Preschool: Week 1-2 Report

Week 1

Day 1: Tuesday, Noah BURST out of the car, ran for the door, and by the time I got there, was pounding on the door to be admitted. He dashed for the classroom, and by the time I came from signing him in, he was already on a mat with some other kids playing with blocks. He held a hand up like "I'm busy, woman -- come back later." I heard him when he realized I'd gone, just as I stepped out the door. The director patted my arm reassuringly. "Call when you get to work -- he'll be fine."

I called. He was fine.

Day 2: Wednesday Noah was a little less exuberant, but still eager, though vigilant about making sure I stayed. Cried when I left. "Call" the director said. I called. He was fine.

Day 3: Now he was ready. He melted down the moment I moved toward the door. School request is for a bandaid-removal-fast departure, so I kissed and left him howling in his teacher's arms.

Day 4: "I don't want to beeeeeee here!" He sobbed the whole way into the school from the car. I had to peel him off me and hand him to his teacher, then slink away like an ashamed dog.

Week 2

Day 1: What? We were going there again? NOOOO! "I don't want to be here!" Crying and much gnashing of teeth. Teacher thanked me for being so resiliant with the "fast departure" policy -- that he's fine within minutes of my leaving and has fun and is already progressing during the day. He howls in her arms as I leave.

Day 2: He professes that he doesn't want to be there, and for the first time requests to go to day care instead, but walks in willingly holding my hand all the way into the classroom, where I kiss him and transfer his hand to his teacher. He whines, but does not howl. I arrive in the afternoon to find out that he's had two accidents and needs new pants in his storage bin; he's in the school's rather alarming pair of red sweatpants.

Today is Day 3. We went early, and he weakly objected that he didn't want his teacher, but left me signing him in and walked to the early-morning care room, and as I joined him, we found a bin of plastic alligators -- what's not to like? I kissed and departed, and heard him TELL the teacher that he wanted his Mommy, but not only no howling, but not even crying.

When I picked him up after lunch, his teacher told me that he had had another accident, and what she's doing about it. She also told me that where last week he had been in full-on wracking sobs when I left, this week he hasn't been nearly as upset, and I told her that he hadn't even cried this morning, and she practically high-fived me.

Already I see the changes in my beloved boy. He talks to me in full sentences in the car, and I'm cherishing the extra time to talk in the car. He responds much more verbally now -- something that the teacher is working on. When he was surrounded by younger kids, he had a less-than-ideal tendency to just whine, and not tell you what's wrong. She's working with him to verbalize what's bothering him, as I've been. So in the car, we discussed and quizzed and discussed again about "When you need to go potty, what do you do?" until his consistent response was "I find my teacher and tell her I need to go to the bathroom."

She tells me, too, that he's adjusting to the structure of the class -- standing and sitting on the line, sitting quietly during story time, etc. He hasn't had any of that structure, really, to this point, and that he's starting to get it in the first 2 weeks of school is just amazing to me. And yet, he went to the service for erev Rosh Hashanah last night and made it through almost all of a nearly 2 hour service, and also through the children's service today. This would have been unheard of before.

It's hard to take him from the warm, womb-like loving environment of day care and put him into a place with people he doesn't know and who don't already love him. I feel like I'm already having to participate in "hardening" him for the big bad world, and that maks me a little bit sad. But I also continue to feel that this is such a good environment for him.... If we can just survive the transition, I'll be happy.

Let's wait until the last minute, shall we?

My boy is the master of the last minute. Just about the time that I'm certain that something's terribly wrong with him and he's going to fall way off the developmental curve, he takes one last deep breath and does whatever he's due to do as if it's nothing. He walked like that. He talked like that. I was ready for teh showdown of the century over the pacifier -- and he just handed it to me and walked away. It's crazy.

And so we went to preschool orientation on Friday, where I explained that Noah's been slow to get the hang of pooping in the potty. And today, with 2 days to go, he got it. Got it. I mean, just completely got it.

And as a reward, he now has Lightning McQueen AND Mickey Mouse underpants.

I just wish there were some way that he could telegraph his planned moves a little more, so that I don't fret quite so much about whether we're going to get there....

Human again? Maybe.

Today, I realized that I felt like myself again consistently for long enough that it felt weird to NOT feel like myself briefly in the afternoon.

What?

Let me try that again. Somewhere around the time I discovered I was pregnant, I began to feel like, well, SOMEONE ELSE. Blame hormones, blame exhaustion, blame a whole mass of life changes -- but for nearly 4 years, I've felt like more than a bit of a stranger to myself. Dark moods. Angry patches. Frustration after frustration. Resentful that there was no time for me, once I'd done taking care of children and husband and job and family.

Its worst was probably shortly after we moved into our house, just about 2 years ago. I hadn't seen my own things for over a year, and I'd felt like a guest in my husband's home for that entire time -- and I was tired of living on eggshells. It was nice, once we got here, to think that I would feel like an equal participant -- and yet, it wasn't that easy.

And admittedly -- it's hard to make a marriage the way we did it. Never doubt that I love my husband, and married him because I chose him, and wanted to spend my life with him. It's just that so much happened at once, in part because of our ages -- and when I turned up pregnant, well, there was wedding planning and execution, not to mention packing and selling my house, then packing and selling his house after finding OUR house. It was, for all practical purposes, 2 solid years of packing SOMETHING, and the first things packed (my things from my house) were the last into this house (thanks to the convenience of Store-to-Door). And both sleep deprived while we tried to settle into THIS house, and make sure that neither child was slighted in the process... Exhausting, physically and emotionally.

And my brain wrote checks my aging body couldn't cash, frankly -- I simply underestimated how exhausting being the mother of a small child at my age would be. I'm always flattered by the shocked response when I tell someone that I'm 43, but as good as my eye cream is, HEY! I'M 43! With a 3-year-old! Someone get me a drink and a cushion for my feet! I've earned it!

I used to be proactively organized, prepared, and on top of things. The last few years have been an exercise in staying just ahead of emergencies, and in all honesty, resenting that my hubby doesn't seem to care about how many balls I have in the air, as he plunks down in front of the TV to watch some monster-creature devour half-witted city folk in a rural setting on the SCIFI channel. So I may have made a routine of cleaning the kitchen and bathroom every Saturday morning, but I ticked off on my list how long it had been since HE cleaned the kitchen or bathroom. And felt much less like myself, and much more like a scullery maid.

Today, all day, I felt like myself. This evening, I even had a moment of feeling as efficient and capable as I think I maybe used to be, and I really liked it. And I realized that perhaps I've come out of the long shadows of childbirth and early motherhood.

As I prepare my boy to go to preschool on Tuesday, and as I look in astonishment at his enormous feet, and try to figure out what size DOES come after 5T, and lament slightly that I won't ever need to lift his butt by his feet in order to slide a diaper under it again, I feel like an old friend has come over, sat down next to me, and asked if she can stay for awhile. And with delight, I realize that she is me.

I cannot believe tomorrow is his last day.

Almost exactly 3 years ago, I realized that I was a month from going back to work, and began to panic. I had no idea how to find or pick a day care provider, no one to ask for references -- nothing. Fortunately, our local government provides a certification program, and a database of certified in-home day care providers on their website. I printed the list, highlighted the ones that looked plausible by location and a few other characteristics, and began making calls.

I eliminated a lot of options right away. Some people you just know are too nutty to take care of your heart child by talking to them on the phone. I made interview appointments with most of the rest of them, and went to meet them. A few, you could eliminate just by walking into the house. Finally, I settled on a woman who struck me as, well, just fine. She'd do. Nice enough, clean house, didn't have a basement full of toys that she clearly sent the kids into each day while she watched television, agreed with me about not having the kids watch TV all day -- I didn't love her, but she'd do, at least for the initial period of time. I asked her to hold me a spot; I'd come over the next week to sign the paperwork. She was going out of town that weekend -- I should call on about Tuesday.

The next week, and this is now the Tuesday before I go back to work on Monday, I called her. When could I come over to sign the contract? Oh, goodness -- someone else who had interviewed with her had come over during the weekend and signed a contract, and she didn't have space available now. What? She was supposed to be out of town until Tuesday! She was holding a spot for me! Well, you know, something happened and she didn't go, and she couldn't say no to a booked spot....

This happened while I was in the customer service area of Kohl's, breastfeeding after having spent the last hour trying on pants that would fit my postpartum body, and blouses that would allow me to pump at the office. It was all I could do not to just sit there and cry.

Resolute, I bought my new breastfeeding-mother-work-clothes and went home, and back to my list. No, I'd talked to EVERYONE on the list. I sighed heavily. I went back to the computer, ran the search again on the daycare provider database, and printed the results. I took Noah to the bedroom to try to get him to nap while I looked for something, SOMETHING that I'd missed.

Two new names. Two names I hadn't called. I checked. They hadn't been on the list before. I called them and made appointments for the next evening.

The first was nice, very organized -- I'd have loved her as a coworker. She was, though, I thought a little too HARD for my purposes. I wanted someone who would love and cuddle my little boy, and I just couldn't see it.

I went to the second one. My last option befor breaking into Big! Commercial! Daycare! I walked into her house, sat down -- I think on the floor with her -- and knew. We talked, she looked at Noah and cooed (but in a very professional way) about what a cutie he was. Yes, she hadn't had an opening, but there had been a mom who had reserved early in her pregnancy and there had been complications.... So sad, the thought of having gone through this far in advance, only to have something go so terribly wrong. But lo! an OPENING! She handed me a stack of papers; her contract, some information, an emergency contact sheet... I saw her hand. Her ring. I recognized it immediately: Hebrew, reading "I am my beloved's and my beloved is mine..."

"Are you Jewish?"

"No," she laughed, "but my husband gave it to me...." We talked for a moment about religion, about her church, and about her philosophy about her day care kids. No, I didn't need to worry about Noah coming home singing "Yes Jesus Loves Me."

I told her that I'd call her the next day. By the time I got home, about a short 6 blocks, I was sure. I told my husband, who was really leaving the decision to me.

The first working day of October of 2004, I trundled my little boy into clothes, his "bucket," and into the car, and took him to "Car-Car's" house. And he has gone there, except for holidays and her occasional vacations, every day that I've gone to work, ever since.

