8/25/2017

The Tobin Times #72

Filed under: — Aprille @ 8:36 am

My sweet Tobin,

Happy birthday, my big boy!  What a birthday this has been—not only did you complete another year, you got to experience a near-total solar eclipse, and you started kindergarten.  I’m not sure which will be more memorable when you look back on your life, but they were both pretty impressive for me.  It was cloudy on your birthday/eclipse day, so the pinhole method I had planned on using to view the eclipse didn’t work.  Luckily, we were able to borrow some eclipse glasses and saw a pretty spectacular cosmic event.

The peak of the eclipse only lasted a couple of minutes, but you are up and running nearly every minute of every day.  The first day of school, you were up and ready to go plenty early.  You got a little quiet as the moment of entering the school building approached, but you shed no tears and followed the teacher right in.  I asked you later whether you liked Kinderfarm (preschool) or kindergarten better, and you said, “Definitely kindergarten.”  I asked you why, and you said, “At Kinderfarm, we only learned babyish stuff.  Actually, in kindergarten, we sort of learn babyish stuff too.”  I imagine you’ll find new challenges as you get further into the school year, but in any case, I’m glad you like it.  You’ve gotten to be good friends with Kit, a kid from our neighborhood, and you’ve been spending recesses collecting cicada shells with him.  You decided you wanted to buy milk from the cafeteria instead of having a juice box in your lunch, so I put money in your lunch account.  You handled it just fine.  Today you decided to go back to a juice box.  It’s a testament to your flexibility and bravery that you were willing to try a new task on the second day of school.  Way to go, Tobes.

We didn’t get every single item on our summer activity list completed, but we’re darn close.  The biggest problem was that the summer ended on a cool streak, so we didn’t get a chance to do Twilight Swim at the City Park pool.  You did get to go  swimming, though, at nicer pools than the one at City Park.  You went twice in Ames and once in Albia, and we did a good amount of running around in fountains and sprinklers.  We still need to make granola cups, but they’re half ready and we can finish those up after school today.

Photo by Gary Clarke

You love Callum’s hugs.  It’s become a bit of a power struggle—sometimes you try too hard and he denies you, and that really bums you out.  But this morning, as you were about to leave for school, he gave you the sweetest, most spontaneous goodbye hug.  Your huge smile told the story.  Yesterday, out of nowhere, you decided you wanted to buy some Paw Patrol toys for Callum.  Those are little figures that I think have a show associated with them, though Callum has never seen it because it’s on some channel we don’t get.  Callum likes them, though, because he sees them on YouTube toy videos.  You wanted to go out to a store to buy them, but we compromised on an Amazon purchase.  You very proudly handed me money from your wallet, because you wanted to make absolutely sure it was a gift really from you to Callum.  After you made your purchase, you leaned into me and said, “I can’t wait to see his face when he opens it.”

You and Miles usually get along well too, especially now that you each have Minecraft accounts and can play those games together.  When I pry you away from screen time and make you use your brains in other ways, you do a good job of coming up with creative activities.  You certainly squabble sometimes, but you’re also best friends and playmates.  It was hard to think of birthday presents for you this year, because you’re just not into toys anymore.  Your favorite gift (besides the Minecraft account) was your Batman bathrobe, aka a “dressing gown.”  You’ve greatly increased the number of showers you take because you get a chance to wear it.

I’ve known since the day you were born that you would be a source of sunshine in my life.  You’ve always been such a cheerful and go-with-the-flow kind of guy.  I didn’t worry a bit as you started kindergarten, though I admit to feeling a tug as you lined up outside the doors like a big kid.  I miss having lunch with you every day, since that has been a part of our life together since your lunch was nothing but breastmilk.  You graduated to mashed foods—I have a great video of your enthusiastic response to blueberries.  In recent years it’s been pizza and pasta and peanut butter toast, and now it’s a lunch in an insulated bag.  You were so excited to tell me that you saw Miles in the school lunch room.  Fortuitously, kindergartners and fourth graders have lunch at the same time.  I bet it was pretty cool for both of you.

I am not a big believer in astrology, but if anybody is well-suited to his sign, it’s you.  You are a little lion, from your fantastic mane to your loyalty to your pack.  You can also roar when the occasion presents itself.You’re brave, sunny, and always ready to scramble to the next adventure.  It would take a serious cosmic event to eclipse you.

Photo by Gary Clarke

You are a joy to behold, my beautiful little cub.  Congratulations on six trips around the sun.

Love,

Mommy

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8/11/2017

The Callum Chronicle #31

Filed under: — Aprille @ 8:42 pm

Dear Cal-Pal,

You have a lot to say.  Your dad and I have been remarking lately on how your language skills have exploded in recent weeks.  The other day, you were looking for some Play-Doh you’d gotten out.

“Maybe I take—maybe I took it downstairs.”

Aw, baby’s first irregular preterite.  Another development that may or may not be related is an increasing understanding of the difference between real and pretend.  You like to set up false structures so you can contrast them with true ones.  For example, if you’re eating a strawberry, you might say, “It green?  Noooooooo.   It lellow?  Nooooooo.  It red!”  I think that’s something we’ve all done to quiz you, and you’ve picked it up and now use it on us.  You even did it when I remarked on the color of your diaper contents.  “It red?  Noooooo.  It green!”

