Choices

The school year is now over. The last final exams have been graded, course grades have been turned in, and I can now stay at home most days with Sharayah and Lucas. There is still some work to be done during the summer, but most of it can be done from home. I'm really excited to have more time at home this summer. I have a ton of projects around the house that I've been wanting to tackle pretty much since we moved in. I also have a lot of books I've been meaning to read. Mostly, I have a Boy to watch learn and grow. I've talked about my nice schedule before; I already get more time at home than most full-time jobs would normally allow. Still, during the summer I'll be home almost always. Sharayah has had a monopoly on Lucas time that I plan to take over for the next few months.

It's about time, anyway. He is really digging her lately, and I want a piece of that pie. Lucas, as we have mentioned, is developing all kinds of preferences, and they are only getting more frequent and well-defined as time goes by. Currently, he's firmly in the middle of that phase where he consistently wants a particular parent to do (or help him do) each particular thing throughout the day. For most things, that's Sharayah.

She's mentioned that during breakfast, I am not allowed to identify the things in his book as he frantically points at them. If I do, or if I look like I'm going to, he will wave his arm at me as if to shove me away (even though I'm clearly too far away to be shoved). We have a post-meal routine for getting him out of his highchair and cleaned up which used to involve her taking his tray and me unstrapping him and carrying him to the sink, where I hold him while Sharayah washes his hands and face. No longer. If I start making my way behind him or reach to unstrap him or pick him up, cue the grunting and attempted shoving. Sharayah has to do the whole thing on her own, now (don't worry, she's quite good at it from doing it alone while I'm at work, anyway). Sometimes, Lucas won't even let me take off his shirt at bedtime. I say something like, "Ok, Lucas, let's take off your shirt," and he grabs it with a death-grip and runs to Sharayah, saying "Momom! Momooomom!" Of course, you know what he does if I reach for his shirt anyway. Shove. There are many other examples. It's fun to sit and think about them. He's such a funny kid.

I take all these things in stride. All the wobsites say it's normal for toddlers to strongly prefer one parent or the other for various tasks, and it's best not to try to force them to do otherwise. It's a passing phase. Besides, there are also things he prefers me to do. At bedtime I sit in the rocking chair in his room and read books with him. He wants me to read the books to him. At various times, he chooses me to carry him when we're going somewhere (this one's kind of a toss-up - we never really know who he will want to carry him). Sometimes he wants me to push the shopping cart. If that's his choice, what happens when Sharayah tries to push? Yeah. Shove. Getcho hands offa my cart, Momom. I want Daaa. Ah, it's nice to sit and think about the things he wants me to do for him, too.

I don't know how he chooses. Some of the things are obvious: habit, or routine. He wants whoever he is accustomed to for a particular task to be the one who does that task. For some things, though, he has recently made us switch (ok, usually when we have to switch from a set-in routine, it's because he's choosing Sharayah). Interestingly (but possibly coincidentally), he shifted several tasks to Sharayah around the time I went back to work after spring break. My theory is that he got used to me being home all day, and then he was mad at me for leaving everyday again when break ended. Or, you know, that just happened to be when he entered this phase. For still other things, he might choose either one of us for the same task at different times, depending on who knows what. Once he does, though, there is usually no convincing him otherwise. Although, now that I think of it, sometimes Sharayah can get him to let me do stuff by giving me "permission" to do it: "Lucas, you can let Dada put your socks on. Then we'll go outside and play." It doesn't always work, but sometimes.

At the end of the day, he is just a really funny little guy. He's so often a little ball of energy and sweetness packed into a package small enough you wouldn't think it would all fit. I can't wait to spend all summer with him. Maybe by the end he will let me look at him during breakfast.

Disclaimer: Lest anyone think otherwise, Lucas is still ridiculously sweet. It's just funny to talk about the silliness above. As earlier chronicled, he loves to obey us. He's super affectionate with Sharayah, and very huggy with both of us. Sometimes he'll run up to one of us, shout his name for us, grab our hand, and lead us away somewhere (or no where in particular, just walk around holding our hand). Yesterday while we were all playing, he suddenly stopped, ran over to me, and gave me a kiss on the cheek. Then he ran over to kiss Sharayah. Then he just picked up playing where he left off. Gah.

two sides of the toddler coin

In celebration of warm weather, outside exploration, a freshly mowed lawn, and everything spring, Lucas is the ecstatic owner of a brand new lawn mower. It does not blow bubbles but by golly the pull cord [starter rope? varoom thingamajig?] makes a noise that simultaneously fascinates the Boy and scares the whiskers off of Puma. Score. This little green lawn mower also comes with a miniature gas can that fits conveniently in a notched space on the back of the mower. [This space can alternately be used instead as a storage spot for any number of other important life items, like colorful Easter eggs, hotwheels, or a peanut butter sandwich. Versatility!] And this gas can is the star of the latest installment of Life with Lucas.

Topping the list of Lucas's many heartwarming attributes is his sweet desire [some incalculable percent of the time] to dutifully carry out whatever task you ask him to do. In hopeful-parentspeak, he loves to be obedient. Sure, a lot of the time that he is sweet and dutiful about obeying is when he is being asked to do something that he has no reason or desire to refuse to do in the first place [confusing sentence!]. And granted, he has not reached the age where he questions everything before he agrees to do it, which is a good thing since we ask him to do a lot of inane things just for the sake of watching him do it. Like I said, he is a pretty sweet kid. Anyway. All this to say, more often than not, Lucas seems to love to do what we ask, as long as what we ask does not interfere with the consumption of his bananas.

