Two Years Old

Happy Birthday Little Apple!!!!

First day of Fall today: each morning a little crisper- it feels good to snuggle down under covers. You are two years old and wearing your new hat from Rachel. Flaunting your new two-ness, although the concept is lost on you: when we ask you how old you are you say "months!" We sing happy birthday to you and you hide under my skirt.  I woke up this morning with intense cramps: a funny coincidence, to start my period on this morning. Two years ago I had just broke open and we were learning to breathe together, chest to chest. Now you call out to me from your crib and we snuggle together in bed with a bottle of milk and a present from grandma, to distract you from your tantrum... the past few mornings you have wanted milk from my boobs and NOT the bottle and have gotten quite mad when told that you were a big girl now: only milk in bottles. This new two-ness comes with some hard breaks, you are learning.

Now you are at daycare and I am hunkered at the computer, determined to write about the current state of Sava- but first I am going to perform one of your birthday rituals which is to bake a carrot cake: it will be the usual adventure in the kitchen with your mom making a wild lumpy mess of a cake and trying to fix it all with heaps of frosting. Later I will pick you up from daycare and we will swing out to the lavender farm to play with the giant white flemish bunny at the rabbitat, and then we are going to have a party at the playground this evening, with face paint and swings and slides, and you are excited about this. You may not understand "two" but you understand "party" and "playground".

Okay, just a few notes about some of my favorite things about you right now.

Spicy.
You went through a period where you were fascinated with spicy things. It started with our Russian dumpling dinners. You saw Dad and I swirl this cool red stuff into our cream and wanted some of the "sauce" for your own. You puckered your face and said "hot" and then stuck your spoon out for more. Then you wanted hot sauce on your eggs, and so on and so forth. Even as you were cringing your face and grabbing your glass of water, you always came back for more. We always talk about how PROUD your Papa is going to be of you. Another fledgling spice monster with whom to enjoy oyster shooters and jalapeno-infused margaritas....Then, the other day, I think Dad overloaded you a bit, and suddenly you are not so very much into spicy any more.

Sharks and Tea Parties: the development of the imagination.
You are not afraid of anything, as far as I can tell. Except, you are strangely fascinated with sharks. It started with Finding Nemo... your favorite part of the movie is the AA meeting held by Bruce and the other sharks. (Fish are friends, NOT food!) I am not sure if it is a genetic thing (I can be gripped by terror while swimming in a pool) or what, but you are hooked on the magnetism of that fear. Actually, I am not even sure if it is fear. I don't know what to call it really, since it seems to be mostly a game for you. For instance: the other day, we were walking in the woods with Nico- a nice long walk through a maze of paths in the thicket. We were ambling along and just being quiet together, when suddenly you stopped and pointed down. "Mama, ook!" as you pointed to a half-submerged tree root which was crossing our path. "Ook! ...........Shark!!!" And then your voice got really low "Bruucce!  Swim Away!"  and you gleefully leapt over it and went running. I just about died laughing. It was so great, to see you using your imagination like that. Translating a tree root into something symbolically cresting the surface of the ocean. We hopped dramatically over every single tree root that we crossed. So interesting..... It reminds me that you are really starting, in these last few weeks, to start using your imagination so much more. You are always now wanting to throw little tea parties from your little toy kitchen. Pouring the "water" into cups and bringing it to me to drink, over and over again. Serving me empty plates piled high with delicacies.

Chloe and Elliot
As I wrote before, it was wonderful to see you fall in love with Chloe up in Hayfork. The beginnings of the instincts of friendship. Now, when we are cuddling in bed in the morning, Daddy asks you "What did you dream about, Sava?" "Chloe dream." "You dreamed about Chloe?" "Yeah. Chloe park dream." "You dreamed about Chloe and the park?" "Yeaah, Chloe park dream." Every morning. 
But your current obsession, probably because he lives down the street and we have weekly playdates with him, is Elliot. Elliot is about four months younger than you and has inspired all kinds of big sister instincts in you. I think the fact that he is a boy, and that he is younger and thus doesn't present as much of a threat to you as some of your girl playmates, but with Elliot you are just unbelievably sweet. (Instead, of say, pushing Rihanna away from all your toys- shouting "Mine!" and grabbing her water bottle and running off with it - that sort of awesome stuff that always makes a parent feel so warm and fuzzy and proud). With Elliot, you are pretty good at sharing all your toys with him and showing him around the house and pushing the button on the rocking horse's ear when he wants to giddy-up on it. So anyway.... this is all leading up to the fact that now you are fixated on him. "What do you want to do, Sava?" I ask in the morning as we are cuddling. "See Elliot!"  Anytime I ask if you want to take a walk you respond "I want see Elliot!" and then you pull me eagerly by the hand to his house. I am not sure if he shares your passion.. Elliot is such a mellow kid that he often seems kind of stunned and awed by the world (and especially you), but I think you prefer it that way. 


