Childhood

Penelope became a child today. I'm not sure how this manages to sneak up, but it does. Today is the day the switch flipped.

Maybe it was teaching her to play hide and seek this morning, when I told her to go into the kitchen and count to three, but after walking straight into the kitchen, she counted to ten instead. And then we played hide and seek for half an hour, taking turns while she giggled and gave herself away every time.

Maybe it was the way she walked into the house after coming home from the library, pushing the front door closed behind her before walking into the dining room, throwing her lunchbox on the table, climbing up into a chair and unlatching the box to finish her lunch before taking a nap. She closed it back up when I insisted, clicked both latches closed, and carried it up to her bedroom to have a little more while we read a book, sitting side by side on her carpet.

I definitely saw it when I woke her from her nap, she smiled when she saw me and spit the pacifier out into the bed without me asking her to do it. When I asked if she wanted to go to Luna's party, a smile broke out on her face and she told me she needed her lunchbox and a juice box. I suggested she also needed shoes. She said it's "not too cold outside," and that she "didn't need to bring a sweater." She then marched out the front door while I hurried to get shoes on my own feet and grab my things.

And then tonight, she played for hours with Micah and Luna. She helped them to color various projects Luna got for her birthday, she followed them around playing some kind of imaginary games of house and superheroes. They ran around in the dark, each with a tiny LED flashlight, her trailing behind and fully immersed in the game. When the big kids climbed onto the trampoline, she walked across the pitch black yard, came into the house and asked me to help her up onto the trampoline too. And when it was time to leave, she gave Luna a hug and told her "Happy Birthday!"

This house holds no more babies. And that's okay. She still snuggled up against my chest while I sang Twinkle Twinkle Little Star before putting her to bed. I'll hold on to that as long as possible.

Swinging

Micah learned to pump yesterday. He was so proud, that he told everyone who walked past at the playground, "This is my first day swinging all by myself!" He experiment with sitting on the swing, swinging himself while standing on the swing, moving his legs in the opposite direction while propelling himself with his body, and moving his legs in a circle motion kind of like swimming, though he did tell me that was way too hard. He got so excited that he fell off the swing at one point, basically laughed about it, and then climbed back on. He swung continuously for over an hour before it was time to take Penelope home for a nap. When that time came, he asked if he could stay at the park while I took her home, but we settled on going home, getting lunch, putting her down for a nap, and then heading back out to the park. After lunch, I asked if we could go to a smaller park that was closer to the park, Micah said he would go to any park with swings! So we walked to the park together, I brought some crochet, and he swung on the swing for two full hours, stopping for a couple drinks from the water fountain but swinging right through a light rain and finally deciding it was time to go home, take a hot shower, drink some hot cocoa with marshmallows, and snuggle on the sofa while watching a movie. I guess the rain had made him cold. :)

Broken Bone

We are about halfway through our first broken bone now. Penelope fell while climbing a ladder at the park with the sitter. It took 48 hours before the ED finally diagnosed the break because at our first visit, they only xrayed her elbow and forearm, not listening when Michael said it seemed like her shoulder that was actually hurting. When he took her back two days later, we thought it must have been a collar bone break, but it turned out that her arm is just broken very high on the humerus. No need for a cast because it's too high for that to be reasonable, she's been living life very happily with an ace bandage securing her arm in place. We've been to the playground, she's jumped on the trampoline, we've gone to the beach twice, it doesn't seem to have slowed her down at all. I think that like Micah, Penelope must have a pretty high tolerance for pain. Even the first two nights when the arm was not restricted and she cried out if we picked her up under the armpit, she was sleeping almost through the night, with only a single wake up each night. Since the moment that arm was bandaged, she hasn't complained at all, and we haven't given her any pain medication. Lucky us that it wasn't any worse, but I'm sure it won't be the last injury our kids sustain!

Penelope-isms

Down-the-stairs
Up-the-stairs
In-the-side
Out-the-side

Mama: What happened to Dada's car today?
Penelope: Dada car broken!
Mama: Then what happened? Where is Dada's car now?
Penelope: At Bruno's house. In a garage.

My do it?
Obie Bob
Go in ah swimming water?
Go in ah sandbox?
I ready get up!
I ready nap.
Mama comin'?
My fan beeps.
No my fan beeps.

Tidbits

I caught Penelope "reading" a book for the first time about a week ago. Her interpretation of Click Clack Moo was, "Moo. No milk. No milk! NO MILK! NOOO MILK!!!!! Splash." Read the book. It's a great interpretation!

