playdates

Josephine and I recently met Sarah and Zanna out at Brentwood Park for a picnic lunch!  It was a blast for the girls, and so relaxing for Sarah and me... how wonderful to just sit back and watch them entertain each other beautifully!   A much needed break for two tired, pregnant mommas.  (Sarah's due in less than a month!!!)

We also had the treat of seeing Julien and Stacey before we headed out of town!

Josephine found a fun way to engage Julien.  They were so cute playing with the swing!

I love that Julien and Zanna have been such a consistent part of Josephine's life... as much as I love their mommies being a consistent part of my life!

And now we're in Astoria again, happily settling into temperatures 20 degrees cooler and a much less hectic pace of life.  I love having fewer demands, fewer possessions, fewer options of things to do.  A couple of folks have been surprised when I describe staying in NY as being the "simple life", and I can see how that runs contrary to most notions of enormous cities, public transportation, tighter living quarters, tighter budget, etc.  If I were living here without a 3 year old in tow, I probably would still run myself ragged and there wouldn't be much that's simple about being here.  (That's been the case the other times I've lived in enormous cities and relied on public transportation).  But with Josephine and her schedule, getting stuff "done" during the day looks like one or two walks out to a nearby location like a grocery store, library, park, laundromat, etc.  Maybe a short train ride somewhere.  And meanwhile, my load of chores is minuscule compared to owning a house, and my "projects" are fun, creative projects-- not the house projects I've been doing the last four years.  It truly is a much simpler, more focused lifestyle.

And with our Austin home in the care of the hands of these wonderful friends, I am so thankful for this opportunity to rest and enjoy my little family more fully (before the next whirlwind hits in a couple of months!)

school snippets

It would take ages-times-infinity to extoll the virtues of Josephine's preschool and describe the depth of her enjoyment of the morning program she's been going to on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  It's been such a blessing and revealed interesting new facets of her personality that we weren't aware of.

While not a high pressure instructional type of program, it is still very involved; chapel, music class, spanish class, playground time, and lots and lots of art.  Lots of art.  Her teachers are bottomless pits of creativity, and the centers they have set up upon arrival always impress me.  As do their energy levels.  I would NEVER attempt to replicate the activities they do-- not even with just my one child-- and they do it while herding ten.

The week or two they spent on dinosaurs made a notable impression on Josephine.  She came home singing a song about dinosaurs chewing up their food and spitting out seeds, replete with hand motions and an enthusiastic "BLEH!!!"  Soon thereafter, breakfast one morning revealed a dinosaur:   

I was amused enough with her food play to take a picture of the brontosaurus bust, so while I had the camera out, I asked her to sing the song.  You can watch it here on youtube by clicking this sentence.

You've already seen some of her classmates because they came to her family/school birthday party, but here's an excellent group shot that Leah's mom took right before their classroom Easter egg hunt:  

Leah is second from the right and one of Josephine's highly discussed friends, ever since we went to her birthday party in February.  Leah turning three:

I feel like I should note that the kids had their portrait session the same day as the egg hunt, so they're all looking pretty cute here.  Of course, they're always adorable, but maybe slightly less preppy on the average day.  Like I said, they do a lot of art.  Josephine, for one, normally goes in something like brown pants and an old t-shirt, but on this special day, the teachers swore they wouldn't paint anything.  :-)

Here's a scanned copy of her school portrait:

Note to any matriarchs presently entering advanced stages of hyperventilation:  I'm not super-crazy about this picture, but Sean decided you all needed one, so my compromise was purchasing wallet-size.  :-)  So you can thank him that you have one and curse me if you wish yours was bigger.  If you haven't already gotten one, you have one on the way or about to be mailed, I promise.  (you may also feel free to send a reminder)

Today was her last day, so in addition to bringing home a pile of her artwork a mile high, I also decided it'd be good to bring home a picture of her beloved teachers, Ms. Arline (left) and Ms. Becca (right).  They've been so wonderful to her.  It's a joy dropping her off and watching her run up enthusiastically to them for a hug and warm greeting.

We're hopeful there'll be an opening when we return from NY in early 2013, so she can start back, but at the very least, we're grateful for this last season that she got to spend there!  

teeth counting

Josephine accompanied me to my dental check up in early March.  She sat very attentively and watched, and I tried to look a little less tense than I normally do (which really, I don't know why I get tense, especially with Dr. Roye, because his cleanings and examinations never hurt a bit).

Now when he let Josephine use his buzzing whirly tooth polisher thing to clean MY teeth, my tension was harder to hide.  Not so sure her comfort with dental tools demanded such a precarious situation at my expense...