So. The gas can story. The little green lawn mower came packaged in a frustrating mixture of cardboard and a dozen absurdly tight zip ties. Things were zip-tied that had no reason to be zip-tied. There was even a zip tie that was zip-tied. Seriously. Ridiculous. [First takeaway from this story: If you think you can quickly remove this toy from its packaging in order to discreetly shoplift it away, think again. Trust me, just spend the $25 and save your integrity and sanity.] Lucas was in toddler agony trying to be patient as I manhandled those never-ending zip ties one by one. Each time I successfully removed one, he would think it was finally time. But no, cutie, there are still a gazillion more. Sigh. 

One of the first removable parts I managed to get loose was the miniature gas can. He held it reverently in his hands as he watched me wrestle with the rest of this menace-disguised-as-a-toy. Finally, it was finished. I assembled the four pieces of plastic with minimal pinching of toddler fingers [he insisted on sticking his fingers in each and every spot that I was focused on because, well, you know, curiosity] and presented him with his very own lawn mower. He was gleeful. I explained to him what it was and showed him the various parts. In conclusion I pointed to the gas can clutched in his hands and said, "Lucas, that's a gas can. Gas can. Gas can." And the turmoil began.

What turmoil you ask? My thoughts exactly at that moment. Lucas became clearly bothered for a couple of seconds. He hesitated. His face got that serious, decide-y, pondering look to it. He was clearly bothered. But why? When a toddler becomes bothered, it is sometimes quite hard to pin down the reason. Did he not get the concept of a gas can? Does he not know how to hold the gas can and push the mower at the same time? Is the gas can's color too red for his liking? Did my mention of the gas can bring to mind a previous babyhood trauma involving a scrap of carpet fiber, applesauce, and an unwanted diaper change? Did he suddenly realize it was an election year? Who can say. This is life with a toddler. 

A moment after the turmoil-filled pause, Lucas turned around, gas can in hand, and waddled off into the kitchen. After the past fifteen minutes of anxious excitement to get his hands on his new toy, I found his wandering off a bit odd. But, a few seconds later, he returned. Empty-handed. Gas-can-less. And then it dawned on me. You see, one of the various requests we make of Lucas is to throw things in the garbage can. He gets a big kick out of it and loves to find dirt and crumbs on the floor to throw in the garbage can of his own volition. It is such a big kid thing to do; I love it. Well, apparently with all of the excitement zooming around his head, Lucas misheard what I said. He saw me pointing at the gas can in his hands and thought I said "garbage can" instead of "gas can." The poor kid was torn between doing what he thought I asked him to do and keeping his new toy, and he chose to dutifully do what he thought I asked.

I love this kid. You have no idea.

The gas can was rescued from the trash, the difference between gas can and garbage can was explained, and the entire main floor was mowed about thirty times in the next thirty minutes. In the middle of his mowing, with his eyes closed tight, he gave me the sweetest little kiss, smack dab on the chin. For the rest of the day I marveled at what an unbelievably sweet and good little boy I have. I win in the kid category.

Zoom.

Just in case anyone gets the wrong idea or thinks I am epically naive about my child, I suppose I should toss in here that I am quite aware of the other side of a toddler's behavioral spectrum. Lucas is by no means perfect and his sweetness isn't always apparent 100% of the time. To prove my point, here is an abbreviated list of some of his quirkier moments:

• During breakfast, if Jason [yes, this is particular only to Jason and only during breakfast] looks at him too long or identifies an object in a book, Lucas will thrash about in his chair and sometimes even start crying. Why.
• The classic Back Arching occurs if he doesn't want to put on his shoes or his jacket or if he doesn't want a diaper change at a particular moment. 
• Lucas loves being outside. Playing in the yard is one of his favorite things to do. And if he isn't ready to come back inside when you insist it's time? Cue Armageddon.
• There is one particular shirt he refuses to wear. Refuses. If you try to put it on him, he acts like it is made out of acid. That's right, we bought an Acid Shirt for our son. 
• The correct parent has to push the shopping cart. If the incorrect parent attempts to push the shopping cart at any given moment, get ready to be that family with that kid in aisle 12. Sometimes you've just got to choose your battles...

And the list could go on. But I think I'll stop there, because, really, Lucas is such an amazing kid. He has the sweetest heart. He is incredibly empathetic. He looks adorable even with drool crusted on his face and his hair doing some kind of weird toddler comb over in the back. He laughs heartily whenever we're laughing even though he has no idea what we're laughing about. He laughs when he hears us say the word "funny." He laughs when I say the word "potato." He gives hugs that speak volumes and volumes. He emanates such joy.

Being Lucas's mom means I get to see and experience and, yes, sometimes just simply endure every moment, every mood, every side of his personality. It is a privilege that no one else gets to experience, and it is a grand, grand way to spend my days. 

the Boy and the pig

There once was a boy. He had many friends of the stuffing-filled type. One of these friends was a small, red-bandana-ed pig named Alfred. The Boy and the pig got along splendidly.

One morning, the Boy determined that the pig was hungry. Knowing pigs do not care for rice cakes, the Boy searched for an appropriate pig food. He discovered a large bottle of Bar Keepers Friend underneath Daaa and Momom's bed. He decided this would most certainly do. Yes, most certainly.

The Boy carefully balanced the pig on his tiny pink haunches on the edge of the bed. He then used both hands to heft the heavy bottle of household cleaner up to Alfred's snout, tipped it up, and started feeding him. To ensure an authentic feeding experience, the Boy diligently made many lip smacking and slurping noises on behalf of his porcine friend.

The Boy's parents saw this outrageously cute play unfold and pretty much declared the Boy the best, most hilarious, sweetest child alive.

The End.

Basically.

