Crushing news!

According to Dutch, I am the "boringest mom in the WHOLE WORLD."

Mugging

Commuting

Today Dutch went to a childcare program about a mile away. Cook dropped her off and picked her up by bike, and she was delighted to join him for part of his commute. This is their homecoming today.

Updates

We're painting. The color is actually "limesickle" rather than the yellow it looks in this photo.

And we're only painting ONE ROOM (at this time), but it's a giant pain in the ass. This is our

very first painting experience, and it turns out we had a lot to learn. We still do, but now we know a few things. We haven't even started on the trim yet, so our dressers will be living in the living room for a while. Our doors are also living in the garage (until we get around to cleaning up all the painted-over hardware, repairing the dings, painting them, and rehanging them).

Also, Dutch went to the orthodontist last week. She will be getting a baby tooth pulled in August, and a metal contraption installed to force her bossy new grown-up teeth to make room for one of their brethren. It'll be her first orthodontic experience, but definitely not her last.

Dutch won a strawberry shortcake walk at the grocery store yesterday (when neighbors invited her to hop on their cargo bike and come to the store with them) and again today when she went with me and Skipper.* She's now won all three cakewalks she has ever participated in. If you're considering buying a lottery ticket, I suggest you have her help you.

That's the news.

*That was complete overkill, because the kids ate the following samples while we were shopping: yogurt, cheese, strawberry kefir with strawberry granola, strawberry shortcake with mascarpone, strawberry tequila chicken, strawberry lemonade, chocolate-covered strawberry, and strawberry jam on baguette. Our grocery store is expensive and shiny, has fabulous customer service, and really goes to town on samples. We can no longer enter a grocery store without Skipper yelling gleefully "I want SAMPLES!!!"

Swimming update

Dutch is a Polar Bear! She is SO proud. In order to reach this level, she had to do the front crawl (with side breathing) for 30 feet and the back crawl for 30 feet. Apparently, one of the Polar Bear skills she will gain is "drugs/alcohol in the aquatic environment." Yikes.

My kids can apparently be courteous and nice to each other, and may, after all, become civilized people.

The scene: This evening. Skipper is playing in the dining room. Dutch enters the room.

Dutch: Skipper, can I play with you?

Skipper: Yes, you can play with me!

Dutch: Okay, what are you playing?

Skipper: I'm playing baby.

Dutch: Okay!

They play. Nobody screams. Nobody bullies. I make a mental note to remember this moment.

Oh, books. You crazy books!

Dutch continues to read. She's reached a point in the Harry Potter series where she can't bear to read any more. (She's decided to finish Goblet of Fire, but only under certain circumstances - it must be read TO her, and by a parent with whom she can cuddle, rather than a babysitter.) We noticed that those books are challenging for her, not just because they're pretty dark and scary, but because they're noticeably more subtle than the books she had been reading, most of which are very clear about what is happening, and how you're supposed to respond. ("That makes me feel so angry!" said the very bad man. "I think I will go do something BAD now!") She can read the words, but she's not sophisticated enough a person or a reader to understand what's going on beyond the very obvious. Not that Harry Potter is the most subtle literature out there, but it makes the Rainbow Magic fairy books look spectacularly crude.*

Noticing that made me think about how important it is to learn how to read a book. Not just read a word, but actually read a book, and grasp how the book is put together, and make connections. It's not easy.

So we're launching the summer on books that don't really demand that the reader do any lifting. She's pretty interested in Magic Tree House books right now, and Andrew Lost, (books that are fun, easy, informative, and confidence-boosting) but by far the most popular reading in the house is this book. Oh my lord. She's read it cover to cover, and now is just enjoying re-reading all her favorite parts. While I'm totally sick of the fart poem, I'm completely charmed to see my daughter loving a book that way - cherishing it. She carries it everywhere with her. It gives her a chance to read words and play with words, with no plot or characters to try to understand. Perfect.

*There aren't many books I wish I could un-read (and I read a LOT of bad books), but I feel that way about those accursed fairy books. (Though they'd be WAY better if they were about accursed fairies.) Cook and I both finally refused to read them out loud - Cook because he hates them, and me because I could actually feel my brain rotting when I read them.

Apparently, these overalls used to belong to me.

Potty mouth

Because half of what I write in this blog turns out to be quotes from my kids, here's your obligatory kid quote. When Skipper woke up this morning, the first thing she said was "Mama, smell my poop."

A friend of mine is doing potty-boot-camp with her just-turned-two son - she got rid of all the diapers, and he will now become potty trained. I expect it'll work; she's done it with her older kid, and she's the sort of person who will Make It Work. Skipper, on the other hand, is on track to never potty train at all. You may recall that she used the potty, due to daycare encouragement, pretty often when she was around 12-18 months old. Not any more. She occasionally sits on it and says "I peeing!" but she doesn't actually do anything. And she's so stubborn - she makes her sister (at any age) look like a pushover. So we have decided not to make it an issue* that could provoke any battle of wills, because we will inevitably either lose or be made miserable for a good long time. Today, Skipper, tired and grumpy after being dragged along to Dutch's swim lesson,** and then thwarted in her plan to use my keys for some weird purpose, shrieked for 45 minutes. Or it may have been 18 hours, I'm not sure. So we'll just wait until she decides to leave the diapers behind. In a few years. Or maybe 18 years, I'm not sure.

*I'm big on the path of least resistance in most things, including parenting. Also, LAZY.

** Dutch is making swimming progress, after being stuck at Seal level for a very long time. Cook thinks she's had some kind of developmental leap and can finally coordinate (to some extent) her incredibly long limbs. Next stop, Polar Bear!