But all his tricks worked; when it was her turn to sit in the chair and have her teeth counted, she was an eager subject.  Even the ups and drops of the motorized chair didn't upset her (just made her look very, very serious).

And thankfully, her chompers looked good.  First trip to the dentist = success!

bowling

Josephine's dear friend Zanna had her third birthday party back in early March (I'm just way behind in posting about a few things we've done)!  It was at a bowling alley!  Such a fun idea.  Josephine had never been bowling before, but she enjoyed it-- it was prime territory for exerting independence and insisting that she do it all by herself.  :-)  

The morning involved some turn-waiting (I love their expressions)...

some slowly-rolled-ball waiting...

some enthusiasm...

general rejoicing...

and of course, yummy cake...

song singing...

and a very sweet birthday girl whom we love dearly:

I helped Josephine push the ball occasionally-- either on the rare occasion that she would let me, or when my maternal concerns over her toes stepping precariously beneath a 9 pound ball forced me to override her lack of permission.  But for the most part I tried to let her do her thing, despite it adding 5 minutes to the game every time we waited for her ball to inch down the lane. :-)  Miraculously, it never got stuck or stopped in the lane.  Which pretty much defies laws of physics and makes me very curious about the actual operations, design, and strategic development of bowling allies...  those folks have some tricks up their sleeves...

   

Anyway, final score: 54.  Better than my average score growing up-- by far!

Risen: the Lord, her sugar levels, my blood pressure. Typical Easter.

Why do we celebrate Easter with candy??? Why do we celebrate anything with anything containing sugar? It's as though we're hellbent on ruining all celebrations by willingly feeding children crack. Since having Josephine, I have completely revised my opinion on the substance. I think it should be strictly forbidden until the age at which you gain some semblance of control over your feelings, moods, attitudes.

By the way, when does that happen? Maybe once I'm 40?

Truly. I admit, I don't even think I should be trusted with the stuff. Much LESS my THREE YEAR OLD. I feel like the cruelest parent EVER because I am always intervening with well-meant sugar gifts directed at my child. And I even tell Josephine outright, "No, I don't want to give you that snack because when you have sugar you don't act the same. You aren't as nice." I'm very matter-of-fact about it, not incriminating or guilt-tripping, because I don't think it's her fault. It's simply a mind altering drug-- no two ways about it-- so I explain it that way, in the same tone I use when I say, "I know you are having allergies but I can't give you medicine all the time. You can't go through the next two months drugged on Benedryl. Let's just eat less yogurt and cheese."

Yet there seems to be this culture of good parenting that implies that you should BOTH willingly overhaul your family's diet to avoid allergies AND have the wherewithal to cope with a small child under the influence of sugar. I'm a bad mom if she sniffles and I don't immediately cut out wheat, dairy, eggs, name-a-potential-culprit... and I'm a mean mom if I don't let my kid have fruit juice and treats and candy and all the natural highs a little life is entitled to!

Really??? I should bend over backwards in BOTH directions?? Because let me choose between Josephine on allergies-- a snot-caked, poorly sleeping, occasionally eczema-prone mess... and Josephine on sugar-- a disobedient, live-wire, temper-tantrum-prone train wreck... and yeah, I'll pick the allergy-ridden kid ANY day.

Why on Earth is the general expectation that I would intervene in allergies while supporting sugar consumption??

anyway. end rant.

Wait. One more rant. Single-parenting = rotten eggs.

I've been through nothing compared to some of my friends, but enough to multiply it exponentially and come to the solid conclusion of It Is Insanely Hard. On Easter morning, during the minutes we needed to be leaving for church, I was reduced to the desperate, psycho mom who wanted a picture of her kid, couldn't get any cooperation, and was a hair away from fashioning a toddler-sized noose on Easter morning. (Thank you, Jesus, for dying for these sins.) Granted, I wouldn't have been any less desperate, rushed or psycho with Sean around... I'd have just somehow felt less self-conscious about it. That'd have been nice.

Note the face clawing. Precisely how all involved parties felt.

Eventually settled on snapping ONE forced cheese smile before shooing her off to the car and canning my perfectionist tendencies. It had been made clear that a halfway decent smile was the best I was going to get that morning.

After church, we drove to San Antonio to see Sean's Grandma Holloway, who has been deemed "Granny" in an effort to distinguish between all Josephine's matriarchs. I took some eggs to hide and managed to capture a couple more shots of the Easter belle as she tromped around the backyard.
Every time she found an egg, she shook it and said "What's IN it???" I would then say, in what became a rather robotic melody, "Once we're insiiiide you can open it and seeeeee."
She would proceed to plop it in her basket and automatically plead, "I don't see any more eggs. You help me find the eggs???" before she even tried to look past the air molecule on her nose.
I would say, "Well, you have to LOOK. They are hiding." -- again, rather robotically, seeing as how there were 18 eggs and we had this exchange with every. single. one.

