Fam in the leafpile

Fam in the leafpile
Originally uploaded by Wingates.

Now that Christmas is over life has resumed some of its normal rhythms. I've been able to take off from work most of the last two weeks, which helps blunt Cora's impact on a single caregiver.

We started getting estimates for the work on our roof and other parts of the house that are falling apart. The first guy came highly recommended and it was an interesting visit. I learned several things from him in the course of a 30-minute housecall:
1. He has a good account with the local animal hospital.
2. He can do anything and everything well.
3. His daughter was conceived on a pool table in a biker bar.
4. He was the manager of the biker bar at the time.

And the list goes on....it felt like a two hour visit by the time he left. Nice guy, but a little too much of something.

Merry Christmas!

Family Christmas
Originally uploaded by Wingates.

The kids are all nestled snug in their beds, and Christmas 2005 comes to an end. Suddenly all that Christmas music sounds tacky. So yesterday.

We had a great Christmas here. It's sooo nice to be able to stay in town with two little ones. The festivities started yesterday on Christmas Eve with Christmas dinner at G'ma and G'dad's house in the afternoon. That meant Cora had to withstand the anticipation of the event for most of the day. She struggled. "Santa Claus Is Coming to Town" really threw her off her game. The notion that he knew what she was doing, when she was doing it, and whether she was being bad or good definitely frayed her nerves. By about two in the afternoon she was crying uncontrollably. She looked at me and said, "Santa understands that everyone is going to have a bad day sometimes!"

About that time our roof started leaking, and I ended up on the roof in the rain with a tarp while Kate suddenly tried to corral the kids for Christmas dinner on her own. After a trip to Lowe's for better tarps I lashed them down with the help of my Dad and figured they weren't going anywhere. There's only so much you can do on Christmas weekend.

Once we got to Christmas dinner everything went well. Cora was giddy with excitement and could barely wait her turn in the gift giving before tearing into another present. After our eyes glazed over from a fantastic meal we packed the kids home to get ready for Santa and another round of Christmasness.

Cora was up a little before 6am, ready to go. We hit the ground running with stockings and started in on presents once Anne got here. We had three waves of opening to pace ourselves, and Cora did well. Opening some presents on Christmas Eve seemed to take some of the manic edge off. Oliver slept through most of the unwrapping festivities but woke up in time to thrash through boxes and paper wrapping.

G"ma and G'dad came over bearing instruments in the afternoon and set up a family quartet--Sally on cello, Mark on violin, Anne on recorder, and Kate on flute. Cora added an extra spice with accompaniment on triangle and drum. It sounded wonderful.

Words!

oliver's crawl
Originally uploaded by Wingates.

The crab crawler has his first "real" word--light. He says "ight?" in a singsongy elfin whisper and gazes at the ceiling in every new room. He first said it on Thanksgiving day sitting in Granddad's lap. Oliver suddenly lunged at the lamp over Granddad's shoulder and said "Aight!" like he had just put it all together in his mind. He's been saying it constantly ever since. He also said "hat" when Anne walked in yesterday wearing--you guessed it--a hat.

It's neat that Granddad was with Oliver when he said his first word because "light" was my first word too. Deja vu!

Hmmm....

On the way to school this morning Cora said,

"Dad, it would take one hundred days to drive to the sun."

"Really? How would you get there? That's a long way."

"They should put some gravity in outer space and then we could put gas stations there. I'd bring a biiiiiig bottle of glue and we'd glue them down."

Cora's Message to Elise and her parents

g'ma carol and cora
Originally uploaded by Wingates.

"To Elise and her parents:
I like you and I hope I see you at the beach at my birthday party. And I hope you have a very good time with me at the beach. It's fine over here but Ollie is crumpling up my stuff and eating my books. He's really good to me but he's just a little too silly for me. He sticks out his tongue but I really don't like seeing his tongue. Elise, I'm already four. Oliver is already almost standing up.

Love,
Cora"

(Transcribed verbatim)

Slackin'

Yikes! It's been a slack November on the blogging end of things. Not that things have been dull around here; on the contrary, we've just been trying to keep up with ourselves. We went to Kentucky for a mountain retreat a few weeks ago and had a grand time. Winter is slowly encroaching here and we're seeing colder days and nights. The full moon seemed to disrupt the emotional equilibrium of at least half of Nashville last week, and we slogged through several days of emotional sludge. But the experience did provide some valuable insights and all has been much better since then.

Happy Halloween!

Cora had her first real Halloween tonight. Last year in the apartments we went to our upstairs neighbor and got a packet of Goldfish. Maybe that was two years ago...at any rate, one packet of Goldfish was her cumulative lifetime Halloween haul so far.

This year there are too many friends at school who know what Halloween is all about--loads of candy. So lest Cora feel betrayed when she goes to school in the morning (and because it's fun), we hit the neigborhood for some real trick or treating. She dressed herself in her Ladybug costume, discarding the color-coordinated red pants and shirt in favor of her own blue stripe shirt and flowered pants. We went to Anne's street and visited about fifteen houses in all, her pumpkin bucket sagging at the handles by the end of the night with the weight of her candy.

