A Month's Worth of Kid Quotes

Ellen, to Peter, when we're all in the car: Next time I want to drive.
Peter: You'll be old enough to drive when you're 16.
Ellen: No, I can drive. 'Cause I have my princess keys.

Ellen, to Zuzu's 7 year-old friend: Where's your cell phone?
Zuzu's friend: I don't have a cell phone. I have to be 16. And I have to buy it with my own money.
Ellen: I have a cell phone.

Adam: Winnie the pooh.
Ellen: We need a poo?
This exchange is repeated several times, with escalating emphasis on the "Winnie!" from Adam.

Adam, yelling at me across the house and not knowing I'm within earshot: MOM! I'll DIE if you don't come and help me with this RIGHT NOW!
Zuzu: Adam, that's not true. You wouldn't die.
Adam: I know, but I WANT her to do it, so I'm lying.

Adam has been asking ceaselessly to make something "out of nails and wood." Everyday, "Mom, please let's go get some wood and some nails and I can make something." So Peter bought a kit and helped him build this airplane. Adam was over the moon. He said to me, "Next I want to make a computer."

Me: I can't find it. I've looked everywhere I can think of.

Adam: Then it's in one of the places you couldn't think of! You need to look in those places!

Ellen, October 2009

I'm going to start doing some posts based on random photos.*

I made this dress for Ellen for Halloween/Fall 2008, and I was so pleased that it still fit, once I loosened the sleeve elastic, the next year.

*Considering recent trends, maybe I shouldn't start any sentence with a statement so bold as "I'm going to start doing some posts. . . "

Saturday Morning TRIPtych

Green Eggs & Jane

I can hear Jane & Zuzu at the end of the hall lying in their bunk beds. Zuzu wants to go to sleep, but Jane is in a chatty mood.*

Jane: Would you, could you, in a box?
Zuzu: Would you, could you, please be quiet?
Jane: I don't know; I've never tried it.

*Jane has always needed less sleep than Zuzu, so Zuzu is frequently sleep deprived as a consequence of sharing a room with her.

Valentine's Day Redux

Zuzu's class had a valentine box decorating contest. She wanted to make a circus tent box.

Here's her original design drawing:

(I love, love, love that elephant drawing.)

And here's the finished box:


Better show you the other sides too:



Peter helped her build the box lid (It's hinged. I'm not kidding.) and I helped her with the decoration.

My sister Suzy generously let the cousins come over and squander vast amounts of use her craft supplies for a valentine-making extravaganza. Here is Jane with the fruits of her labor:


Jane was most perturbed that I bought pencils to give away instead of candy again this year. We're that family.

Excuse me for a moment while I scroll up and check out that elephant drawing again.

To bring this post back into the present, here's a picture Peter took in our backyard this morning:

And here's a picture of our backyard right now:


Here we go again.

Just Me and The Alpine Loop

Yesterday, I went up into the mountains for an outing, by myself, on an ordinary weekday, while Peter was at work. That has not happened since before I birthed my firstborn.

I have a couple of things to say about trading babysitting with neighbors: Hallelujah, Amen! The last two weeks I had too much to do so I didn't do anything fun on my free morning. Yesterday, again, I had too much to do. So I blew it all off and headed for the hills for a couple of hours.

Hallelujah, Amen!

I had the trail entirely to myself on the way up.

*This hat features in every outdoor cold weather photo of me from the last 8 years. I keep thinking I'll buy another hat. But then, this one has never failed to keep my head warm and it seems silly to buy a new hat solely to lend some variety to the family photo album.

**I also took some self portraits facing the camera. They were not fit for human optical consumption. It was just as well there was no one else on the trail.

I did come across a musher with a full team of sled dogs on my way back down. I thought that was pretty cool. Then I got to ski through what the full team of sled dogs had left behind.

It's Hard to Drive in High Heels

Both Statements Can Be True

Tuesday night my dad babysat so Peter and I could go to the temple. Today when I gave Ellen a hug and said, "I love you," she pointed her finger at me and sang, "And I love YOU, a bushel and a peck!"

Ellen: Gampa Tacy sang dat to me. He sang dat to me when I was in my bed.
Me: Aww. You know he used to sing that song to me when I was a little girl?
Ellen: No, he sang that to me when I was a little girl!

You're Never Fully Dressed Until You Look Like A Million Bucks

Children are good at pointing out to you things you may say all the time without realizing it. For example, I never noticed how often I said "Oh dear," until a sing-songy "Ah dee" popped up as a staple of Jane's just-over-a-year-old vocabulary.