I want to know: did it make the game more fun for her? I hope so.

But I won't post the sequence of photos 18 times.
Just twice.
...before moving on to counting found eggs before they hatched:
She wasn't far off. After much pleading and robotic coalescing, she found all 18-- and I'd only overlooked stuffing one of them. So 17 hatched. Good turn out.

"Oh, hello, Peep. I'm Josephine. You may call me 'Sugar-Deprived.' And can I just say-- I am SO pleased to make your acquaintance! Christ the Lord has risen INDEED."

We played a bit with the trinkets stuffed in the eggs, and then moved on to playing with some stickers Granny had collected for her and opening a few Easter presents.


"Mesmerize me, O Twirly Orb of Lit Amazingness. You with your little orange button that I instruct everyone to push and keep pushing and never stop pushing-- you are the most tremendous gift ever given to me! And with a Peep in my system I will obey your every command..."

I do love the bunny socks. In order that she will only hate me the normal amount when she's a teenager, I won't post the pictures of her dressed in those with her new bathing suit. But that was a pretty awesome get up.

Despite our grumpy start, the day ended well. We had a really good, relaxing time with Granny and she'd napped enough on the way down and back to afford us a fairly calm evening back home. I can honestly declare, though, that I'm relieved we've booked our flight back to NY; as a kid well-versed in taking on two parents working from home all day, she is too much for me alone! And until we get back under the influence of Sean, there will be ZERO sugar entering this kid whatsoever. Mommy cannot consume enough sugar of her own to combat it singlehandedly!

That doesn't sound like a perky enough ending to an Easter post.

Hmmm.

Weeeell, I guess I can refer back to the very title of this post: Christ is risen, indeed!

All this insanity has a purpose.

Even sugar.

(Just not in my kid).

mommies with their babies

Josephine has named this baby, who lately goes with her everywhere, something that sounds a lot like "Five Guys." She doesn't ennunciate it perfectly-- "fi-guys"-- but upon questioning she seems to affirm that it's five, like the number. No idea where the name came from-- we've never eaten at Five Guys-- it's a bit bewildering.
Of course, her other baby doll's name is Six.
At least she gives them names. Mine is still nameless.
I'll be 26 weeks tomorrow-- rapidly approaching the end of my second trimester!

I'm still feeling pretty good-- though more tired, heavy, and my walks around the neighborhood are anything but brisk, as they usually bring on some strong Braxton-Hicks and mild waddling.

Thankfully some of the chaos around here is starting to subside. The bathroom guys just finished up the shower, the tree is fully gone, stump ground, and the squirrels have been successfully eradicated from the attic, which means the rat mites that had been infesting my closet and clothes are also gone (HALLELUJAH!!). Josephine's birthday is behind us, taxes are done, and a flight back to NY is booked.

There is still a good deal to get into place before being gone for a couple months, but I feel like I can more or less focus on those items now without the huge things hanging over my head at the same time, and that is nice.

Of course, Josephine woke up this morning with an engulfing case of what I think are hives, so that's interesting. We have a doctor appointment in an hour; hopefully it isn't anything that will keep her home from her last couple days of school-- for her sake and mine-- because that will turn what was a manageable amount to do into nearly impossible.

That's the update for now. Haven't forgotten Easter photos-- I think they're mostly uploaded-- should be able to post them soon.

Josephine looking rather Napoleon

...and also just looking precious...

Josephine and the patient, monocled babydoll

A couple notes here:

First, can I point out that a belt Josephine got with a pair of shorts when she was about 3 months old PERFECTLY matched a shirt I found her at Savers for her birthday? This is the sort of perfection I can't plan, and it didn't dawn on me until I was dressing her that day that the belt might match, so I went to find it. Tickled pink, I was. Josephine was too, for about the 30 minutes it took her to realize she preferred her shirt untucked.

Second, we decorated for Easter when her birthday passed, and I let her have at the window clings Mama Jo had included in her Easter gift (saving the rest of the gift for Easter itself).

Having practiced with Christmas ones a few months ago, Josephine knew right what to do. See above.

Their ACTUAL purpose being rather old hat, though, since she's done this once before in her life, it didn't take her long to adapt them to new games. See below.
To explain, she is using the Easter egg-shaped clings to stick over her baby's eyes, and then she is using her digital camera (one of her birthday gifts) to methodically document each color. She was disturbed, but not overly fazed, by the fact there was only one green egg. For that step of the photo shoot, the baby doll was merely monocled. I just thought the whole thing was totally bizarre, but who am I to impede her artistic expression?

One of the pictures from her camera: