My Husband's Google Adventure

My husband did some google-searching after we received the comment on the last post from "K and E," who blocked their profile. If you refer to my answer to the comment, you will see that I mentioned the possibility of sanctimonious zealotry rearing its perfect little head. Interestingly, the connection my husband found was to a very churchy blog about the blogger's child and peers running around with goats on their farm. The actual church mentioned on the blog foregrounds the law "Love thy neighbor as thyself." Here is another tidbit from their website.
"Creativity: To win the unchurched we believe we must present the Gospel of Jesus Christ in fresh, creativity ways (illustrated messages, dramas, video, etc.)"
Yes, this snippet is verbatim. "Creativity ways" indeed to reach the unchurched. If they check back on this blog, I'm sure they'll try to start a huge fight about which of us is less Christian than the other, but be forewarned, "aggro" parents. I intend to remove any future comments of yours.--K

Thanks, Sis!

My sister commented on my last post that "new toys" often interested children in independent play. She specified which types of toys were most useful. Lola always likes arts and crafts, but we have plenty of those materials, so we didn't need to add any. However, when my sister suggested "beeping interactive machines," I immediately thought of the Cinderella-themed laptop computer ($30) that obsessed Lola during one visit to Target. I had to conceal its existence from her for several visits thereafter. Today, when she came home from school, I told her that this time when she peed or pooped in the potty, she was going to get a beeping laptop computer from Target, possibly with Cinderella or Dora on it. In record time, we had our first poop take place in the potty (a couple happened at school before, we hear), followed by a respectable pee. I hope you squeamish people are enjoying hearing about infantile greed and bodily functions.--K

Chugging Along

We are all exhausted due to the large amount of time we are spending together for the potty training. I am posting a new entry more to reassure myself that the training is working than to interest any readers with this rather mundane virtual place-marker. Last night I looked up "Raising an Only Child" online. Nothing I found specifically addressed the situation we find ourselves in--to wit, 2.5 year olds have understandably limited independence. Therefore, when Lola is home with us, we either spend all our time playing with her, or we let her watch PBS cartoons. We don't mind (most of the time we enjoy) spending time playing with her, but because we are trying to help her have a lot of fun during this potty-training time, she has become very demanding, ordering us around a lot. I suppose the task now is to assert our rights as parents without stopping the fun and games. If anyone has any suggestions about how to encourage independent play in toddlers, please post them here.--K

3 New Dresses and a Bunch of Art Supplies

We are now properly stocked for the extended summer camp that we are running for Lola to make sure her potty technique is satisfactory. The washable watercolors are the biggest hit, but I don't think that she is painting in the genre, exactly. Other entertaining things include glitter pens, which actually are mostly color with a little glitter thrown in; bubbles (always golden); and thousands of stickers. (I threw in this list with semicolons for my college students who are blogging for me on different blogspots this summer--some of them have visited this site, I hear.) I also purchased some scissors with rounded ends. She won't be able to use them to make collages, but I can now cut out the pictures she likes without jabbing her fingers in the process. When I've been reading good books to her and doing crafts for several hours, this way of life starts to seem like the most pleasant possible. Perhaps it actually is, but we grown-ups are used to entertaining ourselves in less healthy ways.--K

From Beatific 2.5 Year Old to Crafty Four Year Old

Lola has seemed to change this much in only four days, since potty training started. We never knew what she was truly capable of until she reached this point, at which we can no longer simply "redirect" or distract her from any aggression or limit-testing. The way this game is now working is that we have to set limits in every other part of her life, but give her no suggestions or directions about when it might be appropriate to go to the bathroom. It's working, but she is now displaying outlandish behavior in other areas that we must address. Here's an example: I'm putting on her socks, and she jumps on top of my back and says: "I'm going to slide down mommy's butt." Never has she dared to use the word "butt" in reference to one of her parents' behinds before, and I think she fully understands its necromantic power. Yikes! Back to the front, so to speak--K