*No Bar Keepers Friend was actually consumed or even opened by any party*

*No stuffed pigs were harmed by the imaginative ingestion of Bar Keepers Friend*

*If you write Bar Keepers Friend too many times, it starts to look like a tasty ice cream flavor*

Daaa beats the system

Sharayah has documented many of the ways in which Lucas is developing his own little personality and preferences. Occasionally this means crying for no apparent reason (or for a seemingly irrational reason, if we guess correctly what he's upset about). It reminds me of this list that I read before he was born. That list really gives a peek into the mind of a toddler (although I don't think he's cried for any of those particular reasons yet). Mostly, though, he is just learning how to play and explore his world on his own. It's been really fun. He is such a sweet little guy. He loves to transfer things from one place to another (often the "another" is a person, and if they put down anything that he gave them in a given round of transfers, he stops his transferring to pick it up and give it to them again [or pushes them to pick it back up on their own] and then resumes transferring without missing a beat). He loves "reading" probably more than any other activity. Many times throughout the day he will suddenly run off to another room, stop, and shout "Daaaaaaa!  Dadaaa!" until I come find him. It's the best (although it makes me a little sad that when I'm at work he will pound on the door that leads to the garage and shout "Daaa!" in the futile hope that I will come rushing in to find him). That's pretty much how he always calls for me: loudly shouting "Daaaa!" In contrast, when he wants Sharayah he says "Momom" (yes, he ends his "mama" with another "m") in the sweetest, calmest voice you can imagine.

We are getting a passport for Lucas for an upcoming trip. Did you know babies need passports? The requirements for the picture are not easy for a toddler. Mostly the hard part is that he needs to sit still, look straight into the camera, and not have any expression on his face. Lucas was actually really cooperative, and also demonstrated to us once again that, while he is a man of few words (at least, few real ones), he probably understands pretty much everything we say to him. Sharayah told him to go stand with his back to the wall and look at her for the picture, which he did promptly without hesitation. We have never told him to do anything like that before, so I don't know where he picks these things up. He kept looking away or looking down, so I told him to look up and he looked at the ceiling. I guess I should be more specific.

Passport photos are stupidly expensive to have made, but they are really just 2 inch square pictures with the head filling a certain portion of the picture. No place will print that without calling it a passport photo and charging a lot (think $15 for a single print), but you can get a 4 inch square picture for less than 25 cents. So we just made a 2 by 2 grid of the 2 inch picture that we actually wanted to print. So we got four times the picture for less than 1/60 of the price. It turns out Lucas is pretty cute even just standing there with no expression on his face.

So this is what it would be like to have quadruplets staring at you...

It also turns out that we misread the requirements on what size the face should be within the picture, so we ended up having to pay to get another picture remade at the post office anyway. So much for beating the system.

Right now it's spring break at MBU, and I've loved having the week off to spend all day with my little family. There are only 5 more weeks (and finals, and grading...) left before summer vacation. I am very excited to have a few months in a row to stay home almost every day and watch my little guy get bigger. Not to mention going on the grand adventures that require baby passports. Being Daaaa is pretty great.

seventeen months going on irrational

Suddenly, Lucas has opinions. What. Kid, you're just barely 17 months old, you still pee your pants, and you find specks of dirt fascinating. You're not old enough to have opinions and preferences and unbelievably specific demands. You're not.

Before becoming a parent, I liked to ruminate about the age at which one goes from "baby" to "real-life tiny person." As we are now finding out, it is so much sooner than I imagined. Seriously. I was under the impression I would have a much longer period of time to impose my desires willy-nilly on this child. Alas. Lucas has other ideas.

Some of Lucas's budding opinions are more obvious, and slightly more understandable, than others. For instance, he has opinions about food and opinions about whether or not he wants to get his diaper changed. Fine, so that food doesn't taste as good as last time - noted. Okay, so you weren't done playing and don't want to lie down for a diaper change - I understand. But then, there are the much more... random preferences. 

Stoic.

Explain to me again why it is imperative for you to hold my left hand? What's wrong with my right hand? And while we're on the subject of hands, do you not realize that it is physically impossible for you to hold both of my hands to dance since I need at least one to hold you up? Also, would you mind enlightening me about how you decide who has to hold out your plate at mealtime? What is so unacceptable about me offering the plate as opposed to your dad? And why does your preference change five times a meal? I understand you like cats, but you can't wear your cat shirt every day. If you remember, it is unwearable because you kept patting it with your food-smeared hands at dinner. Plus, I hate to break this to you, but the cat shirt is really a TIGER, not a cat. So... there. How do you decide who you want to lift you out of your crib? Or whose lap you want to sit in at night? Or which plastic chicken deserves to be in the barn? Or which pot is allowed to have a lid and which is not? Or whether you want your socks on your feet, on your hands, or nowhere within a 10-foot radius of you?

I suppose I can't fault him for his preferences and opinions since, well, one's preferences and opinions, almost by definition, don't necessarily have to conform to any sort of sensible, logical reasoning. But come on, why is it so all out important that the now unrecognizable blob of food go only in my mouth? Why can't it stay on your tray, or be given to dad, or placed in the bowl with the rest of your discarded leftovers? Why do you demand that that piece must be fed to me? Sigh.

Gleeful.

Lucas seems to basically understand 85% of what we tell him. It's crazy. His ability to understand longer and longer strings of words is amazing. But, of course, he is still just a little kid. And so when I'm trying to talk him through why I would rather he place the food blob somewhere other than my mouth, he starts getting super frustrated. "Mom! You don't understand! This food has to go in your mouth right now. Can I be any more specific about what I want?!" It's hard being a tiny person who doesn't verbally communicate and who cannot parse his parent's statement of "I don't like to be fed cold squished foods." I can already hear it now: "But why, mom? Why won't you eat it?" Because it's GROSS, kid.

Silly.