Baby talk

Oliver now has three words:
"Ma"=Mommy
"Da"=Daddy
"Buh"=Buh-bye now.

He's added "buh" to his waving, so we're pretty sure he knows what he's saying. Or he knows that he's imitating what we're saying.
He has enjoyed an explosion of freedom in the last two weeks after mastering the slithery crawl. He also shimmies on his butt with one leg straight out to the side. He cocks his left leg out straight, curls his right, then starts bouncing up and down, propelling himself forward. He developed this technique after constantly ramming his head into cabinets and couches when trying to get close to objects on the floor. The "dropping" game is also a new favorite. Oliver has learned that when he drops things off the high chair they disappear and then someone will pick them back up.

Cora's World

We got a chance to visit Cora's home away from home tonight as Abintra Montessori held an open house. Anne and Grandma Sally came with us to see what Cora does with all the time she spends away from home.

Here Comes Fall

"Ma...ma!"

Oliver finally said it today; the word every mother longs to hear after she has faithfully nursed and nourished her young offspring and he has been saying "da-da" for a month already. We were in the car on the way to Cora's school for an open house. Oliver was hungry and lunging enthusiastically at Kate's chest as she sat between the two kids in the back seat. As he waved his arm in the direction of her torso Oliver said very clearly "maaa...Ma!" And he kept saying it the rest of the night, usually when Kate was around. He's also starting to wave at us--he does the wrist swivel wave like a dignitary on a parade float.

Grandma's Little Helper

Da Kiddos

Oliver is in a pitiful state right now... he got his current round of shots at the doctor yesterday and his body is feverishly fighting off a volley of diluted but nasty bugs. He couldn't sleep last night and had trouble napping today too, so by 5:00pm tonight he was a woozy drunk, babbling incoherently in a half-cry, half-moan. And somehow he's still sweet. Not happy but sweet.

Cora got a full dose of boys tonight and couldn't be happier about it. Fog and Sarah had a party at their place and as luck would have it there was a five year old and and a six year old there. They all played hide and seek and streaked through the house, the boys taking turns either ostracizing or including Cora. One minute she was in the game, the next it's "Eww, girls! Get away!" "She's only four! We're five and six!" Of course I'm standing there feeling bad for her, forgetting that this is how the game of boys and girls is played, that cooties and rejection rituals are all just flirtation building blocks and certainly not taken seriously by the kids themselves. I was reminded of this when Cora sang all the way home in the car, making up lyrics to songs and opening the window to let the wind blow her hair. She was one happy kid.

Cora's past life

Yesterday morning Cora looked at me and said, "I was born before, you know. Before this."
"Really? Tell me about it."
"I was born in Twenty-Six. Before, when I was God, the first wind was invented by invisible fans. The wind you feel comes from big fans that you can't see. I invented those."

The kids eating snacks, Oliver eating trash

The kids eating snacks, Oliver eating trash
Originally uploaded by Wingates.

Sarah's photos

Click on the "Aunt Sarah's Photo Album" link in the upper right of the page for some new pictures of the kids...mainly Ollie and his man-boobs.

Oliver pulled up into a standing position on the couch yesterday. He's still not crawling per se, but scuttles his body across the floor like a fat crab. His physical progress is what strikes me with him, while at this point in Cora's infancy it seemed I could already hear her brain pulsating eagerly in her skull. It was about this time that Cora started responding to words and saying "oof oof" when we asked her what a puppy says. Oliver, on the other hand, doesn't seem drawn to intellectual pursuits just yet. He is intent on the tactile world, moving his body around, sticking stuff in his mouth. He eats like a horse already; Cora didn't really start solid food until she was a year old. When we wave and say good-bye to Oliver he just looks at us blankly, then at our hands, then back to our faces, as if he's thinking "there they go again flailing their arms around." He doesn't seem to think about doing it himself. Maybe he's relieved he doesn't share our arm-flapping affliction.

Cora's Bud

This morning we were eating breakfast and Cora was dawdling a bit, not too interested in her food. I passed her a cup and said "Here you go, Bud." Her eyes lit up and she said "Can you be Elise?" I agreed and finished the rest of breakfast as Elise. It was amazing. I didn't change my voice or anything, just said "bud" at the end of every sentence.
"Have more eggs Bud."
Are you going to finish your cereal, Bud?"
The effect was magical. Food gone.

Cousin Elise--priceless. And missed by her little bud.

Oliver's Travels

Oliver discovered the kitchen cabinet this morning. The silver knob caught his eye and he crawled over to examine it. As he pulled on the knob the door swung open, and as it did his weight shifted and he swayed to the side. He did this for a few minutes, swaying side to side, opening and closing the door, without realizing there was anything inside the cabinet. Then he changed his focus and I saw the lightbulb dawn over his head. Aha! There's stuff behind this door! A big bag of cayenne fish rub went right in the mouth. Luckily the bag stayed closed, but it was a sign of things to come. Time for cabinet locks!