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October 29, 2004
The neighbors brought over two little Halloween gift bags for Zeke and Stazi, which was very nice of them. Each bag had a box of Goldfish crackers, a Reese's peanut butter cup, a coupon for Einstein Bagels, and a plush lion toy. Zeke's had a lion and Stazi's had a lioness.
Zeke was very pleased with the windfall and spent quite a bit of time playing with the new stuffed animals and making up little stories with them and so forth. I asked him if he wanted to name the lion, and he said "Yes!". So I said, "OK, Zeke, what name do you want to give the lion?"
After several moments of deep thought, he said, "Rar!"
Then when it was bedtime and he was heading upstairs, I said, "Zeke, do you want to take Rar with you?" He said "Yes... and...." and then stopped, searching for what to call the lioness.
"...and More Rar!"
Zeke and Rar and More Rar are all asleep in Zeke's room now.
Posted by Jan at 10:54 PM | Comments (0)
We're just back from a successful trip to the library. One of the silver linings to the car having blown up on us is that Mom loaned us their "extra car" (my stepdad has a little Honda that he drives back and forth to work to avoid paying out the wazoo for gas for the gas-guzzling pickup truck, not that this is relevant but I'm in a sharing mood today) to get Keith back and forth to work. We got our own car back yesterday, but we haven't returned Mom's yet, so for a couple of days we're a two-car family. So, I took the kids to the library.
There was no screaming, shrieking, running away, yelling, hitting, slapping, or temper tantruming. It was great. And I also have to tell you about Zeke's new computer skills.
In the children's section, they have all these computers set up with children's computer games on them. They have little sign-up sheets where you record your start time, because you're not supposed to use the computer for more than 30 minutes to give other kids a chance, but I've never seen all of them in use any time we've been there. (We tend to go to the library early in the day.) So I'll let Zeke hop up and mess around with the Maisy game or the Sesame Street Learn About Letters game, or whatever. When we first started doing this, a month or so ago, he was totally stymied by the mouse and couldn't figure out how to make it do what he wanted.
Well, today he was mousing like a pro. I kid you not. For example, there's one segment of the Sesame Street game where you click the picture of a phone, and then it shows you Big Bird, Oscar the Grouch, and Mr. Snuffleupagus. You click the person you want to talk to, and then the phone rings and you hear a little conversation with whoever you called. Zeke clicked the phone, saw the characters, and clicked on Oscar. After Oscar hung up, he clicked the phone again, and then clicked Big Bird. Then after that, he clicked the phone again, and picked Snuffy. It was very deliberate. He wanted to hear all the characters in order. This is like light years beyond where he was at a month ago with mouse skills, so I was totally impressed.
In other kid news, we had "Beggars' Night" here last night -- no, I don't know why the entire city does it four days early; I don't make the rules -- and Keith took Stazi and Zeke out on a candy-finding expedition while I stayed on the porch and handed out candy to the hordes of kids that came trooping by. Well, hordes of kids and also suspiciously old-looking high school students. Keith thought maybe they were college freshmen. They were all wearing goth costumes, as though they were trick-or-treating on their way to a Kindred: the Embraced vampire role playing game. I told them happy Halloween and gave them a Butterfinger anyway. They were very polite.
Zeke was totally ecstatic about getting treats, and has been pretty okay with the treat rationing we've been doing in order to make sure he doesn't go into a sugar coma. He is also very happy that he gets to put on his Elmo costume and do the whole thing again on Sunday, which is when they're doing trick-or-treating in his grandma's neighborhood.
Pictures will ensue once I upload them. I promise.
Posted by Jan at 1:45 PM | Comments (0)
October 22, 2004
One great way to limit your time on the computer is to move the office chair upstairs to your sewing table, and then have to sit on the top of a stepladder when you're surfing the Internet. I don't know what the opposite of "ergonomic" is, but if you look it up in the dictionary, there's a picture of me typing this entry.
Anyway, that's beside the point, which is that we're back from Kindermusik, at which Zeke did a number of extremely cute things, which I will now share with you.
First, when we all assembled in a circle and started singing the "Hello" song, Zeke surprised us all by singing along, mostly in key and with the right words. Everyone kind of looked at him, and the teacher congratulated him for singing along. So, that was cool.
