Girl Detective

I really enjoyed when Guppy was about 6 months old. He smiled but did not yet have teeth, was not yet eating solid foods, and he stayed where I put him. He was soft, round, and very good natured. Over the past year+, he’s gotten fourteen teeth, learned to stand, crawl and walk, and eat like a champ. He also has learned to love many of the same things as his big brother, 4yo Drake, which meant a steep increase in sibling rivalry and fights.

Now, as he hits the 20 month mark, I again notice he’s at a particularly charming age. He’s walking and talking. He loves to smile and wave. He likes to play, and he continues to be soft, round, and very good natured, at least when he doesn’t have a tooth coming in.

I heard once that kids tend to be more easy on the half year than they are near their birthdays. I’m certainly appreciating Guppy’s half years, but since he’s 2 1/2 years younger than Drake, it means that one boy will always be going into a challenging period as one is leaving it. I’ll try to notice how things are with both boys as we manage the next six months.

I had the strangest playdate this morning. My friend The Hoff came over with her son A, who is Drake’s age, and her small infant. 20mo Guppy was at the babysitter’s today. Drake and A played mostly well and on their own, then took off to the basement to watch My Neighbor Totoro and SportsCenter (tough loss for the Bills last night, apparently; ouch!) The baby slept. The Hoff and I had time to sit, drink coffee, and talk.

The boys had fun, we had adult conversation, and the baby had a nap. It was lovely.

Yesterday and today have been nigh-perfect weather: 70’s, sunny, low humidity, and few clouds. Here were a few songs that popped into my mental playlist out walking:

Time in a Bottle by Jim Croce
Good Day, Sunshine-The Beatles
Pig Island-Scott Bakula (From Philadelphia Chickens, and because Drake always mentions it when there’s a “very blue sky”)
The Sesame Street theme song (”Sunny Days….”)
Walkin’ on Sunshine-Katrina and the Waves (played to death, I know, but I love it still.)

Up, up pile the clothes–
Biking, bed wetting, barfing–
Laundry never ends.

Yesterday afternoon, 19mo Guppy was long and loud is his protest against afternoon nap. I went in to comfort him and try to settle him down. There was a great deal of snot running out of his nose.

And a noodle.

In horror, I grabbed a tissue and wiped up the mess. I confirmed that it was, in fact, about an inch or so of linguine.

Which we’d had THE NIGHT BEFORE for dinner.

“Oh,” said my husband G. Grod when I told him about it later. “THAT’s why he was breathing so heavily last night over the baby monitor.”

Last week I was downstairs with 19mo Guppy, who had awakened early (pre-6am) per his usual. I heard 4yo Drake on the stairs, and called out good morning, and said I was glad to see him. He scowled at me, stomped down the stairs, ran up to me, then kicked me in the shin with his bare foot.

This is the kind of thing I think of when people, especially non-parents, get all gooshy and romantic about motherhood.

According to the MPAA:

A G-rated motion picture contains nothing in theme, language, nudity, sex, violence or other matters that, in the view of the Rating Board, would offend parents whose younger children view the motion picture. The G rating is not a “certificate of approval,” nor does it signify a “children’s” motion picture. Some snippets of language may go beyond polite conversation but they are common everyday expressions. No stronger words are present in G-rated motion pictures. Depictions of violence are minimal. No nudity, sex scenes or drug use are present in the motion picture.

I took Drake to see Ratatouille yesterday. Within ten minutes he was terrified, and I didn’t blame him. I was offended then, and further later when I confirmed the G rating and what it is supposed to cover. To me, minimal violence DOES NOT encompass a little old lady pulling out a shotgun, shooting at main characters until her gun is empty, searching for bullets, reloading, releasing rat poison, putting on a gas mask, and continuing to shoot. This scene, about ten minutes into the movie, is loud, violent and it scared my four year old child.

I’ve long been aware that the MPAA ratings are screwed up, giving more leeway to violence than to sexuality, but I thought these errors were on the R and PG13 end of the spectrum. But as Drake found out, to both his and my dismay, the leeway on violence seems to be a pitfall of all the ratings.

Ratatouille might be a good movie for older kids and adults. It’s not for small kids. Shame on you MPAA, Disney, and Pixar. Why couldn’t the old lady simply have chased the rats with a broom–why the shotgun AND the gas? Next time I’ll consult a site like Common Sense Media to be better informed.

With apologies to Nora Ephron, and thanks to my friend A for the joke. I think I’ve pulled a muscle in my neck. I’m not sure if it was carrying a tantrum-ing Drake to the car after preschool, or struggling to pick up and hold a crying, arching Guppy in the middle of the night, but my neck, back and shoulder have seen better days.

Yesterday I went to get a massage. That afternoon, he said he wanted to watch a video.