Micah learned to tie his shoes last week. He wanted to wear lace up shoes and I suggested he try to tie them before I did it for him. He came down frustrated that he couldn't do it and I started to explain it to him while I watched him tie the first knot. "I can never find the hole!" he said. He was trying to make "bunny ears" and one of the ears goes through the rabbit hole. I told him he didn't have to make bunny ears, he could just fold the laces over and tie them the same way he had just tied the knot and it was a complete breakthrough for him! He can now tie his shoes!

Michael built a huge sandbox in our backyard, filled it mostly with sand we got for free from a neighbor, and now that the weather is warm, we also put up the little pool. Between those and the garden full of strawberries, plus the mulberry tree that is great for grazing and for climbing, our backyard is a blast for these kids! Penelope asks to go in the swimming pool or the sandbox the moment she wakes up in the morning. She mostly swims nude so that we can get her onto the potty quickly. Micah spends hours in the mulberry tree trying to find mulberries he's overlooked. It's so amazing. They are so amazing. 

Yesterday was Micah's last day of kindergarten. Not particularly eventful, but he had a great year. I cannot believe that it went by so quickly. Of course, I remember standing on the front porch, taking photos of him on his first day. I remember the horror of that first week when he thought he wasn't good at school. The incredible response from his principal who quickly moved him into a wonderful classroom where he was able to be his happy and maybe too wacky self. All the little morning performances he participated in... 

Last, but not least, Micah has his first loose tooth! I'm not going to have babies for long, am I?

Another Beautiful Day

I've been struggling the last week or so. Feeling like I'm failing at giving both kids what they need, helping Penelope learn the basics while also challenging Micah to learn and grow. I often find that I'm so exhausted by it, I would rather just let them play by themselves while I cook or clean or play cellphone games. And I've been feeling really guilty about all of that.

Yesterday, though, was wonderful. Micah is on spring break, so I had both kids while Michael had a busy day at work. We got up, ate some breakfast, I sent Micah up to get dressed and he DID. That's a huge win all by itself, for the record. We went to Einstein's to buy some bagels and each of the kids had a chocolate milk for the car ride to Trader Joe's. We did our grocery shopping for the week and Micah only asked for a few special treats, most but not all of which I gave in to. When we got home, Mac and Harper were out front and we played in the front yards for about an hour. We took Penelope and Harper down the street to see the garbage men, they showed the girls how the garbage truck smashes the garbage and shared some freshly baked cookies that a neighbor made for them. Micah worked on a project on the front porch that involved gluing some string and pieces of wood together. We went inside to pull together some food and supplies for a trip to the park and then walked with Mac and Harper up to the Farmhouse playground where I briefly played hide and seek with Micah (he's an excellent hider, I must say), Micah learned to climb on top of a new piece of equipment and decided to eat his lunch there, and the highlight for Penelope was Mac pushing her on the swing, something that I was not allowed to do. We had some snacks, got a bit of a sunburn, and generally enjoyed ourselves. When we got home, I let the kids play on the porch for just a little while, Penelope was serving Micah some imaginary food from their play kitchen and both of them were coloring on the porch with chalk, and then I put Penelope down for a nap. Once she was down, I turned the tv on for Micah, watched one show with him, bowed out of the second, and then worked on Penelope's quiet book while he played in the back yard. When Penelope woke up, the three of us took a very slow walk around the block and then she and Micah played in back together for a while. Around 5pm, I started prepping for dinner and got the grill going. They played on the front porch while I moved things outside for a front porch dinner. They played with the radio, trying to see if they could find the baseball game, helped set the table and move chairs, and when Michael came home we had a nice meal: Steak (hotdogs for kiddos), grilled sweet potatoes, and salad. After dinner, Micah turned on the radio and worked on his dance moves on the front porch, always a good time! A little while later, he screamed that poop was coming out the top of Penelope's diaper and I took her up to change her and get ready for bed. She had dumped some sand in her hair in the back yard, so she took her first solo stand up shower and loved every second of it. She just kept filling and dumping cups of water, she was great about having her hair rinsed, and when she heard Micah coming up the stairs, she begged for him to join her. I think she quickly realized that having him in the shower was actually not fun at all since he completely blocked her water access, so we wrapped it up and I put her to bed. Her current favorite bedtime books are The Hound From The Pound and the Katz book which I think is called Doggies (counting and barking). Michael came in as we were reading Hound from the Pound and she insisted he sit down with us, so the three of us read together for a while. After she was down, I got Micah out of the shower, dressed him in Pajamas, and the two of us ate ice cream sandwiches on the front porch while reading one the chapter books we've been working on, the second Sisters Grimm book. Then I put him to bed too and while I did a little calming breathing with him after we finished reading, he fell asleep before I even left the room.

