sparrow is having lots of fun in role play these days--being a mom, that is.
the other day, i noticed she was telling her elephant "lie down!" so she could diaper him. but then she must have realized she was still in the kitchen, and so she took her elephant and toddled down the hallway, and thomas and i snuck behind her all the way into the diaper room. once there, she put her elephant down on the changing pad and said, things like "poopy diaper" and "wipe wipe" (when she got the wipes out and wiped his blue elephant bottom). she even found a new diaper, and finally thomas and i helped her put it on him because she was getting frustrated with the dimensions of the project, but the diaper enveloped the elephant's entire torso. so we took it and put it on her purple teddy bear, which is much bigger. just now she decided bear must have a poopy diaper, and laid him on the counter, opened it, and pointed inside, saying "poopy diaper." she is so insightful. hahahahaha!
holly took her to the zoo today with samuel and hope and camille. sparrow got so excited by this adventure that she didn't even end up taking a nap at all today. i swear i nursed her for about an hour and a half, and she kept letting go and looking up at me with her big round eyes and saying things like "fishies!" and "mow-key! one, two, mow-key!" (monkey.) one time she told me, "long neck--holly--long neck." what? holly has a long neck? ok. ...OH! you saw the "long necks" with holly! (sparrow refers to giraffes as "long neck;" i think it's because she can't pronounce giraffe yet.)
she has so much fun with samuel and hope, she gets really excited every time we are driving to their house. i have to sing her songs all the way there like "there's a jason and a samuel and a hope and a holly on a bump on a log in the hole in the middle of the sea!" and "deck the halls with boughs of holly, fa la la la la, lalala la. this the time to go be jolly, falalalalalalalala. you will get to play with hope, falalalalalala la la, while mama goes to help rod cope, fa la la la la, lalalala!"
today when i picked her up i gave her a piece of bagel to eat in the car. pretty soon i heard "moe? moe?" and i said, "sparrow, more!? you still have a huge chunk of bagel in your hand!" pause, pause, then she says, "moe--hope!" hahahaha! she must love having baby hope around. holly tells me that whenever hope is taking her nap, sparrow will walk around for long periods of time saying "hope, night-night. hope, night-night."
something else funny the other night was when i had her on the floor to change her diaper. my foot was right by her head, and she looked over at it, and then said, "duddy--foot." (dirty.) it's true!!!!! i rarely get down to scrubbing my feet. saying "duddy" is a pretty common one now. she eagerly points into her book of farm animals and says, "duddy piggy!"
she likes to run around with a sleeping baby doll that i found in one of my old trunks, from when we were kids. she had been seeing dolls in books and already had the word "baby doll" down perfectly, so i thought i should get her a baby doll soon, but then i found this one. even better! she got really upset today when she was trying to put a diaper on this baby doll and it was way too huge. but her absolute favorite thing to do with the baby doll is to say "nu-nu baby doll!" and put her up to me as if she is nursing. she absolutely LOVES watching that! and she does it with her bear too.
sparrow is correctly identifying colors! today she looked at this muti-colored script on the back of a book, and pointing at the tiny individually colored letters, correctly pointed out green, blue, pink, and orange! i am so proud of her for that.
Wednesday, November 14, 2007
Friday, November 2, 2007
she speaks sentences!
last night, driving home from the reeves, little sparrow in her car seat suddenly says, "oh no! dark outside!" oh my gosh it killed me. i didn't even realize she knew what "dark" was, much less how to use it in a sentence!