To Be Continued....

Just entirely too funny....

Utterly unrelated to my child.

My brother just made me aware of LOLCATS. So far, this one...
...is my favorite. And someday I'll unleash my inner death cat at him for introducing me to this vicious time-suck.

Noah says "NO!"

It's been an interesting week here at the spherical home, because Noah's day care provider has been on a well-deserved vacation from her charges, and we had to play tag-team to handle the little guy during his week off.

I spent the whole day Monday with him, Daddy got Tuesday and Wednesday, we split Thursday, and I got today. It was mostly a lot of fun.

Yesterday and today, I'll admit, I used the TV as more of a babysitter than I'd usually be okay with, in order to get some work done, as I was on a deadline. But once that was past us this morning, we hopped in the car, went to the grocery store, got a bundle of balloons and a gift for a colleague who's having a baby next month, and then tried to entertain ourselves for the weekend.

After a week of rain and cold temperatures, suddenly today it was 95 degrees and 210% humidity and just as miserable out as you can imagine. Oh, plus bugs. Never forget the mosquitos.

At 2:00, we tried the playground, but the equipment was simply too hot to play on. Noah ended up inside the tube in the only cool spot, requesting that his claustrophobic mama climb in there with him. "Nothing doing, kid." We went home, and I began making a case to go to the pool. "nope, I don't want to," he told me. "I want to go outside." "Nope, I don't want to," I replied, "because it's too hot outside, unless we go to the pool." He picks up a Mickey Mouse plushy, and in a funny voice says "Mickey says no." I took the debate to Mickey. "Wouldn't it be nice? In the pool and the water? Where it's not so hot? We could go get in the pool, and swim, and be cool and outside at the same time!" "No," Mickey replied, "Mickey says no." This debate went on for some time. Finally a very serious voice announced his bottom line: "Noah says NO!" Oh my. I hardly knew how to respond, except to tickle him.

Spherical Hubby arrived home around 4:30, and I explained the predicament. "C'mon, let's go to the pool," Hubby announced. Somehow this made it okay. We went, and for 2 hours, Noah splashed and played and had a complete blast. "You realize we could have been here all afternoon," I pointed out to no avail. We had to drag him out of the pool at 6:45 to go home to dinner. He's too tired to eat, even -- lying on the sofa beside me, watching a Tivo-ed Mickey Mouse Clubhouse episode, and fighting sleep.

The end of a long and wonderful week.

Day 5 and counting....

Noah has not had wet pants in 5 days. Well, except at night. He still occasionally doesn't wake up at night -- and I'm very very not worried about that.

But when he came home from day care last Friday he was dry, and he stayed dry all weekend, and then with our daycare provider on vacation this week, one of us has been with him the entire time, and he has not had a single accident.

In fact, this morning he joined me when I went to the bathroom, and suddenly I realized he was WAITING HIS TURN, and successfully held it until it was his turn and everything turned out just fine.

He starts preschool in a week. Much like his mother, my boy makes his deadlines -- sometimes at the last possible moment, but he makes them.

In other news, he's gaining shocking control over his farts, and shares them with us with relish. He also informed me that I "smelled like an elephant's butt" on Monday. But he still loves me, and tells me he loves me, even if I DO smell like an elephant's butt. And Monday, with a very sincere face he told me that he was "soaking happy."

Motherhood rocks.

He's so soaking cute!

My grammatically brilliant boy.... He has concluded from context that "soaking" is simply an indication of extremeness. Soaking wet is, after all, just REALLY wet.

I learned about his new vocabulary word one morning when I was asking him to go to the potty.

Me: "Noah, do you need to go potty?"

Him: "No, Mom -- I'm soaking dry."

It is to laugh...

But now it's expanded to beyond the underpants. Last weekend, it became "soaking dark" outside at night. Monday morning, his bagel was "soaking delicious."

That boy is soaking hysterical!

Flying solo....

Two weeks ago, I returned from vacation, having spent nearly 24 hours a day for 2 weeks straight with my little boy. Tomorrow morning, I do something I have never done -- I leave him behind for a two-day trip. I'm surprised at how hard it is to do this. It's the trip of a lifetime, though -- and something I'll share with him when he gets older, that will hopefully make him think that just perhaps, his Mama is one of the coolest Mamas on earth.

In the meantime, we're in the final month count-down to preschool, and not QUITE potty trained, but making tremendous progress. Backsliding was bad in Scotland, but he's back to nearly completely dry all day when prompted to go by his day care provider, and often into the evening. And today? Successful peeing standing up. Some resistance -- but overcome by floating Captain Crunch Crunchberries in the toilet for target practice.

This morning he informed me that Superman can't fly because he doesn't have feathers. Smart kid.

A report from the road....

Hubby just called to report that in an afternoon of blistering fast pace and moving from one appointment to another for teen son and hubby and dog, Noah did the ride-along with aplomb. And when they went into the house to quickly change clothes and pick up the dog, Noah did the following amazing things:

• FIRST, he took his shoes off by himself.


• SECOND, he took his own pants off all by himself.


• THIRD, he got up on the potty on his own.


• FOURTH, he peed, unbidded by adults.


• FIFTH, he got off the potty without assistance.


• SIXTH, he attempted to put his pants back on without help. He did this, unfortunately, with his underpants upside down, so with minimal success.

My boy! A potty-going genius! Bring on the preschool!

Some thoughts on being frisked by airport security...

So there we were, we three -- Noah in a stroller, hubby and I each carrying our carry-on bags, and desperately trying to put everything into those little plastic bins that might make the metal detector go off, in addition to stripping off our shoes in close quarters, folding the stroller, and trying to explain to a 3-year-old to go through the weird doorway and wait on the other side for the next one of us to come through, while the one remaining tried to shove the stroller through the xray machine somewhat like shoving a large onion into a Thanksgiving turkey.

And it should be no surprise that SOMETHING had to throw off those amazing coordination efforts -- and it was me. I went through the metal detector and it went off. I took everything out of my pockets, all my jewelry off -- everything into a tiny bin to go through the xray machine. And then it went off again. And they asked me very sternly NOT to touch Noah, and to go sit in the sequestered area for more *ahem* personal attention. Hubby managed to get all of the rest of our cargo together, stroller reassembled, and maintain calm with the 3-year-old, while I sat in a chair with my feet in the footprints in front of it and prepared for the worst.

A very considerate and respectful woman in her late 20s, I'd guess, came over and respectfully and apologetically told me that she would have to wand me down, and *gasp* possibly touch me. As she wanded, I remembered the barette holding my hair out of my eyes, and I called it to her attention. Sure enough, the wand went off as it passed over my head, and she checked out the barette, but she also at that point had to complete a full-body scan with the wand. And politely explained that if the wand went off anywhere else, she would have to *eek* touch me, but would use the back of her hand whenever possible, so I wouldn't feel it was too intrusive. About the third time she explained that she would be as respectful as possible, I stopped her.

Her: "Ma'am, I'll have to touch you now, because the wand went off near your armpit, but I'll use the back of my hand just enough to determine if it was your underwire that set off..."

Me (interrupting): "Honey, you do what you need to. I completely understand."

Her: "Yes, but I want to be sure that you don't feel that this is too intrusive..."

Me (interrupting again; such a rude wanding victim): "Okay, listen -- I've given birth. You can't do anything to me that, let's be honest, hasn't been done before."

Her (laughing): "Well, no one's told me THAT before...."

Me: "They're probably thinking it."

Her (laughing): "Okay, so I'm going to have to check inside the waistband of your pants..."

Me: (Dissolving into hysterical laughter)

It was as fast, painless, and polite as a frisking could be, and dare I say it? I almost enjoyed the opportunity to interact with them a little more than "Okay, here are your shoes back."

That was the outbound trip. On the inbound trip, we came through Newark, and after being in the UK for two weeks, I just have to say that this was NOT the first vision of the US that I wanted. With the exception of the one woman who helped us find the tram to the other terminal, I have never encountered such an unhelpful bunch of "customer service" professionals in my life. For example: After coming through customs (for which we had to pick up our checked bags, go through a tremendously huge line, and then go re-check our bags, on a one-hour layover), we were confronted with a sign that read "Go to the left if your departure is in less than one hour. Go to the right to exit the airport, or for departures after more than one hour." Our departure was now in 30 minutes. The "customer service" rep barked "To your right" at us. We looked at the sign. She sighed heavily. "TO YOUR RIGHT. KEEP MOVING." We read the sign again, and I cocked my head like a puppy. "Our flight is in 30 minutes," I said calmly. She sighed like I was trying to get away with something sneaky. "Oh, alright, go to the left." We tossed our bags back on the conveyer belt and took off at a dead run for our gate, arriving just at the end of boarding....

But not until we'd encountered their security checkpoint. Similarly, someone was barking instructions. We walked up, she checked our passports, and then pointed to a long line waiting to go through the air-puffing device. I thought "oh God in heaven, how are we going to get Noah through THAT?" But we began unburdening ourselves of our jackets, shoes, carry-on bags, crashing the stroller into compact mode... Then it became clear that there was another line that was shorter, to go through a second metal detector. They diverted us around the puffy-machine to a hidden metal detector (presumably because of the presence of 3-year-old), and grunted at us until we went one by one through the machine, then didn't like how we'd done it and we had to go back and they grunted impatiently to do it again, and then once we'd all passed, someone back in the line barked something about the bags not going through the xray machine, and we had to go BACK out through the metal detector to (I can't even understand this) push our bags up the conveyer belt manually to the xray machine, and then go through the metal detector AGAIN. And THEN we ran madly for our gate, arriving at the tail end of boarding for our flight. Only to discover that on this commuter flight which had one seat on one side of the aisle and two on the other, somehow they'd booked our tickets in sequential rows of the one-seat side, so that our 3-year-old would be, and who would possibly allow this, sitting alone. Fortunately the others on our flight were more accomodating than the security staff, and allowed us to swap seats.

But perhaps I digress. OUTGOING security, at any rate, is just as lovely as it can be - enough to make you want to write a glowing note to someone's supervisor, or send a holiday card to the security agent herself.

Inbound through New Jersey? Welcome to the US, m*therf&cker. Just keep moving.

31 hours dry!

