Memorable Weekend

Actually, not really. I was supposed to ride with my friends in the Wilderness Ride on Saturday, procrastinated about signing up, signed up at 12:30 on Friday, and discovered a mere three hours later that Miranda was sick with a fever (no other symptoms). On Memorial Day weekend. When the doctor's office is closed from Saturday afternoon through Tuesday.

Oh well, I thought, she'll be better in the morning. She wasn't; instead, her fever was higher. In the off-chance it might be strep, I managed to get a doctor's appointment for her on Saturday morning, and I learned a valuable lesson: sometimes it is NOT a good idea to make your kid use the restroom before you leave the house. When the strep test came back negative, the doctor decided that we could not leave without testing a urine sample for a bladder infection. An hour and a half later, she succeeded (no infection, of course) and we went home. She had a fever through this morning, but seems to be fine now.

But, who knows? Maybe she saved my life by being sick -- not having ridden on a bike in a year, I was a little apprehensive about my ability to do the Wilderness Ride anyway. I did take the bike out today to make sure when I go for a lunchtime ride with Joel this week I won't die, and it looks like I should survive.

Xavier did not get sick (knock on wood), but every symptom Miranda has exhibited, he has shown as well. Heck, if Miranda falls down the stairs, he will pretend to fall down the stairs, too. No sibling rivalry going on there.

To try to reassure Xav that he was still loved, I started playing a game with him where I would pretend there was something on his face, and then I would say, "Oh -- I see! It's just kisses!" And I would shower him with kisses. He thought this was funny for awhile, but when I leaned over him today with a concerned look on my face and said, "Xavier, what is that on your forehead?" he shouted, "It's not kisses! It's just a goosebump, OK?"

Beachin' 2

When I read the Beachin' posting to my husband, he asked, "Did you tell that story about ...?" So here's the sequel.

The story Adam wanted me to tell was this: he and my mother went to the fish store (with Miranda) to get some fish (what else?) They got some Wahoo (the idea of cooking and chewing up a Wahoo was definitely too great a chance for a former Hokie to miss), but figuring that the kids wouldn't eat that, Adam also got them some shrimp. Miranda looked at the shrimp and asked, "What's that?" Adam said, "They're shrimp!" Then, feeling a little playful, he added, "You know, little fish for little kids." Miranda gave him a disparaging look and said, "Dad, shrimp aren't fish, they're Crustaceans!"

On the way to the beach, Xavier felt obliged to point out every water tower he saw. At one point, there was a water tower next to a clover-leaf exit we had to take. Xavier chanted from the backseat, "Look, Mom! There's a water tower! And another water tower! And ANOTHER water tower!"

At the same exit, Miranda expressed an interest in using the restroom, so we stopped at a Red Apple gas station. I filled up the van while Adam took the kids to the rest room. The flourescent lighting was going out, so evidently there was some kind of disco effect going on in there. Now, this is our very first week-long trip to the Outer Banks with the kids, yet when Miranda looked up at the flickering light, she said, "I sure hope they fix that light before we come through next year." Already a tradition ...

Okay, this last story requires a little background. My father-in-law is a well-known laser physicist. One of his sons is an electrical engineer, and his other two children majored in Biology; one of them works in Pharmaceuticals and the other works in the genetics lab at Duke. To protect the identities of my children, we are going to pretend that his name is "Dr. Jones" (no, not Indiana.)

When we arrived at my brother-in-law's house to spend the night on the way back home, his wife's parents were there for our niece's baptism. After the kids went to bed, we discussed this, that, and the other, and the subject turned to that of the children. After an amusing anecdote about Riley and golf, I said, "You know, I find it interesting ... Miranda is obsessed with dinosaurs -- she can tell us almost any detail we could want to know about dinosaurs, she writes stories and songs about dinosaurs, and when you ask her what she wants to be when she grows up, she says she wants to be a paleontologist. Riley is obsessed with astronomy, and he knows more about planets than I do. Then there's Xavier -- he is obsessed with Thomas the Tank Engine. He wants to be a (railway) engineer, he talks about writing Thomas stories when he grows up ..." My sister-in-law's mother commented, "Of course, you realize that he's the normal one of the three." My brother-in-law sighed and said, "Yes, it appears that Miranda and Riley have been afflicted with the recessive Jones Science gene."

Beachin'

Well, we are now back from a week at the beach with the grandparents. The number of funny lines were probably too numerous to cover here, but I'll do my best ...