Rihanna and the Green Beans
Probably the proudest moment I have had thus far, as a parent, was the afternoon that Rihanna and her mama came over to garden. The two of you were hopping on the trampoline together and you were doing your usual thing of stuffing cherry tomatoes in your mouth as you jumped. I was picking through some green beans off the vines and thought that you might like to try some, so I brought some over. "Hey Sava, you want some green beans?" Not really sure that you would like them. "Sure!" you said in that delightfully accomodating way of yours: "Yeah, sure!" So you both got a handful and gobbled them up and well, you just LOVED them! So all of a sudden we had two little girls bouncing wildly on the trampoline and clamouring for green beans. I mean, if they make awards for good mommies, I think Miriam and I deserved one that day. Like, Rihanna came over last week while you were gone to daycare and was jumping by herself, and she asked me for green beans. And just two nights ago you and I went out for a late afternoon jump and you got really mad when I said there was no more green beans (until I remembered I had bought some at the farmer's market and saved the day). It is weird... something must have clicked for both of you guys, to have you now associate the act of jumping on the trampoline with eating green beans. 


Little Mama




Wheels on the Bus


Market


Mommy Sad


Baby crying at playground.....

two lumps of clay

september 16th

In dreams last night I walk along the ventriculated limbs of my thought possums, those sleeping possibilities.  Endlessly variegated and multi-edged, these tentacles deliver me into courtyards, into street scenes, where I weave amongst seated patrons and take some orders, ignore others. Everything is blossoming, wild differentiation. A man speaks to me and then you cry out from your room next door and I am wrenched from the scene and into this one: darkened room and stillness.
Six a.m.
I gather you into my arms with a bottle of milk and we snuggle back into bed for our new morning cuddle routine (you drink the milk with eyes wide open on my face, while I hold you and stare back dreamily, and we break and giggle for kisses and fierce hugs before returning to soft focus) and we are two lumps of clay again, waiting to be formed.

-mom

Dear Sava,

Your communication skills are growing, you are becoming cuter and more excited with life than ever before. It's almost absurd how cute you are. In fact, you're the child who makes people want a child. At least that's been a comment from quite a few people.

For the past few weeks now you've been on the "What's that?" phase, only you use who for what. We'll go walking and you'll ask "Daddy, who's that?" and I'll say "That's a ______ (flagpole, grate, brick, desk, lampshade, mousepad, coat rack . . .)" and you'll repeat (in your own language) "Moosh pad" "Cot wark". I always congratulate you and you seem so proud of yourself.

Last night we were sitting on the bed together upstairs. Your mother was downstairs, but you thought she was coming up and, as per usual, you shushed me. "Mommy coming," you said wide-eyed. Then you grabbed pillows and hid us under them. In the dark under the pillows you asked "Where mommy go?" "I don't know," I said. We looked up, but mommy wasn't there. "Where is she?" I asked. "Cooking," you said. "What's she cooking?" I asked. "Chicken!" came the reply.

The idea of chicken cooking was particularly appealing to you. "Mommy!" you called out. "Cook chicken!" I stopped you and asked you to repeat after me. "Mommy." "Mommy," you said. "Can." "Can." "You." "Yuuuuuu?" you said. "Cook." "Cook." "Chicken." "Chicken." "For." "Foo." "Dinner." "Dinner."

Excellent, I told you. Now say it back to me. You thought about it for a moment. "Mommy. You. Cook. Chicken?"