This weekend, we achieved a minor miracle -- over 24 hours of dry pants. Since it's only a little over a month into Potty Training Boot Camp, I think this is high achievement!

Saturday morning, I set the poor guy up for failure by leaving him in training pants and taking him to the zoo, with no idea on earth how we were going to do the potty thing there. Fortunately, he ran into one of the mist areas (it was darned hot!) and got soaked to the skin, so hey - his pants were wet, but unattributable. We changed into a pullup at noon after lunch, since we'd be in the car for awhile and potty availability at G-ma and Poppy's house was unclear.

But there *was* a potty seat available, and lo, he was still dry. And an hour later, he asked and went to the potty again, and was still dry. And we got home, and throughout the evening we had two requests to go potty, and he remained dry. And he asked to go potty right before bed, and to everyone's shock and amazement, he slept until 8:30 the next morning (a personal sleep-in record for a guy who is my 6:30 alarm clock most days) and WAS STILL DRY! And remained so (except when we were in the pool, and again -- unattributable) until around 7:00 that night -- by my calculations a full 31 hour stretch of dryness!

Last night? Not so dry. Two sets of wet pants AND an ew-factor incident. And this morning, his pullup was as full as its ever been when he decided to deign to go potty.

But life is full of movement forward, periods of greatness, backsliding, and then moving forward again -- and I'm starting to feel a little sad that there'll be a day soon when I won't have to say "Pick up your tuschie!" to slip a diaper under it, and his little butt will always run around in those little cloth underpants that make me want to knock him down on the ground and nibble on him, he's so cute in them.

Where oh where did vinyl training pants go?

Now really, how hard is this? We have training pants. I bought a dozen extra this weekend for emergencies. No problem. I mean, a little hard to come by, but once I found a source, no problem. Got 'em. Got enough. We're in good shape.

But the little vinyl pants you put OVER them? IM-FREAKIN'-POSSIBLE to find. I've tried online, I've tried stores, I've tried specialty stores, I've been to Toys-R-Us and similar, I've been EVERYWEHRE I could think of.

And then this morning, something said to me "Come! Come to Walmart! One more time! C'mon! Look one more time!"

And lo! There they were. Three packages, three each, a size probably just at the small end of what he can wear -- but HIP HIP HOORAY! Got 'em!

Now I can give back the one his DCP sent him home in last week that I've been harboring jealousy over while it was in our laundry. Whew!

And, I can't believe I'm saying this - Yay Walmart!

Potty Training Boot Camp: HOUSTON WE HAVE LIFTOFF!

Allow me to scream it from the rooftops:

HALELLUJIAH! By George, I think he's got it!

Yesterday morning, we began the routine of going to the potty every hour or so, and each time, we had just missed the window of opportunity. The change was that he was heartbroken each time, and cried inconsolably that we hadn't made it - I felt terrible for the little guy, and did as much as I could to reenforce that we were going to master the potty, and he was doing SO WELL, and we'd get it soon, I could just tell.

Then we went out for the afternoon and got into a pullup because who knew if we'd be near a bathroom.

And then we went to a party, and went swimming in my friend's pool -- and before he'd go into the pool, he insisted that he had to go potty (with little effect) and then NOW we could go in the pool.

And then we got home, and then through the evening, we'd find him holding his crotch, we'd say "You want to go potty?" and he'd run to the bathroom -- AND PEE! He stayed dry the whole evening, peed 3 times, and went to bed in the dry pants he'd been wearing all evening.

Overnight? We'll deal with that hurdle later. But this morning, after breakfast, he went to the potty and IMMEDIATELY peed, and so far, so good today!

I think my boy is figuring it out. I'm so proud.

Potty Training Boot Camp: End of Week Three

I went to a Premier Jewelry show last night, and was out of the house until nearly what would be regular bedtime at our house. When I walked into the house, I was greeted by my jubilant husband.

"Noah made a poopie and peepee in the potty," he announced. Then he went back to watching an alien slaughter most of the life on Earth on the SciFi channel.

I went upstairs to find Noah watching Shrek in our bed, curled up with several plastic dinosaurs, and a wooden skillet and fried egg. "I hear you used the potty!" I said as I entered, and he stood up and shouted that yes, he had made a poopie AND a peepee. Then he began reenacting the scene where Princess Fiona makes the bird explode, and then cooks the eggs from the nest for Shrek.

We're not all the way there, but I'm feeling more and more confident that he'll be potty-compatible by September. Or, as my father would say, "close enough for government work."

Caught talkin' naughty at day care!

Uh-oh. Cheese it - the cops! Noah's been caught "talking naughty."

It is not an uncommon turn of phrase in our house to refer to someone as a dumbass, when it's appropriate. I think that's going to have to stop. This morning on arrival at day care, I was told that after several days of pondering, our DCP has finally determined that no, Noah was not calling his buddy Jonathan "Thomas" for some inscrutible reason -- he was calling him a dumbass.

Now, she had to acknowledge that his use of the word and his delivery were perfect. It was always when Jonathan was doing something that Noah didn't like and he was "instructing" him to do something differently, and his intonation was perfect. And yet -- this is bad, and it's got to stop.

Because it came up in the context of something else incomprehensible that Noah's been doing that I was able to shed light on today. He breaks into this little song sometimes, and I finally was able to place it: he was singing Ricky Martin's "Shake your Bon Bon." In one of his movies, some character sings about 2 lines of it, and that's Noah's entire exposure to the song. Here comes the hysterically charming part: he doesn't know the words, so what he's singing is this:

Chicken - BAWK BAWK!

Now he has all 4 boys at day care singing it too.

Other things that we're trying to discontinue include absolutely perfect use of the name of a large segment of our society's savior in vain, and impersonation of an Asian comic. Let me explain.

My beloved husband (SphericalFrictionlessBull?) has an Asian friend who self-parodies when he's said something silly by taking on an exaggerated Chinese accent and saying "You funny, AAAH!" SFBull found this funny and started doing it too. Okay, Jewish American using mock Asian accent strikes me as a little inappropriate for reasons I can't seem to properly express to him, and he persists in doing it, and encouraging Noah to do it. I persist in trying to stop Noah from doing it. Most of the time, at least in my presence, he doesn't add the "AHH!" part, and so I'm okay with that. I'm just praying that he's not setting our little boy up for an Asian gang ass-whoopin' later in life.

Second story: Last week one night, I'm guessing the dog sat down next to Noah and farted. And he responded just exactly the same way that I would -- with a hearty "Oh, JESUS, Lucy!" You know, for us, it's not taking the Lord's name in vain or anything -- I don't think too terribly much about it if I let an "Oh Jesus" escape my lips in frustration. I'll admit -- I've laughed at the occasional "Oh Jesus" from my toddler, too. It seems so adult on him.

But when I saw it from our (oh, egad) delightful and Christian day care provider's eyes as we talked this morning, I realized that it was clearly something we need to put an end to, to be appropriately respectful of her, and you know, the hundreds of Christian friends we have.

And of course this is the perfect time to mention that before he could say Ls with any allacrity, Noah would occasionally address his "flock" (a la Wiley T Sheep from Jakers!), and sound like he was uttering the dreaded F-word....

So, to summarize, clearly I need to maintain the following....

LIST OF FORBIDDEN UTTERANCES

• Oh Crap! - primarily uttered by SS14


• Dumbass! - primarily uttered by SphericalFrictionlessCow and Bull


• Oh, Jesus! - ditto


• The dreaded F-word, or anything that sounds like it


• Any song by Ricky Martin, unless rewritten to refer to barnyard foul

I'm sure the list will continue to grow.

And then, there's normal life

You know, even with the honeymoon, there are occasional bouts of non-honeymoon. Friday morning, I came upstairs to convince my boy to come down for breakfast and put on clothes and go potty, and found him sitting at the top of the stairs reading FOX IN SOCKS to the dog. I rounded the corner, said "Come down for breakfast now," and he responded by shouting to the dog:

Hey look! A great ugly ogre!

It's not all smooching all the time. That's probably a good thing.

Second honeymoon

I read in one of the parenting books that around the 3rd birthday is the start of what the author referred to as a "second honeymoon" between the child and the mother, and I had no idea that it would be so profound. After a period of fairly intense "I do it myself" style independence, suddenly my son is a ball of affection that, if I could find a way to bottle and sell it, would solve the loneliness problems of the entire world. I'm greeted each evening when I get home from work by a child who screams "MOMMY!" at the top of his lungs and runs to hug me. Each morning, a little voice from down the hall calls for me, and when I go see his little descheveled morning face, he looks up at me with beaming eyes and requests that I come snuggle with him. In the evening, he comes upstairs with me before bed, gets into bed with me and we curl up and watch a cartoon together. He pats my face. He holds my hand. He tells me that he loves me. Sometimes he gazes at me and tells me that I'm his sunshine.

Now don't get me wrong -- he loves his Daddy. He likes hanging out with Daddy. He likes going out and playing in the yard, and going for walks, and periodically he announces that he wants to go fishing, which is the way to his father's heart. There's a lot of love there, too.

But the sheer volume of affection at this stage in his development is staggering. I wish I could bottle it and store it away for about 12 years from now, when he thinks I'm the most horrible dumbass to walk the face of the planet.

Weekend 1 - Making friends with the potty!

Things throttled back at Potty Training Boot Camp this weekend. Let's be honest -- there's just a lot to do over the weekend, and staying 10 steps from a toilet is out of the question in some circumstances. So we switched back to pull-ups for the weekend, but maintained a fairly healthy schedule of spending time on the potty both days. And I am pleased to make the following declaration:

I HAVE WITNESSED MY SON PEEING IN THE POTTY!

Now, apparently this wouldn't be exciting news at day care, where it's a routine occurance. But for me, it's a first since we started this process, and I was pretty darned excited, even though most of it ended up on the floor somehow.

We've gone from a lollipop for EVERY trip to the potty to a lollipop randomly, in order to reenforce the behavior more solidly. (I read several places that inconsistent reenforcement is more successful than 100%, because hey! what's the fun if you know you can do it and get a lollipop. But if you do it and SOMETIMES you get one -- that's worth testing again and again! See for reference all those crazies sitting in front of slot machines in Las Vegas.)