Solid parenting day. Basically no complaints. I hope we have a lot more days like that one was!

Perfection

If I had to live a single day repeatedly for the rest of my life, yesterday might be it. The weather was beautiful. We woke up to open windows and the sounds of birds singing for the first time this year. We started the morning laying in bed while Micah went into Penelope's room and "read" a book to her. Michael cooked bacon, eggs, and potatoes for breakfast. The kids played in the backyard while Michael pulled some dead weeds from last year and burned them in a tiny backyard fire that smelled wonderful. He was gone doing some volunteer work for several hours and the kids and I had a wonderful time. We did a little gardening in our bare feet. Penelope wasn't sure what to think of it, she kept asking me to take off her shoes and then to put them on, to put her in the garden and then to take her out. There was a nice breeze all day and later in the day, the skies got overcast and threatened to rain. We squeezed in a quick walk as it started to drizzle and both kids thought is was wonderful. Micah had the hood on his sweatshirt up, Penelope was cowering under the stroller's canopy while chuckling about the rain. I spent a little time playing on the living room floor with Penelope as she explored the cash register, I spent a lot of time carrying her around in the baby sling because she wanted to be held. I cleaned both the dining and living room, vacuumed both rooms, did all our laundry and folded some of it. Before putting her to bed, I sat on the porch with Penelope and watched the pouring rain. Everything was perfect. 

Micah's Dream

Micah woke up just before I left the house for work this morning and when I went up to give him a quick hug before I left, he reported on a pretty mature, story like dream. It was the first time I can remember him describing a dream that it seemed like anyone else might have had.

He said there was a battle and that only the good guys were wearing hoods that were pulled down such that their eyes were covered and they couldn't see. The good guys didn't have any weapons, but the bad guys had swords and knives under their shirts on their backs. And when the good guys went to fight, they would just take the weapons from behind the bad guys before the bad guys could get to them.

It's a short description, but it seemed kind of cool.

Night time

This morning, just as I was finishing getting ready for work, Penelope started crying. I quietly went into her room to pick her up and put her back to bed. She put her head down on my shoulder. Then she lifted it up, looked at my shoulder, tapped it, and said, "jacket." I was wearing a suit jacket. I told her it was okay and time for night night, but she was on to me. She looked up, tapped on my glasses, and said, "glasses." I restrained a chuckle, told her it was okay, and successfully put her back down in her bed. Completely adorable.

Growing

Something has happened in the last couple weeks and Penelope has joined the conversational world! She most definitely understands everything we are saying. If I ask if anyone wants to go outside, she'll say, "Yes!" and start walking toward the front door repeating, "shoes on? shoes on?" as she goes. If I ask her to say goodnight to Michael, she'll say, "Night night, Dada," instead of just "night night." If I ask her to go get me something, she'll do it. The other day I was sitting on the sofa, trying to take a little break, and she came over, started pulling cushions off the sofa, repeating, "Jumping?" to convince me to pull out the sofa bed so that she could jump on it. Yes, I do pull out the sofa bed for them to jump on it, and it's a blast!

I think I heard her say her own name, Penelope, yesterday for the first time unprompted. Usually, I'll ask who she is and point to her and she says, "Me!" I say, but what is your name, she says, "Me!" and then she gets bored and stops answering altogether. 

Michelangelo James Vicaro

Micah has had a surprisingly tough transition to kindergarten. I've noticed that he has a hard time transitioning from one routine to another and he started the year off mourning the loss of the last preschool he had attended. He also started the year off with a rather horrible teacher. After 1.5 weeks of kindergarten, he had concluded that he was stupid, "bad in school," and wasn't good at math. On top of that, when we talked to him about what his teacher told him about how he was doing, he said she didn't tell him anything about his performance and he blamed it on himself for not speaking up. There were a whole variety of things she seemed to do poorly including requiring them to earn recess and lunch, only allowing them to have silent reading time until the first kid made a noise and then making everyone else stop reading and return to other class activities, etc. On day 14 of school, a Wednesday we emailed the principal, we met with her on Friday morning, we met with her and the teacher together on Monday morning, and on Tuesday Micah was in a new class. At the end of the day on Monday, after meeting with the teacher and before Micah knew anything was going on, his teacher told him how sad she was that he was leaving and how much she would miss him and that if he didn't want to move classes, he didn't have to. He came home in tears and I had to explain to him why he needed to change classes. I guess that was a good reassurance that we made the right decision!

