Zen

Z.: I'm not going to answeuhr da question so da question can answeuhr itseuwf.

Transitions are not our friends

The beginning of the school year, yeah? Meltdown, meltdown, meltdown. Z. does not do well with transitions, like the ones between taking her pajamas off and putting her clothes for the day on. Or the one between not having a toothbrush in her mouth and having one. And going home? Well, in the time it took us to go from daycare to parking our car on the block, one of her classmates' moms had already walked her kid past our house to The Co-op on the Corner, completed her grocery shopping, and was passing us on the way back to her house. And we still had two more pauses for acting out and discipline before we made it to our gate.

Yeah. We are having some fine, hysterical times around here.

But I do think that Z. gets to the end of the day and she just needs to be hysterical for awhile.

Magpie helped us out today, by giving me the link that led me to this little piece of toddler catnip:



It's the most hilarious thing she's seen in months. She had to watch it twice, of course. And then when Mommy came home, she needed to jump up and down on the furniture for awhile.

Z: I want you to get off dat chair so I can double over wiss laughter.

As I recall, this doesn't last all school year, but it's gonna be a long September.

Halfway to Four

The semi-annual tooth-cleaning of the boo was yesterday, and as it happens, it was also her half-birthday.

We are bopping along in the car on our way to the dentist, listening to a cd a friend of mine put together for me for my own birthday a bunch of months back, and Z. is singing along to the words she can decipher.

Z.: "Happy Birssday..." When I listen to diss I sink dey're singing about me!

S.: Oh yeah?

Z.: Yes, because it's going to be my birssday soon!

S.: Sweetie, your birthday is still a long time away. As long as it's been since your last birthday, that's how long it is until your next birthday. There are a lot of months between now and then, and a lot of holidays first. Your birthday isn't until around Purim.

Z.: Dzat's vewy soon.

S.: Well, it's getting closer every day.

Z.: Dat's TWUE! En den it will be my BIRSSDAY!

Bee stories

For the past two weeks, Z. has been in a phase of wanting bee stories told to her. Bee stories are made up on the spot, and the protagonist is a bee. That's it, those are the rules of the genre in their entirety.

A. and I are getting mightily tired, not to say slap-happy, about the bee stories.

Z: Mama, will you tell me a stoawie about a bee.

S: Once there was a bee who got trapped in a car. Buzz, buzz, buzz, buzz, buzzzzzz. She went all around the car, buzzing at all the windows, and the people in the car got scared the bee was going to sting them. Then a little girl in her carseat told the grownups to roll down the -- do windows even get rolled down anymore?--to put down the, to lower the windows, so the bee flew out. The end.

Z: Mommy, now it's youah teun to tell a stoawie about a bee!

A: (groans)

The benefits of a religious education

Z: Mama, I'm Pharaoh!

S: (opens mouth to speak--)

Z: But I'm not Pharaoh da man!

S: (opens mouth to speak--)

Z: I'm Pharaoh da bunny!

Gimme that cookie

We are at the dining room table. We are eating passover cookies, the almond kind with the almond on top, and the raw paste in the middle. Z. is surrounded by the remnants of cookies that have their almonds removed and their centers eaten out.

Z.: I know how to take dat off. (Reaches across to my plate and takes my cookie.)

Z. removes almond from top of cookie and hands it to me.

Z.: Here you go. You can eat dis.

Z. proceeds to bring my cookie to her mouth.

S.: Hey! (S. snatches cookie from her child's mouth.) You can't just take my cookie off my plate!

Quick, what's the weather forecast?

Z. got some new boots this week. They are purple, with white daisies on them, and just like when she got her ruby slippers, she had to get out of bed once and put her boots on to clomp to the top of the stairs and ask for water. Apparently having cool new shoes makes her too excited to sleep, and very thirsty.

I let her wear them to school Wednesday (the first day she was at school after she got them), but not yesterday. "Only if it rains, or we go down to the creek," I said, in my best mom-lays-down-the-rules voice.

This morning she woke up and said "Is it supposed to rwain today? After school, I want to go down to da cwreek."

New York City, there we were

We took a mid-week, one-night trip to New York last night to see a showing of some films. It was only Z.'s second time ever seeing a movie in a theater--her first time was last week, when we pulled her out of school early to see a matinee showing of a documentary about a kid we know from our neighborhood. She hasn't quite got the whispering thing down.

