Yesterday, Ben turned 18 months old.
Today, he let us know loud and clear that he is not, in fact, the sweet small boy we have come to expect. Ben, Ella and I headed over to Eagle Hill to meet Kat for dinner. As soon as we arrived, Ben started screaming. He screamed throughout the entire meal, except when he was throwing things on the floor and eating bananas. His dinner tonight? THREE bananas and a handful of oyster crackers.
(I'm hoping there are no adverse effects to eating that many bananas in one sitting. I'll let you know!)
Actually, yesterday was the first day he got "in trouble" at school. Ben's daycare providers, Miss Jenna and Miss Jen, are two amazing women who spend their days with five or six or seven (I can't keep track, which is why I don't run a daycare) little boys who range in age from 18 months to around 2 and 1/2. Of course, my sweet boy has always been the darling of this rough and tumble group...until yesterday.
Jenna and Jen fill out updates on all the kids, which we get every day. One of the sections is called: "Today I was: ______________". Previously, Ben has been described with lovely words like "creative", "happy", "curious", "lovable", and "adventurous".
Yesterday, Ben was "jealous" with an added note, letting us know that he was throwing toys at anyone and everyone who would not give him what he wanted, including our beloved Miss Jenna.
So it appears that our loving son is well on his way to teaching us to never underestimate the power of an angry toddler.
On the other hand, he's just learned how to say, "I love you!" and gives big squeezes when asked....so I guess he still has a couple of redeeming qualities.
Then again, he's not two yet!
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
Sunday, September 18, 2011
The Cousin Connection.
So, it's a Sunday night, and I have a million things to do.
Make lunches. Iron. Balance the checkbook. Pay bills. Submit online coursework. Correct 60 projects. Pick out an outfit for Picture Day tomorrow. Etc.
Instead, I want to write about my weekend.
We had a crazy week last week. Kat finally started teaching, and all of sudden, she's not around as much. (Duh!) Ella had her first gymnastics lesson on Monday, Wednesday I had a girls' night out with the teachers, Thursday I started a class, and Friday we had our Back to School dance. We also lost a principal, gained an interim principal, and I picked up some new responsibilities, like helping out with the Peer Leaders. (This may be babble to most, but it makes sense to me!)
Anyway, I think I saw my kids about five minutes a day this past week.
After all of that, you'd think we'd say, "let's just stay home and veg this weekend." If you do think that, you clearly don't know us very well. Instead, we packed everyone into the car and headed up to Maine early Saturday morning.
First, we stopped at my Aunt Ky's house. She has, among other animals, NINETEEN alpacas. I have a little boy who is OBSESSED with alpacas. As soon as we pulled into Ky's driveway, Ben started screaming, "al-pac-a! al-pac-a!" and fussing to get out of his carseat. As soon as we released him, he ran right over to the fence and called to the alpacas. Of course, they were a bit nervous and began to dash around in the pen (although later Ky said they were just really horny boy alpacas....). This did not phase Ben one bit. He had the biggest grin on his face, and cried when we dragged him to lunch.
Once we returned from a delicious lunch (if you are ever in Wells, ME, you have to eat at least one meal at "Jake's Seafood" and I'm not just saying that because I'm family!!) we were able to go inside the alpaca pen, thanks to my cousin Alexis, who is amazing with both animals and small children. Ben was mostly interested in checking out the communal poop pile and watching the alpacas go pee, but he did get to snuggle on one friendly alpaca who knelt right down on the ground and let us (yes, I even got down on the ground and hugged her too...) hug her and have our pictures taken with her!
Then Ella got to sit on Haley, the horse. Of course, this was after Ben picked up some of Haley's poop and tried to eat it, so he didn't get to see her sit on the horse.
Ky and Jake also have two dogs and several cats, as well as sheep. I think I am going to have to send Ben to them in the summers so that he can get his alpaca/farm fill! It was a lovely fall day and a wonderful visit.
(I also got to meet Ky's first grandchild, Fisher, who is as cute and adorable as I expected him to be, and I'm very sad that his parents and grandparents love him so much, because I would have liked to take him home with me.)
Next, we went on to visit my cousin, Betsy. Betsy and I are about a year apart, and GP's two oldest grandchildren. I used to spend a week in Maine with her family every summer. We went to Camp Albany together when we were little (way too little to go off to summer camp, I think) and she let me sleep with her pet rock because I was homesick. (Yes, you read that correctly. She gave me a ROCK to sleep with.) We have always had a "cousin connection." This time, it was Ella and Max (who is 6) who shared a special bond. Right from the start of the visit, they were having fun.