We "read" books all day long. We have about 45 books checked out from the library at any time. It's fantastic. Lucas will run to the door and attempt to leave the house when you say, "Let's go to the library." He will take my hand, walk me over to one of his specific reading spots throughout the house [because, no, he doesn't want to read in the chair in the living room; he wants to read in a particular spot on the floor in the dining room BECAUSE PREFERENCES], position me just so, and back up until he plops down in my lap. And then we read. And identify every animal, goldbug, and familiar picture. Two or three times. Rinse and repeat.

Luckily, I love reading and I especially love reading with this warm, sturdy little body sitting in my lap. It's the best. But, I'll be honest. I'm not a huge fan of reading a book fifteen times and still having no clue what is going on because of page skipping, absolute obsession with only the first three pages, absolute disinterest in the last four pages, or only spending 1.3 seconds on a page. Do the chickies ever go to bed? How does Clifford get home? Why is it important that the bear now has a rabbit friend? I don't understand the knitting penguins AT ALL. Sigh.

Irresistible.

Obviously my brain can't handle this many incomplete stories, so sometimes I take matters into my own hands and try to read the book on my own. Sixty seconds, that's all I want. Sixty seconds to quickly read through this undoubtedly predictable children's book so I can have my peace of mind again. Fine, I'll settle for thirty seconds and a general idea of everything that occurs. Is that so much to ask? Yes, yes, it is according to a certain 32-some-odd inch person. As soon as Lucas spots what I'm doing [especially when this is a book that he has deemed not fit to read ("Child, what are you basing this on?!")], he runs over and closes the book. If I try to read it again, he closes the book and takes it away. If I keep doing it, he starts to get frustrated. But, but, why? His consistency in doing this is pretty hilarious, though I really have no idea why he does what he does [this is becoming the case more and more often]. He's a barrel of laughs and perplexity. I love him so incredibly much.

Every so often Jason will ask me, "So, do you like your life? Is it everything you hoped?" My answer is always a soul-resounding yes. Even on the fragile, on-edge days with all of the food thrown on the floor; the Boy in his mismatched, not-so-clean, sock-less attire; and the eighteen perpetually unfinished books strewn about the house and my brain. Even then, or perhaps even especially then, it is absolutely everything I have ever hoped or imagined. 

signs

Recently, we have been teaching Lucas sign language for various simple things. He obviously knows a lot of words and understands much of what we say to him, but since he's so far reluctant to speak, we thought that signing would allow him to communicate to us what he wants sometimes. Plus, you know, a baby doing sign language, right? That's pretty cute.

Among other things, we taught him the sign for "more" so that at mealtime when he finishes his food, he can tell us whether he's done or if he wants more. We learned two things: First, a baby signing for more food really is very cute. Second, he always wants more. He is not ever really done eating. What's that, you say? He finished all the food we prepared for him? But that's not all the food in the house, right? There is applesauce in the fridge, right? Yeah. Go get him some applesauce. Kid's not done. He wants... more.

With very inconsistent results, we have been asking him to "be patient" when he wants something that we plan to give him but don't have ready yet (or for some reason don't yet want to give him) if he's fussing for it. Sometimes he will stop fussing, sometimes not. Usually it at least causes a pause of a few seconds (maybe he thinks "be patient" means "ok, I will give it to you, but only if you stop fussing for just 2 seconds, man!" [which, now that I think about it, it sort of does mean]). Still, he can only be patient for so long. Then, if his mood is right (wrong?) he's right back to fussing for it. I guess I can understand. It's not like he can just tell us what he wants. But he wants us to know that he wants something. Telling him to be patient acknowledges that we understand him, but it doesn't always work. However, what's usually more successful is that Sharayah taught him the sign for "please." If he's asking for something and we ask him to say "please," he stops fussing and does the sign, and then looks at us expectantly. Of course, this only works for things that we plan to (or are ok with) giving him anyway, but it's very effective and he seems to like that he can express his desires.

Hold on, though. It gets cuter. Lucas really likes cheese sticks, so sometimes for a snack or (more commonly) with a meal we give him little pieces torn off of a cheese stick. He loves it. A lot. Enough to ask for it frequently. Enough to drive home the "please" sign. He started just walking up and signing "please" instead of fussing and being asked first. Then Sharayah taught him "thank you." So he would walk up, sign "please," get his cheese, and (upon being prompted) sign "thank you." Then. He starting walking up, quickly signing "please" and "thank you" in quick succession and holding his hand out expectantly.

So maybe he doesn't quite understand the intricacies of language. Maybe he thinks "if I do this motion, they get all happy and give me cheese and applesauce!" Still, being played by a polite baby is better (and more adorable) than having him fuss at you. I call it a win.

two things, and then one more

2016. Here we go. Goal: Blog more than once every four months.

So much has been going on, so many good and tiring and exciting and stressful and fascinating things, but Life [read: Bedtime] demands that I only touch on a few of them in this post. I will touch on two of the Things. Two Things and One Random Factoid. 

First of the Things: We live in a house. It is a pretty house. It is the perfect house for Us Now and Us Down the Road. We have a master bedroom [which took several nights to get accustomed to since it felt like "the parents' room"] with a vaulted ceiling so high that Jason's best leap cannot even get him close to the center beam. We have a garage [Lucas loves opening and closing the garage door] and a backyard with a giant play set and two trash cans to drag out each Tuesday and Wednesday and a finished walk-out basement and bedrooms galore for future kpluBlets and so many other good things. We Christmas-ed with just the three of us and our house. We survived the never ending rain and were grateful to not be in a flood plain. We celebrated the beginning of 2016 by going to sleep before midnight. Already, we have had such good times in our new place. It is a good house. We feel at home already.  