“I think it will help your back feel better, Mom,” he announced, cannily.

Drake later announced to G. Grod that we’d been to the gym because I had a “cricket” in my back.

Today, he kept asking me if he could look at something, but I couldn’t understand his word through his lisp.

“Quick?” I guessed. “Click?” So he pulled out the back of my blouse, looked down and seemed satisfied that he’d seen something that was the “crick” in my back.

Having learned our lesson last week, our family went to the usual pizza place for dinner. After consuming a bottle of San Pellegrino Aranciata and maybe one piece of pizza (as opposed to last week’s pizza AND A HALF), 4yo Drake looked down at his distended belly and announced, “I’m fat!”

Drake has consistently been in the bottom third of weight percentiles, so he’s hardly that. G. Grod and I looked worried at one another about where he’d picked up this “fat” business, and immediately started damage control.

“No, you’re not fat. Your belly is full,” etc. Drake continued to repeat the word fat all the way to the car, so unfortunately we overdid it. Just as I gave a high sign and a whisper to G. Grod that we should drop it, Drake started chanting, “Fat, fat, fat, fat, fat!” at the top of his lungs while G. Grod and I stifled our laughs.

Wouldn’t you know it, but 19mo Guppy then joined the chorus, “Fah! Fah! Fah!”

Just when things started to settle down and I thought we were out of the woods, Drake changed subjects. He picked up the Justin Timberlake CD in the back, and crowed, “Sexy!”

G. Grod and I continued to swallow our grins, but we didn’t say a word. And because we ignored it, he stopped.

Meanwhile, 4yo Drake got bored with the Guppy on a Swing Show, so he went inside. Minutes later I heard a crash and a yell. I rushed to the porch. Drake was standing next to an upended shoe rack, which he’d obviously climbed up on and fallen off of.

Me: Are you OK?
Drake: Yes.
Me: Why were you climbing on the rack.
Drake points at the duster I’ve put up high.
Me, puzzled: What were you going to do with the duster?
Drake, looking at me as if I’m an idiot: Dust, mom.

Good for me that “sheesh” and “duh” are not in his vocabulary, yet.

19mo Guppy loves to swing. Last week he was on the jungle gym, and yelled, “Stah!” for stop, so I halted the swing. He grinned at me slyly, then said decisively, “Fing!” I began to push him again. He continued to exercise his will over what I did, with me in full collusion. We went through this cycle about a half dozen more times, then I laughed and asked him if I was a clown for his amusement.

He shook his head, “No, Da-yeh.”

“Dad is a clown for your amusement?” I asked to clarify.

He nodded his head twice, and said “Mmm-hmmm!”

Wednesdays are new comic days. We usually go to a certain pizza place for a quick dinner, then to the comic shop to pick up the new titles. G. Grod wanted to do something different from pizza, though, so he drove to another nearby restaurant. As he pulled in, 4yo Drake’s voice rose in a shout, “NO! Pizza!” Surprised at the immediate vehemence, G. tried to reason with him. Then he pulled out of the parking lot, drove to the usual place, and as we pulled in the parking lot 19mo Guppy grinned, clapped his hands, and said, “Yay! Pees-ah!” over and over. Children love routine, and we learned not to mess with it last night. And we got a free pepperoni kids pizza when the kitchen had an oops, G. and I tried a very good salame e funghi pizza with LOTS of garlic, so things turned out well.

At the comic shop, Guppy insisted on being put down, not carried, and proceeded to run four laps around an aisle. I picked him up again before damage occurred, but he lunged toward a plush character, grabbed it and began yelling “Muh-tee!” (Monkey) He clutched it to his heart, then pronounced “My muh-tee” and was so absurdly cute that we could hardly deny him the toy.

Meanwhile, I tried to interest Drake in the very nice and inexpensive first volume of the graphic novel starring Guppy’s “monkey”, but he was having none of it. Instead, he picked out and insisted on the second volume of a teen girl’s manga title; we grudgingly bought him the first volume a few weeks ago. “Let the kid get what he wants,” laughed the owner, as I grumbled and wrote out the check.

Yes, we could have protested, but why? Guppy clearly was enamored with the toy, as Drake was with the book. And all of us enjoyed the pizza. It is more clear than ever to G. Grod and me who is in charge at our house. The animals are running the zoo.

My sister Sydney complains when I do reviews and don’t write funny stories about her nephews. The point of the blog is to encompass it all. I hope to do a slew of reviews soon, though, so this entry is to placate Sydney.

18mo Guppy likes it when I sing the ABCs, and starts to babble random letters while I sing, in a letterish harmony. When excited, he does a happy dance, like Drake did at the same age, where he stomps his feet up and down very fast and grins, rather like Snoopy. He also likes to pivot in a circle, using one leg as a fulcrum.