Thursday, October 25, 2007
boody!
i love the way sparrow pronounces things. she sits on the bed, for example, bounces up and down, and says, "bowncy? bowncy?" then, "mama--bowncy? bowncy?" "hahaha, sparrow i can't bounce with you! i am sooo tired!" she is undeterred. "Daddy--bowncy? bowncy?" she always does it when i am trying to get her to nap, too, so i can nap, and it doesn't help her being so cute because she makes me laugh so hard when she does that that i can't even properly discipline her to come back and fall asleep...
another one of her favorite things is to pat her bottom when she is getting her diaper changed. Thomas actually taught her to say "booty" instead of "bottom," and it kills me because she will twist and say "boody! pawo (sparrow) boody!" then follows the inevitable, "mama boody!" whence she is not satisfied until i, too, have patted my own boody.
i couldn't get what she was saying at first, but we were in the car the other day and she kept saying "toway! toway!" finally i realized she was pointing out the window at the trees. tree! toway! that is a new development! tree for her used to sound just like "wee."
i can't believe all the things she is saying! may-doe! (tomato) twacca (tractor) baby-dah! (baby doll) it is precious. what else... oh yes! she says "neiba--wady!" (neighbor-lady!) can you believe it? when she hears the neighbor lady work on her porch or walk up the stairs! now that's amazing! this morning we were on our way to samuel's house, and we stopped at a red light, when suddenly she cried out, "WED!" what? wed? ...oh, RED! red! she is astounding! she can also point out yellow for sure, but colors are still a bit mixed.
since her hair has gotten to an unfortunate mullet-like stage, i try to put her hair in pigtails every day. when we do her hair, we tell her to lie still, then take the brush and start working on it, counting. recently she has been finding the little rubber bands or her hair brush and attempting the process herself, counting faithfully along. she can definitely count to four, i don't know about any further.
we have taught her to drink out of a glass, a thick little blue flower-pot-shaped glass without a lid. i wanted her to become independent of sippy cups at an early age for several reasons: the plastic chemical contamination, also the impossibility of clearing sippy-cup crevices of mold, and also because i plain didn't want her to still be dependent on a sippy cup when she was seven. the sooner she learns to handle a glass and not to spill it, the better. she is simply addicted to (rice) milk. she cries for "maauk!" loudly several times a day, and devours it, with her cute little hands cupping the glass, one pinky sticking out. if she spills, i give her a towel and she has to wipe the spill. if she starts playing with the milk, i take it away.
the other day it came quite in handy because we were at the co-op and they had out samples of hazelnut milk. sparrow is always a challenge a the co-op because she doesn't sit happily in the cart for long, and jumps out on me, and then to let her down amongst all those bulk bins that she so desperately wants to dig her fingers into becomes quite the hawking experience for me. anyways, thank God for almond milk samples, because it kept her happy for another 15 seconds while i was trying to pay and get outta there, and she could drink it all by herself, straight out of the sample cup. i don't have to take an extra cup for her everywhere we go.
however, when her sample was gone, she loudly cried out for more milk. i wasn't going to just keep feeding her the co-ops milk samples! we were about to go to trader joe's so i told her she could have more milk there. she threw a bit of a fit, i'm afraid. still haven't quite figured out how to command immediate and unprotesting obedience in the store! she wailed and wailed and cried for milk almost all the way to trader joe's. at first i kept telling her she was going to get more. then i told her to stop whining, and subsequently ignored her. she got a lot more cheerful toward the end. once in tj's, i got a little sample cup and then opened a box of rice milk and she devoured almost 3 cups of it while we were shopping! but what a convenient thing it is to have her be able to drink it like that in a shopping cart!
sparrow does a million cute things, like say "okay!" and "alright!" and "whoa," and she keeps asking us to pray over and over again, throughout our dinner time. she stretches out both her hands to us and says, "pway? pway?" in the middle of church on sunday, jacob was teaching, and sparrow suddenly said "jay-bup!...jay-cub!" i couldn't believe she just pulled his name out of her memory like that! she has a thing for names. she knows all the lomelinos, and the other day we were playing in the reeves' yard (they weren't even there), and suddenly she said, "asha!" asher!? i thought she only paid attention to goldie! she also repeats "dowis!" if she hears anyone say my name.
