Ain't No Baby Book Girl

Today as I was putting Dani’s clothes away, I caught a glimpse of her barely touched baby book, buried underneath the general closet clutter. The little twinge of pink-gingham covered guilt. The hard-bound reminder that I had succumbed to the second-child cliche.

Her dental record....unrecorded. The girl only has four teeth, so it shouldn’t be that hard to fill in a few dates. But the molars will remain a mystery, and her baby book untouched.

Her trip home from the hospital. Well, she got home okay, as far as we know. But according to her book, well, we’re not even sure what her name is.

Her first vacation? Geez, we were all over the place with that girl. We moved when she was five months. She went house-hunting with us at 12 weeks (she wasn’t fond of this, and I vividly remember her screaming temperament without the help of a baby book). But according to her book, hmmm....was she a boy or a girl?

So this is the deal, Sheridan. You get a blog. No baby book for you. Just this silly blog. Tell ya what, I’ll print it out for you, and you can see for yourself how darn cute you were. And maybe deduce from the pictures when you finally got teeth. And I’m pretty sure you won’t care what you liked to eat when you were eight months old, so I won’t bother to blog about that.

As for your first words, well, that seems to be transpiring now. We’ve got various forms of Mommy, Daddy, Caed, Calli, Doggy, Banana, Thank you (though that’s only been witnessed by Nana & Del), Belly and Peekaboo.

Your percentile? We’ll find that out next week at your 15 month appointment. But it’s safe to say that “stout” will be a term you won’t shake anytime soon. Your dad says you have a perfect build for soccer and lacrosse. He’s being kind.
And that’s all I have to say about that.

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Pride Comes Before (and After) a Fall

As Caed took the ice this afternoon, his adoring fan (Dani) squealed with delight, pressing her nose against the glass, yelling “Cae!!", I sat on the sidelines with Dani, squealing on the inside with pure parental pride at my little Gretzky. This was Caed’s first time on skates, and I wasn’t sure if he would love it or hate it. Thanks to Daddy’s patient hunched-over, hand-holding technique, Caed had a ball. He even skated a bit all by himself, and wasn’t phased a bit by falling. In fact, he was beaming with pride, both before and after his falls.

When all was said and done, he proclaimed that he “loved hockey” and that he wanted to do it again tomorrow. Later, as Dad was reading to him before bed, I overheard him say, “I am s’atin’, Daddy.” A bit bewildered at why my 3 yr old had just confessed to being the devil himself, I rounded the corner and heard the rest: “I’m s’atin’ past the zamboni! I’m goin’ sooo fast!!!” Ahhh, that’s my boy--a little devil on skates.

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Maine Maple Weekend

This morning we headed out for a pancake breakfast at the Snell Family Farm in honor of Maine Maple weekend. Lest you get any big ideas and think that the harvesting of sap/syrup in the “Sugar Shack” heralds the coming of spring, take a look at these pictures.

That white stuff you see coming down is not excess fluff from the Easter bunny, or marshmallow confetti. In spite of the snow, we still managed to have a yummy breakfast and lots of fun with our friends who met us out there (the Norfleets & Nightingales).

Best of all, we enjoyed some quality time with Dad. His vacation this past week and weekend was just what the doctor ordered! And when we got home, we even built a fire--for the first time all winter. (I didn’t have a clue how to build one, and Larry hasn’t been home long enough to show me how). The morning turned to afternoon, and as the fire dwindled, everyone settled in for a long winter’s nap. Except me, of course, because I wanted to stay up and blog. And technically, Caed is still awake too. I can hear him upstairs building a fort out of his pillows and stuffed animals. Oh, and there goes Dani as well. That girl’s got lungs like a fire alarm. Oh well, it looks as if the “long winter’s nap” concept is not quite catching on here. But it was a nice thought, right?

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Superhero Status

“Mom, you look like a SUPER-HERO!” Caed exclaimed this morning, followed by a hallway demonstration in which he feigned flying and shouted “to the rescue.....wooooooooshhhh....to the rescue!!!!”

So how, you may be wondering, did I snag Super Hero status without leaving my living room? Well, apparently, the poncho-style sweater that I pulled on this morning looked deceivingly cape-like to the preschooler in the house. I knew it was a bit out of fashion, but honestly didn’t think it was bad enough to get me lumped in with the likes of wonder woman and ‘piderman.

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Wicked Pot Holes

I really wish I could have captured the audio on this one. So I’ve been explaining to Caed that the cracks in the road are often caused by winter weather, and that cracks turn into holes, which we call “pot holes”.

Driving home this morning, Caed noticed a number of these pavement imperfections. Now, to understand why I found this funny, his pronunciation is key. He drops the “L” sound at the end of most words, and often substitutes it with a “W” that sounds like a messed-up “R”. Thus, the word “hole” sounded more “horwe”.

So Caed yells....“Look at all those crack holes! They are everywhere. Here comes another one! I don’t like the crack holes, mom. They are not good. Why are there so many crack holes in Portland, Mom??”

In between my laughter, I reminded him that the word is “pot holes”. He replied, “No, I like calling them crack holes.”

I’m thinking we better work on his pronunciation before he goes back to school and tells his teacher that he saw “crack horwes” over the weekend!

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