I loves you

It's been way too long since I've blogged but I wanted to drop a quick note to remember something cute Ez is doing.  He will snuggle up to us and say "I loves you" rather than "I love you." He also get so excited when he sees an excavator. I'm so used to him saying "Excabator" that sometimes I can't remember which way is the right way. :) We pass one every morning during our commute. 

Donuts Come Back

Yesterday Ezra told me about how he and his friend Hudson tried to cheer up Hudson's little brother Archer when he was crying at school.  Ezra sang Archer a song from Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood. The song is called "Grown ups come back."  I don't know if Ezra was confused or making a joke but instead Ezra sang, "Donuts come back."  So, if you're having a rough day, just think to yourself that someday soon you'll be able to eat a donut again and that should perk you right up. :)

This morning Ezra must have said 30 times that he wanted to eat a hamburger for breakfast.  Maybe it was the fact that he was so calm and not throwing a tantrum but just clearly stating his preference, or maybe I was just in an agreeable mood, but after Eliza and S left for school/work, Ezra and I headed to the only place I could think of that serves hamburgers at 8am, Burger King.  To his credit, he did polish off an adult-sized hamburger in less than 5 minutes.  I guess sometimes you just have a craving. 

1st grade journal

Both kids had Back to School Night this week.  Which makes for long days and tired kids but that's another post. I already know Ezra's teacher really well so his event went as expected.  Eliza's teacher seems equally great but my favorite part was getting to read her journal. I'm getting better at reading her inventive spelling and her messages cracked me up.  Some examples:

Today I soul my BFF and she soul me.
I ate twelv waffls this morning. (to be fair, they were the mini waffles)
This weknd I had a slip over with my BFF.
This summer I went down watr slids and ate smors one time.
This morning I was vary vary vary tird.

Ez is talking all about his new class.  The other day he said, "Ms. Sarah brought some sparkly soap and now it's all gone.  Can you tell Ms. Sarah to get more of that sparkly kind?" 

These kids.  They crack me up.

Work Hard, Play Harder

Since this was S's birthday weekend, we decided to live it up a bit! Friday night we went to a Frozen Ice Skating party at the place where Eliza is going to camp soon. It was crazy crowded but the kids had a blast.  They both improved a lot after just a couple of hours on the ice! Eliza entered the costume competition and won a prize.  When it was her turn to be "announced" she skated out by herself, gave a big wave beauty queen style and smiled for the audience. 

Saturday the kids had a playdate with Phin while we went to Odd Duck with Tara and Troy.  It was probably the best food I've ever eaten.  Afterward we went to Crown & Anchor, a favorite hangout from our twenties. 

Sunday we met Grammy and Papa for a birthday lunch and then the four of us went to Hawaiian Falls.  I was excited that Eliza was tall enough to do so many of the big slides! We took turns doing them with her and it was a blast.  I felt a little bad Ez wasn't tall enough for the slides, but he didn't seem to mind at all.  He loved the wave pool so much.  I wish I had a picture of how cute he was; every time a wave came he laughed and laughed.  He also loved the lazy river and really enjoyed watching Eliza do some slides. 

After such a busy weekend, I fell asleep at 9pm!  I guess the birthday boy stayed up later because when I woke up this morning, he had cleaned the kitchen and put away the laundry.  Pretty impressive from a guy who leaves for work at 6:30am lately. 

Chicken or shrimp?

So Eliza has been an inconsistent vegetarian for years now.  I guess she learned from the best, haha.  Just yesterday at Costco she said she wanted pepperoni pizza when I suggested cheese, and when I was about to tell her it was pork (usually we both draw the line at pork), she said, "Mom, I'm a vegetarian who likes pepperoni, okay?!"  Saturday I heated up some mandarin chicken and fried rice from Trader Joe's.  She loves the fried rice and I didn't even offer her any chicken since she's usually anti-chicken.  She saw the food on the table and said, "Oh, shrimp, yum!" She ended up eating a ton of it. Ezra asked for "more chicken" and Eliza said, "Oh how funny!  He thinks it's chicken!  We fooled him, huh?  Wink wink!!"  S and I laughed and laughed because she had no idea she was the one who was fooled.  #storiesshecantellherfuturetherapist

I Can't Know It

Ezra has coined a really useful phrase. When you quiz him about something he doesn't know the answer to, he says in the funniest little voice, "I can't know it."  It sounds so matter of fact, like it can't be known by anyone, period.  I think it would be useful for lots of us.  The meaning of the universe?  I can't know it.  The science behind string theory?  I can't know it. 

On an unrelated note, the kids were arguing over something in the car yesterday.  Ezra said, "I said please, Eliza!  It's the magic word!" 

I love you to the moon

I love you to the moon is something I started telling Ezra a while back. Now, at bed time especially, he likes to grab my face, look straight in my eyes and say it back to me.  It's adorable. 