The consistent reenforcement method now is that 100% of the time that he actually makes a deposit, he gets to flush, and flushing is COOL. So now it's all about being allowed to flush. How easily he's entertained.

I brought a TV tray into the bathroom, too, which allows him to sit for 10 minutes or more at a time while he plays with playdough, and the extra playdough time has led to some impressive artistic efforts.

In other news, Noah got a new haircut this weekend and actually did not cry to the point of vomiting on his mother this time -- I consider that progress as well. We also had time to go to the pool, where he jumped in from the side (in water wings) without holding Mommy's hand, and other than horking up a good cup of pool the one time he went all the way under and the resulting discussion of how you have to CLOSE YOUR MOUTH when you go under, the pool trip was a complete success. And on Sunday we went to the mall, played in the huge tube crawl thing, and went to see Shrek in the theater, also a first time for Mommy but not a first time for day care.

Yesterday morning we transitioned back into big boy pants for the ride to day care, and again this morning, and each morning a very willing but unproductive sit on the potty before we left and after breakfast. I'm trying to introduce a schedule change to make the potty sit the FIRST thing we do, but he's not buying yet.

So at day 9, not HUGE progress, but all steady forward progress, and some fabulous playdough art, to boot!

Potty Training - Day 4 and start of Day 5

Thursday morning started much like Wednesday. A cheerful "Okay!" when it was suggested that he could get a lollipop for using the potty, and no action, but a banana lollipop. (Banana? Who's idea was THAT?)

Thursday nights, Noah and his Daddy go out to dinner while Mommy fences (for fun, see my blog on the subject here. So although I skipped class, Daddy had soloed at a restaurant with a potty-training 3-year-old, and my hat is off to him for trying it. He got home and needed to be changed, and Daddy, having had enough, put him in a diaper. But we did do another potty-sit after they got home, and in the middle of watching Elmo Potty Time on DVD. Which held Noah's attention, I might add, much longer than I thought it would.

Day 5 was just more of the same morning routine -- a happy "okay!" and willing hopping on the potty, presentation of lollipop, and then a very quick "Okay I done now." I convinced him to stay on while I put on my makeup, but he wasn't there very long. I'm thinking about using the little DVD player in the bathroom to hold his attention, actually.

I talked to his day care provider, Car-Car, about the regular schedule so we can maintain it over the weekend, and she tells me that he does potty-sits 1) after arrival in the morning, 2) mid-morning, 3) before lunch, 4) after lunch, and 5) after nap. They're about 15 minutes each (how DOES she do that? oh yes, she gives him those tiny M&Ms!) and he does actually pee when he's on the potty for her. At home? No joy. She did notice that he's been waiting to poop at home (and frankly so had I).

But after week 1 of Potty Training Boot Camp, I think the progress of him willingly sitting on the potty for any period of time at all as part of his regular routine is a step in the right direction. Here's hoping that the next couple of weeks show the same rate of progress, so that the application and tuition deposit I made for preschool aren't in vain!

And in cute Noah news: Noah's very into THE LAND BEFORE TIME right now. So when he and Daddy got home from dinner, he ran over and hugged my leg and started saying "I'm so glad you're not leaving!" and I thought "what the heck is he thinking?" and then he launched into Ducky's soliloquy from LAND BEFORE TIME 4, I think, about "I'm so glad you're not leaving, I am, I am, and the Great Valley will never ever change nope nope nope." Which shouldn't surprise me, because occasionally he also summons up as much bat-like eerieness as he can and tells me in his best Boris Karlov voice that "Petrie is VEEERY SCARRRRRY!"

Wish us luck on the first 48-hour "solo flight" of potty training boot camp!

Potty Training Boot Camp - Day 3.

Day 3 of potty training boot camp dawned bright and clear. After a few minutes of disorientation when he woke up, which is genetic and he got it from me, he was ready to start the day with unusual enthusiasm. Holding his beanie-baby pig and several plastic friends, he stood at the top of the stairs and announced:

I have to go downstairs! I have to make pancakes!

And so off we went to make pancakes, which he ate with gusto.

Belly filled, I suggested that while we were changing into his clothes, perhaps it would be a good time to sit on the potty. "No thanks," he replied. "I don't have to." I reminded him that boys who sit on the potty get lollipops. "I want to sit on the potty!" he announced, and sped into the bathroom, slipped his pajamas off and hopped up. "A purple one!" he demanded, and sat and kicked his cute feet and licked his lollipo for several minutes while I brushed my teeth and put on makeup.

No outcome, but an overwhelmingly happy potty experience.

Last night? Not one, but TWO poop explosions. Somehow I went from needing tequila to recover from the first one, to being up to my elbows in a toilet, rinsing out a pair of underwear. How quickly the world changes....

Potty Training - Days 1 and 2

We arbitrarily selected Monday as the official start of potty training chez cow, and I thought I'd report in on our progress.

But first, let's stipulate who the "we" is. It's me and my parenting partner -- our day care provider. We frankly didn't even tell my beloved husband that we were doing this. Poor guy didn't even know what was coming.

So yesterday morning, we got up, got breakfast, and I put him in a pair of cloth/vinyl pants instead of a diaper, and off to day care we went. When we arrived, he immediately went under the dining room table and pooped. I felt tremendously guilty about it, but I pointed it out and fled the scene of the crime, thanking God in heaven for the woman he brought me to, who I love far more than she knows for being such a wonderful, willing, and supportive third parent to my son.

I got home last night, and lo! there was my son in the second vinyl/cotton pants arrangement, that I'd taken with him for the trip home. I didn't push going to the potty, and sure enough, as it was time for bed, he was wet, but just wet. Okay. Not a big deal. Cleaned up, changed into a diaper for the night, and went to bed.

I had NO idea how things went during the day yesterday, but this morning we gamely went for round two -- and I put him in a vinyl/cotton pants arrangement and off we went. The report was that after the pooping incident, he'd reluctantly (read: crying hysterically the whole time) sat on the potty, and that during the course of the day, all three boys had managed to pee on the rug, which was now outside.

So I went off to work where the challenges pale by comparison with potty training.

Tonight, I arrived home to find my beloved husband instructing my son in the fine art of reading an LL Bean catalog while sitting on the potty. And he got a lollipop reward for sitting gamely, though producing little.

The horror began shortly after.

We went for a walk, and then came up to watch SHREK for the 300th time in 4 days. And when I began changing him into his pajamas, I caught a whiff of something that made my blood run cold. Cloth pants -- poop. Oh no.

I convinced him to pause Shrek and come into the bathroom, and what came next was Benny Hill-esque, and really only lacked the soundtrack, so please, for effect, just sing it quietly to yourself in your head. I peeked into the pants. Not just poop -- no, he could have generated a little pile of rabbit pellets or one of his more "sturdy" bits -- it was a little pigsquish of poop. I inhaled one last time the clean air of the bathroom, and began peeling the wet, squishy pants off him. Got them to his feet with little ill effect, and asked him to step out. First foot okay, second foot okay -- clear! We made it! NO! He lost his balance, and stepped directly back INTO the pants, collecting approximately 80% of the poop onto the bottom of his foot. I quickly dropped the pants to grab ahold of his foot so he wouldn't run off that way, and thought "oh dear God, what do I do now?" No paper towels in reach, no toilet paper in reach -- but if I really stretched.... REEEEEALLY stretched.... I could get the box of wipes.

Ten wipes later, I had gotten most of the poop off of his foot, but there was a nasty pile of wipes stuck to the bathroom floor in a very unsanitary fashion. But, as I told my beloved son who was whimpering quietly through the whole process -- Hey! Everything can be washed! Even Mommy.

Got the boy cleaned up, and managed to find a Target bag to collect up the wipes, and then use more wipes to clean where the wipes had been, and the little bit of dirty rug. Then I took my bottomless son into the other room to get a diaper on for the night.

And then it dawned on me. The pants. The other 20% of the poop was on the inside of the pants. Dear God, what do you do NOW? And it dawned on me -- WIPES! So I carefully wiped out the interior of the pants, and then *ew!* soaked them clean in the bathroom sink. With everything contained in the pitcher from the potty and the Target bag, I left my beloved and now mostly clean son watching Shrek, went down to regale my darling husband with the tale, and take the evidence out to the trash and into the laundry room, respectively.

And then did one last ritual that seemed appropriate to this milestone in my life. I did a shot of tequila.

Other Jews would say Shehekianu:

Blessed are you, oh Lord our God, Maker of the Universe, for giving us life, for sustaining us, and for enabling us to reach this moment of poop.

Me? Didn't even dawn on me. But I did appreciate God handiwork in the distilling of cactus, and its combination with lime. Yay God! Nice thinking.

My boy is in a diaper for the night, and two pairs of pants are bouncing around on "sanitize" mode in our washing machine, for which I also say "Thanks, God."

More reports as they happen. Wish us luck.

The best compliment EVER.

This morning, my little guy crawled into bed with me, and in no hurry to get in the car, I acquiesced to his request that we "snuggle" for awhile. We turned on Bob the Builder, and cuddled up with his head on my shoulder.

Mommy?

Yes, darling?

I love you, Mommy.

I love you too, snugglebug.

He looked at me very seriously, like he was formulating a complex thought.

Mommy?

Yes, darling?

You make .... glad.

What?

You make .... .... glad.

I make you glad, honey?

Yes. You make me glad.

I'm so flattered....

Three years ago....

Three years ago, I was 10 days shy of my due date, and just learning about the strange world of instinctive medical intervention. I felt fine, I was doing fine, no tests indicated anything was wrong with my baby, and yet my OB had decided that I needed to be induced. Why? Because I was gestational diabetic, and the words "macrosomic" kept creeping into the discussion, despite the fact that twice-weekly ultrasound estimates of his size had him at a very manageable and healthy 8 pounds. Why force things to go early?

My theory: Because they can.

I had been walking around dialated for weeks now, and as I recall, by the time I *did* go into labor two days later, I was trotting around town at a respectable 6 cm dialated, something many other mothers I know fought through long and hard labor to achieve. But at 6cm, there was a (reasonable, I think) fear that if I *did* go into labor, things would happen FAST.