Today's musical instrument was the glockenspiel. The teacher only had two keys in it, and she was using it to demonstrate the concept of "triads". (Music-type people will know what this means. If you don't, it's OK, it basically just means a particular type of chord. If that doesn't make sense either, don't sweat it. Just envision small children banging on two keys of a glockenspiel. Which is like a xylophone.) We were singing a song that only used the two notes, which the teacher played alternately, to give the kids a sense of what a "triad" is. Not that they were expected to understand the concept of "triad"; it's just that triads aren't super-common in Western-style music, and the idea is to introduce them to a new kind of sound.
So after we all sang the song and the teacher played the glockenspiel, it was time for the kids to play. The teacher asked, "Who wants to be first?" and Zeke yelled, "ZEKE!" and ran over, but one of the other little boys beat him to it. So Drew had a turn at the glockenspiel, and the teacher helped him play first one note, then the other, while we all sang along. Then it was Zeke's turn (at last -- oh, how trying it is for a two-year-old to have to wait thirty seconds for his turn) and he managed to play the notes in an alternating sequence with no help from the teacher. I felt proud.
After his turn and subsequent round of applause, the teacher asked him if he could hand the stick to another child. He thought for a minute and then (of course) handed it to Savannah, who is very cute and also currently Zeke's best friend. He taught her how to drum on the teacher's toy box during one part of class. If only I'd had a camera.
Anyway, Savannah had her turn and then she handed the stick to Olivia, but drama ensued, as Zeke ran up and grabbed the stick out of Olivia's hand! Oh, no! I intervened and told Zeke that that was not very nice and he should give the stick back to Olivia. So he came over and kissed Olivia on the top of the head -- awww! -- but kept the stick. Nice try, Zeke. I took the stick gently away from him, without much protest, and Olivia finally had her turn.
All in all, a successful Kindermusik. Frankly it was just nice to see some of the other parents running and chasing their kids and trying in vain to convince them to come back and participate in class instead of punching their own images in the mirror, for a change.
Posted by Jan at 10:22 PM | Comments (0)
October 21, 2004
"Zeke, are you ready to go see Aunt Amanda and Uncle Josh?"
"Yes! Go see Josh and Amanda. And Grandma."
And just as I'm about to say, no, we're not going to see Grandma Prater or Uncle Jaren or Uncle Joe...
"And Daddy, and Mommy, and Zeke! And baby Stazi."
"Zeke, do you miss Grandma Morrie?"
"No."
"Oh? Grandma Morrie misses you, Zeke."
"Grandma Morrie will come back."
"Yes! She will, Zeke."
"Grandma Morrie will come back at six."
Posted by Jan at 11:39 AM | Comments (0)
October 18, 2004
Sorry about the lack of updates lately; Zeke and Stazi's Grandma was visiting from Seattle, so we were kind of preoccupied for awhile there. Her visit went very well, and we all miss her. (Well, Keith and I and Zeke miss her; Stazi misses her as much as it is possible for an 8-month-old baby to miss anything. Definitely nobody has a lap that is as nice for sleeping on as Grandma's was, though; that's for sure.)
In other news, I gave Zeke some drawing paper and markers yesterday -- you know, to try and channel his artistic impulses somewhere other than our furniture and walls -- and he drew a letter "Z". All by himself, too! I said, "Zeke, can you tell me what your drawing is?" and he looked at me like I was stupid and said, "Z, Mommy!"
Not to be outdone by her big brother, Stazi has recently started crawling, which, to paraphrase my brother-in-law, means that there is a whole world of new dangerous stuff that she can get into. She's also babbling, and of course what she mostly babbles is "Dadadadadadadadadada." Keith tries not to look too smug about this.
Posted by Jan at 8:58 AM | Comments (0)
October 12, 2004
Stazi had her first sauerkraut today.
This is what happens when you take the family to a top-notch deli and everyone orders sandwiches and then you realize you forgot the baby food at home.
She loved it, of course. (Keith says, "That's my girl.")
Posted by Jan at 9:32 PM | Comments (0)
October 2, 2004
Today I went shopping with the two kids and my mom and sister. On the way to the mall, Zeke started whapping on my sister, who was sitting between the two carseats in the back.