He's been doing much better ever since. The homework that he has in the new class is much more enjoyable. Yes, they have regular homework in Kindergarten!! The reward system is much more appropriate, they have some kind of peg system where they can move up and down a smiley/frown spectrum based on their behavior. Micah has gotten into some trouble for blowing spit bubbles which I think he does when he's bored, and for not tucking in his shirt which I just can't believe kindergartners are penalized for, but I've seen other kids scolded for this as well. He has friends in class, he likes his teacher, and he is obviously learning. I couldn't be happier.

These days, Micah is very into art projects as usual. He's currently working on creating a Winnie the Pooh play and has created scenery, a sign on his bedroom door, balloons with the characters' faces on them, tickets for entrance, and placed pillows on his bedroom floor for seating. Next steps are to create sock puppets and distribute invitations! :)

He outright refuses to learn to ride a bike, even the version he has with no pedals. And he generally is not particularly interested in athletics, though he does love running and playing at the playground. We went to the mall yesterday and he brought his fisher price camera and took some honestly amazing photos of the things he saw there. They were well framed, clear, I couldn't believe it.

My favorite thing about Micah is how much he loves to snuggle. He crawls into our bed to snuggle in the morning, he climbs onto my lap whenever Penelope will allow it on the sofa or at the dinner table, and we snuggle in his bed every night before he goes to sleep. I know this won't last forever and I try to remind myself to enjoy every minute!

Penelope Gail Vicaro

I really should do a better job of writing. And that is not a "resolution." I'll write a bit today about Penelope.

There is nothing more wonderful than the way her little body feels all curled up against me when I pick her up to comfort her in the night. Her little head resting on my shoulder (after she's instructed me to move my hair out of the way), her hand holding onto the blanked she has asked me to put across her back, this morning she was humming Twinkle Twinkle Little Star right along with me while I swayed back and forth. 

Penelope has so many words these days, most of which are basically instructions. 

• Thirsty. "Sir-see"
• Juice. "Jooos"
• Milk. "Buck"
• Nummy. (Pacifier)
• Blanket. "Banket"
• Hungry. "Hungy"
• Up Please. "Uppy"
• Down Please. "Dow Pea"
• Mama. 
• Dada.
• Micah.
• Outside. "Side"
• Walk.
• Diaper.
• Potty.
• Tissue. (which she asks for every time she sneezes)
• Cracker. "Cacker"
• Phone. "Foam"
• Open. "Opum"
• Help Please. "Hup Pea"
• Harper.
• Doggy. "Daugh-yee"
• Chica!
• Ow. "Ow-wee"
• Night night.
• Choo-Choo. (a demand for the Chugga Chugga Choo Choo book)
• Llama. "Yah Mah" (a demand for Llama Llama Red Pajama)
• Boom Boom. (a demand for Chicka Chicka Boom Boom)

A recent addition to the list is "why," although I'm not sure she even knows what it means. She says it frequently at the exact right time, maybe even just to keep us talking which I certainly remember Micah seeming to do as well.

Monday Morning when she woke up, she was calling for Mama for a while. When she realized I wasn't coming as quickly as she wanted, she started calling for basically anyone who could save her. Mama! Mama! Micah! Dada! She just cycled through those commands again and again.

Penelope loves to be held. I was so worried that my second baby wouldn't want as much physical contact as my first, but Penelope loves it just as much as I do. She wants to be carried constantly and generally speaking, it is wonderful. If someone else sits on my lap (or on the sitter's lap), Penelope shrieks and runs over to push them away and steal the lap. 

Currently, she likes toys phones phones, keys, musical instruments, and of course electronics. A few days ago she was trying to swipe a screwdriver I was using, so I pulled the toy electric screw drivers out along with the plastic toy plane that can be taken apart and reassembled. She figured it out fairly quickly and spent at least 30 minutes alone on the carpet unscrewing and then screwing in the three screws on the top of the toy. I enjoyed just sitting quietly together while she worked on it.