she sits in a tiny blue chair at a coffee table in the kitchen. every time i give her toast or crackers to eat there, she settles in, then pulls out another little gray chair next to her and says, "mama?--mama?" wanting me to come sit with her. LOVE that!
another one of her favorite things is to pat her bottom when she is getting her diaper changed. Thomas actually taught her to say "booty" instead of "bottom," and it kills me because she will twist and say "boody! pawo (sparrow) boody!" then follows the inevitable, "mama boody!" whence she is not satisfied until i, too, have patted my own boody.
i couldn't get what she was saying at first, but we were in the car the other day and she kept saying "toway! toway!" finally i realized she was pointing out the window at the trees. tree! toway! that is a new development! tree for her used to sound just like "wee."
i can't believe all the things she is saying! may-doe! (tomato) twacca (tractor) baby-dah! (baby doll) it is precious. what else... oh yes! she says "neiba--wady!" (neighbor-lady!) can you believe it? when she hears the neighbor lady work on her porch or walk up the stairs! now that's amazing! this morning we were on our way to samuel's house, and we stopped at a red light, when suddenly she cried out, "WED!" what? wed? ...oh, RED! red! she is astounding! she can also point out yellow for sure, but colors are still a bit mixed.
since her hair has gotten to an unfortunate mullet-like stage, i try to put her hair in pigtails every day. when we do her hair, we tell her to lie still, then take the brush and start working on it, counting. recently she has been finding the little rubber bands or her hair brush and attempting the process herself, counting faithfully along. she can definitely count to four, i don't know about any further.
we have taught her to drink out of a glass, a thick little blue flower-pot-shaped glass without a lid. i wanted her to become independent of sippy cups at an early age for several reasons: the plastic chemical contamination, also the impossibility of clearing sippy-cup crevices of mold, and also because i plain didn't want her to still be dependent on a sippy cup when she was seven. the sooner she learns to handle a glass and not to spill it, the better. she is simply addicted to (rice) milk. she cries for "maauk!" loudly several times a day, and devours it, with her cute little hands cupping the glass, one pinky sticking out. if she spills, i give her a towel and she has to wipe the spill. if she starts playing with the milk, i take it away.
the other day it came quite in handy because we were at the co-op and they had out samples of hazelnut milk. sparrow is always a challenge a the co-op because she doesn't sit happily in the cart for long, and jumps out on me, and then to let her down amongst all those bulk bins that she so desperately wants to dig her fingers into becomes quite the hawking experience for me. anyways, thank God for almond milk samples, because it kept her happy for another 15 seconds while i was trying to pay and get outta there, and she could drink it all by herself, straight out of the sample cup. i don't have to take an extra cup for her everywhere we go.
however, when her sample was gone, she loudly cried out for more milk. i wasn't going to just keep feeding her the co-ops milk samples! we were about to go to trader joe's so i told her she could have more milk there. she threw a bit of a fit, i'm afraid. still haven't quite figured out how to command immediate and unprotesting obedience in the store! she wailed and wailed and cried for milk almost all the way to trader joe's. at first i kept telling her she was going to get more. then i told her to stop whining, and subsequently ignored her. she got a lot more cheerful toward the end. once in tj's, i got a little sample cup and then opened a box of rice milk and she devoured almost 3 cups of it while we were shopping! but what a convenient thing it is to have her be able to drink it like that in a shopping cart!
sparrow does a million cute things, like say "okay!" and "alright!" and "whoa," and she keeps asking us to pray over and over again, throughout our dinner time. she stretches out both her hands to us and says, "pway? pway?" in the middle of church on sunday, jacob was teaching, and sparrow suddenly said "jay-bup!...jay-cub!" i couldn't believe she just pulled his name out of her memory like that! she has a thing for names. she knows all the lomelinos, and the other day we were playing in the reeves' yard (they weren't even there), and suddenly she said, "asha!" asher!? i thought she only paid attention to goldie! she also repeats "dowis!" if she hears anyone say my name.
she sits in a tiny blue chair at a coffee table in the kitchen. every time i give her toast or crackers to eat there, she settles in, then pulls out another little gray chair next to her and says, "mama?--mama?" wanting me to come sit with her. LOVE that!
