Camping at Lake Goodwin's Wenberg State Park this weekend.

Sadly, Mr. Blues (the Beta fish) died on Thursday. Kenzie cried and cried when Cindy broke the news to her. Cindy wasn't sure...what do you do with a dead fish?? Bury it?? Flush it?? So...she saved it for me. As soon as I got in the door from work, Kenzie wanted to show me his body. I really did not want to see it, but ended up giving him a little flush when she was out back playing. When she came in, she wanted to know what happened to him. I just overheard part of the conversation. Cindy thought she could maneuver around the question, "he's in heaven." Kenzie was unsatisfied with that answer, "but where's his BODY?" Cindy, taking the low road, replied, "go ask your mother."

And, potentially more horrifying, we went camping this weekend and lost Chirpie! The last known sighting was at Thriftway when Kenzie was pushing him around in the little cart. She had returned the cart and I didn't think to check if she had him. So, when we got to the camp site we searched the car, the camper, the suitcase: no Chirpie. I called Jackie, who called Thriftway and found a nice lady who turned the grocery store up-side-down looking for him...to no avail. We made it through the night by promising that he was "probably" at home waiting for us. Luckily, he was found at home...out back on a rock. When I told Kenzie she said, "poor Buddy! He had to sleep on a ROCK!"

I'm happy to report that we had a fantastic weekend at Camp Indianola. With memory of New Year's Eve's 2AM jaunt home fresh in our minds, we were leery. However, they gave us a private room that allowed Mason to be as loud as he liked in the middle of the night. (A wise move, it turns out.) Both kids did a pretty good job sleeping, but the days were the highlights!

Rope Swing
As we were heading up to camp, I started remembering the rope swing from the retreat last year. "Holy cow!" I thought. "I let her go on that swing last year, by herself, when she was only 2-1/2 years old! What was I thinking?? The swing is 50' in the air and you get launched over the trees. To even get on it you have to climb on a platform! Heck, no. Not this time," I thought.

It started slowly, as poor parenting decisions often do. First I went with her. "If I'm holding her, she won't let go." Then the next time, "She's going with another adult." Then, "well, if she starts from the ground instead of the platform." And soon we got to, "all the other kids are doing it" until finally I found myself on top of the platform loading her onto the CPS-mocking swing, pulling her into the air above my head, and letting go.

But, yes, she did have fun.


Kites
$10 seemed like such a good deal for a fish kite. In addition to never quite getting off the ground, it drew blood and gave me a rope burn. Mason did, however, seem both fascinated and perplexed by the giant dive-bombing fish.







Basketball
Regardless of the context, Mason squeals every time he sees a ball. Basketballs appear to be his favorite.

(As a side, I just have to have it go on record that I beat Cindy in a game of p-i-g.)


Talent Show
For the talent show, Kenzie recited the first few pages of The Little Mermaid. She and I went to the front of the room full of people, and we alternated reading sentences. She was a little shy, but did a great job of talking loud so that everyone could hear her. She won an Einstein award. I think people thought she was really reading it and didn't realize she has the entire book committed to memory.


Rests/snacks on the beach
Won't eat hotdogs or chicken, but kelp and sand, sure.




Playing
They had fun with all the different kids from church.

Yes, that is the bathtub.

And I was doing so well...

Five months ago since:

Water logged

Double Disqualification

I took the day off work today because we're going to go to church camp this weekend. Kenzie and I got up and went to get our nails done. I think she takes to this primping thing a little too easily. She sits completely still while she's tended to. All the ladies in there say how cute she is, and she soaks it all up. Oh boy, what am I starting here?

