Pre-Christmas Happenings

Gratitude

This is what we overheard Harrison saying at the table during the pre-dinner craziness tonight:

May we have grateful hearts for all we receive and be ever mindful of the needs of others.

We will try to guide our words, control our tempers, and speak the truth.

Bon appetit! You may eat!

I love Montessori.

Rochesterian

Griffin became a true Rochesterian today---he shook hands with Danny Wegman.

Outtake

My Thanksgiving List

This year, I am most thankful for:

1. My mother, for watching my children every single day that I work. What an amazing and generous gift.
2. Memories of my grandmother, and for the opportunity to eulogize her, with my sister Val at my side.
3. The opportunity to observe the family of robins we had in our climbing rose this year--from egg to flight.
4. Maria Montessori and our Montessori school. I am inspired by Griffin and Harrison's teachers and classrooms every day.
5. Barack Obama, being able to take part in a historic election, and the American people for making the right choice.
6. Children's books which are not painful to read over and over and over again.
7. Letchworth camping with Harrison and Doug, snuggling them in the sleeping bags on a 30 degree night, and sharing hot cocoa with marshmallows in enamelware mugs.
8. The Twilight series and the guilty pleasure of being singularly absorbed into reading 2,000+ pages of such earnestly awful (yet titillating!) prose in a few short weeks.
9. New dahlia bulbs and blooms, which were spectacular this year.
10. Being able to go to the Rochester Public Market or Greece Farm Market every free Saturday, which is the bright side of being woken up at 6:30 AM by the hellions
11. Girl talk over the Thanksgiving Tasting supper at Hurd Orchards
12. Harrison's growing appreciation for The Beatles (even though I may go mad if I have to hear 'Revolution' on the ride to school again tomorrow)
13. Picking and eating so many sweet cherries that our bellies hurt and our fingers turned red.
14. Having a progressive/feminist husband who is a true co-parent and partner.
15. My new sewing machine and the fun (fantasy?) of planning winter projects
16. The best of this year's thrift store treasures: a cherry-red metal roller skate case repurposed to store train-set tracks; teacups for Val which match Gram's dessert plates; and vintage juice glasses perfect for small hands.
17. The few days when the kids and cats all sleep in and it's actually light out when I wake--like today!
18. Love, love, love, love. Crazy love.

(And kudos, as always, to Danika, for the inspiration to write this list. Thank you, dear friend!)

Angst

H: Brenden doesn't care about me.
D: What?
H: Brenden. He doesn't care about me.
S: What do you mean? Why do you think that? He invited you to his birthday party, so I'm sure he likes you.
H: Because I told a joke to him today and he didn't laugh.
S&D [quietly snickering]: What was the joke?
H: Knock knock.
S&D: Who's there?
H: Chicken.
S&D: Chicken who?
H: Why did the chicken cross the road?
S&D: Why?
H: Because he wanted to get to the other side!!!
S&D: HAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHA!
S&D: Brenden didn't think that was funny?
H: No.

Science and Religion

Scene: Dinnertime in an atheist household.
Griffin squishes mashed potatoes between fingers, then lifts hands together above head.

D: It looks like he's praying!
H (a few seconds later): What does 'pray' mean?
S (to Doug): All yours. You can take this one.
D: ....'Pray'....well...um...some people believe in a God, or multiple gods, and 'pray' is when someone asks for something that they wish... um...or....
H (only somewhat listening): Is it 'pray' like when T Rex 'preys' on other dinosaurs?

Yes We Did

Taken this morning. A historic day.

Jump

Vote Obama. Vote Hope.

...for the sake of my family, especially my children, to whom this blog is dedicated. 

There's nothing left to say. 

Our New Cat

Doug came across this Sunday afternoon:

A Happy Halloween!

Digging into Harrison's lame-o pumpkin:

This year's collection, special ordered, "Make the first one happy and not too scary..." The second one is based on the face drawing that Harrison has been making all year. For the third one: "Make a scary one with lots of teeth!"

Hesitant mummy.  Doug got a great mummy book out of the library in preparation for this costume, so I now know more about mummies than I ever thought I would.