I can't explain how amazing it was. If you know my daughter at all, this should surprise you as much as it surprised me. Usually when Ella meets "new" people, she can be prickly and shy, and sometimes downright unfriendly. None of this happened with Betsy's boys.
Betsy's husband Josh and I were talking about it on the way to church this morning, and he brought up the "cousin connection" thing, and it made a lot of sense. Then I got to thinking about cousins.
Cousins have been a HUGE part of my life. On the Wheeler side, there were six of us who spent a lot of time together growing up. We'd play spy games at Granny's annual Christmas Eve parties, and shout ridiculous things while jumping off the diving board one right after the other. We'd get together a couple times a summer, maybe more often, but it was always like meeting up with a best friend. (I could write a lot more about cousins, but that list of stuff at the top of this blog is still waiting for me.)
That was how Ella and Max were this weekend. How awesome is that?
Cousins RULE!
Make lunches. Iron. Balance the checkbook. Pay bills. Submit online coursework. Correct 60 projects. Pick out an outfit for Picture Day tomorrow. Etc.
Instead, I want to write about my weekend.
We had a crazy week last week. Kat finally started teaching, and all of sudden, she's not around as much. (Duh!) Ella had her first gymnastics lesson on Monday, Wednesday I had a girls' night out with the teachers, Thursday I started a class, and Friday we had our Back to School dance. We also lost a principal, gained an interim principal, and I picked up some new responsibilities, like helping out with the Peer Leaders. (This may be babble to most, but it makes sense to me!)
Anyway, I think I saw my kids about five minutes a day this past week.
After all of that, you'd think we'd say, "let's just stay home and veg this weekend." If you do think that, you clearly don't know us very well. Instead, we packed everyone into the car and headed up to Maine early Saturday morning.
First, we stopped at my Aunt Ky's house. She has, among other animals, NINETEEN alpacas. I have a little boy who is OBSESSED with alpacas. As soon as we pulled into Ky's driveway, Ben started screaming, "al-pac-a! al-pac-a!" and fussing to get out of his carseat. As soon as we released him, he ran right over to the fence and called to the alpacas. Of course, they were a bit nervous and began to dash around in the pen (although later Ky said they were just really horny boy alpacas....). This did not phase Ben one bit. He had the biggest grin on his face, and cried when we dragged him to lunch.
Once we returned from a delicious lunch (if you are ever in Wells, ME, you have to eat at least one meal at "Jake's Seafood" and I'm not just saying that because I'm family!!) we were able to go inside the alpaca pen, thanks to my cousin Alexis, who is amazing with both animals and small children. Ben was mostly interested in checking out the communal poop pile and watching the alpacas go pee, but he did get to snuggle on one friendly alpaca who knelt right down on the ground and let us (yes, I even got down on the ground and hugged her too...) hug her and have our pictures taken with her!
Then Ella got to sit on Haley, the horse. Of course, this was after Ben picked up some of Haley's poop and tried to eat it, so he didn't get to see her sit on the horse.
Ky and Jake also have two dogs and several cats, as well as sheep. I think I am going to have to send Ben to them in the summers so that he can get his alpaca/farm fill! It was a lovely fall day and a wonderful visit.
(I also got to meet Ky's first grandchild, Fisher, who is as cute and adorable as I expected him to be, and I'm very sad that his parents and grandparents love him so much, because I would have liked to take him home with me.)
Next, we went on to visit my cousin, Betsy. Betsy and I are about a year apart, and GP's two oldest grandchildren. I used to spend a week in Maine with her family every summer. We went to Camp Albany together when we were little (way too little to go off to summer camp, I think) and she let me sleep with her pet rock because I was homesick. (Yes, you read that correctly. She gave me a ROCK to sleep with.) We have always had a "cousin connection." This time, it was Ella and Max (who is 6) who shared a special bond. Right from the start of the visit, they were having fun.
I can't explain how amazing it was. If you know my daughter at all, this should surprise you as much as it surprised me. Usually when Ella meets "new" people, she can be prickly and shy, and sometimes downright unfriendly. None of this happened with Betsy's boys.
Betsy's husband Josh and I were talking about it on the way to church this morning, and he brought up the "cousin connection" thing, and it made a lot of sense. Then I got to thinking about cousins.