My recollection is that on this day 3 years ago, I had already checked out of work, and my husband had arranged a babysitter for ME -- a friend who spent part of the afternoon sitting at Starbucks watching me have a sugar-free decaf iced vanilla latte, and telling my son through my shirt that it was time to come OUUUUUUUT. He clearly wasn't listening.

Three years ago, I had no idea how much my life was just about to change.

TWO years ago, as we prepared for Noah's 1st birthday, I recall being overwhelmed by the thought that OH MY GOD, He's STAYING! With all of the focus on getting through the first year safely, I guess it had never dawned on me that the first birthday wasn't the final destination -- it was just a milestone along the way.

In that moment, I realized that my life hadn't changed temporarily -- it was forever. Did it really take a whole year for me to come to that realization? I blame sleep-deprivation.

Noah is about to turn 3. He's the most charming little boy and best little friend I could ever imagine. No mother could be prouder than I am. I wonder what I'll laugh at myself about, this time next year?

Oh, the matchbox cars!

My son never had a lovey. I always kinda wanted him to develop an attachment to some object that would bring him comfort, and he had other plans. Didn't need one, I guess. We went through the pacifier phase, but beyond that, no special plush bunny, no blanket, no favorite fluffy toy. And I was a Linus -- I had my blanket well into college (though in a box in my closet for most of those years), so I know the appeal of a lovey.

But then we discovered matchbox cars. OH, MATCHBOX CARS! And better yet, the cars that are associated with the movie CARS! We cannot possibly exist without having Lightning McQueen clutched in a tiny fist at all times. I mean, ALL times. Can you ride a tricycle with a car in your hand? Well, Noah can! Falls asleep with Lightning in his hand, and wakes up with him still there. A boy and his car. It's amazing.

Until the other night, when he *gasp* LEFT LIGHTNING AT DAY CARE! It was a catastrophe of epic proportion, and controlled the actions of two grown adults for several hours, calling to see if the beloved car could be found, arranging to go pick it up, and going to the store where we bought it, to get a BACKUP car, in case of emergency. We actually now have THREE of them, because I couldn't resist buying one for myself, to put on my desk. Like having a pacifier in my pocket all of the time for most of the last 2 years, somehow I feel better with my very own Lightning McQueen in my pocket now...

So now we share a lovey -- a tiny metal racecar. This I would never have anticipated.

The things we argue about....

This morning, after playing in the sink with the beloved Lightning McQueen and Cheerios cars while Mommy showered and dressed, the not-quite-3-year-old who rules my world pedded toward the stairs in his Curious George pajamas requesting breakfast. As we neared the top of the stairs, he turned to me seriously and said "You are my sunshine." I responded, of course, "You are *MY* sunshine." This quickly became a debate.

"No, you are MY sunshine."

"Yes, and you are MY sunshine."

"No, Mommy - you are MY sunshine!"

"And you are MY sunshine too, honey."

"NO! MOMMY! YOU ARE (growling) MYYYYYY sunshine!"

I let him win.

By George, I think she's got it.

AntiqueMommy summarized it perfectly.

Did we pass?

Noah went for an interview to enter Montessori preschool yesterday. Well, they didn't CALL it that; they called it a "visit." Okay. Sure.

We arrived promptly at 8:45 as scheduled. As if I could make that happen if I wanted to. I count this as evidence that God loves us and wants my boy to have an education. We walked in. "This must be NOAH!" the director's daughter (who's probably the assistant director, too) says with delight in her voice. She guides us down to a classroom where we're introduced to the teacher and her assistant, or rather I am -- Noah charges full-throttle through the door and directly up to a group of children I estimate to be approximately twice his age. "Hey, kids! What are you doing? Hey, what's that on your shirt? It's Lightning McQueen! Look! I have Lightning McQueen shoes! Can I play with you?" Within moments, with the bond of common adoration for a cartoon racecar established, my son is being instructed by a 5-y-o boy in the creation of a Pink Tower. Which would be Norman Rockwell beautiful, except that the older boy's technique for showing Noah that his tower isn't right is to kick it over with his foot and tell him to do it again. Okay, he needs some work on pedagogy. And yet, there was no objection from Noah, who gamely built the tower over and over again until he got it right.

Stark contrast alert: I am CERTAIN that at day care, this same incident from one of his buddies would have resulted in a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth. Somehow, though, coming from a bigger older child? Totally acceptable.

I was STUNNED by the sudden maturity of my son, and his complete passion for all things in that room. He could barely stay on one task, but only because the siren song of some other little tray of goodies was nearly overwhelming. But in about 30 minutes, he did about 4 different activities, including counting flags, using clothes pins, putting beads on sticks, and building the Pink Tower. He was just ecstatic the entire time, at one point waving a handful of small flags held like a bouquet, and singing "I counted flags! Hooray for me!" at full voice. This prompted the teacher to sweep in, hug him and practically kiss his cheek, and tell me that he was adorable.

Yes, of course he is! As if I doubted such a thing.

The director's daughter came to retrieve us, and we walked back up the hall to the office where he played with the bead maze while we discussed the rest of the admission process. But soon he'd decided that watching us old ladies talk business was no fun. He worked his way to the office door, stepped outside, and leaned back in. "I'll be right back. I'll be back in ONNNNNE MINNNNUTE..." and then he took off for the classroom.

I lured him back into the office as I gathered up paperwork and asked a final question, and he walked up and down the long hallway outside of the office, peeking in doors and windows. Another child arrived for school a little late, darted into the bathroom there at the entrance, and flushed the industrial strength toilet just as Noah walked by. Noah lept back into the office and onto my lap and hugged me tightly. "Mommy! That SKEEERED me!"

I think that last bit clinched the interview. Who wouldn't want that much cuteness in their next entering class?

Noah crawled up into bed with me when he woke up for his morning snuggle, and the cat joined us. We patted the cat and talked about purring and her ears, and then Noah pointed out her tail and said "she gotta tail." I said "yes, she does." And after a moment of thought, I said "I wish *I* had a tail."

He pondered briefly and with a little bit of sadness in his voice, he said...

"No, Mommy - you gotta butt."

Let's fly in an AIRPLANE!

We just returned from a 6-day trip to visit Noah's grandparents in Key West. This involved a 5-leg trip in each direction; in there-ward order:

1. Car trip from home to where we parked the car, a couple of miles from the airport


2. Taxi ride from the car to the airport


3. First leg of airplane trip to Miami


4. Second leg of airplane trip from Miami to Key West


5. Car trip from airport to Nana's house

Reverse to come home.

I don't think we were more than 2 minutes into the taxi ride when Noah made his first announcement that he was "ready to get out of here." Uh, okay kid, but you've got a good long while to wait to be done with this trip, and it's too late to punch out now.

He handled the plane ride with aplomb, other than the struggle over putting on his seat belt. He's actually a good little traveling companion, sat in my lap and identified objects outside the window as we taxied and took off, and wasn't at all taken aback by going to 30,000 feet. He snacked and played with toys and talked to me, and really we just had a real good trip. And he got excited about landing, and was delighted to see his Nana at the airport.

And after dinner that night, he said "Okay, let's go on the airplane and go home now." It took the first 2 days for him to realize we were staying for awhile. But he loved the little sleeping bag/inflatable mattress his grandmother got for him to sleep in, and loved the beach, and LOVED riding in his stroller up and down Duvall Street and napping. He loved being with his grandparents. Really, he just had a great time, and other than a few expected and (I think) normal not-quite-3-year-old meltdowns when thwarted or when things weren't moving to his speed, he was a complete and total angel.

He enthusiastically got back on the plane to come home, and even willingly put his seat belt on and sat in his own seat during takeoff on the long leg of the return trip, and placidly handled the multi-car trip home. We came into the house just about 10pm, and he was asleep in his big-boy bed (instead of his "new liiiiittle bed") within minutes of coming in.

While we were there, he played in the surf a few times, which in Key West is blissfully low, and ran-ran-ran on the beach, and dug in the sand like a terrier, and threw rocks into the water. We had dinner one night at friends of his grandparents who have a pool, and he swam-swam-swam until he was nearly unconscious and starving. I mean really -- what's not to like about such a trip?

And in the most exciting news of all, we left the house without a single sippy cup or pacifier, and survived the whole trip. He had plastic cups with straws and did just fine, and other than when he was a little freaked out by the strange bed at first, he didn't give a second thought to his pacifier, something I couldn't have imagined leaving the house without a couple of months ago, much less the state for a week.

I can't believe what a big guy he's become, or how much fun I had traveling with him. Or how proud I am of him.

Who knew the moon was so close?

This afternoon, we were outside playing in the yard, and to his surprise, Noah saw the moon in the sky during broad daylight. "Mommy! The moon!" he cried. "Yes, honey - it's the moon, out during the day!" And then he cleared up everything for me:

The moon is up there! On the second floor! Where there aren't any chairs!

I wonder where it will sit?

Suddenly, the ground rose up to meet me....

Noah has spent what is to me an uncanny amount of time plummeting to the ground recently. First it was 2 weeks ago, when with his arms behind his back, he got his feet tied up in one another and caught himself with his nose and a big part of his forehead. The scabs are off now, but the little pink fresh skin is still glowing under his nose, and I hope and pray that it's not a permanent mark. I guess it could be like some kind of dueling scar -- from dueling with the sidewalk.

But he's taken his plummeting antics into the bedroom recently. We moved him from his crib to a bed last summer when he began doing some crazy gymnastics along the top of the crib rail. His new bed used to be his uncles, and is a nice platform trundlebed that provides great storage where the trundle bed would be, and a not-very-long drop to the ground... but it is still enough. We put up rails, but got brave a few weeks ago and pulled them off, which made the bed a great place for reading books and playing with toys and cuddling with his Mama while he got ready to go to sleep.

Two nights in the last week, though, I awoke halfway down the hall in mid-stride to the sound of Noah shrieking in terror from the floor next to his bed. No injury -- just the fear of a little boy who didn't mind the falling, just that sudden stop at the end. At 4:00 in the morning, I reinstalled the side rails on his bed. I guess he's not completely grown up after all.

You are my best friend.....

We are all about Little Einsteins at our house. I mean, why wouldn't you be? Between the musical references, the art, and the problem-solving, I really can't argue with the kid for his choice of TV viewing. We have a dozen or more episodes in permanent rotation on our cable box/DVR setup, and in the morning while Mommy showers, the little guy often sits in the rec room watching little einsteins and eating a bagel.