"Yes!" I said with a big smile. "And what else do we say?" "Thankyouyouwelcome," you said.

You were so excited to be able to ask your mother this complex thing that we actually went to the store and bought chicken to cook!

Tonight I returned home and found you still sleeping at 5:30pm. You woke up at 6 and we both sat in bed together watching Fern Gully for a little while. You really like sitting with me on the big bed, reclining back in my right arm with a pillow behind your head, and watching movies. You continually ask me, "Who's that, Daddy?" and I tell you, even if it's the same person 100 times. Then I ask you to tell me who they are. Most of the time you will remember, and when you don't, I remind you.

During movie time you inevitably grow bored with the movie and begin asking about my face. "That, Daddy?" you'll say while grabbing my ear. "That's an ear." "Eeeeaaarrrr," you say. In this way you've enabled yourself to attain an incredible vocabulary of terms. You not only know mouth, like most two year olds, but you know the difference between lips, teeth and the tongue. You also know nostrils, nose bridge, earlobe, shins, forehead, eyebrows, eyelids, eyeballs, and eye lashes. You're amazing. Truly amazing.

There is so much more I'd love to write. The wonderful dinner we ate tonight which was followed by jumping on the trampoline for starters. The moon kept going behind the clouds and you'd ask "Moon go?" Then you'd look all around in the trees, the bushes, up in the air. Then the clouds would part and you'd shout, "There it is!" We played this for a while, then we came in the house and you took a bath while I wrote this. Right now you're sitting on my lap. You're wet, but wrapped in a towel. You're burping and making silly noises...and while I write this, you gently touch my face and say, in the sweetest little voice, "Daddy, Daddy, milk please." I told you yes, I'll get you milk, but when I kept typing you poked your finger into my cheek very hard. "What is it?" You hugged me very closely. "Mommy," you said. "Uh. Daddy."


I love you, sweetie. And I'm going now because we are going to look at picture of crocodiles on the Internet before getting milk.

Daddy

Poop: in your mother's words

last night, i came home from work at 9:30 (so early!!) to find an overwhelming stench of human excrement wafting down the stairs. Instead of proudly trumpeting my spicy chocolate ice cream treasure to (what I had imagined would be) an adoring and grateful husband, I raced upstairs to find Jamba forlornly scrubbing the sides of Sava's cribs with antiseptic spray. The smell was noxious..I gave a little dry heave.
Me: "What happened????"
Jamba: "I swear tonight I came so close to ending her puny little life. After taking her out to buy new shoes and a new dress, getting ice cream, and then taking her to the playground and letting her go down the slides, coming home and making us both dinner, and then putting her to bed, I finally laid down on the bed in exhaustion. I heard her call out a few times, and then silence. I got suspicious and went into her room and she had, in that space of time, pulled handfuls of poo out of her diaper and smeared it all over her shirt, into every crevice of the crib, all over the walls. She even flung chunks of it across the room. It's everywhere. I thought, at least it looks like her dollies and stuffed animals escaped, but I turned them over and she had smeared shit all over their faces."
Me: "Oh my god. Jamba. I am SO SORRY! That sucks. Here, get out of here. Let me finish it up at least. Go take a walk. Ummmm.. do you want some chocolate ice cream?? It's really spicy! Maybe it could take your mind off it"
Jamba: "Yeah, I don't think I could really eat chocolate ice cream right now. But... thanks. I feel more like throwing up. Sava's lying on the bed. I made her take a freezing shower and I think I scared her a little. I was SOOOOO pissed at her. I think she got it."

There were some feeble "mama's" coming from the bedroom, so I went into our room to find Sava just lying there quietly on her back, looking up at the ceiling. Since she started to crawl, I have never seen her lie so still in one place for any length of time. I chastized her gently and then told her that I had to go finish cleaning up her poo, and that I was really really unhappy about it. She nodded penitently.