You still had a hard time with it, though, when we were playing a game in the car tonight.  Miles suggested a round of “A, My Name Is…” and we took turns.  Tobin had G, and he said, “G, my name is George.”  You said to him, “You not George.  You Tobin.”

Your big brothers spend a week at Mubby and Skitter’s house, and for probably the first time in your life, we spent a whole week doing things that were just for you.  We went to toddler story time at the library, to the splash pad, to a kids’ music class, and restaurants your brothers don’t like.  You’re very versatile.  It was really fun to see you enjoying life with other kids your size instead of watching you be frustrated because you can’t keep up with your brothers.  You missed them a lot, and I understand that they missed you too.  You asked many times, “Where Miles and Tobin?”  You asked it so much that soon you were able to answer your own question.  “Maybe they’re in Ames.”  We Skyped with them every day, and you reached out to give hugs through the computer screen.  Things are certainly louder with them back, since they tend to rile each other and you up, but you’re happy to have them.

Though no one specifically taught you, you’ve learned a lot of letters and numbers from the ABC blocks and an alphabet puzzle we have.  You still enjoy your old favorite, S-5 (which we always have to visit when we go to Solon), but you know a lot of others, too.  We got a new book from the library Summer Reading Program called Hug.  You looked at it, pointed to the first letter, and said, “What is that, H?”  You don’t know every single letter yet, but you know a lot more than I expected you to.  Third kids probably don’t get as much focused academic instruction from their parents as kids earlier in the order, but you’re certainly sharp and able to gather information from your surroundings.  Your dad has been working with Tobin a lot on putting letters together to form words, and I bet you’re soaking it in while it looks like you’re just making plastic salads in your toy kitchen.

You’re smart, yes, but because I try to be honest in these letters, I have to describe what happened at Costco the other day.  I think you had your first truly ridiculous tantrum.  You’ve been upset plenty of times, sometimes just because you have to be more than three feet away from me so I can make dinner.  This was the first time, though, that you seemed angry just for the sake of being angry with no understandable reason.  You see, we were eating lunch in the Costco food court.  Their pizza slices are huge, so our usual strategy is to order two slices, have each of them cut in half, and share them among the pizza eaters in our group (you, me, and Tobin).  I got us our food, Miles and Tobin went to get their drinks (an Okiishi, of course—a delicious mix of Sprite and lemonade named after our illustrious friend Chris).  We sat down to enjoy some pre-shopping lunch, and you absolutely lost it.  You see, I committed a terrible crime:  I separated the two halves of the pizza on the plate.  Worse yet, I started to eat my half.  “I want them together!” you screamed.

I tried to reason with you, to soothe you, to hug you, to offer you bites and drinks of both water and Okiishi.  We were getting a lot of stares.  I decided I just needed to let the tantrum run its course, so I held you safely on my lap and ate my pizza.  I finished my half, and you still hadn’t eaten any of yours.  You started yelling that you wanted a hot dog.  Tobin suggested that I get you a hot dog.  I told him I didn’t want to stand in line again, which was true, but the whole truth was that I didn’t want to reward your tantrum.  You love pizza, and there was no reason you shouldn’t just eat your pizza.  You expressed very clearly that you did NOT want the pizza, so I figured I’d find you something to eat when we got home.  The lady at the next table, who was not being judgey, just trying to help, offered to stand in line for me.  I declined.   You were finally calming down, and I thought we were moving forward, so I took a bite of your pizza.  Big mistake.  That set off a whole new round of freak-out.  However, it did get you interested enough in the pizza that you were willing to eat it.  In fact you refused to let go of the last bites, the toughest part of the crust, which you gnawed on as we did our shopping.

In the old days, when I heard little kids crying in public, I thought, “Oh, that poor kid.”  Now I think, “Oh, those poor parents.”

I’m happy to say that so far you’ve just had the one tantrum.  I’m sure there are more coming, but they don’t define your personality for the time being.  You’re still brave and fun, and I’ve really enjoyed watching you engage your imagination.  You made a cool Lego camera the other day and had fun pretending to take pictures of your brothers.  They were good sports about saying cheese.

Your current favorites:  Walter the Farting Dog, peanut butter Lara Bars, your new Magnadoodle, Arthur (the kids’ show, not the Dudley Moore movie), making pretend Okiishis in the bathtub, and playing with/tormenting your brothers.

Despite the ramping-up of allergy season, you’ve been sleeping pretty well.  I think we’ve got a good regimen figured out of internal and external treatments, so your skin and nose and eyes are all doing okay.  You did have itchy eyes a couple of nights ago, and you very pathetically asked me, “You have any eye lotion?”  I didn’t, so I had to do my best to treat you by kissing your eye.  You wanted me to kiss your actual eyeball, which I don’t think I did, but it was dark so I can’t swear to that.

I love your little brain, growing so fast like the rest of you.  Sleep tight, my funny baby.