Drake is reminding me that things change, then change again. When in the midst of some particular stage, it seems as if it will last forever. He’s entirely out of diapers, though, even at night, so he is changing. Several months ago, Drake would wait till we shut the light off at night, then scurry up, turn on the light, and look at books till he fell asleep. G. Grod and I would remove the pile of books from his bed, and turn off the light. At some point, though, it stopped. When we turned off the light, he turned over and went to sleep. Or he stayed up and turned off the light before he fell asleep. Within the last week, though, things have changed again. He’s turning the light on after we leave, then falling asleep with it on.

I will be interested to see how long this variation of the stage lasts, and also whether Guppy does it when he gets older.

Yesterday all four of us went to the fair for food and rides. Drake loved it. So if you’re wondering at what age kids really get a fair or something like it, for us it was four (same thing for his birthday party).

G. Grod was less than thrilled that Drake wanted to ride the giant swinging boat ride, but both enjoyed the big ferris wheel. I agreed to go with Drake on the giant slide, which I found disconcertingly fast, though Drake loved it. I decided that discretion was the better part of valor and decided not to try any rides with 18M Guppy. Even the carousel frightened Drake until he was three.

And, oh yes, we did some eating.

Breakfast was Cinnie Minis from Cinnie Smith’s–warm mini cinnamon rolls with cream cheese frosting. CMs have a good amount of cinnamon and sugar, unlike Cinnabon. For protein, we got the Twisted Sister sausage from Sausage Sister n Me. While better than the Uff Da brat, it still wasn’t great. I don’t know if we’re choosing bad menu items, or if they’re off their game this year, since we’ve so enjoyed them previously.

Since we were in the food building, we got Mouth Trap fried cheese curds and fried pickle slices stuffed with cream cheese from The Preferred Pickle. Both of these were hits with the boys, though the ranch dipping sauce for the pickles was overkill, if such a thing is possible at the MN state fair. Exhausted, Guppy took an early nap in the stroller while Drake, G. Grod and I devoured a wild rice/beef hot dog on a stick from the Wild Rice stand in the food building, surprisingly inexpensive for fair food at only $2.50.

I got a lingonberry sno cone. It had too much ice, but the syrup was pleasantly tart and sweet, though I’m not sure I could have distinguished it from cranberry.

We tried Fresh French Fries this year, which didn’t seem markedly better than World’s Best, and had too many short, “bottom of the batch” specimens.

While his brother was on the ferris wheel, Guppy devoured his first Pronto Pup, and I suspect it won’t be his last. Pups are Minnesota’s batter-dipped hot dogs on a stick. Corn dogs are Iowan, you know.

Drake was loathe to share from the cone of Sweet Martha’s chocolate chip cookies, and our glass of milk wasn’t big enough for the four of us. We had a few other unremarkable food stuffs for the ravening kids, like fried cheese on a stick, lemonade, and soft-serve ice cream. By that time, though, it was hot and crowded, and G. Grod had had enough. Drake and I could have probably kept going, but I think we’ll wait till next year. A look at the daily attendance makes it look like the opening day and the first Tuesday are the best bets to beat the crowds.

Drake’s and my semi-annual dentist appointment happened to fall on his birthday. He was an exemplary patient, and chose cookie dough flavored tooth polish, and bubble gum flavored fluoride treatment. I was gagging inside, but he seemed to really like them.

Did you know that the fluoride treatments in the trays are only 1 minute each, top and bottom? I remember them as endless misery from my childhood, or at least thirty minutes. I asked the assistant how long they were when we were kids. She said they were five minutes each. I think there are two possibilities. One, that my childhood mind magnified the experience since I found it so unpleasant. Or two, my childhood hygienist took the opportunity to go have a smoke and read a magazine, and just returned when she felt like it, leaving me soaking in nasty goo far longer than necessary. While I suspect the latter, maybe she was doing me a favor. I’ve only ever had one cavity, and every time I go to the dentist they gush over my teeth, which is strangely affirming to my esteem.

Since we had the morning to ourselves, I tried to make an adventure of it:

Child tooth cleaning: $101
Used book store: $20 + $1.48 for Magic Tree House #2–Drake’s birthday book.
Children’s store: $12 for clothes, $.27 for a birthday Matchbox car
Noodles & Co: $14.50
Ben & Jerry’s: $4.50
Morning spent happily tooling around with my 4yo, who was listening and not yelling: priceless.

Four years ago today, I became a mom when Drake was born. It’s a strange and disorienting feeling to compare life then and now. People say “it goes so fast,” but it feels like we’ve had a new lifetime in these four years.