Tiny Bladder Made of Steel

We've been potty-training Lola for three days now, and today she showed herself capable of "holding her water" for FOUR hours. Since potty-training in its intense phase involves (as all the experts recommend) letting her run around the house with no pants on, it was a hypervigilant afternoon for Josh and me! We'll see how things go when she goes to school tomorrow. She's going to wear training pants, and I need to remind them to give her lots of positive reinforcement, since she is not going to need to cooperate unless she wants to! :)

Lola's Pinwheel

Lola picked out a pinwheel at the grocery store this morning. She doesn't really know how to blow on it to make it turn, but sometimes she succeeds in getting enough wind moving. Of course, the most exciting activity is to ride in the car with the window rolled down, watching the pin try to rattle itself off its stick.

Uncharacteristic Post

All Thy works with joy surround Thee
Earth and heaven reflect Thy rays
Stars and angels sing around Thee
Center of unbroken praise

Ouch! I'm having a little bit of minor-illness related pain tonight. However, sometimes this state lets us see beauty in the ordinary--in this case, Lola's "Baby Einstein: Baby Beethoven." Its "Ode to Joy" number, tinklingly rendered as it is, recalled for me the words to the famous hymn. Good night!--K

Cindy and Dustin's Wedding, and Other Pictures

We had a wonderful time at Cindy and Dustin's wedding, followed by a good visit with Kathryn's parents (Lola's grandparents).
The first photographs below are taken in the hotel courtyard.



Cindy and Dustin were married in Jackson Square. Here the musicians are playing under a sunny sky.
Lola encounters a mule, to her bemusement and eventual delight.
This fortune-teller claims her name is "Lola."
Lola was a wonderful flower girl, escorted by Elijah the ringbearer.
It's truly a fairytale setting. Mommy and Lola enjoy the weather.
The groom poses with Lola.
Daddy and Lola walk down the hall in the hotel.
The bride and her father dance (I wish I had succeeded in getting a picture of Cindy's face, but she was constantly mobbed by well-wishers).
Here are the bride and her father, and in between their outstretched arms, you can see the groom and his new mother-in-law!
On the visit to her grandparents, Lola stopped at her great-grandmother's retirement home, where we took this picture of her with Grandpa P.
Below: Great-Grammy, Kathryn, and Lola
Meanwhile, Star was hard at work back at the house.

Housework Georgics

I really love the housework we've been doing. I've invented a new genre for writing about housework: housework georgic. For readers of my blog who have wasted less time on 18th century poetry than I, the "georgic" is a rural poem that values labor as Nature's necessary and virtuous calling. I don't have enough time to write a georgic in verse right now, but I will announce to all of you fans of our thirteen-year-old couch that we have purchased a Bissell "Little Green" upholstery cleaner, and that the brocaded, over-sized loveseat of our youth has been purged of its associations with our poodles, Star and Abdiel.--K

Lola and the See-Saw

Josh, Lola and I went to the playground near the Presbyterian church a couple of nights ago. Like a lot of young children, Lola is afraid to play on the see-saw when it goes really high. We tried to show her different combinations: I on one side to balance her, Josh on one side with Lola and me on the other. Finally she got up from her side of the see-saw, reached down and picked up some pine-chips from the playground mulch, headed over to the other side of the see-saw and placed them carefully on the seat, apparently in order to balance out her weight on the original side. What a scientist!--K

Josh's Favorite Short-Short Story

Here is an addendum to the previous post. Josh is ticked off by one of Lola's "Angelina" books because the first page contains his biggest writing peeve. The following short-short story will make clear what this peeve is.

Finding herself once more at the grocery store, Sarah could hardly tolerate the thought of looking for another non-organic bottle of apple juice for her husband.
"Can I help you?" smiled the clerk in the striped vest as he advanced down the aisle toward her. She groaned inwardly. One of the accoutrements of a successful writer like herself, she knew, was an inevitable contempt for the common herd.
"That's okay," she smiled, "I know where I'm going." But did she really, she smiled inwardly to herself. She saw the canned vegetables pass before her eyes, and then, before she knew it, she was into the fruit.
"DOLE!" the labels smiled at her, all in a row. Perhaps they even leered at her, but she kept walking, talking to herself, and smiling a little, on the inside:
"They are out of non-organic apple juice!"

