Kid Update

Here is another partial post from around November 2013.  Chloe would be nearing four and Abram nearing two. 

Dear Chloe,

You are soon to be four years old.  Just mulling over that sentence is enough to give me writer's block.  I haven't posted about you in so long.  Seriously, I can't find the words.  As a good friend once said, "I imagine it is difficult to capture the essence of Chloe in words," and it is.  Impossible, almost. 

I don't know when or how it happened, but somehow you went from a toddler to a kid.  You are constantly rolling your eyes.  Sometimes just to be funny, and sometimes just to be a shit.  A few months ago while we were lying in your bed just talking I said "well, duh."  You asked me what "duh" meant, and I spent a few minutes trying to teach you.  What I told you was to point to the green grass and ask, Is that blue? and when they respond with, No, it's green, you hit your head with the palm of your hand and say Ummm duh!  Eventually, you gathered a deep enough understanding of the phrase to use in context.  I created a monster. 

You dress yourself in some variation of the same outfit every day: tights, poofy skirt, and shirt (if any of it matches, it's out of pure coincidence).  You went through a phase about a year ago where you would only wear cat shirts.  You are a little more flexible now - typically opting for Hello Kitty shirts, Ninja Turtle shirts, or anything that is two sizes too small or stained.  You have a giant collection of hand-me-down poofy skirts, so finding one is never a problem. 

You go to preschool twice a week.  You love your teachers, Miss Ronda and Miss Susan, so much.  Your best friend in the whole world is in your class, Ezra.  He is basically one of the only kids you play with and you are so obsessed with him it's frightening.  Your teachers are so amazed at how smart you are and especially at how strong you are.  They say they have never had a kid in "3's" who can make it all the way across the monkey bars with no assitance.  You are a beast!

Abram loves trucks, cars, tractors, and trains; he demands to wear shirts that display trucks, cars, tractors, or trains; and, he can say only the essential words: snacKK, coo-kee, juish, NO, and shoe.  He is a shoe fanatic.  I mean, seriously, it's pretty annoying.  Kid has been throwing his shoes in my face since he was 14 months.  Recently he acquired a pair of lace-up Spiderman shoes that are four sizes too big and untie/fall off constantly.  We ended up hiding them after weeks of cursing. 

**And, oh my gosh, that is all I wrote about my sweet boy.  Poor guy!  I recall a few things about this age of his, though.  I don't recall exactly when we threw out the pacifier, but I feel like it was sometime around here.  He kept chucking them all over the place and losing them.  We finally decided that when he lost the last paci that would be the end of it.  When he finally lost the last paci I recall he cried for it at night and during naps for at least a week.  I was terrified, because Abram's best trait his whole babyhood was that he slept like an angel.  He often put himself to bed for naps and he always slept through the night.  Mostly, he just loved to go up and snuggle with Blanky and his paci.  It's funny, in retrospect, how some of the smallest things are these terrifying parenting events in the moment.  I think Abram still slept in the crib at this time, but not for very much longer.  Eventually we moved the kids into the same bedroom and they were so thrilled.  Abram loved having a big bed, but especially loved sleeping next to his big sister and best friend.

Harry and the Hendersons

Here is part of a post I found in my "drafts" from about a year ago in October 2013:

I taught Chloe at an early age to watch television.  I mean, I had her on a pretty strict training schedule.  If you are wondering about the intensity of the daily regimen, I would compare it to something similar to training for the Olympics, or something like that.  She got pretty good at watching television.  She is a fast learner, and a dedicated athlete.  We started with Sesame Street: baby stuff, literally.  We moved on to Dora, then to her kind of sexy cousin, Diego.  Things started to spiral out of control after I made the discovery that we had Nickelodeon.  We never knew this, because we never bothered with the channels that were not delivered in HD, because it burns my eyes.  We hit rock bottom I'd say somewhere in the middle of a SpongeBob Square Pants and Cow and Chicken marathon on Cartoon Network.  I'm getting really off track here.  Point is, Chloe is really good at watching TV whenever anyone needs a little break from her madness. 

Abram, on the other hand, does not ever even glance in the direction of the glowy picture shows.  He is immune to the beauty of it all.  He is above it: the lowest of all forms of human entertainment.  Why would he bother with the TV when he could be raiding the snack cabinet saying, "nack, nack, nack" or raiding the fridge saying, "cheeez, cheeez, cheeez" or raiding the pantry saying, "coo-kee, coo-kee, coo-kee."  He hasn't yet figured out that eating while watching TV is the true American way.  So, all of this, all of this babbling is just unnecessary, because what I really want to say is that we finally found a show that Abram likes to watch.  It's a movie, actually, and if you were alive in the late 80's you might know of it: Harry and the Hendersons.  This little dude will sit there with his giant, blue eyes glued to the screen for the entire movie. 

That is where it ends.  I totally forgot about that and it makes me sad that having two kids has basically derailed this whole blogging business.  I'm going to do my best to jot down a few stories here and there to remember the little things.  Like the movie that turned Abram into a TV watching genius.  Add to that The Sandlot, The Goonies, Ghostbusters, and any other classic 80's/90's kid classic.  Watching TV with Abram is so much better than watching it with Chloe.  Kid's got taste.

The Severed Arm

Last week we visited Matt and Sara in their new house.  Sara must have been in the middle of putting away her Halloween decorations and the first thing Chloe noticed upon entry was the bloody, severed rubber arm lying in the middle of the living room.  Terrified, she ran and hid.  Upon the realization that Chloe was scared of the arm, Paul seized the opportunity to chase her around the house with it while she literally screamed in horror.  Later that evening we sat in the basement listening to a Bob and Tom song called TOAST!  The adults lounged on the couch cracking up at the song.  Chloe sat and listened, occasionally smiling and forcing a laugh.  The next day Chloe said to me, “Mom, remember when Matt played that song about toast?  Well, while he played it I kept imagining that the arm was upstairs dancing.”  She laughed a little.  I held mine back.  I told Paul about it later that night basically ending the story in tears from laughing so hard.  I told him I just envision her sitting there in that basement looking at all of the stupid, stupid adults as they laugh and laugh, because don’t they know there is a freaking severed arm upstairs dancing in the office?  I love moments like that to remind me what it feels like to be a child.  Like, 50% thinking your parents are the best people in the whole world and 50% thinking your parents are just enormous assholes.