Thursday, October 11, 2007
ready for calculus
apparently my baby can count. of course she can recite a few numbers. she knows one, two, three, and possibly four after that, and she can copy us in saying them all up to twelve or something. she can also correctly place seven after six and eight after seven. we count when we set her on a swing, before we give her a big push! and we count in the morning when we put her hair in those adorable pigtails. nowadays she walks around with her hairbrush in hand, saying, "one, two, three..."
however, i was pretty sure that she was not exactly sure what the point of counting is or what it means, necessarily. about a month ago she was looking at the cover of her good night moon book and said "two--moon." sure enough, in the illustration there is one moon in the window and another in the picture on the wall. but i kind of thought it was just a fluke that she'd said that. however, tonight we were reading one of her favorite duck books, and she noticed a frog on one of the pages, and then another one on the same page. she pointed them both out and then said to me, "two frogs." she even put an S on the end of the frog! i think she's already surpassed me in intelligence. i mean, next month she'll be doing calculus!
however, i was pretty sure that she was not exactly sure what the point of counting is or what it means, necessarily. about a month ago she was looking at the cover of her good night moon book and said "two--moon." sure enough, in the illustration there is one moon in the window and another in the picture on the wall. but i kind of thought it was just a fluke that she'd said that. however, tonight we were reading one of her favorite duck books, and she noticed a frog on one of the pages, and then another one on the same page. she pointed them both out and then said to me, "two frogs." she even put an S on the end of the frog! i think she's already surpassed me in intelligence. i mean, next month she'll be doing calculus!
a little sick bout
on monday sparow woke up with a stuffy, runny nose. oh no!! i couldn't send her to holly's this way, what with samuel and hope there, and sparrow's tendency to commandeer everyone's sippy cup! so i would have to take a day off work. this situation could not drag on. i would take the day off work, but i was going to make dang sure that she was better in the morning! first thing i did was give her a little of my amazing detox tea to flush her system. she gets the effects through my breast milk already, but i thought this situation called for extra.
she also had two doses of natural cold/virus medicine that day, and an extra vitamin. (she LOOOOOOOVES her vitamins because they are in gummy-bear format, and she calls it "minamin!" she asks for them all day, and whenever she gets one she gets this huge grin on her face--when you put it into her grubby, eager little hand, she laughs.)
that night, i remembered a garlic poultice for combatting sickness that kim told me about. it involved some sort of crushed garlic possibly folded into a warm, moist paper towel and placed on the child's skin or even in their sock overnight. the garlic seeps through and gets into the bloodstream through the skin and fights the virus. well i didn't think sparrow would keep a garlic sock on, as she is not used to sleeping with socks on anyways, so at the last minute i decided to put it in her diaper before bed time. however, i ditched the paper towel because i needed quick action, and i thought it might block the effects. plus i was just doing this from memory of something kim told me from something she found on the internet. anyways, sparrow ended up with raw garlic in her diaper. i told her all along what i was doing: "we are gonna put garlic in your diaper and make you feel all better..." i was slightly nervous and felt that i should go look up the kosher-ness of leaving it raw in her diaper, or if it was "caustic" and would irritate or something. but an hour later she had already woken up crying heavily and i immediately changed her diaper and took out the garlic just in case. later i read that one needs to be careful not to get raw garlic on children's skin. oops! but voila! it had already done its job! the next morning she woke up happy and far less stuffy and was well enough to go to holly's so i could go make up my lost day at work.
the next 2 times i changed her diaper after the garlic episode, she replaced her usual "sparrow--booty! mama--booty!" chant with this: "gaeec! gaeec!" i finally realized she was saying "garlic!" remembering from last night! isn't that amazing?