I Cleaned the Grout!

You can tell I'm on vacation when I have time to rejoice on my blog over my adventures with disgusting yellow grout in my bathroom tile. I successfully cleaned a huge swath of it with bleach solution today--I'll do the rest of it in a couple of days, since I need to return to work tomorrow to wrap up loose ends. In more interesting news, Lola is enjoying her new "Angelina Ballerina" library books. It was beautiful today; we went to two playgrounds (one shady, one sunlit) and enjoyed what will be a brief time of temperate weather before the soaking heat.--K

On the One Hand . . .

I'd like our neighbors to be able to accept us, so that in a year or two, Lola's little friends can come over to our house to play with her.

On the other hand . . . if my daughter gets her biggest kicks out of making Josh and me sing a song called "chicken hop" that involves squawking like chickens for half an hour, loudly enough to be heard from the street . . .

I'm not sure that mowing the lawn will rehabilitate our reputation!--K

Lola's Recent Doings

Lola is having a good time this week. Recently, she opened the atlas and was looking at the U.S. map. I said, "What are you doing, Lola?" She replied, "Reading the weather!" Josh and I grinned at each other, since Lola obviously thinks the Weather Channel's maps are equivalent to "the weather." Lola has also been showing an interest in putting her dolls on the potty. This activity is a good sign that she is ready for potty training, which we will begin in earnest after we return from our Louisiana trip, in about two weeks. Tomorrow (Saturday) Lola will spend time with her friend Miss Sarah W., while Josh and I attend our required graduation ceremonies in different parts of the city.--K

Babies A-Go-Go

I was saying to Josh today that it's hard to believe that there are 2 and 3 year-olds who can sit through a church service. Lola and the couple of other kids I watch in the toddler nursery on Sundays are unstoppable dynamos. The most effort I'll make to slow them down (rather than just leading frenetic play sessions) is to suggest that they stay seated for five more minutes after we've watched five minutes of Elmo and they are ready to run around with the toys again. I've heard that there are toddlers who are immediately and permanently mesmerized by toddler-TV. Not these kids. It feels strange to suggest that a child watch more TV, but I want them to get used to the idea of sitting still and concentrating. I'm sure their real teachers have much better techniques for encouraging concentration than I do. I've seen teachers at Lola's daycare "herd" the children into a tight group, and then gently police the crowd as a book is read. The peer pressure works pretty well! One caregiver on her own could never do it, though.--K

The Mouse and the Big White Strawberry

Lola is getting awfully verbal. This afternoon, when she came home from school, she asked me to draw a mouse. While I was drawing the mouse, she said what was obviously a title: "The Mouse and the Big White Strawberry." Just as I was recovering from her creative brilliance, she added, "And the Big Hungry Bear." I quickly wrote down this title, in order to Google it and see if there were such a book. I entered "mouse strawberry book" (because I couldn't believe that the "big hungry bear" addition that Lola had made was actually a part of the title). What popped up was the book "The Little Mouse, the Red Ripe Strawberry, and the Big Hungry Bear." Lola had just successfully remembered a ten-word-long title! She told us that Miss Keisha (her teacher) has the book. We rushed out to the bookstore and bought it. It's very good! Lola can "read" (recite from memory) the first few pages. In the car on the way home, she said "Another" after I read her the book. I said, "Other books are at home." She replied, "I want "Sally."" "Sally" was obviously another book title. I said, "Is Sally a book?" She said, ""Sally" is in Miss Keisha's . . .". Then, since she had just experienced the triumph of the "Little Mouse" purchase, she suggested, "We could go to the store . . . and get "Sally"." A long sentence, even!