Second of the Things: The door leading to the basement has a cat door. It is a perk that has been amazing. We now have all things related to Smelly-Cat-ness located in the bathroom in the basement. This is something we have always wanted to do. Success! Anywho, this cat door fascinates Lucas. He loves to peer through it and see if Puma is lurking on the steps. He loves to stick his arm through and feel around for the fluffy tail. It's pretty funny and cute, right? But then, the other day, Lucas discovered he could meow. The cutest little meow you ever did hear. So now he squats in front of the cat door, opens it up with his little arm, and meows for the cat. You know, because he wasn't adorable enough. Plus, any time Puma meows, Lucas will meow back. Puma is generally unimpressed and I am usually dying from cute overload. 

In case you are wondering, nothing ever really gets done in our house. We mostly just stare at Lucas and try to wrap our brains around how smart and hilarious he is. The floors go un-vacuumed, the dishes go unwashed, and there might be a trail of kindasorta used tissues strewn about ever since Lucas found out he could blow his nose, but boy is there a lot of clapping and laughing and high-five-ing every time the Boy learns something new [basically, every 15 seconds]. It's a grand time. I love my family.

The Random Factoid: **obligatory TMI warning** Earwax. Everyone does not have the same kind of earwax. Truths.

I never knew that earwax could be yellow and wet and sticky and all-around gross. Never knew. The only earwax I was familiar with was my own and, in the past year, Lucas's. We both have, what I always thought was, "normal" earwax, the dry and flaky and whitish earwax. The earwax that doesn't seem any more gross than, say, scraping a dried squash seed off the floor. Jason has always made comments about his gross earwax and he always made a big deal about cleaning off his earbuds before each use. I just figured it was because he's a little OCD about things and made fun of him as was appropriate.

But then, sometime after the arrival of Lucas, we actually had a discussion about earwax [stemming from my obsession with cleaning out Lucas's ears while he nursed]. And we discovered that Jason's experience with earwax was not at all like mine. And so we dug further [ha, gross pun!]. And we discovered that Lucas and I have a different earwax than Jason, in color, consistency, texture, etc. Weird? Well, I kiddingly attributed it to our awesome Asian genetics and left it at that. But the other day, I suddenly remembered that I had wanted to google this earwax topic but had never gotten around to it.

Jackpot: What Your Earwax Says About Your Ancestry

If you don't care to read the article, here's the summary: East Asians [and Native Americans apparently?] seem to have superior genes that allow their earwax to be dry and smell-less and not gross. Not only that, but the same genes are also responsible for the lack of armpit smells. It's going to sound gross but I have to say it here, once and for all: This explains why I only use deodorant MAYBE twice a year. See, it sounds like a gross thing to admit to, but come now, it's actually the exact opposite... Am I bragging? Yes, yes, I am. Don't judge.

Okay. I'll leave it at that. Two Things and One Random Factoid. You're welcome.

Here's a hamster. To un-gross your minds.

dusting off the ol' keyboard

I have moved twice since the last time I posted a blog. I have an alert on my phone from October 31st telling me to write a blog, and that was already after a 3-month gap. I guess I dropped the ball a little bit. There are many things that I could talk about, but I will just stick to one topic for this blog, in the hopes that I can start posting more frequently. In this post, I give the primary reason for my lack of posting: my new job.

I heard a funny (or so I thought) saying about teaching sometime in the last year or so. It was something along these lines: "Being a teacher is great because you have a very flexible schedule: I can work whichever 60 hours per week that I want!" Man, I really thought that was a joke. I chuckled to myself a little bit. It was not going to be that bad for me.

Well, I didn't keep track of hours exactly, but for my first semester teaching at MBU teaching took a huge amount of time. Planning lectures for 3 different courses that I had never taught from textbooks I had never read kept me busy pretty much every day. It ate every bit of what could have been free time after Lucas went to sleep. Most weeks, I found the time to take one evening off. Sure, I could have worked while Lucas was awake, but I already missed so much time with him while I was at work. Every day when I got home (or sometimes through text while I was still at work) I'd hear from Sharayah all the hilarious things he did, or the new things he learned, or the new things he could do. It was really hard missing so much, so once I got home each day I spent as much time with Lucas as possible. That was the choice I made.

I am truly thankful for my flexible schedule. If I had been offered a job with conventional hours and no work to do in the evenings but no time with Lucas in the morning and being away from home until 5:30 or 6 each day, I would have refused. I got to be with my happy little family in our happy little apartment by 3:30 or 4 every day, and many mornings I didn't have to leave for work until 10. For that I traded my evenings. It was worth it. Of course, in the coming semesters I plan to get the best of both worlds. Eventually, as I start teaching more and more classes that I've already taught before, I will be able to do my lecture planning much more quickly.

(Rereading those paragraphs, I feel like it might come off as though I only miss Lucas while I'm at work. Of course, I miss Sharayah as well, but she doesn't go to bed at 7. I get to spend time with her even while I work at night.)

Hopefully this doesn't come off sounding like I'm complaining. I've really enjoyed teaching this semester, and I know that time-wise it will only get better. As always I had to battle against the strange apathy of many students (why would you pay to go to college and then make no effort to learn anything?), but I also had students who put in huge amounts of effort, in particular in an upper-level pure math class that I taught. For most of them, it was their first theory and proof-based math class (as opposed to a computational math class), which is always a very difficult step. I think most universities start proof earlier on in easier classes, but these students had really had no experience with proof. Many of them coped with it impressively. However, I am still proposing a few classes to be added to the math program to better prepare students for this and other upper-level proof-based courses. I have some pretty big plans for the math program here. Hopefully I'll be here for a long while.

wish come true

Dear Lucas,

I wished for you upon a shooting star. You're my little star baby come true. You're my answered prayer. You're my tiny miraculous wonder.