she also had two doses of natural cold/virus medicine that day, and an extra vitamin. (she LOOOOOOOVES her vitamins because they are in gummy-bear format, and she calls it "minamin!" she asks for them all day, and whenever she gets one she gets this huge grin on her face--when you put it into her grubby, eager little hand, she laughs.)
that night, i remembered a garlic poultice for combatting sickness that kim told me about. it involved some sort of crushed garlic possibly folded into a warm, moist paper towel and placed on the child's skin or even in their sock overnight. the garlic seeps through and gets into the bloodstream through the skin and fights the virus. well i didn't think sparrow would keep a garlic sock on, as she is not used to sleeping with socks on anyways, so at the last minute i decided to put it in her diaper before bed time. however, i ditched the paper towel because i needed quick action, and i thought it might block the effects. plus i was just doing this from memory of something kim told me from something she found on the internet. anyways, sparrow ended up with raw garlic in her diaper. i told her all along what i was doing: "we are gonna put garlic in your diaper and make you feel all better..." i was slightly nervous and felt that i should go look up the kosher-ness of leaving it raw in her diaper, or if it was "caustic" and would irritate or something. but an hour later she had already woken up crying heavily and i immediately changed her diaper and took out the garlic just in case. later i read that one needs to be careful not to get raw garlic on children's skin. oops! but voila! it had already done its job! the next morning she woke up happy and far less stuffy and was well enough to go to holly's so i could go make up my lost day at work.
the next 2 times i changed her diaper after the garlic episode, she replaced her usual "sparrow--booty! mama--booty!" chant with this: "gaeec! gaeec!" i finally realized she was saying "garlic!" remembering from last night! isn't that amazing?
exercise
sparrow has become increasingly fascinated with exercise! first of all, she can say the word, which is more than most 2-year-olds can boast. she handed me the "going to bed" book the other day and said excitedly, "ecacike! ecacike!" i thought for 2 seconds... ecacike? oh exercise!!! "and when the moon is on the rise, they all go up to EXERCISE!" she loves it that there is a dancing hippo on that page, and always says, "hippo--dance."
about a week ago, i was contemplating doing a pilates session in the eve. while thomas was gone. i asked melissa if she had any pilates tapes, and then said to sparrow--"hey, do you wanna do some pilates with me?" i was totally blown away when the girl immediately started doing leg lifts and breathing pilates-breath!: "wh-wh" it was soooooo cute, and i couldn't think where she had picked that up except that nicole and i had been discussing and kidding around with pilates one evening, at least three weeks ago! crazy how she remembers things.
here's one i am really baffled as to how she picked it up: i was trying to change her diaper the other eve. and she was goofing off a bit, but as i was about to get annoyed, i tuned in to what she was doing, and she was doing SITUPS. she was putting her hands on her head, lifting up a little, and counting "one, two..." baffling! but i'll take it!hahahahaha!
she is well into doing her plies whenever prompted; she gets this verschminzt little look on her face--a slightly self-conscious smile, and bends her knees--down, up. thomas has been letting her watch dance videos on tv quite a bit. old ones of his performances, or fernando bujones in class or whatever. she LOVES it. she just stands in front of the TV and dances along and it is hilarious. i have to post a video of it asap. whenever she sees anyone dancing on the screen now, she thinks it's "daddy!" and if it's a performance video, and she hears people clapping, she starts clapping and exclaims, "Yay!"
about a week ago, i was contemplating doing a pilates session in the eve. while thomas was gone. i asked melissa if she had any pilates tapes, and then said to sparrow--"hey, do you wanna do some pilates with me?" i was totally blown away when the girl immediately started doing leg lifts and breathing pilates-breath!: "wh-wh" it was soooooo cute, and i couldn't think where she had picked that up except that nicole and i had been discussing and kidding around with pilates one evening, at least three weeks ago! crazy how she remembers things.