Kindergarten, first and last days.

Dutch lost a bunch of teeth (she lost her ninth tooth just yesterday), grew at least four inches, and learned to read. I don't know about you, but I didn't change much in the last nine months. (Skipper did, though!)

In the photo from this afternoon, by the way, she's wearing that wistful expression because she had been talking about a beloved staff-person who is leaving the school because her position was eliminated. One of the ballot issues passed, so the staffing won't be cut any more (but the building improvements are not happening). It's still pretty brutal.

Also, in case you're wondering, Dutch's report card indicates that she now "consistently" does almost everything she's supposed to. (She got "often" for a few things. We'll drill her over the summer. I'm trying to be a Tiger Mother.)

Portland, represented in one photo.

Two kids, transported by bike, surrounded by greenery, fetching home the farmshare.

Here are your close-ups, as a bonus.

Evidence

This is what I found when I looked under Dutch's pillow this afternoon:

If you're unable to see, but are curious, the books are:

• Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
• Karlsson on the Roof
• Little House on the Prairie
• The Boxcar Children
• Meet Felicity

I love the being-outside part of living in a house. I really do. I'm looking forward to summer in a way I never did when we were apartment-bound.

And the garden! Today Dutch was given the "task" of cutting kale for our dinner.

She and Skipper edited their established game of Orphans Who Live On a Boat, in order to accommodate the kale, and it became Orphans Who Live On a Boat and Sell Kale (For $400/Leaf)

Also, another reading picture.

Summer!

Dutch has two more days of kindergarten left. (To kick off her summer, she's spending Wednesday with me at work. Whee!)

I'll be home with the girls two days a week. (Did I tell you I'm doing a poorly-paid-but-interesting internship this summer? No? I am. ) As I do every summer, I have visions of us spending our days doing delightful, summery things, full of joy and peace and relaxation. I'm sure THIS summer will be the one when it all works out as planned.

Dutch, at any rate, is set up for a summery summer. She has swim lessons, t-ball, and day camp lined up. I'm excited about her day camp week - I felt that Dutch needed to go to Summer Camp in its classic form. Indifferent teenage counselors, campfires, swimming, popsicle-stick crafts, friendship bracelets, freeze tag, etc. I expect she'll love it. Next summer, sleepaway camp!

I expect we'll be biking all over the place, too. Next week, we're going on a couple of Pedalpalooza rides (including the Ice Cream Ride). See, it's going to be a GREAT summer! Now if only we could have more than one day in a row when the temperature gets over 75.

A gift, enjoyed twice.

This is Skipper and Dutch enjoying a package that arrived recently.

This is Skipper enjoying her new chair (which came in that package, wrapped in bubblewrap). She's "reading."

Another post about bikes

So, we're a biking family now. This morning, now that we finally have three bike locks, I was able to take Dutch and Skipper to Dutch's school by bike. We left Dutch at school with her shiny pink bike locked up outside, and Skipper and I pedaled off for the 2-mile trip to her nannyshare. Skipper likes to hector me as we ride - she yells strange praise like "Mama, you're SO tall!" and unhelpful warnings like "Mama, watch out for those cars!"*

Speaking of cars, Dutch had her first near-dooring episode last week. She was paying attention (unlike the driver) and not moving very quickly, so it all worked out okay. It was a kind of a rite of passage. I'm pretty sure I didn't have MY first near-dooring episode until I was maybe two decades older than she is now.

I'm liking this Biking Thing a lot. I still don't really like biking, and I don't think I'm going to start riding downtown or very long distances. I'm not interested in bikes, and I don't care about them at all. What I LIKE is things that are convenient. I like things that are healthy. I like things that are fun. Bikes can get me and my kids from home to school to daycare in about 45 minutes (door to door), maybe 15 minutes longer than it would take by car, except that we get exercise along the way, don't burn any gas, and don't jeopardize anybody else's health through noise pollution, air pollution, resource-raping, or collisions. And it's fun. (Mostly for Dutch, but I allow as I how I do enjoy biking more than say, driving a car, or riding in a bus.)

*Parked cars, with no occupants... not the dangerous kind of cars.

If only I had this kind of faith in myself.

Last night I was lying with Skipper, trying to con her into falling asleep (I do this by ignoring her and pretending to sleep myself, which often results in my actual sleeping), and she rolled over, kicking her blankets off. A few minutes later, she said "Mama, why my blankets fall off?" and I said grudgingly "I don't know." She thought for a minute and said cheerfully, "Maybe because me did sumfing AWESOME!!!"

Household Update

The kids discovered a common interest in Blue's Clues.

And a common interest in reading. Skipper pretends to read and says long sentences of nonsense words in a very important-sounding voice.

This is the way Dutch looks at you when you interrupt her reading. If looks could say "What the &*$%)_ is so $%^&# important that you have to interrupt me!???!?!?!?" then this one would say that.

Anyway, it's summer this weekend! It was in the 80s today, and sunny ALL DAY. The garden lettuce even got all wilty by late afternoon. (The tomatoes are happy, though.)

This is what part of this afternoon looked like. Skipper continues to be interested in moving water between containers, and Dutch continues to read.

Lastly, look! We got a brand-new bike trailer. With Dutch's new bike- mobility, and my fed-uppedness with all the service cuts the bus has been taking lately, we're entering a new phase in our household transportation life. My plan is to take the kids to their various school/daycare arrangements by bike. We'll see how it goes!

Skipper's first words on waking up today: "Me DO have pants on!"

I suspect she's having the same anxiety dream that I do.

Also, two more Skipperisms:

Orange= "ornjhree"

Pillow= "pohdoh"