Four years ago, G. Grod and I were living in a cute little condo downtown. We both had executive jobs, and walked to work. I regularly went to yoga, and we frequently went out to dinner and to the movies. Now our little family of four lives in a house in a neighborhood. G. has a different job, and I stay home with the kids. We have different friends, and different habits. We also have the extraordinary privilege of being parents to Drake, who is a very cool person. He loves books, music and cars. His current favorite CDs are The Beach Boys and Fatboy Slim. He loves to run, and he’s an agile climber. He’s learning yoga. He likes to shop at our grocery cooperative, though he often doesn’t eat what we buy there. Last year he wanted to be a quarterback and asked us to call him Donovan, since he’s an Eagles fan like his dad. This year, he says he’s Lito Sheppard.

I look forward to seeing who he is, and who we are, next year.

whatever else she was going to say was interrupted because she accidentally stuck a nappy pin into one of Clifford’s rare moments of peace and he went very red and started to scream and scream until poor Nell shook him before bursting into tears herself and exclaiming to Frank, ‘I didn’t know it was going to be like this.’

Behind the Scenes at the Museum has been sitting out for months now on my Book Stack of Reproach, as I’ve wanted to quote and quote again from it. I was shocked at the recognition of feeling when I read the above passage. I’ve felt that way so many times. It’s ugly, but it’s also sometimes true.

A French author, Corinne Maier, is getting a lot of press for having the audacity to write a book called No Kid: Forty Reasons Not to Have a Child, and to say that she sometimes regrets having kids. (Links via Bookslut Blog.) I try to write parenting anecdotes I don’t think my kids will mind reading in ten years, but I’m tempted to be honest here in a way that could easily be misunderstood.

Like Maier, I sometimes feel regret about having kids, rather in the manner of “Calgon, take me away!” While it feels perilous to admit this, I don’t think it’s either/or. It happens about once a morning when I am not able to meet some basic need of my own, like having breakfast or getting dressed, and the boys are screaming and fighting. The moment and the feeling both pass, and develop context.

Lately, I’m trying something new. Since these incidents occur almost every morning, I flirted with the idea of embracing the chaos. That was too much to contemplate. Instead, I’m trying not to mind the scream fests, meaning let them bother me, or attend to them (unless I suspect grievous bodily harm, which does often occur.) This new “trying not to mind” strategy is working pretty well. I find myself appreciating parenting more often, and wishing it away less often.

Yes, I know that life isn’t all happy bunnies and sunshine, or Oprah and bonbons. I think a great deal of my struggle with post-partum depression was that my pregnancy and the adjustment to a second child were so much harder and longer than I’d expected. Further, they upset the rhythm and routine that G. Grod, Drake and I had established. While I knew to accept disruption for a while, the continued chaos and difference of every day wore on me. It felt like body surfing–the variety of waves can be exciting. But once I was tired, I couldn’t withdraw to the beach; I was stuck in the ocean, constantly facing new and different varieties of challenge.

Even now that Guppy is a year and a half, I still struggle to settle our life into routine. It continues to elude me, though. The best I can do for now is to rest, take short breaks, try to look ahead, and not get frustrated when things go awry, as they are so wont to do. We will eventually have a routine, and the peace and comfort that it brings.

I yearn for a simple life, without literal or metaphorical clutter. Two kids, a house, and modern life, though, seem to conspire against me. Near constant vigilance is required to stem the tide of too much stuff. I give baby items my boys have outgrown to friends. I donate regularly. I take myself off mailing lists, but still, the crap creeps in. One of the most superfluous bits of modern junk is the podcast. I steer clear because life is too short, and my limited time too valuable.

M. from Mental Multivitamin periodically expresses the need for “no”. I recently agreed with Lazy Cow that I often hear M’s advice in my head, and count myself fortunate for it. She is a passionate advocate for the value of one’s time, especially as it relates to learning and writing.

I recently attended a writing workshop. I enjoyed it, and thought the writing within the group was very good. When the address list for the class was passed around, though, I didn’t add my email address. I feared looking snobbish and exclusionary. But I couldn’t subject myself to a mailing list, no matter how well intentioned. Some might argue that it’s quick and easy to delete. But it still takes time, and consideration that I want to spend on my current emails from friends and family, and the considerable backlog of correspondence I’ve got dating from when Guppy was born. The address list went around a second time. I think the woman sitting next to me thought I’d been skipped on the first time around. I steeled my resolve, though, and passed it on. I wish the others well in their writing, but I want to spend what little time I have on my writing, not on email about writing.

If you other parents have read truck books as many times as I have, you may have wondered at the difference, if any, between concrete and cement. Sometimes trucks are referred to as cement mixers, other times they’re called concrete mixers. Concrete is a mixture of cement plus gravel and sand, so they’re not the same thing. Concrete contains cement; cement is an ingredient of concrete. Concrete has more letters than cement; I try to remember the difference this way.