Update:  Minutes after I posted this, tired but basically satisfied with how you’re turning out, I heard a strange noise.  You see, I’d been writing this from the big chair, which is directly across the hall from the bathroom.  While I can’t see directly into the tub from the big chair, I can hear, so I felt confident that you were doing fine in your bath because you were chattering away to your rubber ducks.  The noise I heard:  a large splash not followed by the tell-tale smack of water hitting water.  I looked in and saw that you were cheerfully dumping big cupfuls of water onto the bathroom rug.  Judging by the level of saturation, you must have done it more than ten times.

Come on, dude.  That topic is specifically covered in No No, Yes Yes by Leslie Patricelli.   Also, did I mention that we’re having a party tomorrow and are frantically cleaning the house?

You are something.  Yes you are.

Love,

Mommy

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8/9/2017

Monthly Miles Memo #115

Filed under: — Aprille @ 2:50 pm

Dear Miles,

Summer’s almost done.  By the next time I write you a memo, you’ll be a full-fledged fourth-grader.  That’s hard to imagine.  I very clearly remember my fourth-grade year.  I had a strict, old-fashioned teacher who was inconsistent in her punishments and tended toward teacher’s petism.  That worked okay for me, as I was a teacher’s pet kind of kid, but I remember feeling righteous outrage when she treated some kids unfairly.  I doubt Miss Thunderbuns is reading this, as she seemed ancient back in the ’80s when she was my teacher, but if she is, I hope she has mellowed and is not currently yelling at squirrels in front of her nursing home.

We don’t know yet who your teacher will be, but you will probably do fine.  You had a really great third grade experience, with a teacher you adored and a lot of academic and social development.  I hope fourth grade can be good as well.  I’m sure you’ll be making some very clear memories, just as I did at your age.

We’ve been scrambling to finish up our summer activity list.  We’ve done well so far—I think we only have one box left to check off, and we have enough time to get it done.  We’ve gone to movies, played in the sprinkler, made homemade popsicles, gone to the Natural History Museum, done the library’s Summer Reading Program, and a whole lot more.  You probably would have been happy spending the entire summer playing Minecraft (or watching YouTube videos of other people playing Minecraft, which doesn’t make much sense to me, but I watch a lot of YouTube videos about eyebrow grooming, so I guess I shouldn’t judge).

Photo by Gary Clarke

You and Tobin spent a whole week at Mubby and Skitter’s house, which you loved and Mubby and Skitter survived.  They insist they loved it too, but I can imagine it was pretty exhausting for people who aren’t used to having little kids around.  You did some really fun things, including camping in the back yard, fishing, mini-golfing, and going to an arcade.  You started with a full week as your goal, but I secretly expected that we might need to come get you around Thursday.  That was not the case.  We Skyped every day, and every day you both assured me that you were doing great and were in no hurry to come home.  I missed you, but I was glad you were having so much fun.

I think you’re ready for a little more structure in your life, though.  Ever since you came back, you’ve been a little surly.  We had a very rough time a couple of days ago.  It wasn’t just you; it was a variety of factors, including a bad night’s sleep for me, which always brings out my worst qualities.  We all did some yelling and crying, but we got it together.  I apologized to you, and I hope you accepted it.  I’m an adult, and it’s my job to keep my emotions under control, even when I’m feeling overwhelmed and stressed out.  On the other hand, I hope you got the message that you can’t keep pushing people and expect them to absorb it with no repercussions.  It wasn’t a shining day for any of us, but we’re all doing a lot better now.  It’s hard to be a mom sometimes, and I know it’s hard to be a kid too.

Photo by Gary Clarke

There will be more moments like that as you grow.  Surliness has always been a part of you, and as the double-digit age approaches, I fear we’ll see it more and more.  I’m sure I displayed it at your age, and I remember getting reprimanded for it (though I always kept it in line when Miss Thunderbuns was looking).  It’s hard to know when to just roll my eyes and ignore your attitudes and when to tell you to check it.  A lot of it has to with what else is going on with me, and that’s not fair, but that’s how it goes.  You take things very personally when you manage to pay attention at all.

Your current favorites:  Minecraft, blowing bubbles with gum, pasta, resisting hair grooming (unless it’s bedtime, when you manage to extend the bedtime routine by giving yourself elaborate hairstyles in the bathroom mirror), Peanuts and Big Nate books, and Pokémon Go.  You and Tobin have mostly gotten along really well this summer.  It’s nice that I’ve been able to trust you to play together while I need to do Callum-centric things.  You read an entire chapter book out loud to Tobin, and you are his greatest hero.  He’s going to love being in the same school as you next year, so I hope you handle that honorably.

Happy month birthday, my dear.  Best of luck as you start your fourth grade adventure.   I’ll be the one outside the school on the first day jumping up and down in anticipation of getting you back.

Love,

Mom

 

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8/1/2017

Not in public anyway

Filed under: — Aprille @ 3:48 pm

Aprille (pointing at Callum): You’re the cutest.
Callum (pointing at Aprille): You’re the nudist.

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