One of the cutest episodes to get captured on the DVR recently is "Annie's Love Song," the story of two hermit crabs on the beach who are best friends and are separated when the red hermit crab is swept out to sea, and gets caught in a lobster trap. They find the red hermit crab by singing the Best Friend song, which has the words "You are my best friend - I love you!" It's catchy, and for the rest of the day, I'll find myself humming it. So the other morning we went upstairs to get out of pajamas and into clothes, and I was humming it, and Noah was humming it -- and so I started singing it, and out of nowhere, Noah grabbed his plastic microphone and began singing along, and suddenly there we were, singing this catchy duet to one another, just like Sonny and Cher singing "I've Got You, Babe" or something.

This morning, no singing, but we were all about eating "Floop-Loops."

It has begun....

This morning, as we were getting into the car, I heard for the first time those fateful words:

I do it MYSELF, Mommy!

He wanted to climb into his seat from the driveway on his own. Now, granted, he got stuck halfway and had to shout for help. But I believe this may officially be the beginning of the end....

A potty update...

So far, no matter what, if you ask him if he's pooping, he says "Nope!" Any interest in sitting on the potty? "Nope!" As his father where he learned THAT lovely turn of phrase....

But last night, I caught him in MID-POOP. There was NO DENYING what was going on. And so I shouted to him: "Hey! You going poopy?" In a gutteral grunt, I got an unexpected reply:

"YEP!"

I figure it's progress.

Thinking about 3 years ago....

Something about this time of year gets me to thinking about three years ago, when I was wondering if I could manage through the couple of months of spring without buying any more maternity clothes, and getting ready for my life to change. Yesterday, I took a few minutes to hunt up the postings I made to my favorite bulletin board in the day or so leading up to my son's birth, and then the arrival post telling the story of his delivery and some of the subsequent antics.

I feel a great urge to write the whole story up for him, and will probably post it here as well. I think it's a great story -- but of course, I *would.*

The answer, though, is that NO, March through May in DC requires a shocking range of clothing, from heavy knit stuff and coats to shorts and little short dresses. I still have a couple of the dresses, thinking that someday I may figure out how to de-maternity-ificate them. But with a budding 3-year-old, who has the time?

All alarming things also come to an end....

The thought of finding myself pregnant again at 43 fills me with dread. And yet, at some level, the thought of consciously permanently preventing it also makes me feel, well, OLD. Like I've suddenly taken the hyperspace route to cronedom.

And so, when we discussed it this past week, my hubby and I decided it was time to put an end to the madness. Neither one of us wants to go through the sleepless nights of a newborn again at our age. As much as I wish that my life had been one that permitted me to have a whole houseful of children, I just need to thank God for the one He allowed me, and accept that this phase of my life is at an end.

I expect there to be some anguish and mourning as the next events unfold, and then some relief at not having to worry so much each month about Oh Dear God, am I?

I imagine I'll need to talk about it some. I feel in good company, since my hero Antique Mommy has also just gone through this milestone.

Wow, I'm all-powerful!

Tonight our cable went out for about 2 minutes, taking down with it the digital video recorder that we lease from the cable company that contains every episode of Jakers!, Little Einsteins, and Mickey Mouse Clubhouse ever aired. Is there room for adult shows? No, not really -- but I'm so happy that we can control what he watches, give him what I think are reasonably intelligent, educational shows, and avoid commercials....

So it's that period in the evening when we watch a little Little Einsteins after dinner and chill out getting ready for bed, and FOOMPT, the whole system goes down -- DVR, cable box, big huge scary high-def TV -- all of it. I explained that it was broken and I needed to fix it, and then he did heavy-breathing exercises while I fiddled with the remote and tried to will the DVR not to have dumped its contents, something it's done more than once on us.

And lo, about 3 minutes later, I managed to get everything back online, and Noah threw his tiny arms in the air: "Mommy! You fix ANYTHING!"

I feel so powerful!

My husband is so witty....

We're in the throes of starting potty training. "Want to sit on the potty?" "No!" "Hey, look -- Mommy is going potty, want to come see?" "No!" "Are you making a poopie?" "No!" "Do you know that big boys who sit on the potty get a lollipop?" "Yes!" "Do you want a lollipop?" "Yes!" "So do you want to go sit on the potty?" "No!" And then foompt, there's a shocking aroma and it's time to change the diaper. Dang, foiled again.

We're looking for the early warning signs of poopie. You know, the signs that come before THE FACE, when it's just too late. So far the most reliable one is, well, the farting.

So tonight, there's a sudden rumbling noise from the diaper, and my beloved says "Are you making a poopie?" And Noah says "No!" And hubby turns to me with a very serious face and says "Coming soon to a diaper near you!" Who knew he could be so funny?

I forgot one...

Another bit of toddler brilliance:

• Last weekend, Noah crawled up into bed with me one morning, and after a bit of a snuggle and a cartoon, turned to me, held my face in his little chubby hands and said "Mommy? I think-a you CUTE!" And really, how could I ever say no to him again?
• Yesterday on returning home from a jaunt to the grocery store Noah immediately stripped off his shoes and then his socks, announcing to the world "Look! I got cute feet!"
• I wish I could get an audio file to use in my email system that's a recording of him announcing to me this morning when I woke up and lumbered downstairs: "Mommy! I got BACON!"

Has anybody seen my cow?

Wow, a few months go by fast! Shortly after my last post, I "came down ill" with something that nearly turned into pneumonia, and became an ear infection shortly after New Year's for my little boy, resulting in the fact that my hubby and I spent our anniversary caring for a puking toddler. Oh, the romance.

But the amazing things my boy has said in the last month boggle the mind. In particular, the following creative marvels spring to mind:

• Mommy, I want-a you arm! When Noah was a newborn, one of the few ways that I could find to lure him into sleep long enough for me to, oh, I don't know, bathe or something was to very regularly and gently run my finger down the side of his face, from temple to chin, over, and over, and over.... And to this day, when he's tired, he'd like to rub his face on skin. Mine, if at all possible; his own, if mine isn't available. The result of this is that even on the coldest possible days, he wants to pull his sleeve up so that he can rub his face against his own inner arm.
• BOO! This past weekend, Noah developed both comic timing and the ability to make an entrance. Three times, I've been jerked out of blissful sleep by a clever two-year-old standing at the side of the bed and shouting "BOO!" then watching his mother levitate and try to maintain bladder control. When I succumb to gravity again, he looks at me seriously an says, "Mommy, did I scare you?" No, kid -- Mommy ALWAYS wakes up 3 feet in the air.
• The big W. A little boy at day care has developed a hopefully shortlived habit of rushing Noah and pushing him over, or using that blanket-with-a-bear-head-sewn-into-it like some kind of medieval flail to whack him in the head. Other boy's mother rushes in and insists that he apologize to Noah, but his answer this morning spoke volumes: "Oh, Jonathan -- WHATEVER." My boy....

A diet of worms

After a visit to my parents' house this past weekend where we celebrated my nephew's 13th birthday, my stepmom told the story of my 3-year-old nephew's recent sojourn as THE GREAT WORM HUNTER. Evidently with great intensity, he dressed up in full-on safari gear and headed out to hunt the great North American Earthworm, which was absolutely fine until he accidentally FOUND one, which was not apparently on his plan. We had a good laugh over this very serious and resolute child freaking out entirely when he actually found his quarry.
And that would be a funny story all by itself. But it's even funnier in combination with Noah's encounter with a worm on Sunday.

We'd gone to the synagogue for Sunday school and the book fair, and Noah was enjoying a chance to run around the halls, particularly the long stretch of hall between the sanctuary and the rabbi's office. Now, nobody really expects to find an earthworm halfway down a carpeted hallway, but perhaps this one had a contribution to the tzedakah box, because he was well on his way down the hall when he and Noah crossed paths, and Noah stepped on him. Mr. Worm coiled up in indignation, while Noah levitated about 2 feet above him and screamed in abject horror, like he'd just seen the most terrifying thing that ever walked the face of the earth. Well, this seems to be the case -- and I carried a shrieking, horrified, full-body-tense child out of the hallway into the lobby to get away from the Terror-Worm. We found Daddy and requested that Daddy please remove the evil monster from the building to protect us, which he promptly did -- but then didn't come back in, but got waved in to take part in a blood drive, leaving Noah absolutely convinced that the Death-Worm had "gotten" Daddy.

After a few minutes, though, I distracted him and thought we were making good progress to a full worm recovery, but silly me -- I was experiencing a false sense of accomplishment. Because about every 20 minutes, Noah tensed up and began reliving the whole worm experience, telling me very seriously and shrill that "Mommy! A worm! I step onna WORM! STEP on him! He SKEERED me!" and then went into wailing again.

This lasted all day. At 10:00 last night, the last hurdle to going to bed, WELL after his normal bedtime, was a quick check around the bedroom to make sure ONE MORE TIME that there were no evil child-eating worms lurking in wait for him to go to sleep. And NO worms in the bed.

Worms. Who knew? Well at least I know that he's not going to go eat them if something doesn't go his way....

I am my son's "pink blanket."

This morning, as I dropped my little boy off at day care, he demanded that I "sit inna chair!" -- and seemed to think that this command should last all day. He turned to one of his fellow daycarites and said "Where you Mommy, Nonathan?" They discussed this for a moment, and concluded "Mommy at working." Pretty good chatting, I thought. "Honey, Mommy has to go to work too -- I'll see you tonight," I told him. "No! You sit inna chair!" He climbed up onto me, to make sure I didn't go anywhere.

And then the snuggling began. Now, how is it that he knows to snuggle just when I'm most resolute to leave? It starts by pulling my arms around him, and rubbing his face against my inner arm. Soon he rivals the cat in his face-rubbing and purring routine -- he spins and climbs up on me and rubs his cheek on my face, or turns upside down and begins rubbing his face on my leg, while his feet flail around my head. He is a skin-rubbing fool. When we're home and my shoes are off, eventually there's a moment when I fear that he's going to gouge his own eyes out with my toes -- that's where I continue to draw the line. No toes in eyes. But the rest of the face-rubbing? Pure bliss.

