just hope they don't burn through them in the first 10 minutes off the ground!

It's going to be a fun adventure, and we're excited to spend time with grandma and John, but we're going to miss Meh and L a lot! O keeps asking if we'll be able to talk on the computer, and what direction grandma and John's house is from here, while Z insists to himself that "we'll definitely see them again another time".

Mamaloshen

One of the most surefire ways to get L to laugh is to start spouting Yiddish words at her. This video perhaps isn't the strongest example, but often she's in stitches from the various words and phrases we come up with -- some of which she perhaps shouldn't be repeating until she's a grown up. She'll also sit in rapt attention while you read books to her; this girl is most definitely an interested and engaged reader already - now where could she possibly be getting that from?



Father's Day has arrived - hope all of the dads have a very happy one! We had a very nice family brunch at mima and papa's house. O's class project was excellent, a fabulous popsicle stick-framed picture of himself answering as he does most questions, by tying it back to cars. Z did a nice fill-in-the-blank project at school as well. And all three of the kids did a super-cute mommy-organized card that featured all three kids' hand silhouettes on the outside, and more trivia questions inside. ("What does Daddy like to do? Make Xboxes.") True to form, Z aptly signed by heavily leveraging his new favorite book/punctuation mark: "happy fathers day! Zachary! Happy birthday - love mommy", while O continued to demonstrate his proficiency in writing out his name.

Caught in a binder

Seemingly every weekend we're back at the boys' favorite park. Thankfully this time L and mommy were able to join us, and the boys were very cute about checking in with her as she smiled and cooed on the blanket (in between snacks for all and her nap time). My main concern with the upcoming birthday party is that every time we're back, another part of the park appears to have broken -- a few weeks ago, a climbing apparatus had caution tape on it; last week, a rocking horse was gone and replaced with a construction cone; and today, one of the two infant swings was just totally gone from the frame. O of course has been full of questions as to why the play structures are gone and who removed them/put up the construction signs. Z in the meantime is insistent that "they're going to fix it!" Here's hoping the city has got budget allocated for repairs!

The weekend has also been featuring ever-warming weather, so we were able to have some dining al fresco opportunities. Mima and papa came over for a grilling good time; the boys were very happy to enjoy the newly added woodchips in the background (unanticipated bonus: they apparently repel more of the insects!), push each other in the swings, and step from stump to stump by the house. L in the meantime was very happy to be outside with the family, smiling big smiles at everyone.

Tonight was O's end of the year class picnic; friend J actually took him and classmate A over to it at a fun park near their school, and I joined up soon after work, finding the entire class crazily climbing all over the playground. Soon enough we were able to herd the kids back to the picnic shelter for dinner, cake, and a small ceremony where each of the kids' parents received their "documentation", a giant binder featuring printouts of the year's activities. In addition to art from the kids, these had involved a full series of excellent nearly daily e-mailed documents that had captured the kids' activities over time, generally richly accompanied with pictures and ridiculously cute quotes from the individual kids on their thoughts about the concept or activity. It's amazing to have such a rich capture of O's life between the ages of 3 and 4, and leafing through the early entries it's wonderful to see just how much he's grown. The kids were off for more post-sugar wildness, running around the park with a few kites, before I eventually coaxed O back into the car and home, happy and exhausted, for bath and bedtime. Even though school continues through the summer, congratulations on a rough equivalent to "graduation", Mister O!

Getting the giggles

Meh had insisted that L had been laughing for her a few times already this week, but I hadn't yet witnessed it -- until this morning. So adorable, and we caught a bit of it on film, er, digital sensor:

OMG MOAR TRUX!!1!$$@#@!

(Sorry, if it was obnoxious enough to use as a blog post title once...)

This weekend was another busy one for the boys -- and not too shabby for Meh and L as well; Meh walked a 5K with L then went to an all-girls tea birthday party for friend E that was apparently adorable. On the boys' side, first O's friend M had his 4th birthday party at his house on Saturday. All mapping software failed us, and there was a large caravan of cars hilariously wandering about a residential neighborhood and turning around. The direction failure was in the same general vicinity as our friends I and J's house, and as we finally found the correct residence, I realized they were next door neighbors -- small world! The party was a wholly pirate-themed affair -- and of course both boys got into the act by wearing full costumes over to the party (once they arrived, O immediately dumped his spyglass and sword to go play). Neither was swayed by the friendly (though also pirate-costumed) face paint artist they had at the party, but both were in love with the incredible indoor two-story treehouse (!) that I think was M's guest kids room.

Then today was the perennial crowd favorite Touch a Truck. There were a number of excellent options to explore this year, including a city metro bus that was handing out foldable papercraft metro buses, Comcast handing out squeezable foam service van toys (there's a joke in there somewhere), several fire trucks, a city electrical vehicle, and, Z's favorite, a construction/traffic redirecting truck complete with cycling signaling mechanism. Unlike at O's previous event, there was apparently no guidance not to honk the horns, so a blast or toot was forthcoming every few minutes, somewhat to O's dismay -- no, that didn't stop him from asking me to blast the big rig's horn, though his hands were tight over his ears when I did it. But fun times all around, and even shared with friends -- I'd mentioned to friends R, M, and their son/O's friend J, and they arrived for some group exploring. We even got to ride a trolley retrofitted as a bus to and from the remote parking lot. It must be just about summer with so many fun things to keep the kids occupied on weekends - yay!