Yesterday I called Kenzie from the hospital where her Grampy was getting the post for the Baja ear implant. As soon as I dialed, I had a sense of dread--I had failed to give her any warning, we hadn't talked about the surgery at all. So, not surprisingly, she wanted DETAILS:

Me: Kenzie, you know that Grampy can't hear out of his left ear, right?
Kenzie: yeah
Me: Well, I'm at the hospital with him because the doctors are going to help him be able to hear.
Kenzie: how?
Me: They're going to put a steel post, kind-of like the end of a pen, right behind his ear that can't hear. Then in a few months they're going to hook a litle machine to it that will send the sounds to his good ear.
Kenzie: Oh. [pause] So, they're going to put a post in his ear?
Me: Kind-of. It's great, though, because he'll be able to hear better.
Kenzie: I want to go see him.
Me: Well, we can't see him right now. I'm actually at the hospital to be with Grammy.
Kenzie: So you're NOT going to see Grampy?
Me [backtracking a bit]: Um, I might see him for a bit, but that'll be later. Right now I'm just with Grammy.
Kenzie: I want to come so I can see him later.
Me: Well, honey, it's going to be bedtime soon. [By this time it was about 7:30PM]
Kenzie: So, is Grampy going to sleep at the hospital?
Me [feeling caught in a lie]: No, they're going to go home tonight, but later.
Kenzie: I wanna talk to Grammy.
Grammy: Hi Kenzie.
Kenzie: Are you going to drive Grampy home?
Grammy: Yes, I'm going to drive.
[more conversation between the two of them, then Grammy hands the phone back to me.]
Kenzie: Mom, are you going to sit in the front seat or the back seat?
Me: Kenzie, the doctor just called and Grammy and I are going to see Grampy now.
Kenzie: Poor Grampy!! He has a post in his ear!!

When she talked to him on the phone the next day, she said, "Mom, it worked! He heard me the first time!"

Kenzie got up from the breakfast table leaving her food unattended. As you can see, Mason wasted no time taking advantage of the opportunity, tipping over his blue chair, abandoning his yogurt and stuffing his mouth with her cereal. She wasn't happy when she returned...but now seems more inclined to stay seated until she's finished eating! Gotta love those natural consequences.

Two egg hunts today! We lucked out and had sun for the family party, shown here are Kenzie, Mason, Emily and Jacob.

Mason quickly figured out the mission of the hunt. Alright...we told him, "go find the ball"--but it worked. He now keeps trying to throw the eggs. But then he figured out that they have candy inside. Hmm...candy or throw, tough decision.

At the church party Kenzie announced that she didn't have enough eggs (even though her bag was almost full) and a nice boy handed over a bunch of his, which she willingly took.

Mason was a clown during the church service, until I eventually quarantined him in the nursery.

Neither child was particularly impressed by the bunny himself, but Mason liked the bean-bag toss (go figure). More pictures of the day can be found here.

Not the best day for it, but we went to Alki and enjoyed low tide.

This picture to the left was taken seconds before we learned that a little crab can really pinch little fingers. Mason started flashing his "crab" and "hurt" signs with a look of confusion.

We were soaking wet and cold, but had a lot of fun. We're looking forward to Alki this summer!

Kenzie loves her Leapster. I just bought her the new cartridge called "Kindergarten." I thought I would get a head-start on her and opened it while she was napping so I could take it for a test drive. Erroneously I thought I could help her. I actually found myself feeling like an out-of-touch parent trying to figure out a video game, secretly give myself a pep talk while she watched me fumble before taking over, "come on - you have a Computer Science degree - how tough can this be?"

Mason was in a car accident today--he's completely fine. He was riding with a friend when another car ran a red light and totalled the car they were in, deploying their air bags. Quite a scare, but when the paramedics showed up they checked him out and he's completely fine.

When I came home tonight I asked him, "were you in the car today?" He responded in the affirmative by showing the "drive" sign. (Like you're holding a steering wheel.) I said, "what happened?" He responded with the "hurt" sign.

Yes, the car got hurt. But, thank God, he didn't.