It was a chilly, wet evening. Your dad, Uncle Shawn, and I were making a few laps around a darkened walking track. I had underestimated how cold it would be that night and was regretting not bringing along a hoodie, but I found the chill in the air exciting, invigorating, a whisper of a reminder that winter was right around the corner. The thought of winter made me feel hoppy, giddy with the images of Thanksgiving, Christmas, and snow dancing around my head.

And then, right in the middle of my hopping and skipping, I saw it. For the first time ever, I saw a star go streaking across the sky. I couldn't believe it. I had always wanted to see a shooting star. It was on my bucket list of things to experience. And here it was! My shooting star!

Your dad and uncle hadn't seemed to notice that they had left me behind and were just plodding on ahead, probably still in the middle of an engaging conversation about some Atari game featuring Captain Picard playing baseball against Chewbacca. Or something like that. I nearly took off running after them to share my star excitement and I nearly forgot to make a wish. Nearly. But not quite.

I made my wish upon that shooting star, just for fun, just because that was a thing I had always wanted to do, just so I could have that one moment of childlike anticipation. I squinched my eyes closed as tight as they would go, and I wished. I wished, wished, wished for you, Lucas. I wished for you to come into this world. I wished for God to choose me to be your mommy. I wished for you to be my special little boy, my little hug buddy, my chubby partner in crime. I wished to know you, to hold you, to love you. I squinched my eyes and wished, wished, wished.

You are my fantastic star wish come true, lovebug.

I never knew how much love I could give until I met you. Watching you grow up this past year has been one of the most exhilarating experiences of my life. You smile and frustrations melt. You laugh and everything makes sense. You hug me and time loses all meaning. You squeal and hop and wave your arms around and I'm pretty sure flowers just up and grow. Seriously. Getting to know you and getting to love you has made the last 365 days a true joy, memorable and fulfilling beyond words. I cannot wait to see the man you grow up to be.

Oh but please, please, please don't grow up too fast. Gnaw on the broom. Smoosh your nose on the screen door. Belly laugh until you're out of breath over me pretending to be a Rockette. Be my little boy for a little while longer. You're only one year old; there are so many more things just waiting to be drooled on.

Oh, Lucas, how I love you so. You are a gift from God, adorably wrapped in the squishiest of packages.

-Mamamama

"I prayed for this child, and the Lord has granted me what I asked of him."

- 1 Samuel 1:27

PS. Choosing just one picture from each week of your life was ridiculously hard. God gave you two extra doses of cute.

Happy first birthday, my little munchkin.

neither here nor there

The air, the hair.

All I ever want to do is talk about the Boy. We packed up our Delaware apartment, traveled 900 miles cross country, and settled into a grand new place, and Jason has just finished his first official week of professor-ing, and yet all I want to write about is Lucas and the minutiae of his days. Everything about him is notable and wonderful and hilarious and worthy of being yammered about. In my opinion. Pre-Lucas, I was a bit of a bore when it came to conversations and socializing. Post-Lucas, I am most likely an even bigger bore when it comes to conversations and socializing, unless the topic is Lucas and then I will jabber until the cow comes home [and yes, I mean Lucas's stuffed cow that resembles a giant soccer ball and moos pitifully if you step on his left hoof]. Yes, I am one of those parents. Unashamed. My kid is that awesome. But, I suppose I should touch on a few non-Lucas things before I get pulled into the never ending whirlpool of life with munchkin. Cue the bullet points!

• Due to rather unprofessional dealings on the part of the moving truck company we used, our moving day was unexpectedly moved up a day. This led to an abrupt end to our packing procrastination and Jason became Super[packing]man for 24 hours. It was a sight to behold. I did my part which mostly consisted of telling Lucas, "No, don't eat that dust blob." We're a great team. Due to Jason's heroic efforts, we were completely moved out of our apartment with seven minutes to spare. Our last night there was spent pretty similarly to the very first night we moved in five years ago: Sleeping on the floor of an empty living room with an open-weave blanket. It was perfect. 
• We planned our cross-country trek to perfectly coincide with Lucas's daily schedule, which led to a pretty stress free [read: cry free] road trip. However, while our stops in Ohio and Indiana were timed well to ensure getting to the hotel in time for dinner and Lucas's bedtime, we did not put much consideration into the town the hotel was located in. And because of this, we ended up staying the first night in some Ohio town [if you could call it that?] that had no easily accessible grocery stores or dinner options other than a gas station Quiznos and whose hotel requested that you use their boot covers and boot scrapers before entering the building. [Note: Boot scrapers are not effective on flip flops.] Also, if you didn't own a pickup truck and/or a hard hat, you stuck out like a sore thumb. So, we were just three sore thumbs who were tired and hungry and lacking boots, dirty or otherwise.
• Missouri greeted us with humidity you could slice through and swarms of weirdly tiny mosquitoes. I would have preferred a bucket of cherries and maybe an ice cream cake or two. Hear me, Missouri? Are you listening? CHERRIES.
• Our new apartment suits us. It has many a perk, only a handful of "Hm, I wouldn't mind that being different," and ceiling fans. Perks are as follows:
• Mail slot in front door. I, for whatever reason, have always wanted this. [Come to think about it, there are more items on my bucket list having to do with mail delivery than one would expect from someone who receives 6.4 pieces of personal mail a month (and yes, my USAA policy update counts as personal mail)...] I want to place our bin for recyclables underneath the slot so those annoying weekly coupon flyers are just immediately recycled. I want to figure out the mailman's schedule so Lucas and I can peer out the mail slot forlornly four days a week when he doesn't have any mail for us. I want to sit on our front steps, collect the mail from the mailman in person, and then turn around and schloop it through the mail slot piece by piece myself. So many plans.
• Kitchen cabinets and drawers for days. No longer do I have to reach into a dark, overcrowded cabinet stuffed with our seasonings and spices and hope, hope, hope I pull out the cinnamon and not the cumin. Because, face it, people, cumin oatmeal is just not the best part of waking up. I now have two drawers filled with all of our seasonings! It's excellent. As for cabinet space, my Pyrex and other baking dishes are now on a shelf that I can reach without Jason's help or climbing on top of the counters. Fantastic.
• Mario and Luigi survived [fingers still a little crossed] the trip in the moving truck and are now placed outside our front door. They look happy and get a lot more sun than they did on our patio in Delaware. Plus, they can now squirrel watch to their little leaves' content.
• Ceiling fans. Ceiling fans. Ceiling fans.
• Have you ever packed up all of your belongings inside a truck and wondered, "What if something happens and all of those things somehow disappear?" Well, we got to momentarily experience such a situation. The big truck pulled up in front of our new home to unload, opened its giant door, and... it was absolutely and completely empty. In case you were wondering, it's not the best feeling. Thankfully it was just another case of this moving truck company's incompetency and not because our stuff had mysteriously been stolen by a herd of moose somewhere between Delaware and Missouri. Whew.
• Jason has finished his first week as Dr. Jason Vermette at MBU. Syllabi and lesson plans and calendar-ing have filled his days. Finally teaching something other than Calc 1 and 2 is pleasing to him, I think.
• We are already frequenting the library. Kudos to their nifty self-checkout system. I needed this technology back when I was 12 and too shy to talk to the librarians. Seventeen years too late, library world! *shakes fist*
• Sometime between unpacking our wall clock and finally getting around to hanging it up on the wall, the battery died. And we don't know where our extra batteries are. And we are particularly opposed to buying new batteries ever. So, in case you wanted to know, it is always exactly 3:44 in our living room. 