Cousins have been a HUGE part of my life. On the Wheeler side, there were six of us who spent a lot of time together growing up. We'd play spy games at Granny's annual Christmas Eve parties, and shout ridiculous things while jumping off the diving board one right after the other. We'd get together a couple times a summer, maybe more often, but it was always like meeting up with a best friend. (I could write a lot more about cousins, but that list of stuff at the top of this blog is still waiting for me.)
That was how Ella and Max were this weekend. How awesome is that?
Cousins RULE!
Thursday, September 15, 2011
A Sweet Moment.
[Notes explaining various things will appear at the end. I believe this is called "footnoting" but it's been a while since I've taken a research class.]
Around six o'clock this morning, Ella stompled* into our bedroom.
Ella: "I just this very second woke up."**
Kat, refering to the massive rat's nest in Ella's hair***: "That's great! You must have slept well--your hair is crazy!"
Ella: "Mama, I think that sometimes, I'm like you. We make the same faces or I act like you. And Ben is like Mommy sometimes."
Kat: "Why do you think that happens?"
Ella: "I think it has something to do with being connected by the cord. It's like the person who cut the cord has a special connection to you."
Kat and Hannah, eyes meeting: "Awwwwww. You're pretty special, you know that?"
Then we started coming up with other cord-cutters that we felt special connections to, like GP probably cut my cord, and Granddaddy probably cut Kat's cord, etc. It was a sweet little moment in a crazy week. Of course, by then we were all running late, and we had to throw her out of our bed and start our day.
Notes:
* I know that "stomple" is not a "real" word, but it really is the best word to describe how Ella moves about the house in the morning. Stompling is sort of a running, thumping shuffle from her bed straight to ours. It's been worse since we moved her bedroom around, because now it's a straight shot to our bed.
** This is probably because yesterday, she woke up at "five zero five" and had to wait to come into our room.
***A massive tangle in the front of Ella's hair is always a good indicator that she humped herself to sleep the night before. Humping has always been a favorite pasttime of Ella's, and we try to be open about it so that she doesn't feel like she has to hide it or be ashamed. However, since she is now five and a "big girl" she is not supposed to hump in front of us/talk about humping anymore. BUT, we can ALWAYS tell.
Around six o'clock this morning, Ella stompled* into our bedroom.
Ella: "I just this very second woke up."**
Kat, refering to the massive rat's nest in Ella's hair***: "That's great! You must have slept well--your hair is crazy!"
Ella: "Mama, I think that sometimes, I'm like you. We make the same faces or I act like you. And Ben is like Mommy sometimes."
Kat: "Why do you think that happens?"
Ella: "I think it has something to do with being connected by the cord. It's like the person who cut the cord has a special connection to you."
Kat and Hannah, eyes meeting: "Awwwwww. You're pretty special, you know that?"
Then we started coming up with other cord-cutters that we felt special connections to, like GP probably cut my cord, and Granddaddy probably cut Kat's cord, etc. It was a sweet little moment in a crazy week. Of course, by then we were all running late, and we had to throw her out of our bed and start our day.
Notes:
* I know that "stomple" is not a "real" word, but it really is the best word to describe how Ella moves about the house in the morning. Stompling is sort of a running, thumping shuffle from her bed straight to ours. It's been worse since we moved her bedroom around, because now it's a straight shot to our bed.
** This is probably because yesterday, she woke up at "five zero five" and had to wait to come into our room.
***A massive tangle in the front of Ella's hair is always a good indicator that she humped herself to sleep the night before. Humping has always been a favorite pasttime of Ella's, and we try to be open about it so that she doesn't feel like she has to hide it or be ashamed. However, since she is now five and a "big girl" she is not supposed to hump in front of us/talk about humping anymore. BUT, we can ALWAYS tell.
Sunday, September 11, 2011
The Language Barrier. (or, How We've Taught Our Daughter to Swear)
**Disclaimer: there is some bad language in here. Please don't be offended.
Lately, Ben has been full of words. His vocabulary is exploding these days. He has a repetoire of typical words, which include:
Mama
Mommy
Ella (pronounced "Lella")
truck ("ruck")
alpaca
baby
tonight ("oo-nigh")
goodnight ("nigh-nigh")
book
moon
belly
nose ("no-eh")
more ("mo-eh")
various animal names and sounds
and many more that I can't remember right now...
He also will repeat almost anything we say.
Apparently, so will Ella.
The other day, we were driving in the car on the winding, bumpy road that brings us home from New Hampshire. Whenever I drive on this road, a lone turkey runs in front of my car, and without fail, I always have to slam on my brakes to avoid hitting the beast. (Usually, I'm alone with the kids, so Kat hasn't experienced this before.)