We got rid of the changing table this weekend.  S has been wanting to do so for a while, to give Ez more space to play in his room.  It wasn't a particularly fancy changing table (we gave it to a neighbor) but it did make me a little sad to think it's the end of an era.  We've had that piece of furniture in that room for over 6.5 years.  Ez has been sleeping in a twin bed since he learned to climb out of his crib (when was that, around 18 months?) but just this weekend S rearranged the furniture and turned the bed into a legitimate big boy bed.  It doesn't look like a nursery in there anymore at all, especially without the changing table.  Ez is happy with the extra space though.  When he woke up this morning, he didn't want breakfast.  He wanted me to come to his room to play cars on his rug. :)  He's even been staying dry overnight.  My baby boy is growing up. 

My baby girl is growing up too.  Last night at the library I had one of those moments, an image of how I pictured parenthood becoming a reality.  In the past at the library we usually only spend 15 minutes or so, during which time I read as many books as I can to the kids, grab about 10 to take home and zip out of there around the time that Ez remembers the library has an automatic door that's fun to make a run for...  This time just Eliza and I went (although Ez did request some dinosaur books, LOL).  Eliza used her own library card.  And this time instead of reading books to her, she plopped down on the floor and started reading books to herself.  And that was the moment I'd pictured in my head previously.  Having a kid who couldn't wait to plop down and read everything herself, right away. 

My son uses a urinal

Whoa, hadn't realized how much of a slacker I've been on this blog lately! Time flies when you're having fun.  So they've been remodeling Ezra's preschool and this week they got to use their new bathroom.  They put a tiny urinal in the 2 year old bathroom.  I watched Ezra walk up to the urinal and use it, just like a grown man.  He seemed completely sure of himself.  It was the most bizarre thing to watch, since none of us have taught him to pee standing up.  It was probably the most "mother of a son" I've felt since he was born!  He just looked so macho!  In other news he's been singing the Zacchaeus song non stop.  I love the way he says sycamore.  So cute.  One of the student teachers at his school taught them The Eyes of Texas this week and he made me sing it 5 times before bed the other night.  He starts by saying, "Get your horns up!" and then after we sing it he says, "Texas Texas Yeehaw!" 

Kindergarten had a Texas concert last week.  Eliza was one of the few kids who got to narrate.  Her line was, "This next song tells of the beautiful scenery you will see here in Texas."  She nailed it but said she had stage fright and butterflies during the show.  My favorite part might have been watching her randomly dance during one of the songs when no one else was.  Ezra sang "deep in the heart of Texas" along with them. He's also started asking, "Is this Texas?" at various places around town. Ha. 

 

 

Talents

Caution: Bragging parent ahead... As a parent you tend to think everything your child does is amazing.  And when they start interacting with other kids their age, it's hard to objective about their strengths and weaknesses.  It's also hard not to project your own issues on your child and live vicariously through them.  And it's really fun to imagine what sort of person they'll grow up to be. Anyway, it's been interesting this year to see how Eliza stacks up with other kindergartners and to get objective information from her teachers.  It's interesting to see what traits she seems to have inherited from each of us and how she's also her own unique person. 

I've always loved reading and been pretty terrible at math and science.  In some ways Eliza is a lot like me and I sort of expected her to be the same way. What I'm finding though is that even though she can read, she still much prefers us to read to her instead.  I'm a little dumbfounded by this because I remember feeling like the whole word opened up when I learned to read and I'm surprised she doesn't want to read everything she gets her hands on like I did.  We had a parent-teacher conference this week and though she's doing fine in reading and already ready to progress to first grade, I was surprised to learn that she had done quite well on her math benchmark.  I hadn't really pictured her being better at math than she is at reading; I'll assume she got that trait from her father's side of the family. :)

Yesterday we got an invitation from the school district (not her individual school) inviting us to see Eliza's art in an exhibit.  Apparently her art is one of 1,500 selected from 111 schools in the city.  When we asked her about it, she had no idea which piece of art was selected (she literally makes an average of 4 pieces of art per day) so we are excited to see the display!

She started gymnastics again about a month ago.  She did gymnastics when she was 3 but it obviously wasn't too serious.  She went to a friend's gymnastics birthday party and several parents commented on how she was a natural and seem to have a lot of upper body strength for a 6 year old.  E kept asking to start taking classes again so we finally found one that works with our schedule. Last week in class her teacher also commented on her upper body strength.  They've been running laps in gym at school and when I asked her about it she said she and her friend Jude are the fastest in the class.  Like I said, this is definitely a bragging post, but it's fun to notice her strengths.  So far she seems pretty well rounded!