Ok, surely that's enough non-Lucas stuff to balance out this post, right? Now, if any of our five readers are of the "parents who talk about their kids all the time are annoying" opinion, this is your opportunity to stop reading. Go on, no offense will be taken. Go, shoo. Quickly now as I am about to Lucas-ify this whole thing.

.....

Ok. Here goes. 

Lucas is incredible. I am pretty sure if the world were filled with Lucases, the world would be much funnier, healthier, and more drool-filled. My days literally consist of playing with Lucas, feeding Lucas, napping while Lucas naps, and saving the cat from Lucas. A few loads of dishes and laundry are sometimes thrown in there. It's a pretty nice gig. 

Sigh, I just became overwhelmed with everything that I wanted to say about the Boy and am fighting the urge to just overload this post with pictures of Lucas instead of words about Lucas.

The boy with the beat.

Lucas loves to eat. He is one of those human garbage disposal eaters. I had no idea this was a phase that could start even before his first birthday. He just eats and eats and eats. The kid still nurses every 2-3 hours during the day [no complaints here]. He shovels in yellow squash and broccoli like it's syrup-covered pancakes. He skillfully downs tofu cube after tofu cube, even when I offer them to him via chopsticks [he is an a-DOR-able chopstick-feeder Asian. seriously, it's ridiculous]. If you hand him a cheerio, he will deliberately place it between his front chompers and crunch down, every single time. That tiny little crunch is magnificent, every single time. We have reached the point where we cannot eat a meal without him waddling over, his tiny feet smack-smack-smacking against the floor, and asking for food. And don't even mention the word milk unless you're ready to fend off a very handsy 11-month-old. To round off his well-rounded diet and to further solidify his status as Human Garbage Disposal, Lucas loves to eat garbage. It can be cardboard, cat fur, strands of my hair he scrapes off the carpet, shoes, anything delectable he can lick off the stroller wheels, paint chips, grass, anything he can salvage from the bathroom trash can, tiny flecks of unrecognizable something from underneath the couch... You name it - if it is dirty, inedible, or not fit for a rodent, Lucas wants it in his mouth.

Story time: Lucas [luckily] has a very distinctive movement of his mouth whenever he's busy mulling over something he shouldn't be eating. It is one of those special safeguards God installed in young children so you know immediately that a prompt finger swipe of their mouth is needed. Oh so many finger swipes are needed... Anyway, upon seeing his little lips clamped tightly shut and his jaw methodically working back and forth, I swooped in for a swipe. In went my finger and out came... a stalk of broccoli? He had eaten lunch about an hour earlier and did indeed have broccoli, but he had definitely just been exhibiting his I Have Delicious Inedibles face, not his broccoli face. I asked Jason to finger swipe him and Lo and Behold! out comes some styrofoam. Little sneak. He thought he could fool us by relinquishing his broccoli stalk so he could keep his styrofoam. But we're too smart for him. And our fingers are too invasive. Better luck next time, little champ.

Cat and Boy are Friends-ish.

Lucas loves to look at books. I love to read him books. We make a good team. We order dozens of books online, pick them up from the library, and then it's like Christmas for the both of us. I am not ashamed to admit that on more than one occasion I found myself wanting to skip ahead to the end of the 16-page book to see what happens. But I resist. Most of the time. He loves books about cats, books that have flaps, books that mention Tweedle Beetles, and books about bears losing their hats [I do not think I can say enough good things about Jon Klassen's I Want My Hat Back and This is Not My Hat. Absolutely hilarious books.]. Is it weird or terrible or inappropriate to have my list of favorite books slowly but surely coming to include a good number of picture books? Really though, I could read some of these books over and over and over again, even if I didn't have my captive audience of one rocking back and forth, toe-monsching, page-turning little boy. 