Here is something that might happen to you if you raise your child to be polite and to respect privacy by asking first. You might be in a quiet theater and she might ask to sit on your lap. And then she might ask if she can hold your breast.

*****

On our way to the car and home, I had the rolly bag and A. was herding Z. In the gutter of the driveway in front of the faculty housing where we were crashing: a bird's head, walnut-brown, long-beaked, red at the neck where it was severed. I bumped the bag up onto the sidewalk and went a few paces. I turned and waited to see what would happen when Z. got to the same place: would A. see it in time and head her off? But if I pointed it out, Z. would certainly see it.

Neither of them noticed it. I left it at that.

One of the great imponderables

The scene: we are reviewing an online shopping cart together.

Z: I want dat, an' dat, an' dat, and all of dose.

S: Do you just want everything?

Z: Probably I do.

Cut to the quick

The scene: Mama is singing Z. her bedtime song. There has been some debate about which verses will be sung.

Z: It seems to me ... I don't like you.

S: Oh?

Z: I sink dat maybe some kids like dair parwents and some kids don't like dair parwents.

S: (laughs and kisses Z.)

Z: Cuddle me!

Good news/bad news

The good news? There's now an interim location for daycare--two, in fact, one for preschoolers and one for infants and toddlers--starting at some vague point next week. Rumor has it, on Tuesday.

The bad news? It's a 20-minute drive away, and the teacher who collects Z. on Mondays and babysits for her until we get home is going to be several miles away in the other location, so the childcare arrangements that allow us to go to couples therapy are now officially all shot to hell.

Crap.

Name that literary allusion

Z: What do you want fwrom me? I'm only just beginning to live!



Points if you recognize the book, and I swear, she chose it all by herself at the bookstore, (not-so-)vaguely disturbing sexual overtones and all.

Edited: The book is The Amazing Bone, by William Steig, and really, you need to check out the sample pages to get a sense of the flowering, blossoming, blooming, pollen-drenched world that Pearl walks through with a bone hanging out of her open purse. I mean, come on.

Will someone toss her a cape, already?

Z. is naked except for diaper, between the removal of pj's and the application of actual clothes.

Z.: I put on my spauwkellies! And now I'm not cowld anymore!

Vocab update

The following words are now officially in Z.'s active vocabulary:

Lovely
Horrible
Miserable
Gorgeous

I guess she picked it up in school

Mama is opening a small package.

Z.: Dat comes in Bubble Wrap! Dat's Bubble Wrap! Is dat BUBBLE WRAP?

S.: (laughing) Yes, sweetie.

Z.: Can I have it when you open it up?

S.: Sure.

Z.: Oh, thzank you, thzank you, thzank you, thzank you! Thzank you, Mama! Thzank you!

Fish recipe (contains no fish)

Flouwr
Cwream
Zucchini
Appeuws*

You put it in a bowl. Den you stirw it and mix it and stirw it and mix it and stirw it and mix it and stirw it and den it fawlls out of da sky and PLOP! it goes on da dauuuwgs! Plop, plop, plop, PLOP, PLOP, PLOPLOPLOPLOPLOP! PLOP!


*or, alternately

Wine
Enchiladas
Grwape juice

The witch in her hat

Magpie, that's the gingerbread house in the background, before we decorated. Post-decoration pix coming this weekend.

The schoolgirl with her first braids

Yep. Same hair as in yesterday's pictures. That's how much hair goes into those corkscrewing curls.

* * * * *

Z.: I don't want to be yeuwr daughteuwr. I want to be a beautiful lady and sing my songs.

Phone call

A. is on the phone to new mama, Z.'s Auntie Lo.


A. to Lo: You spell it in Yiddish. K-v-a-t...*

Z.: K! V! E! T!

A. to Lo: Oh, Z.'s spelling now, k-v-e-t.

Lo on the phone: Z., the end of that word is "c-h."


Go forth and Kvetch Out Loud...it's Wednesday Whining!

*A kvaterin is someone who agrees to be responsible for a baby's Jewish education.

The artist at her easel

I realize this sweater has made an appearance in this blog before. Actually, it was in my fourth post, ever. You might be surprised to know it remains one of my most popular posts (coming in just after the one I unwisely titled "braless").

Why? Because it comes up third when you ask google for the last frost date in Philadelphia. Never let it be said I do not provide my readers with useful information.