I only caught one shot of them together, and this is it! Tex and the mummy:

The haul:

Oblogma

I can't tear myself away from election coverage to blog anything of substance lately. Suffice it to say that I am obsessed and fearful. One week of this to go, and then (please, sweet lord baby Jesus, Allah, Gaia, whomever may be listening) Obama will win, we can all celebrate, and things can get back to normal around here. 

In the meantime, guess what? Photos! At the pumpkin farm!

____________

You know how they say that in order not to overwhelm them, you should reduce young children's choices to two things tops? (For example: would you like the red cup or the blue cup?) Well, they're right, because, man, this is such a hard, painful decision every, single year.

We finally realized that he wasn't going to pick any of the pumpkins we suggested, so we tried covertly putting perfect pumpkins in his path and then "spotting" them. Didn't work. He had to find it on his own, and after looking over approximately 5,365 candidates, he wound up with the rinky-dinkiest pumpkin. But it was all his. And it was perfect.

 Griffin was easy. He was more interested in loading up the wagon with rocks. Here he is with rock number 2:

Serious and Handsome

The New Photo Face

Camping:

In a tree:
In the car:

Weirdo.

So much better when unaware he's being photographed:

Shirt

11 Things We Like Lately

1. Buckets, 11 of them, arranged in order by size.
2. Sidewalk chalk.
3. Neighbors who leave hand-me-down presents of sandboxes, buckets and sand toys in our driveway.

4. Neighbors who grow extra tomatoes and shove the plants through our side of the fence, just for us.
5. Galas, Empires, and Arletts, and living 10 minutes from an orchard, with u-pick apples for 60 cents a pound.

6. The last of the evening sun.

7. Umbrella cranks.
8. Buzz Lightyear underwear.

9. Morning hikes in Letchworth on beds of fallen leaves.
10. Walking sticks left for the taking by previous hikers.

11. Cocoa, with marshmallows, drunk from enamelware mugs around the campfire.

[Update: I just saw that Soule Mama had a very similar, albeit much better posting this week: enjoy.]

Metro School

On our minds lately has been the looming public vs private school dilemma for the kids.

A big ray of hope these last few weeks has been this proposal for The Metro School, by Dr. William Cala. His idea is inspirational...I hope it becomes a reality:

"The way we have populated our schools is appalling," says Cala "What we have is an economic apartheid. Urban schools do not look like the rest of society, and suburban schools don't either. Both groups of students need to be prepared to enter a global workforce that is multicultural."

Eagle Eye

Yesterday, as an afternoon diversion, I taught Harrison how to have a staring contest. I thought this would be a fun exercise because he is REALLY bad at making eye contact. So I explained it to him, and we played a few times, and he cracked up in hysterics, and of course lost every single round. Then he got a devilish look.

H: I know! Let's have a NON-staring contest.
S: How do you do that?
H: You don't look at each other.
S: Okay, but how will we know who wins?
H: Uh...

So we did.

And he lost.

Waning Days of Summer

A good week. Shucking corn in the yard:

Discovery of Concord Grapes (Mama's favorite):
And what weekend would be complete without pantless recycling?
Goodbye, Summer! Happy Autumn!

Tutti Fruiti

This has been the summer of fresh-picked fruit. We were out of town last weekend and didn't make it to the farm or the farmer's market, but the parents stopped by yesterday on their way home from the local orchard. Now we're faced with the fortunate "problem" of figuring out what to do with several pounds each of peaches and apples (mac, gala, 20 oz), and a quart apiece of plums and late-season red raspberries.

Harrison and I made this super easy raspberry and peach tart tonight. Tastes like summer!

Griffin's First Day of School Photo

Unmentionables

Scene: Target. Harrison walks by lingerie department and points at bras:

"Are those for boobs?"

Checkup

On the drive to school this morning:

S: Grandma's going to pick you up today. Grandpa's got to go to Buffalo.
H: What's Grandpa doing in Buffalo?
S: He has to run some errands and take the car for repair.
H: What's "car repair"?
S: Repair means "fix." Actually, he just needs to get it checked out. Cars need checkups just like people.
H: But...cars don't have hearts!
S: True, but they have engines.
H: Well, that's silly.

First Day of School (the Griffin edition)

Griffin had a great first day of school on Friday!

No crying, no fussing.

According to Ms. Goodwine's status report:

"Mood: Very happy!