On this day, Kat was driving, and we rounded the corner, and lo and behold, there was a turkey in the road.
Me: "Oh my God, that's the fucking turkey I was telling you about! I swear, the same fucking Goddamn turkey runs in front of my car every time I drive on this road!"
(I'm not sure why I was swearing like a sailor, except that perhaps I was surprised.)
Ella: "Why is there only one?"
Me: "Maybe it's lonely."
Kat: "Maybe someday we'll hit it and it won't be lonely anymore."
Me: "Maybe it will happen around Thanksgiving and we won't have to buy a turkey this year."
(This is a perfect example of why our kids are going to be weird.)
Ella: "Is that why it's a fucking damn turkey?"
Pause.
Kat: "What did you just say?"
Ella: "The fucking turkey. You know, the fucking damn one."
Pause.
Ella, confused: "I didn't say frigging, if that's what you're worried about."
(I should explain that this is not a new conversation. I'd like to put the onus of our daughter's potty-mouth onto my wife, but I'm not sure that's fair. For instance, Kat used to refer to the iPod touch as "the fucking little computer". This had to stop when Ella started asking, innocently, if she could play with the "fucking computer". She (Ella) will also often refer to her bottom as her "ass" or tell us that she's doing a good job wiping her own ass/keeping her asshole clean. I think some of this comes from the way Kat talks to the cats. However (see above) I also am guilty of making poor vocabulary choices on occasion. Recently, in an effort to curb our language, we have tried to used "other" words in place of swear words, hence the "frigging" comment.)
Me: "What?"
Ella: "You know, you don't want me to say frigging. So I'm saying fucking. Fuck. That's not as bad, right?"
Oh dear. After I stopped laughing (actually crying with laughter...) I tried to explain why using the word "fuck" is not really appropriate. I'm pretty sure the damage is done, however.
At least Ben's words are still pure. For today. :)
Lately, Ben has been full of words. His vocabulary is exploding these days. He has a repetoire of typical words, which include:
Mama
Mommy
Ella (pronounced "Lella")
truck ("ruck")
alpaca
baby
tonight ("oo-nigh")
goodnight ("nigh-nigh")
book
moon
belly
nose ("no-eh")
more ("mo-eh")
various animal names and sounds
and many more that I can't remember right now...
He also will repeat almost anything we say.
Apparently, so will Ella.
The other day, we were driving in the car on the winding, bumpy road that brings us home from New Hampshire. Whenever I drive on this road, a lone turkey runs in front of my car, and without fail, I always have to slam on my brakes to avoid hitting the beast. (Usually, I'm alone with the kids, so Kat hasn't experienced this before.)
On this day, Kat was driving, and we rounded the corner, and lo and behold, there was a turkey in the road.
Me: "Oh my God, that's the fucking turkey I was telling you about! I swear, the same fucking Goddamn turkey runs in front of my car every time I drive on this road!"
(I'm not sure why I was swearing like a sailor, except that perhaps I was surprised.)
Ella: "Why is there only one?"
Me: "Maybe it's lonely."
Kat: "Maybe someday we'll hit it and it won't be lonely anymore."
Me: "Maybe it will happen around Thanksgiving and we won't have to buy a turkey this year."
(This is a perfect example of why our kids are going to be weird.)
Ella: "Is that why it's a fucking damn turkey?"
Pause.
Kat: "What did you just say?"
Ella: "The fucking turkey. You know, the fucking damn one."
Pause.
Ella, confused: "I didn't say frigging, if that's what you're worried about."
(I should explain that this is not a new conversation. I'd like to put the onus of our daughter's potty-mouth onto my wife, but I'm not sure that's fair. For instance, Kat used to refer to the iPod touch as "the fucking little computer". This had to stop when Ella started asking, innocently, if she could play with the "fucking computer". She (Ella) will also often refer to her bottom as her "ass" or tell us that she's doing a good job wiping her own ass/keeping her asshole clean. I think some of this comes from the way Kat talks to the cats. However (see above) I also am guilty of making poor vocabulary choices on occasion. Recently, in an effort to curb our language, we have tried to used "other" words in place of swear words, hence the "frigging" comment.)
Me: "What?"
Ella: "You know, you don't want me to say frigging. So I'm saying fucking. Fuck. That's not as bad, right?"
Oh dear. After I stopped laughing (actually crying with laughter...) I tried to explain why using the word "fuck" is not really appropriate. I'm pretty sure the damage is done, however.