I was rocking Mason to bed tonight when he sat up and gave me the sign for "Grammy/Grampy" (hand extended with thumb hitting forehead repeatedly). He didn't want to rock, just kept signing for them. I tried to get him to lay back down and wasn't sure what he was trying to say until he signed "phone." So, Kenzie brought us a phone and we called. It seemed that he just wanted to say goodnight because he heard both of their voices and then waved bye-bye. Then he was okay rocking again.

A minute later he sat up and gave the "hurt" sign (two index fingers bumping together) and pointed to his mouth, right where a big molar is coming in. I got up and gave him some medicine, then we finished rocking and he went to his crib.

It occurred to me later how amazing that whole scene was. Without speaking a word he told me that he wanted to call his grandparents to say goodnight, then that he needed some medicine for teething. I love sign language for babies...

Kenzie came running in from playing outside, "Mom, I was scared of a bee but Ama told me that the bee was just looking for a nice flower to get some pollen."

What a great teaching moment I thought, "That's probably true. The bees take pollen from one flower to another flower to feed the flowers so they can grow."

Kenzie, astonished and very upset, replied "Umph! No!! You're not right. The bees take the pollen to the queen bumblebee. The queen uses the pollen so that she can make honey. That's the way it works, Mom."

I explained that there are bumble bees and honey bees. Honey bees make honey but other bees don't. I also explained that bees eat pollen for food, and they also help by spreading it to the flowers.

Her response, demonstrating that she didn't believe a word I said, "Mom, flowers already have pollen."

We looked at this picture and then Kenzie told me this story about it.

Once upon a time there was a little dog walking through the forest. It had beautiful kind eyes. He was looking for his mommy. And soon he found his mommy. And then he and his mommy settled off to their home and to go eat dinner because it was about to get dark. And then it started raining and there was lightening and it shot across the sky. Then the little dog was scared of the lightening. So the mommy took him for a listening walk. Then when they got back home there was no lightening or thunder.

The end.

~Kenzie

In preparation for school, Kenzie announced, “Maybe Aidan will want to play with me today, maybe he won’t. If he doesn’t, it’s okay because I’ll just play with my other friends. I have lots of friends. And if Aidan doesn’t want to play with me today, maybe someday he will and we’ll play again if I want to.”

After work tonight I asked her...trying to be subtle..."how was your day?" "Great!!" was her reply. I pushed a bit, "who did you play with?" With a great sense of satisfaction she said, "I just played by myself. I didn't play with anybody. Aidan didn't want to play with me today and that was his choice. It's okay, though. If Aidan doesn't want to play with me then I just won't play with him." She seemed really convinced of that.

I suggested that next time, if she wanted, she could ask another kid to play with her. She said, "That's a great idea! Maybe next time I'll ask one of my other friends to play with me!" I hope it lasts!

I called home today to hear Kenzie absolutely sobbing in the background. Cindy finally convinced her to talk to me and tell me what was wrong. After an extended period of time hearing her cry uncontrollably, she told me, "Aidan didn't want to play with me today. He was playing with some other girl that he didn't even know. He didn't even know her name!" In reconstructing the scene of the crime, I learned that it was a girl from another class (presumably older) and he wouldn't have anything to do with Kenzie.

She said, "He wouldn't even talk to me. [sob, sob] I tried to ask him why, but he kept saying 'no' to me. Friends are supposed to like each other. I wanted to play with him." I reassured her that it's okay for people to have lots of friends and it's okay for Aidan to have other friends. She responded, "Yes, but friends are supposed to play with each other."

Trying a different approach, I tried to get her to list with me the friends that she has, to help her realize there's more to life than Aidan! That seemed to help as we ran through the list of names of other kids. Then we talked about how she can't control Aidan, but she can choose how she reacts to it and how she behaves. Her response was, "If he doesn't like me then I won't play with him. If he's not going to like me then I'm not going to like him." Alright, but maybe we're going too far...I tried to bring it back into perspective by telling her that we can talk to our friends if they hurt our feelings. Her response, "but he wouldn't let me get close to him to tell him."

Stay tuned for more preschool drama on Thursday.