Train

A couple of weeks ago S finally took the kids on a train ride he's had his eye on probably since Eliza was born.  S has a thing about trains.  Maybe from living in Europe where mass transit is much more efficient; maybe just because he's a dude who likes trains.  He's always looking into where we could take a train.  He's the one who convinced me to take the train from NYC to New Haven and the one who convinced me to take the overnight train alone from Paris to Barcelona (something I'm pretty sure my parents are happy they only learned of after the fact.) For years he's been trying to convince me to take a train to see my brother and family 3 hours away.  Keep in mind the train ride takes 6 hours but he still thinks it would be a great adventure.  We've taken the kids on the metro train several times just for fun.  So, he finally booked a (sort of expensive) trip out to see the grandparents.  I drove the 3 of them to the suburbs to catch the train and then he spent 1.5 hours (each way) going to see his parents for a couple of hours.  Granted by car this same trip would have taken 30 minutes. :)  But, look how happy they are. And they made a fun memory.  It's nice when parenthood turns out like you pictured...

Bowling with your wife

Our household really likes this catchy tune from Broken Bells, Holding on for Life.  The kids have misinterpreted the lyrics though and their version is much more upbeat.  Instead of holding on for life, Ezra and Eliza think the song goes, "Only dynamite! Bowling with your wife!" Reminds me of when that Pumped Up Kicks song was popular and Eliza thankfully thought the words were "Better run, better run, Albino Bowler" instead of the real lyrics, "Better run, better run, outrun my bullets."  I'm not sure why my kids think so many popular songs involve bowling. :) Also reminds me of when I was that age and a song about a cheating husband called "Your Nobody Called Today" was popular and I thought the words were "Chicken and dumplings when I asked her name" instead of "She hung up when I asked her name." And now I understand why my parents never corrected me!

February

I was cleaning out Eliza's backpack last night and came across a note.  Eliza had written down two wishes: that Martin Luther King, Jr. hadn't died and that everyone in the world had enough money. Made me feel like we were raising a pretty sweet kiddo.  :)

Ezra went back to the ENT this week, at his speech therapist's request, for another round of hearing tests.  They must have done seven different tests on him and he was such a trooper.  His hearing is so much better than it was a few months ago, but he still has some conductive hearing loss in both of his middle ears.  The ENT started him on allergy meds, so hopefully that will help.  We go back to the ENT in another month.  Ms. Jayne thinks that may be why his language is doing much better but some of his sounds are still not developing.  He brought his moose puppet with him to the appointment and checked his ears too. 

Baby Daddy

The other day at Ezra's school I noticed the 2 girls in his class (Lucy and Leona) were playing with Legos and trains and Ezra and his friend Hudson were playing with dolls. Ezra carried this particular doll around for almost an hour, sunglasses and purse on the whole time. He said he was the daddy and Hudson tried to nurse his doll and said he was the mommy. So cute. 

Why be normal?

This morning I realized Eliza had picked out quite the interesting outfit for school.  Her pants had holes in the knees (the last time I pointed that out, she said it looked "hip") and she was wearing 2 shirts on top of each other, one of which was backward and wrong side out.  I pointed that out and she said she planned it that way because she wanted to look like a movie star. She also drew stripes on her socks.  I think I'm officially paying for my raising.  I hope her little spirit didn't get crushed at school today when someone undoubtably told her she didn't look like a celebrity today.

Favorite Ezra isms

1. "'Cuse me. I barted."
2. "Tiss it, Mama."
3. "Dumbo Dash"
4. Listening to him sing his ABCs and count to 10.
5. Singing "This Little Light of Mine," "Hosannah," or "Royals." Yelling, "That's my song!" when he hears Royals on the radio.
6. "I not want it."
7. "It's brighting me!"
8. The way he runs and hugs his friends each morning like he hasn't seen them in months.
9. The way he sings the themes songs from Superman and Star Wars.
10. Singing the My Little Ponies theme song.

Winter Break

I can't believe Eliza is halfway done with kindergarten! When I was reviewing 2013 and looking at our old calendar, it was amazing how much busier we got when elementary school started.  Eliza is reading simple books on her own now and Ezra is speaking in sentences.  We had a great, low key winter break and I feel like we hit the reset button and are ready for a new year.  S took the kids to the new Thinkery and for once they didn't get sick from the trip! I took the kids to the new aquarium with Papa, Grammy, Drew, Zac and JuJu.  A bird landed on Ezra's arm and Eliza touched a sea star.  We spent a few days in a cabin on the Frio and did a big hike.  Ezra fell asleep on Daddy's shoulders on the way down but Eliza was a hiking trooper.  The river was beautiful and clear and the kids loved having a fire outside.  The trip combined the best parts of camping with the best parts of staying in a cute hotel.  We had tons of playdates and it was so much fun catching up with friends and family.  We spent a lot of time on the playground, until it got very cold and cedar season started.  Then we had Cards Against Humanity marathons with friends while the kids had My Little Pony parties. :)  This year Ezra was really excited about Christmas and loved unwrapping presents.  2013 was a great year and we are so lucky to have this awesome little family.