"Zeke," I said, using my best Mommy Warning Tone, "what are you doing?"
To which he said, "I hitting Amanda!"
Well, I did ask.
Posted by Jan at 11:17 PM | Comments (1)
October 1, 2004
Yesterday, Keith had the day off, so we thought it would be fun to take the kids to the zoo. All morning, we kept asking Zeke, "Are you ready to go to the zoo and see some animals?" and he'd look thoughtful and say, "Ummm... no. I playing with cars." However, on the grounds that he can play with cars any time he wants, we hauled him off to the zoo anyway.
It was a perfect day for it. Not too many people are at the zoo on Thursdays in late September. (Every single person who was there, however, had kids in tow.) The weather was sunny but not too hot.
Upon arrival, we checked the map and conferred as to what we should go see first. Keith was keen on seeing the otters and the kangaroos. I didn't want to miss the prairie dogs. Zeke pondered, and then announced, "Elephants!" So our first stop was to the pachyderm enclosure.
Unbeknownst to us, the zoo has a baby elephant right now. It was the very first animal we stopped to look at. They had him indoors, with his mother. At first, I thought the mother was the baby, because she just wasn't as gigantic as I'd imagined an elephant to be, but then I saw the little baby, poking his trunk into a stack of hay, and trotting along happily beside his mom. I cannot tell you how adorable this was. I asked the zookeeper (they probably have a more official-sounding name, but I don't know what it is) how old the baby has to be before he stops following his mother around like that. The zookeeper didn't really answer my question, but did tell me that while the baby will roam away from his mother to some extent in captivity, in the wild he would be stuck to her side like glue, because they would be covering hundreds of miles in the daily search for food. He also told me that elephant pups nurse for several years, so the females only get pregnant once every four or five years or so. Sounds like a pretty smart plan to me.
We're all just monkeys -- I mean, apes -- at heart.
After the baby elephant, we stopped and looked at the gibbons.
Zeke was intrigued by them, although he insisted on calling them "monkeys", probably because he couldn't read the sign on the cage.
I liked watching them groom each other. Their motions while doing this are remarkably similar to the motions that adult humans use when picking lint off each others' sweaters, or fussing with their kids' hair.
They seem so serene...which is how they get you.
Somewhere along the way, we stopped and looked at the bear enclosures. We saw a black bear and a brown bear, but the best exhibit was a couple of grizzly bear cubs. Their mother attacked a man walking his dog in Alaska, back in May, and when she then went on to attack the police who showed up, she was killed. The local authorities tried to rescue the cubs, but were only able to get to one of them. Then the guy who had been walking his dog felt bad, and went and rescued the other one. Both of them wound up at the Columbus Zoo. We stayed and watched them frolic and romp around for awhile. They were very toddler-like in their behavior.
The otters were disappointingly absent. Their little otter run was there, and a sign explaining their habits and food preferences and so forth, but there was not an otter in sight. We hung around for awhile, hopeful, but none ever showed up. I guess they were taking their afternoon siesta.
Next stop: Kangaroos. On our way there, we passed by another gibbon exhibit. This one was much bigger and had lots of nice trees and poles for them to swing from, which they obligingly did. Zeke thought this was pretty cool. We also saw some orangutans swing hand-over-hand on ropes from one tall treehouse-like structure to another one, a few hundred yards away. "Those guys up high," Zeke said.
Mighty Zeke! Grrarrrgh!
Zeke had a great time running around patting all the sheep and goats and shetland ponies. He stood on the gate of one of the sheep enclosures and kept yelling, "Baa! Baa!" at the sheep inside, who was, shall we say, less than impressed.
Boca Burgers?
I'm probably forgetting some of the animals we saw. We did finally reach the kangaroo enclosure, which was way cool. You enter it by these double doors that say, "Keep the roos in! Please let outer doors close before opening inner doors!" We're like, uh, okay, so how exactly close do you get to the kangaroos in here?
Answer: as close as you want to. The kangaroo enclosure has absolutely nothing keeping the kangaroos away from the walking path for humans. The kangaroos were mostly interested in sleeping and occasionally hopping from one shady tree to another, though, so we didn't get all that up close and personal with them.
Before we even left the zoo's parking lot.
Posted by Jan at 2:48 PM | Comments (0)