here's one i am really baffled as to how she picked it up: i was trying to change her diaper the other eve. and she was goofing off a bit, but as i was about to get annoyed, i tuned in to what she was doing, and she was doing SITUPS. she was putting her hands on her head, lifting up a little, and counting "one, two..." baffling! but i'll take it!hahahahaha!
she is well into doing her plies whenever prompted; she gets this verschminzt little look on her face--a slightly self-conscious smile, and bends her knees--down, up. thomas has been letting her watch dance videos on tv quite a bit. old ones of his performances, or fernando bujones in class or whatever. she LOVES it. she just stands in front of the TV and dances along and it is hilarious. i have to post a video of it asap. whenever she sees anyone dancing on the screen now, she thinks it's "daddy!" and if it's a performance video, and she hears people clapping, she starts clapping and exclaims, "Yay!"
Monday, September 24, 2007
sounds like butterball!
lots of little new stories to recount for the record of sparrow's little diary.
thomas went out of town for the weekend and we were desolated without him! he took the car and we felt a bit odd stuck in the house saturday morning, so i decided to take sparrow on "adventures" and ride the bus into IV. i would have liked to go even further (peets comes to mind), but it is always a push to get out the door in time and then be back for the nap... besides, we were just learning how to ride the bus and where to catch it and when--we nearly missed our first opportunity, and they only come once every hour! i wanted to go to the co-op for some tidbits, and so we alighted at ucsb and i had brought the little stroller to make a nice morning of it. i had to stop and get a coffee at a place swarming with flies, where the staff took no pains to be in a hurry to serve you, and the coffee tasted burnt, but not too bad once you added some steamed soy. i was tired enough, that is, that i was content with whatever was available. still a little luxury. anyways, we stopped at a playground on our way back to the stop, and i gave sparrow dried fruits that we had purchased. then i realized the bus was coming in a few minutes, and we ran and ran, but missed it by about one minute! so we found a little spot a ways away to play for the next hour. i read a paper while sparrow splashed in puddles. it got a little crazy when she started licking the puddle water off her hands like she does at home in the sink. finally the next bus arrived. i had us all set: sparrow in the stroller, all the groceries underneath, the diaper bag over my shoulder, and the money in my hand. i pushed up to roll the stroller onto the bus, when the big white bus driver said loudly "UH-UH-NO-NO-NO-nonono, you have to clap that thing together." i gave him a pissed/exasperated face despite my well-knowing that i should just be cheerful and compliant, and cried, "i have a bunch of bags in here--how am i supposed to carry it all!" (and keep sparrow under control and with me the whole time) i wanted to say--what if you have someone in a wheelchair come in here--do you make THEM clap their wheels together? the other busdriver hadn't been so cruel! oh but then again--he was mexican. the mean busdriver obviously had never had a child. (whereas mexican men are well-known to give birth all the time.) anyways it was great getting home and later i borrowed ander's car to go to trader joe's, and then aya came over to keep us company and make delicious thai food. in fact, i quite neglected aya in the kitchen for the good part of an hour, because sparrow and i went out searching for lime leaves for the soup, since she said the asian market had been out of them. i could have sworn there was a lime tree nearby... i ended up rushing around the darkening neighborhood for close to 40 minutes with everything yielding nothing but lemons and oranges. when i got back to the house with many exasperated apologies, i found a lime in our fruit basket, leaves still attached, that thomas had picked the other day.
sparrow stayed up late and played with alan and melissa for quite some time and kept saying "aya!" what a fun one to say. aya and i stayed up til... 3? i don't even know, because i told her i didn't want to know the time, when we finally retired, but now... now i want to know the time.