On the first evening we were at the beach, I took Xavier and Miranda down for their first sight of the ocean (or, in Xavier's case, his first chance to lie flat on his back in the surf.) On our way back to the house to get Xavier something (dry) to wear, my father offered Xavier his hand to hold, but Xavier replied, "No, I want to hold Mommy's hand." I took his hand and teased, "You're just a mama's boy, aren't you, Xav?" "Yeah," he replied. Then, after a moment's pause: "But I'm not Grammy's daddy!"

The morning after that, Miranda, Xavier, Grammy, Grandpa, and I all headed for the beach. The surf was pretty rough that morning (actually, it was every morning we were there) and when Miranda first ventured into the surf to fill her bucket with water, a wave knocked her down and started dragging her down the beach toward the water. My father and I were alerted to her predicament when my mother started to cry, "Grandpa -- hurry! Grandpa -- hurry!" and Dad and I grabbed for Miranda. As we helped her to her feet, my mother cried, "Oh, you're too late! I wanted you to go after the bucket!" The little purple bucket bobbed out of reach for quite a while before finally being swept out of sight, but I think it was more replaceable than Miranda.

One morning, picking up seashells at the beach, Miranda decided that she wanted to seek larger shells than the battered pieces we normally found crushed into the sand by the surf. Avon is not the best place to do that, but I had noticed some (relatively speaking) larger shells over by the signs that indicate that motor vehicles are not welcome on the beach. Xavier joined us on this quest, but midway there he picked up a small sea shell and handed it to me. "Xavier," I said, "I can hold this for you, but it is pretty small." Xavier replied, "That's okay, I like small things." After a short pause, he added, "I'm a small boy."

We found a large horseshoe crab on the beach the morning we left, and we flipped it over and let it drag itself back into the sea. Miranda was very afraid to go back into the water after the first day when she got knocked over by a wave, but my father managed to lure her close by telling her, "The horseshoe crab is a very old animal, dating back to prehistoric times." A few minutes later, Miranda chirped to me, "Mom! Guess what? This crab was alive during the time of the dinosaurs!"

My nephew Riley (three years old) is an avid golfer, and his parents told us this story. I am not an avid golfer, so I will have to substitute the real names of famous golfers he sited with the name of the only famous golfer I know (Tiger Woods). One day, my brother-in-law comes home from work and finds Riley playing golf in the front yard. "How's it going, Riley?" my brother-in-law asks. "I played the PGA tour today with Tiger Woods and another golfer," Riley replied. My brother-in-law nodded and asked, "Who was the other golfer?" Riley replied, "Meow-meow Kitty." I'm guessing I don't need to tell you who Meow-meow Kitty is, since the name says it all.

OK, that's all for tonight. I arrived home at 14:30 today, so I got my BLOG in before the beer-buying limit (for those who play that game, and you know who you are!) Joel, you still owe me chocolate for not blogging fast enough after that race you did with Eileen (the Flying Pig Marathon, was it? Of course, it seems to me there was pretty slow turnaround after the Country Music Marathon. :)

Kempo

A friend of mine is starting a Kempo Karate school. He gave me some free passes and my husband got very excited about it, so I took the kids to attend a Peewee class last night.

My friend is a very devout Christian, and he started the first class with a prayer. Then he got down to business. He taught the kids a number of exercises, and Miranda was quite keen. Then he taught them to do a jab and a kick at the end of class. Miranda followed his directions timidly, but fairly accurately. Her only complaint after the class was, "I thought we would learn to do something tougher."

Xavier was really too young, and I was more concerned that he would hurt the instructor than that he would himself get injured (little things, like sitting on the instructor's head when he kneeled on the floor, ramming into the instructor with his head) but the instructor was very good-natured and patient.

When my husband came home from work, he asked Miranda, "So, what did you learn in Karate class?"

Miranda said, without hesitation, "I learned the Karate prayer."

Choices

Miranda announced at dinner the other day, "I think Sam should come over for a sleepover for seven days."

"Um, Miranda, seven days is a long time for a sleepover, and, generally society frowns on mixed-gender sleepovers, at least at your age." It is too early to explain to her the ins and outs of grown-up culture, and it is too soon for me to think of my five-year-old as having "sleep-overs with boys." Instead, I suggested, "How about we have Jane over for a sleep-over."

Miranda took a deep breath. "Mom, it is always good to make new friends, and some of those new friends are going to be boys. And if you make friends, it is important that you have sleepovers with them, even if they are boys, because blahblahblah..." A veritable speech -- and clearly well thought out -- for a little girl who often gets distracted mid-sentence (a trait in my family :) .)