The other day after Adam got dressed, he came and found me, put his hands on his hips, and queried, "Do I look like a million bucks?" And this morning after I got her dressed, Ellen started asking me repeatedly, "What I am?" It took a while for her to help me understand that the correct response to the question was "You look like a million bucks."

I'm pretty sure I picked up that one from Peter.

Happy New Year!

Ellen Aces Her First Job Interview

The snow has been piling up here since yesterday morning and I've been wishing I was out in it. Here's a conversation from this morning.

Me: I want to go skiing. I think I'll leave Ellen to babysit you kids. What do you think?
Jane (8 years old): I will babysit!
Me: Hmm. I'm not sure you're quite old enough yet. Ellen, would you take care of these kids for me? Do you think you could babysit them?
Ellen (a grin spreads over her two-year-old face): Yeah.
Me: What do you think you'll make them for lunch?
Ellen: Ummmm . . . Pood. [Food.] Onions.
Me: OK. And what will you do if the children misbehave?
Ellen: Hit them.

A Girl Can Dream

I called my neighbor after church on Sunday to meet us outside and take our picture as a family, since we were all dressed up already. No one else shared my enthusiasm for the idea, but family pictures are important, so I was willing to be the bad guy for now and let everyone thank me later. Once I'd gotten Ellen out of the high chair, made Peter abandon his industrious efforts to get lunch for the kids and had Zuzu put her dress back on, we headed out.

Here are some of the shots we were able to get before the camera battery abruptly died.






I like to kid myself that had the battery not died, we would eventually have gotten one where everyone was smiling naturally and looking at the camera. This despite the clear evidence here that Adam wasn't going to support that plan, no matter how long we stood there squinting in the cold.

Instructional Post on Small Children and Snow Play

There are no gloves for children younger than 4 that will keep their hands warm and dry enough while simultaneously allowing them the use of their fingers. It is contrary to the laws of physics. If you put mittens or thick gloves on your younger-than-four year old, she will take them off so she can use her fingers. If you put thin gloves on, she may leave them on, but the gloves will quickly be soaked through and useless. Also, the chances your small child will be warm enough in an article of snow clothing is inversely proportional to the chances that your small child will be able to move in it.

If your small child wants to play in the snow, you will spend 15 minutes getting your child ready to go out in the snow. Your child will play happily in the snow for 15-20 minutes and then will come back in, wet, and demanding hot chocolate. Your house will be draped in wet snow clothes. Half an hour later, your child will want to go back outside, and her clothes will not be dry yet.

In spite of all this, you and your small child will both derive immense joy from her going out to play in the snow everyday.

Completely unrelated to snow play: small children are able to fit themselves very nicely into bathroom sinks.

Three Cousins; One Nintendo DS (Post Turkey)

I Also Have Never Figured Out How I Got Onto AARP's Mailing List

Last week in the mail: a brochure advertising Similac's new line of maternity clothes. This week: two complimentary cans of baby formula. Why, oh why? Do they know something I don't? Then again, the formula claims to have "EarlyShield® for immune support." If I drink it, will it give my immune system the boost it needs to get me get over this blasted viral infection that I don't have time for?

Never Underestimate the Power of the Word "Underpants"

If it makes you feel any better -- I know it does me -- the increased traffic did not come from keyword searches. It was from my sisters and brothers reposting the original post via their blogs, Google Reader, and facebook. Never underestimate the power of having eight siblings.

It Might Work

I dislike the whole "rinse the meat, pat it dry with paper towels" thing. Do you think I could just put it in my salad spinner?

Cyndi Lauper Would Be So Proud

So, the day after I mentioned Jane's continuing love of exotic, self-styled hairdos, she got up and did this to her hair for school. At first it included several more flowers clipped onto the pieces of hair framing her face, but she took those out. Not because of any aesthetic idea of them being "too much," mind you, just that they were tending to slip out and to hit her in the face.

An Example of Jane's Nice Cursive Handwriting

Found this in Jane's backpack last week.

I would have died before handing this sentence in to a teacher when I was in 3rd grade.

I don't know if that says more about the difference between me and Jane or the difference between my generation and hers.

What Autumn Looks Like When You Have Two Giant Maples in Your Yard

It's Saturday, early November, and everyone has important work to do. Here's Peter, raking,

mulching,
and setting out to mow the lawn, with Adam strapped into the pack for old times' sake.

And here are the kids hard at work.

My laborious task was the photographic documentation.

By the way, if you're backing up to get a better camera angle on your daughter in a pile of leaves, and you suddenly find that your foot won't lift up, it may turn out to be because your flip-flop is stuck on a metal garden rake that your 3-year-old son left lying, tines up, in the middle of the lawn. You will be glad you were not barefoot.

See what's still up in that tree?

That means we get to do it all over again next Saturday.