Materials worked with: Explored just about everything today.

General: A great first day!"

He was even blasé when Grandma and Grandpa came to pick him up at noon.

I could not have asked for a better result (or less guilt). Phew!

What a trooper!

[will add a picture later]

First Day of School

It's hard to believe that summer is over! 

Harrison's first day back to school was today. I can't believe what a big boy he's become. Here he is in the outfit he picked and layed out the night before. Our Montessori school doesn't allow any distracting clothing, so anything with logos, characters, numbers, etc. is out. As it states in the parent handbook: "Simple clothing allows the natural beauty of the child to show through." 

Looking at our handsome boy, so excited for his first day back, Doug and I couldn't agree more! (Here he is on the first day of school last year.)

(Griffin starts in the Montessori toddler community on Friday. I'm trying to work through the anxiety I'm feeling about that. He'll be fine....right?)

Cheerios

The Cape

It doesn't get any better....

Words Griffin Can Say*

uh oh/ car/ truck/ stuck/ me/ mama/ dada/ flower/ bird/ grandma/ bee/ milk/ up/ help/ down/ spoon/ berry/ hi/ there/ woof/ meow/ kitty/ this/ that/ moon/ fan/ cheese/ melon/ more/ bye/ bus/ boohbah/ bread/ bubble/ lawnmower/ ball/ fork/ hot/ baby

*mostly intelligible

I love how this list reflects on his world and his understanding of it.

Bubbles

Two days, two boys, two summer treats

Backyard Boys

Bullies

Harrison had a run-in with some 6-year old bullies on the playground yesterday when he was with Grandma. He wanted to hang out and was following them around trying to engage them in play, and they started calling him "Poopyhead" "Toilethead" and "Diaperbaby."

[I had to suppress my smirk and laughter a bit when he was recounting these insults.]

He reported the verbal abuse to Grandma and she chastised the boys in her teacherly way, but I wonder if she should have let him fight his own battle on this one. What's the protocol here?

Poor Buddy. I want to squirrel him away and protect him from the nasty bits of the world, including mean 6-year olds.

Strawberry Fields Forever

Between our wee family and my parents, we've all been strawberry picking at the field down the road from my parents' house 5 times. Five! Harrison's been on all of these excursions. For a 3 week picking season, I'd say that's pretty darn impressive!

Here's Griffin on our last run on Saturday, with three strawberries lined up to be eaten:

John, Paul, George, and Ringo

The Fab Four are growing up! Here they are this evening, only 9 days old, running out of room, and almost ready to leave the nest:

They think the camera is their mama, here to feed them...
...and here are Mama and Papa with a grub and a worm, waiting for the photoshoot to end:

New babies!

No, not for me--our robin chicks arrived on Monday! As far as I can tell, without being too invasive, all four eggs have hatched. We've been so lucky to have them here. The nest is below eye level off the back porch, so we can observe them fairly easily. When I peek through the foliage of the climbing rose where the nest is, I now see a wriggling mass of pink fuzzy bird flesh.

Yesterday Doug saw Mama Bird bring over a worm. This week, too, I saw Papa Bird tending to the nest for the first time, along with the Mama.

It took three days for Mama to lay all four eggs (two the first day, then one each for two more days), then 15 days for all four eggs to hatch. By 14 days old, they will apparently be ready to fly. Robin development is amazingly swift!

When she was brooding, Mama Bird took off whenever we were on the back porch, but now that she's got nestlings, she usually stays in the nest even when the [human] kids crash out the back door and tear out into the yard. Her maternal instinct to protect her babies is strong in the face of the hellions!

I will try and take some more pictures of our new additions when they get a little more vertical. In the meantime, flickr has some amazing shots of other people's chicks. Enjoy!

Weekend Photo Recap

The perfect solstice weekend! 78 degrees, moderately humid, walking on the river, a beautiful evening wedding (thank you and congratulations again, K&J!), sleeping in Saturday, kids sleepover at grandma and grandpa's, strawberry picking/baking/jam making, 5 out of 6 meals eaten outdoors. Hooray for summer!

Our second clutch of robins, almost ready to hatch!

Mashing berries for jam requires The Tongue of Concentration.

Lunch at the kid's table.

My cheese puff.