Lucas loves to play with a whole assortment of different things. Some favorites are:

• Puma.
• Me.
• Jason.
• His stuffed animals. Quietly opening his bedroom door and watching him play with his moose, elephant, fox, and hedgepig friends when he wakes up from his naps is priceless. Usually they all seem to get along grandly, but the other day I witnessed Little Critter being threateningly dangled by his mess of hair over the edge of the crib right above an already cast aside Eddie the Elephant. It was Lucas's first time to throw one of his friends outside the crib. I am afraid it will not be the last.
• Things with moving parts.
• Things with wheels.
• Jason's keyboard. He especially likes to spin the dials so that the keys sound like explosions. Out of almost 500 sounds to choose from, I have no idea how he so often ends on explosions.
• Uno cards. The blue 3 and the yellow 6 have been retired from duty. RIP.
• Anything we don't want him to play with, like phones and wires and the television remote.

Lucas loves to climb on a whole assortment of different things. Some favorites are:

• Puma.
• Me.
• Jason.
• His stuffed animals.
• Things with moving parts.
• Really anything that will make him even a centimeter taller. Once, he put Jason's checkbook on the floor and then stepped on it in the hopes of reaching something previously out of his reach. He was sorely disappointed. 

Lucas is learning so many things these days. One of my constant struggles is deciding whether Lucas is a baby or a toddler, especially when it comes to knowing how to address various behavioral things. Is he a baby who is just acting like a baby or is he a toddler who needs to know there are boundaries he is expected to learn? Is he being stubborn or does he just not understand what is being asked of him? Being eleven months is a tricky age. He shows so much awareness and intelligence and understanding, but then he still can't make heads or tails out of how to make a food-filled spoon land in his mouth.

However, in the midst of all the whining for things he can't have and the fussing about things he doesn't want, there are so many more moments of sheer joy. They far, far outweigh the fussiness [though those 10 minutes of trying to get him into his pajamas every night make it awfully easy to forget his shrieks of laughter about you pretending to burp just moments ago]. He is truly becoming a tiny little individual. With each new skill he learns, whether it's how to wave or how to walk or how to gently pet the cat [ok, so he's still working on that one...], he seems more and more grown up.

Story time Part 2: Lucas has an obsession with tissues and toilet paper. He loves the stuff. He loves to unroll it, pull it from the box, rip it in pieces, and, of course, eat it. I think if you just set him in a room with rolls of toilet paper, open boxes of tissue, and maybe a thing or two of paper towels just to keep things interesting, he would be set for a full hour. Or three. However, as you might guess, this destruction of paper goods isn't the most pleasing pastime for the parents. Cute as it is, watching him rip and slobber on the last three sheets of toilet paper that you were just going to use [forcing you to awkwardly sit there wondering whether any of his scraps are salvageable] is a bit problematic, not to mention potentially costly.

So what's a mom to do? How do you manage to wrangle from him all of the tissues and toilet paper that he is trying to eat? The idiom "like taking candy from a baby" most definitely does not apply in this situation; in fact, I would like to make a motion that the phrase "like taking toilet paper from a baby" should be officially instituted as the direct phrasal opposite. If I try to take the tissue from him, he either cries like his cat died or immediately starts stuffing it in his mouth as fast as he can. Neither situation is acceptable. So, the following is what we now do:

I hold out my hand: "Lucas, may I have that please?"
Lucas holds up his fistful of paper, looks at it, looks at me, looks back at it, continues playing.
Still holding out my hand: "Lucas, may I have that please?"
Lucas holds up his fistful of paper, looks at it, looks at me, looks at it, and then rips the tissue into two and places the bigger piece [which is always in his right hand] in my palm. Continues playing.
I quickly hide the piece he gave me and offer him my other hand: "Aw, thank you. Lucas, may I have that please?"
He considers the request, takes his remaining [now much smaller] piece of tissue in both hands, rips it in half, and hands me the bigger piece.
This continues four or five times until he has just the tiniest scrap of tissue left.
I hold my hand out once more: "Lucas, may I have that please?"
Lucas looks at his fist, the last remaining bit of tissue just barely visible between his fingers, looks at me, looks at his fist, and then promptly shoves it as far into his mouth as he can.
And then it's finger swipe time.

The finger-swiped remnant was too gross to be included.

This is a regular occurrence. It's awesome and hilarious and oddly pleasing. Even though the paper is never usable by the time our "game" is over, I always feel like such a successful parent by the time we get down to that last tiny scrap. Maybe I have low standards, I don't know. I just immensely enjoy feeling like I made some kind of intelligent/behavioral connection with this tiny person. He's the best.

So, that's that. I believe I have covered a little of everything. It just barely scratches the surface, but it will have to do for now. I should blog more often. Perhaps then my posts wouldn't be such a spewed out explosion of words and thoughts. Ha. Good luck, me.

<3

Oh, one last mentionable... I wasn't sure if this belonged in the non-Lucas section or the Lucas section, so I am going to put it here. At the end. So, before leaving Delaware, Jason and I had our first outing together without Lucas. Longwood Gardens was having a new light exhibit and it would our last time at Longwood for a long time so... We left the munchkin asleep at the grandparents' house and headed off into the night. Just the two of us. Like the good ol' days, back when we were just kids together, before we had a kid together. It was nice. It was fun. It felt adventurous being out past 10 pm. But it was also weird. And I think we both felt a bit anxious. We semi-rushed through the sights and quickly headed back to our little sleeping fellow. On the way home, I asked Jason what he thought of our venture, and I think he summed it all up pretty accurately: "I had fun. I didn't worry too much... I worried the right amount. I do want ice cream though, to calm my nerves." Amen.

Life continues to fly by, and we are just trying to soak it in and make the most of it. Hooplah!

ps. My baby is not about to turn 1. Seriously. It's not happening.