the next morning sparrow ran to the office door and knocked and said "dada!" when we woke up. sigh! she missed him! we filled up our day again with walks and playgrounds and songs. what an emptiness it is without the husband around to laugh with and make dinner for though! sparrow barely took a nap which made me so sad following my late late night that i had to make a second cup of coffee in the afternoon. getting tired and grumpy by dinnertime, i had just sat down to eat, sparrow next to me, and taken a big huge bite. suddenly i tuned in to sparrow, who was saying, "bay! bay! bay!" i am thinking--what is she---oh my gosh, she is saying "pray!" i forgot to pray outloud for my dinner! so i chewed and chewed, telling her, ok, we will pray, hang on, and finally swallowed my bite and we folded our hands and prayed. when i was done, i said the usual, "in jesus' name..." and waited for her to finish, but she did not say amen. oh well, i said it myself and was about to resume eating, when she started up again: "bay! bay! bay!" what!? she really wanted to pray some more! she was holding her hands out to me to grasp them! so i grasped them and we prayed some more, and following this prayer, the same thing happened again! by that time i told her we'd pray some more before bedtime and continued eating in astonishment that i had been spiritually put to shame by a one-year-old.
this morning, thomas was back, and i asked sparrow, "guess who came back to see you?" she says, "sisi? ander?" "nooo, daddy!" i say. first thing she does is look around in the bed to see if he is there. not there! already in the office! then she says wistfully, "daddy--rough" and rubs her cheek. he's been showing her his rough cheeks lately, compared to her smooth ones.
i have also noticed that she can sing 'the wheels on the bus' quite well, after only 2 times of hearing it from me! she sings "ound and ound" with almost the right tune, and tries to cram all the verses into one: "waa!--shh--down!"
the other day she said "vegetables" for the 1st time-- she eats them every night, and she was pretty excited about it, and repeated it when i told her they were almost ready. it sounded just like "butterball!" i was so delighted.
i have been calling nursing "nu-nus" forever, i think reece's son christian started it, and it stuck with me. so whenever i try to get her to focus on or get ready for nursing, i say, "nu-nu time!" she has been saying it, too, but it used to sound like "nu-nu mime." now she can say it perfectly, and the other day i was trying to get her to come with me to the stroller and home, from the playground. she was chasing a flock of crows around a field and kept pursuing them at full running speed. i hollered, "come on, sparrow," and she began running around even faster, with all her might, yelling, "NU-NU TIME!"
i've been teaching her recently, "what's daddy's name? tom-tom!" this morning, i asked her, and she said, "papum!" what a great nickname it will make!
i unfortunately taught her to lick. she now randomly tries to lick my face and it gets really funny--licking wars with a baby. what have i done? she never ceases to be amused by it!
thomas went out of town for the weekend and we were desolated without him! he took the car and we felt a bit odd stuck in the house saturday morning, so i decided to take sparrow on "adventures" and ride the bus into IV. i would have liked to go even further (peets comes to mind), but it is always a push to get out the door in time and then be back for the nap... besides, we were just learning how to ride the bus and where to catch it and when--we nearly missed our first opportunity, and they only come once every hour! i wanted to go to the co-op for some tidbits, and so we alighted at ucsb and i had brought the little stroller to make a nice morning of it. i had to stop and get a coffee at a place swarming with flies, where the staff took no pains to be in a hurry to serve you, and the coffee tasted burnt, but not too bad once you added some steamed soy. i was tired enough, that is, that i was content with whatever was available. still a little luxury. anyways, we stopped at a playground on our way back to the stop, and i gave sparrow dried fruits that we had purchased. then i realized the bus was coming in a few minutes, and we ran and ran, but missed it by about one minute! so we found a little spot a ways away to play for the next hour. i read a paper while sparrow splashed in puddles. it got a little crazy when she started licking the puddle water off her hands like she does at home in the sink. finally the next bus arrived. i had us all set: sparrow in the stroller, all the groceries underneath, the diaper bag over my shoulder, and the money in my hand. i pushed up to roll the stroller onto the bus, when the big white bus driver said loudly "UH-UH-NO-NO-NO-nonono, you have to clap that thing together." i gave him a pissed/exasperated face despite my well-knowing that i should just be cheerful and compliant, and cried, "i have a bunch of bags in here--how am i supposed to carry it all!" (and keep sparrow under control and with me the whole time) i wanted to say--what if you have someone in a wheelchair come in here--do you make THEM clap their wheels together? the other busdriver hadn't been so cruel! oh but then again--he was mexican. the mean busdriver obviously had never had a child. (whereas mexican men are well-known to give birth all the time.) anyways it was great getting home and later i borrowed ander's car to go to trader joe's, and then aya came over to keep us company and make delicious thai food. in fact, i quite neglected aya in the kitchen for the good part of an hour, because sparrow and i went out searching for lime leaves for the soup, since she said the asian market had been out of them. i could have sworn there was a lime tree nearby... i ended up rushing around the darkening neighborhood for close to 40 minutes with everything yielding nothing but lemons and oranges. when i got back to the house with many exasperated apologies, i found a lime in our fruit basket, leaves still attached, that thomas had picked the other day.