I remember when he was a tiny little 7-pound bit of goo, formed into human shape by the footie-outfit that contained him, and couldn't remember how to go to sleep. Something told me that he needed a physical sensation, to help him remember to relax and succumb. I began to stand next to his bassinet, which was on our dresser, and very gently stroke his face from his forehead to his chin, and murmur quietly to him to go to sleep. Slowly, slowly, the pressure of my fingers got lighter and lighter, and my voice quieter and quieter, and eventually he was out. More than once, I feel asleep myself, and awoke as I hit the ground, standing there next to his bassinet, stroking his face.

I guess this instinct came from my own childhood. I, you see, was a Linus-child. There is a story that the infamous "pink blanket" was the blanket I came home from the hospital in, a gift from my grandmother's employer and close family friend. It was pink and very thick, and had a silky border that was pulled off and discarded over time, and without it I could not exist. I remember taking it with me on trips, folded up in my suitcase on airplanes for safekeeping. I remember as a girl of sleepover-age deciding that it was necessary to cut a section the size of a handkerchief out of one corner that I could hide in my sleeping bag, because I simply couldn't sleep without it. I remember visiting my grandmother one time and catching a cold, and having a visiting friend of my grandmother's say "she's just got fluff from that blanket in her nose." And there was the time we headed off on a long car trip, and were over an hour away before I realized that it wasn't in the car. My father pleaded with me: "If you can go without the blanket for this trip, I will buy you the biggest stuffed animal we can find." I was a very literalistic child. That gingerbread man was probably as big as I am now, and may very well still be in my parents' basement. Nevertheless, I was glad to get home to my blanket.

Because there was something that was brainstem-level soothing about having it, about putting my face against it. Something very much like rubbing my face against a person I loved.... Almost like going into a meditative state, or being hypnotized. It opened up the twilight between awake and asleep, something that we're pretty familiar with in my family, to last an eternity -- that blissful feeling of "Ooooh, I'm about to fall asleep but I can enjoy hovering here for another minute...."

And so in the great scheme of "things I've given my son," one of the ones that gives me the most satisfaction, really, is that sensation. That feeling of rubbing your face against something that makes you feel safe and secure and loved. I've been worried that he didn't develop a "lovey" like so many toddlers do -- but I get it now. *I* am his lovey. His "pink blanket."

I can't think of a better thing to be.

Halloween is "skeery" and evil.

Last year's Halloween was unmemorable, except for a little boy half-dressed in a Piglet costume sliding around on the hardwood floors in little padded pigletfeet. This year, though, he knew what he was into, I think.

Dressed as Mr. Bones, Noah struck out to "git canny." And get candy he did. Our entire block did their darndest to send us home with more candy that we had to give out, I think, and he wasn't done yet -- we headed off to the next street, and he gamely walked up to a strange door... And then the severed head in the bowl spoke to him. It wasn't just "dross," it became "skeery."

Back home, he poured his earnings onto the floor like a tiny miser and in a moment when no one was watching, he picked the ONE THING that he could unwrap himself and ate it, and that was it. "CANNY!" Oh, the screaming when we explained that he couldn't eat all of it right then, and indeed we did want him to eat dinner. Oh, the wailing when we emptied the plastic pumpkin and gave him back two or three pieces that he could at, and then evil Mommy wouldn't let him refill the pumpkin from the bowl she was using to give candy to other kids we DIDN'T EVEN KNOW who came to the door! Oh the gnashing of teeth each time someone came to the door and more candy left!

After a short stint of screaming it out alone in his bedroom, a huffing little boy came back downstairs to join us, and there was no more discussion of candy -- he ate a little dinner, watched JUNGLE BOOK with me while I caught up with missed work from earlier in the day, and trundled upstairs to crawl into bed.

But it's clear to me now -- chocolate is the work of the devil.

Strange Bedfellows

This weekend, the spherical frictionless family headed to my alma mater for my (eek) 20 year college reunion. I have no contact with anyone from my class at this point, don't have a strong urge to go back half a lifetime to find friends - mostly it became an excuse to go see how things have progressed in the little town that was my home away from home, lo these 20 years ago.

Friday night, we trundled everything through the pouring rain to the car and headed out, with Noah watching ICE AGE on a portable DVD player strapped to the back of spherical frictionless hubby's headrest, and we were off. An hour later, he peered at the dashboard and muttered "well, okay - we've gone 13 miles now."

It was a long drive.

Our hotel room turned out to be a frightening thing to a 2 year old, when we arrived there at 11:00 that night, but eventually we lured him to sleep in one full-size bed, while SFHubby and I attempted to fit into the other one, and woke each time Noah moved, to make sure he hadn't fallen down into the pit between the bed and the wall just big enough for a toddler to get wedged in. And attempted to remain silent, so we didn't wake him up.

And I listened to the rain pour on the hotel window, and thought "Oh dear God, if it rains all weekend and I've dragged them down here and we're stuck in this room for two days, they're going to torch me."

Morning dawned soggy and torential, but as we got showered, it seems there might be a break in the clouds, or was it wishful thinking? Hard to tell -- but my most vivid memories of college involve the constant but subtle worry that I was covered with a thin layer of mold, so it seems right somehow. We had a fabulous breakfast at my old pancake house haunt, and then made our way to campus to find out what they would do about the scheduled picnic, if the lawn had slid off the alumni house property and into the nearby stadium parking lot as we thought it might, arriving just in time to watch the parade, then stomp in puddles all over campus before the picnic -- and somehow during that time, it became a glorious and beautiful weekend.

But I'm not really here to talk about my reunion, which was mostly just silly, or the weekend, which was lovely -- I'm here to talk about sleeping with a two-year-old.

After dinner, where in his two-year-old way he forced us to eat at Hooter's, the only place we figured we didn't really CARE if he made a ruckus, we went back to the dreaded hotel room, where we began the arduous task of getting him to go to sleep in a strange place. In our pajamas, Noah and I cuddled up on one bed to watch the closest thing to childrens' television I could find, the latest Harry Potter movie, and SFHubby promptly fell asleep on the other. Eventually I realized that Noah wasn't used to a television on at bedtime, so I turned it off, and promptly fell asleep myself. I woke up half an hour later to a small hand patting my cheek, and a little voice insistantly saying "Mommy!"

"What?" I replied.

"Mommy!" More patting.

"Go to sleep!" I grumbled.

He cuddled back up to me and began rubbing my arm. All 800,000 BTUs of him, pressed firmly against my chest, fell alseep.

I lay there and sweated, and wondered if I could move my arm without waking him. I didn't need to worry, though, because I've learned one important thing. A toddler in sleep is a toddler in motion. He moved every 30 seconds for the next 8 solid hours, like a small toddler rotisserie, taking the bedclothes and pillows with him, and incrementally invading my half of the bed, micron by micron, for the rest of the night. Like a Mommy-seeking missile. Even when I moved to the other side of the bed, to get some space -- he did a 180 and went back into full pursuit. All the while, rubbing his little hot feet on the tops of my thighs. Patting my arm. Headbutting me on the mouth and leaving me with a knot the size of a tangerine in my lip at 11:00. Waking me again with his little hot feet on my face at 2am so that I'd remember to go change the clocks, so that I'd know exactly how early it was when he woke up, fully rested, at 5:30 am, and began suggesting that we "go home."

I stood for a long moment at the foot of the bed, right around 2am, and looked longingly from my husband, asleep diagonally on one bed, to my son, asleep diagonally on the other, and marveled that a 2-year-old can take up as much of a bed as a 48-year-old man, and nearly half as much as a well-trained cat. And thought about going to the car to get some actual sleep. And then thought, "you really don't get the chance very often to get those hot feet on your face in the middle of the night." And shoved him over and climbed back in for Round 2.

And when a little hand patted my face at 5:30 (thank you, end daylight savings time...) and a little voice said " Mommy! Breakfast!" I thought, MAN it's going to be a long day...." And then I knocked him over and tickled those little feet.

Which were, really, the best part of the entire weekend.

Where has the buddha-belly gone?

Two weeks ago, my son had a huge, fabulous, middle-aged-man-style buddha-belly that draped down over the front of his pants, so that you had to push it out of the way to snap his jeans closed. His 14-year-old brother had a nasty tendency to call him "fatty." He still had the little line of toddler fat-roll on his thigh.

And then, Sunday night before last, he got into the bathtub, and it was gone.

"Noah! Who has stolen your belly?" I demanded to know.

Little brown eyes looked back up at me in confusion.

"Your belly! Where's your belly?"

He pulled his tummy in -- this did not help things -- and pointed out his belly button for me. "Beebo?"

"Yes, it's your beebo, but where's your big buddha belly?"

Brown eyes, blinking.

Someone has stolen my son's buddha-belly. It's true. But in the last two weeks, his sleek two-and-almost-a-half-year-old self has gone shopping with me with no stroller, and has walked (WALKED!) all the way to the playground, and singlehandedly climbed the Very! Big! Hill!

I watched him run toward Very! Big! Hill! in his little jeans and enormous shoes and Mickey Mouse sweatshirt, and felt myself looking back at this moment from the sidelines of a soccer game sometime in the future, and watched the sheer gorgeousness of his little body running and little bell-clear voice laughing.

"Come ON, Mommy! Climb Very Big Hill!" Who could say no?

It's so hard to be 2....

<i>I'm cross-posting this from a parenting forum where I originally wrote the following dialog; it so perfectly summarized the difficulties of being a 2-year-old that I wanted to have it here, as well.</i>

 

Oh, the trials of being two....  Noah's been in a phase of wanting his waffle WHOLE in the morning, so I didn't cut it, I just buttered it and put a light drizzle of syrup on it, and gave it to him.

HIM: SCREAMSCREAMSCREAM! Much waving of fork!

Me: Darling, do you want me to cut it?

HIM: CUTITCUTITCUTIT! SCREAMSCREAMSCREAM! Continued waving of fork!

Me: <cuts one strip of waffle, and then into bites.>

HIM: YESCUTCUTCUT!

Me: <cuts second strip of waffle>

HIM: WAFFLEBROKEN! WAFFLEBROKEN! <crying as if heart would break/>

Me: Huh?

HIM: <Hysterical meltdown/>

Me: Befuddled...