So then I spent an hour on my hands and knees scrubbing dried poop off the floor, crib, etc!!!! What fun!!! I am really glad I had a big glass of that delicious red wine after work, and that I had been in such a good mood all evening that I was still kinda floating over all the horror. And I was shaking my head and thinking about Nico's skunk incidence from last week (I got home at 11:30, let Nico out for a final pee, and she ran directly into a skunk- I was brushing my teeth at the downstairs sink and thinking contentedly of bed, when I looked down to see Nico blinking her little eyes furiously and foaming at the mouth. "You can't get rabies this quickly", I remember thinking for a foggy micro-second, and then the wall of smell hit me like a sonic boom- Fresh Skunk, I learned, smells a little bit like Skunk but more like burning rubber tires, and I ordered her into the tub in a panic (the bathroom stills smells so strongly of skunk a week later) closed the door and ran upstairs to find Jamba so we could spend the next two hours scrubbing Nico in the warm midnight air)  and wondered "What have Jamba and I done to deserve all this, these lives of toiling scullery maids???"

We acquired dependents.
Sometimes, at certain times in the weary day, I don't recommend the habit.

Just kidding, Sava- we adore you and Nico and you are worth all the pain. But seriously.. what's with the poop smearing? 

poop redux

Dear Sava,

Your mother canceled the babysitter for today so when she left for work at 3, I had to cancel my work meetings and return home. You woke up at 4 we watched Shrek together until you lost interest.

I decided to try and give you a really good day because you've done thrown a lot of minor tantrums in the last week as we approach your second birthday (13 days away!), so I took us out for ice cream. You were such a good girl. You kept your napkin on, you ate with your spoon, and when it was over you didn't cry or scream, you just pointed out some trucks to me, noticed a bird ("Bird flying!") and got back into the car.

Next we went to the store to buy you shirts, socks and new shoes with princesses on the sides and lights inside that light up when you run. You love the shoes, but in the checkout line on the way out of the store, you began grabbing everything you wanted or shouted the names of things you could identify that you wanted. This was short lived though and soon we were back in the car headed to the play park.

"Yaaaaaaayyyy" you shouted when you saw that we were at the play park. You were so happy to be there. You jumped on the colored spots that make sound, you went on the swings, you slid down the slides and you were so cute in your new shoes that the adults were pointing to you and smiling.

At home we read a book, changed you into your pajamas and put you into your crib with a bottle of milk. You had all of your babies in there with you, and a while later, when I noticed you were still awake and checked on you, I noticed you had lined them up between the wall and your crib rail. This is a little game you created when you play alone.

But by 9:15 you were still awake! I heard you cry my name one time, but didn't go into the bedroom for a few minutes ... until I heard you cry "Poop. Poop, Daddy. Poop."

When I walked in the room I couldn't believe my eyes. You were covered in poop and you were holding up your poop-smeared hands. You had rubbed poop into the railings of your crib, smeared it across the faces of all your dolls, on the backs of teddy bears, made hand prints on the walls, and what you could not immediately use, you hurled across the room so that the floors were littered with pieces of poop.

Remembering the books, I put you into an ice cold shower and held you in there (a little too aggressively, I'm sorry to say) while you screamed bloody murder, but all the while kept trying to wash you hands and body. It was a horrible, horrible moment. When that was over, I lay you on our bed and put a new diaper on you as I went in to clean your room.

How do you begin with such a mess? It was everywhere. I packed up all of your blankets, sheets, dolls and clothing into a big bag and then began with the railings and walls. Your mother came home about 45 minutes later and took over for me. When we checked on you in our room, you were so petrified that you had not moved from your spot.

Finally it was finished. I returned to the bedroom to find you in the same position as before. You looked worried. You were worried. I dressed you in pajamas and sat you down on the bed.

"Sava, can you tell me what we can play with in your room?"
"..."
"Can we play with dolls?"
"Yes."
"Yes, we can play with dolls. And can we play with books?"
"Yes. Books."
"And can we play with toys and teddy bears?"
"Yes."
"Sava, can you tell me what we CAN'T play with in your room or in the house?"
Long pause.
"Poop."
"Yes, we do not play with poop. Do you understand?"
"Yes."
Long pause.
"Sorry, Daddy."
"I'm sorry too. I'm sorry for getting angry with you, Sava."

Then you gave me a big hug and a kiss.

Cute, but the next morning it was tantrum after tantrum leading to your breaking a glass on the front porch. Ah, two.

And your not even two yet!