The answer was still no.

Then she started talking about marriage. "Mom, I can't decide if I am going to marry Mike, Sam, or Shaun. Right now I am thinking Sam, but I'm not sure. It is hard to decide."

"Well, you have a few years to figure that out."

My mind wandered as Miranda continued to rattle on ... it is hard to focus on everything she says, especially when every meal is punctuated with, "Xavier, we don't play with trains at the table," and "Xavier, drink your juice," and "Xavier, get your feet off the table," and "Xavier, get that rice off your nose." When Miranda said something about "tongue shakes," it pretty much washed right over me until she added, "Of course, we had to be careful to keep the teachers from catching us."

"What?" I asked, suddenly alert. "Tongue shakes ... that doesn't mean touching tongues with someone else, does it?"

She nodded happily. And this from the girl who worries incessantly about dirty hands! We had a little discussion about germs on that one ...

On the Xavier front, he was eating sherbet last night for dessert, and my husband looked over and saw that Xavier's face was covered from nose to chin in green sherbert, almost as if he had dipped his whole face in it.

"Xavier, what are you doing?" my husband asked.

Xavier looked up, nonplussed. "What?" he asked. Then, a few moments later, "Am I a clown to you?"

Painters, Phase 2

The painters came by today to give us an estimate for the second round of painting in our house (Master Bedroom, Master Bath, hallways, and Living Room.) We have a lot of work to do in the half bath, the kitchen, and the great room before we can start there, so I guess we are calling that "Phase 3."

Anyway, when I was leaving for work this morning, Xavier didn't want me to go, so I told him, "But, Xav, the painters are coming today to give us an estimate. You'll be so busy supervising them that you won't get a chance to miss me."

Upon hearing the word "painters," Xavier perked up and said, "They're coming back?"

"Yes, but just to give us an estimate," I stressed. "They won't be doing any painting today."

I gave Xavier the tour of the house, showing him which rooms we were going to have painted. I reiterated again that the painters would not be painting today and my husband also stressed that we would not be painting today. Evidently, though, once the word "painter" was used, it was kind of like that Far Side cartoon where some guy is talking to his dog and all the dog hears is, "Blah, blah, blah, Ginger, blah, blah, blah." Xavier was having none of it.

While the painters were here, Xavier followed them around with the usual questions and supervisory observations:

"What is that funny rolly thing?" ("It's a tape measure for measuring the room.")

"Why did you forget the paint?" ("Because they aren't painting today.")

At one point, my husband stopped in the kitchen and told the painter about our plans for that room, and Xavier interrupted with, "But we aren't painting the kitchen this time!"

Finally the painter finished taking his measurements and said goodbye. Xavier stood by the window as the van pulled away and asked, "Where is he going? When is he coming back? Why didn't he paint?"

It's hard being a manager.

I Spy

You are familiar with the game "I Spy," right? It's the one where one person says, "I spy, with my little eye something ... blue!" (or some other color) and everyone else tries to guess what that person is looking at.

This is a very popular game with Miranda and Xavier. Miranda is an avid player, especially when we are on long car trips. Unfortunately, either her "I spy's" are incredibly predictable ("I spy something ... green!" "Could it be ... grass?" "Yes!") or she picks something in the backseat that I can't see because I am driving (then it becomes a memory game!)

Xavier enjoys it, too, but I don't think he quite has the hang of it. For one thing, I'm not sure that he gets the gist of the game, because either you get it on your first guess (ie, "I spy with my little eye something ... blue!" "Is it the sky?" "Yes!") or he decides later that you did indeed get it on your first guess after all ("Is it the sky?" "No!" "Is it the sign?" "No!" "Is it the car?" "No!" "I give up -- what is it?" "It's the sky!"). I think to him, the point of the game is to find something with a color; guessing is just icing on the cake.

Today as we were sitting down to dinner, Xavier suggested that we play "I Spy." I agreed reluctantly because he really is more than capable of distracting himself into an hour-long supper without the additional burden of a game.

He started off: "I spy, with something in my eye ..."

Dad's IQ

Today at lunch, Xavier did not want to eat his fruit. He said, "Dad, can I have a treat?"

My husband said, "No, Xavier, not unless you eat your fruit."

"Can I have a treat when I get home from school?"

"Not unless you eat your fruit, Xavier."

Xavier pouted, "But I don't want to."

Miranda said gently, "It's okay, Xavier. We can have a treat when we get home. We just won't tell Daddy."

My husband said, "Umm, excuse me, Miranda, but I am standing right here!"