sparrow stayed up late and played with alan and melissa for quite some time and kept saying "aya!" what a fun one to say. aya and i stayed up til... 3? i don't even know, because i told her i didn't want to know the time, when we finally retired, but now... now i want to know the time.
the next morning sparrow ran to the office door and knocked and said "dada!" when we woke up. sigh! she missed him! we filled up our day again with walks and playgrounds and songs. what an emptiness it is without the husband around to laugh with and make dinner for though! sparrow barely took a nap which made me so sad following my late late night that i had to make a second cup of coffee in the afternoon. getting tired and grumpy by dinnertime, i had just sat down to eat, sparrow next to me, and taken a big huge bite. suddenly i tuned in to sparrow, who was saying, "bay! bay! bay!" i am thinking--what is she---oh my gosh, she is saying "pray!" i forgot to pray outloud for my dinner! so i chewed and chewed, telling her, ok, we will pray, hang on, and finally swallowed my bite and we folded our hands and prayed. when i was done, i said the usual, "in jesus' name..." and waited for her to finish, but she did not say amen. oh well, i said it myself and was about to resume eating, when she started up again: "bay! bay! bay!" what!? she really wanted to pray some more! she was holding her hands out to me to grasp them! so i grasped them and we prayed some more, and following this prayer, the same thing happened again! by that time i told her we'd pray some more before bedtime and continued eating in astonishment that i had been spiritually put to shame by a one-year-old.
this morning, thomas was back, and i asked sparrow, "guess who came back to see you?" she says, "sisi? ander?" "nooo, daddy!" i say. first thing she does is look around in the bed to see if he is there. not there! already in the office! then she says wistfully, "daddy--rough" and rubs her cheek. he's been showing her his rough cheeks lately, compared to her smooth ones.
i have also noticed that she can sing 'the wheels on the bus' quite well, after only 2 times of hearing it from me! she sings "ound and ound" with almost the right tune, and tries to cram all the verses into one: "waa!--shh--down!"
the other day she said "vegetables" for the 1st time-- she eats them every night, and she was pretty excited about it, and repeated it when i told her they were almost ready. it sounded just like "butterball!" i was so delighted.
i have been calling nursing "nu-nus" forever, i think reece's son christian started it, and it stuck with me. so whenever i try to get her to focus on or get ready for nursing, i say, "nu-nu time!" she has been saying it, too, but it used to sound like "nu-nu mime." now she can say it perfectly, and the other day i was trying to get her to come with me to the stroller and home, from the playground. she was chasing a flock of crows around a field and kept pursuing them at full running speed. i hollered, "come on, sparrow," and she began running around even faster, with all her might, yelling, "NU-NU TIME!"
i've been teaching her recently, "what's daddy's name? tom-tom!" this morning, i asked her, and she said, "papum!" what a great nickname it will make!
i unfortunately taught her to lick. she now randomly tries to lick my face and it gets really funny--licking wars with a baby. what have i done? she never ceases to be amused by it!
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