At least Ben's words are still pure. For today. :)
Monday, September 5, 2011
Time for a little talk about family.
Family.
Talk about a loaded word. It can be such a simple thing...or not.
My children have two moms. Obviously, that means we had to get some sperm somewhere, so that we could have kids. Kids were always in the picture for us, we just had to figure out how to have them.
So we looked for donors. We debated asking male friends (too weird) or using sperm banks (too expensive) and finally ended up using a known donor. For those of you are aren't savvy about this sort of thing (and you are lucky...), a "known" donor is someone whose name we know and who can be contacted by our children when and if our children want to contact him.
Our donor is pretty amazing (duh, obviously, or we wouldn't have chosen him) and made the process quite easy and inexpensive. Over the years, we've occasionally sent photographs, and then we ended up meeting some of the other recipients online. Now we have a group on facebook where we can keep in touch with the other parents, share photographs and stories, and, if we want to, meet up.
To some, this is shocking. It might be more shocking to find out that Ella and Ben have 30+ half-siblings out there...it certainly was to us. But we've gotten used to it, and even embraced it. Sure, it's strange, and probably not what I would have envisioned originally, but there it is. At least when they are teenagers, we'll have a sounding board for donor-related questions!
Anyway, one of the other recipients posted the following article tonight.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/06/health/06donor.html?hp
It's about a donor who has 150 offspring.
That's not the big deal (well, it is, but not what got me fired up...). The last couple of lines in the article read:
“How do you make connections with so many siblings? What does family mean to these children?”
First of all, my kids have a family. It actually is a pretty typical family--two parents, two kids, two pets. Two sets of grandparents. Five cousins on each side. A super-amazing GP. Sometimes, Ella gets stuck on the idea of "birth mom" and plays it up--"I'm sitting next to my birth mom today" or "Mommy and I have Wheeler blood and that's why we're so good at Sorry", but that's about the extent of it. We love each other a lot and tell each other all the time. Even Ben can point and say "Eye (points to eye) luvv (points to belly/heart) YOU (shouts and points to the person he's loving at that moment)". We fight and make up and laugh a LOT and work through the tough stuff and get silly at least once a day.
MY family is overflowing with love. My kids know that there are at least a dozen people out there who would do anything for them, who are their FAMILY.
And that has nothing to do with having a donor.
Talk about a loaded word. It can be such a simple thing...or not.
My children have two moms. Obviously, that means we had to get some sperm somewhere, so that we could have kids. Kids were always in the picture for us, we just had to figure out how to have them.
So we looked for donors. We debated asking male friends (too weird) or using sperm banks (too expensive) and finally ended up using a known donor. For those of you are aren't savvy about this sort of thing (and you are lucky...), a "known" donor is someone whose name we know and who can be contacted by our children when and if our children want to contact him.
Our donor is pretty amazing (duh, obviously, or we wouldn't have chosen him) and made the process quite easy and inexpensive. Over the years, we've occasionally sent photographs, and then we ended up meeting some of the other recipients online. Now we have a group on facebook where we can keep in touch with the other parents, share photographs and stories, and, if we want to, meet up.
To some, this is shocking. It might be more shocking to find out that Ella and Ben have 30+ half-siblings out there...it certainly was to us. But we've gotten used to it, and even embraced it. Sure, it's strange, and probably not what I would have envisioned originally, but there it is. At least when they are teenagers, we'll have a sounding board for donor-related questions!
Anyway, one of the other recipients posted the following article tonight.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/06/health/06donor.html?hp
It's about a donor who has 150 offspring.
That's not the big deal (well, it is, but not what got me fired up...). The last couple of lines in the article read:
“How do you make connections with so many siblings? What does family mean to these children?”
First of all, my kids have a family. It actually is a pretty typical family--two parents, two kids, two pets. Two sets of grandparents. Five cousins on each side. A super-amazing GP. Sometimes, Ella gets stuck on the idea of "birth mom" and plays it up--"I'm sitting next to my birth mom today" or "Mommy and I have Wheeler blood and that's why we're so good at Sorry", but that's about the extent of it. We love each other a lot and tell each other all the time. Even Ben can point and say "Eye (points to eye) luvv (points to belly/heart) YOU (shouts and points to the person he's loving at that moment)". We fight and make up and laugh a LOT and work through the tough stuff and get silly at least once a day.
MY family is overflowing with love. My kids know that there are at least a dozen people out there who would do anything for them, who are their FAMILY.
And that has nothing to do with having a donor.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)