I think I ended with a big hug and explanation that it's so hard to be a 2-year-old and not be able to explain what you want, and I want to give him what he wants, but sometimes I just can't tell -- do you want a new waffle? And then a new waffle, which he carried into the car and ate, sniffling, with nothing on it, and then a little quiet voice in that perfect little bell-tone says "Thank you, Mommy!"

I never get over how fast he shifts gears.

L'Shannah Tovah

Tonight we begin the observance of Rosh Hashanah, and I believe it will be my son's first memorable experience with a religious holiday. He was practically born into our synagogue; he was born at 5:00 on a Friday, and was at the Friday night service with me a week later -- granted, I was sitting in a super-cushioned chair that had been brought into the sanctuary just for me.... And let's face it -- that's appropriate for a boy whose parents met in that sanctuary, and were married there.

The last year has been particularly hard for me, in a religious sense. We haven't mastered Tot Shabbat, much less the ability to sit through a Friday night or Saturday morning service, which means that my spiritual life has been relegated to "things we can do at home," and "occasions when it would be inappropriate not to attend and so one of us goes alone and the other stays home," plus the occasional "bar or bat mitzvah warranting a babysitter." I feel like I've taken a year-long vacation from God, and it feels weird. I was tight with God for a long time, and I feel like I've had to set Him aside in favor of maternal responsibilities.

So tonight, I've planned to stay home with my boy while my husband and stepson attend services, and the wee boy and I can start to create our own Rosh Hashanah tradition. Ideally, I'd like it to exclude television, no matter how educational, and include some rituals that may create a memory for him that will guide him into the natural flow of the religious year for us. Tonight, we'll eat all the apples we want, I think, and honey right off the spoon. We'll make a honeycake for tomorrow's dinner, and we'll light candles. I think I'll read him some of the prayers from the service we'll be missing, and maybe I can work on teaching him some new songs.

When I was a teenager, watching my parents prepare for Christmas for me and my younger brother, I often wondered how they could get so excited about setting up for a holiday that was fairly one-sided -- they did all these preparations and worked so hard to create an environment that made such an impression on us, and apparently got so little out of it. I hadn't realized, of course, how much joy there could be in creating especially these first impressions of these important family moments that would form our visceral memories of childhood, and create such magic for us.

Tonight I feel the responsibility for creating that magic, in a tradition that I came to and was not born and raised into. I'm hoping that I can do it justice, and create the same kind of magic for my little boy that my parents created for me and my brothers. It's an awesome responsibility, when you get down to it, made complex by having to occasionally pull out reference materials to make sure that I'm doing it "right."

Good Lord, what HAVE I done?

So this morning, I was brushing my teeth, and as I was leaning over the sink to spit, I felt the unusual sensation of being goosed by something rubbery and flexible and small. I look back behind me and there is my little boy, very intently attempting to stick his pacifier, let's be candid, into my butt. I believe my exact words were "precisely WHAT makes you think THAT'S a good idea, child?" and he scurried out of the room with the same focused intent with which he entered it. It's clear that he planned this -- it was a premeditated goosing gone wrong, and he needed to leave the scene and regroup.

Some days, I worry about what I've done, bringing this sweet little boy into this world. Maybe it's because I read the news today, and maybe it's because colleagues of mine and I got into a debate about the fate of the "free world" after lunch, and maybe it's because I read the summary of that book about the last election... Our President is "the devil." Bits are falling off the Space Shuttle and getting in the way of reentry. It didn't help that I saw news just a few minutes ago gleefully announcing that the new partical smasher they're building isn't going to create a black hole so big it'll destroy the earth... they don't think... You know, if you have to TELL me that? I'm nervous about it, even if you're trying to be reassuring.

There was just so much negative to see in the world today that it makes me wonder if having a baby wasn't the most selfish thing I could ever have done. It makes me think in some kind of stark way that someday I'm going to be forced to leave him alone here on this planet with mutant attack e.coli in the spinach and with most of the rest of the world thinking his nation is the collective set of the biggest assholes on the planet. "Hey, kid, I've got a great planet for you here -- good luck." Some days, life just feels that fast, too. I'm springing this on him; he didn't even get a vote in the thing.

And then I watch his little mind operate and all I can do is pray that he'll do just fine and keep his spirit intact. Because you'd hate to lose the kind of spirit that could put together a plan like the one he launched on me this morning. Frankly, the world needs a little more of that, and a lot less of what it's got.

Tonight, in celebration....

...I bought my son underwear.

Certain events of the last few days left me with an unprecedented 2 hours of totally free time, and cause for celebration. The best use of it that I could think of? Going to the Disney store to buy my son Finding Nemo underwear.

A year ago during our summer vacation, he demanded to "go potty," and we thought "Yippee!" -- and that was the end of it. The potty I got for him last spring sits unused in the corner of the bathroom, generally with a book on it. All invitations to sit on the potty go unaffirmed -- I think he thinks that if he ignores me long enough, I'll give it up.

And that's the way he's been his whole life. If you try to force a change, it never goes well, but if you give him a little bit of time, he comes to it on his own. I have to keep reminding myself that I'm here to help, but HE's the one who's growing up.

So he has a half a dozen pairs of underwear now, and we've looked at them and the pictures of Nemo and Gill and Crush and Bruce, and the one pair that has little tiny blue sillouhette fish all over it, and so he knows that they're there. My job, now, is clearly to shut up about it and let him decide when he's ready to take the next big step toward growing up.

Oh, please, little boy -- not too fast.

..and then my mind went blank

Tonight, as I was listening to some show on the television with half an ear, I had the flash of inspiration for The! Very! Thing! that I could write, become famous on, put my child through college on -- the concept that was my very reason for existing on this earth to communicate. Brilliant! I couldn't believe it -- here it was! And in just a moment, I would get up, come to the computer, start outlining it, and begin to make my mark in the world.

But then my mind went blank. Utterly and completely blank, like a big magnet had come down from the sky and erased the last 2 minutes of tape in my head. Gone. Completely and utterly gone. Like that dream that you have that's so funny that you just have to wake up and tell someone, and you turn to your spouse and say "I just had the most amazing dream -- there were mice in it, and ... well, a wall. Mice, and a wall, and it was so amazing and insightful, and funny! Oh, it was such a wonderful dream!" And your spouse, who has to get up in 45 minutes for work and really didn't need this, looks at you and says "You woke me up. At 3:45 in the morning. To tell me. That you had a dream. About mice. And a WALL?"

"Well, it wasn't just a wall, it was a kind of third dimension, and if you went through it, well, there were mice there too. But NICE mice." It begins to sound stupid, even to you, and you wrack your brain to remember why you felt compelled, again, to shake your beloved from slumber to hear this lame-ass excuse for something interesting. There was something else in it, something so huge that you had to wake up... But what WAS IT?

It was like that, really. The idea was just here -- can I recreate it? So I dashed madly to the basement to catch the Tivo before the program went off the schedule, to see if I could Tivo it and watch it again, and maybe have the idea again, and with 20 seconds to spare I find the spot in the schedule listing and it's ...

Educational programming from the local community college. No information on the episode at all that would let me identify it on the schedule to record. Nothing, but the list of sponsors at the end of the show. But wait! It's based on a grant from the Annenberg Foundation! Hooray -- a clue! So I ran up here to the office, hunted down the Annenberg Foundation, found the program, signed up for their video on demand program, found the very episode, fast-forwarded to the very moment where I had the very important revelation, and...

Nothing. No amazing idea. Cute program on Romantic Comedy. Nothing amazing. No insight. Certainly nothing that will put my son through college.

Maybe I just drifted off to sleep briefly during the show and dreamed the idea.... It had something to do with mice, I think. And a wall. Perhaps I should go wake my beloved husband and tell him about it...

Nah.

The jokes continue....

This weekend, he came up with another one. His first play on words. It came out during a wrestling match, when he very sincerely said "No, Mommy -- not tickle... TACKLE!" And tried to knock me over. It must be the Dr. Seuss. I knew that man was a genius....

My son's first joke....

For mother's day, when my son was just about a year old, I took myself to the mall, made the rounds of the jewelry stores, and found myself a small mother-and-child pendant, so that I would have something that connected me to him during the day when I'm at work. Little did I know that his day care provider has the exact same necklace.

So when he began to play with it, I asked him, "Who is that?" It was rhetorical, of course -- I was fully prepared to explain to him that it was Mommy and Noah, and that I wore it because I miss him during the day -- but he had an answer. "CAR-CAR!" which is, of course, the nickname he calls his day care provider. "WHAT?" I replied. "It's not! It's Mommy! Mommy and Noah!" "It's Car-Car," he replied. This went on for some time.

When I told her about it later, she told me that she's had other parents really uncomfortable that she became a part of their child's mental life like that -- that she's actually lost children because the parents were a little too jealous of the love the child felt for this woman who cares for them all day. It made me a little sad, really, and I resolutely put aside any negative feeling I had about Noah associating the necklace with her.

It's been several months, and we still have the conversation. "Noah, who is this?" I point to my necklace. See, now he knows that he can make me nuts with his answers -- it's quite a game. "Daddy!" he yells. "DADDY? DADDY? It's NOT!" I shout back. "Now, seriously who is it?" "LUCY!" he cries, indicating the dog, of all things. "WHAT? That is NOT the dog! Who is it?" "Brother!" The list gets longer. He adds to it; I act as dramatically incensed as I can that he doesn't say that it's me, and then smother him with kisses in all his ticklish spots. And ask again. And very quietly, he whispers, "Car-Car!" and then tries to cover his entire body with his hands in preparation for the onslaught, and snorts with laughter.

His first joke. At my expense. I feel so special.

Things I never thought I'd hear myself say...

Last night, I heard myself yell at my son for something I never anticipated. After a long, exhausted work day, I arrived home to my 2-year-old wanting nothing more than to sit with me on the sofa watching a cartoon and to rub his eyes on my big toe. I felt my not-perfectly polished nails scraping against the skin of his eyelid, and then heard the voice of a worn-out working Mommy shout "SON! GET OFF MY TOES!" My husband dismissed me for a "timeout" and suggested that I put on some shoes.

There are some things you just don't expect to hear yourself saying. Yelling at your son for shoving your big toe into his eyesocket happens to be one, at least for me.