Here we go again

Yesterday I resumed caring for e while her parents work.  We went out for a walk, with e pushing her stroller, but just a few feet from the door she heard a truck backing up or something and said, " Sit," indicating she wanted to ride in the stroller.  So I put her in it and away we went.  When we got back to the house, Sarah and Erik were up, and e interacted with them before they left for a walk.  They came up here hoping for cooler weather, and while it was cooler than San Diego, especially in the mornings under the marine layer, the sun appeared by noon each day and warmed things up.  After lunch I put e down for a nap, with the promise of "watch Elmo" after her nap, then took Sarah and Erik to the airport.  I appreciated Sarah's work of sorting through things she had left in her closet.  She took some items, left some for E to bring when they drive south at the end of September, and designated others for me to dispose of.  Thank you, Sarah!

We watched a video with Elmo and balls when e woke up about four, then took a short walk with her pushing and pulling her little plastic wagon.  I had a piano student at 5, after E finished work.  After supper we rearranged e's room so we could re-loft one of the beds.  The other twin is now lofted in my sewing room again.

This morning we spent quite a lot of time in her room playing with the toys she hadn't seen in a couple of weeks.  European Sleepworks delivered our new queen mattress, and I look forward to sleeping on it tonight.  Now we need to shop for a bed so we can get it up off the floor.

Full house!

We have a full house!  Sarah and Erik arrived Thursday night.  They visited a brewery Friday, then had lunch with friends yesterday, after Erik went running in the cool morning.  Last night E, e and K arrived after spending the day in the car, e's first do-it-in-one-day drive here from Phoenix.  They wanted some time with Sarah and time to rest up for work on Monday.  Last week was very busy for them as they cleaned house and gathered loan papers.  We plan to go out for lunch today.

Adapting to change

After a five-week absence (three with us, one at her house with me watching her, and one in the Midwest with her parents) e returns to day care today.  I hope she enjoys it.  This weekend she and her parents will drive up here and stay a while as their house goes on the market.  Though it may be a bit confusing for her to switch from one care situation to another, I wonder if it may not be better in the long run for her to be able to adapt.

Linda came over after Jazzercise yesterday, and we chatted about an hour about her upcoming move to Chicago and our transition to having EeK living with us.  I will miss her.

I've been working on the "Soul Searching" quilt and have finished four of the nine blocks.  I forgot I had planned to change the orientation and have some long strips with prints that may look funny if turned 90 degrees.  Oh, well.  Just have to wait and see when all the blocks are done.  I laid out the yellow strips yesterday and realized I need to change a couple because they are just too pale to register as yellow, so I may have to buy some new fabric if I can't find anything suitable in my scraps.  The picture on the right shows the placement the pattern uses; the one on the left is better suited for a rectangular or bed quilt.  After I finish all the blocks I'll try both layouts and decide which one to use.

Always working

The other day I was reading a book called Pinkalicious to e, about a little girl who made pink cupcakes with her mother on a rainy day.  One page showed the utensils and ingredients they used in baking; I didn't name these things, just read the text.  All at once e climbed off the couch and went into the kitchen, where I heard her open the one unlocked cabinet and take something out.  She brought me "her" whisk.  Sure enough, there was a black whisk on the page.  Her mind is always making connections.

Quiet

With e and her parents in Ohio this week, we have a quieter house.  James jumps up in a lap when one is available and seems happy enough until Randy shuts him in the green room at night.  Then he bumps against the door, as if to ask why we're punishing him.  But by morning he seems to have forgotten the indignity.  He sleeps a lot, looking dead to the world, then all at once sits up and runs up the stairs.  It's rather fun to watch!

Tinker Toys

One thing we saved from years past is a container of Tinker Toys, plastic not the original wooden rods I grew up with but still a lot of fun.  Following an illustration I built this Ferris wheel which e enjoys spinning.  It uses almost all of the pieces in the box.  I showed e that the blue rounds have a hole in the center that a rod can go through, so she played with that feature and we created some rolling things.  Then we made an axle with wheels and handles and called it a lawn mower, which e rolled back and forth while making a specific sound.  She often clings to me when we're outside and she hears the landscape crew cutting grass or blowing clippings off the walk, but she likes this quiet version of a mower.  Maybe I'll take it apart while she's in Ohio this week; when she returns we can build something else!

By the way, I've attached a picture of the water table to the post titled "water table, wagon" if you want to see it.  I also added a bit to the post about dust.

Ice!

This morning e and I again played outside at her water table.  The water left in the basin felt cool in spite of the high temperature, but there wasn't much remaining.  So together we used the hose to put more in, and it immediately felt like very warm bath water, OK but not what I wanted.  What to do...ahh, of course.  We went into the kitchen, took a mixing bowl from the cupboard and filled it with ice, which we dumped into the water table.  It melted pretty fast, so we repeated the process until the ice maker in the freezer was depleted.  By then the water felt quite cool and pleasant.  e seemed to enjoy playing with the melting ice, grabbing pieces and placing them in a cup or just holding them.

Seeing the empty bowl, she decided it should be filled and used a cup to transfer water from the table to the bowl.  After we poured it back in, she moved to the other side and did it all again.  Needless to say she got herself wet, but since I had removed her shirt and pants before we went out she probably enjoyed the sensation of the cool water on her tummy and legs.

I think the next time she's at our house, I will put out a tub of water and some cups, a sieve, maybe a bowl or two...if it's warm enough!

Water table, wagon

Wednesday morning we took off e's Elmo shirt, went outside and put fresh water in the water table, a table about 18 inches tall (excluding the center tower), two feet in diameter and six inches deep that has several water play devices attached to it. The water was quite warm, I suppose because the hose lies in the sun.  After a while one of the little balls rolled under the table, so e lay on the patio tiles to reach for it.  When she stood up her chest was brown due to the little puddles on the tiles, dusty from the dust storm.  I rinsed her off, then she lay down again a couple of times so I'd rinse her again.  I had to laugh, she is so cute when she does things like that.  After we came back in, I put her pants in to soak, but I'm afraid they may never be white again.

Another fun activity these days is the chase.  I push the shopping cart (which doesn't require me to lean over too much) and follow e as she pushes the little red Radio Flyer wagon from the sliding door in the family room through the kitchen, around the dining table and back to the door. She can go very fast!  Sometimes she allows me to pull a big black ant with red wheels that has a long-enough cord that I barely have to lean over.  She can do this for a very long time without tiring.

After supper K took another load to Goodwill, and then we moved furniture a bit to prepare the house for showing after the Ohio trip.

Dust, broomstick, blocks

Yesterday we had a dust storm, not too bad, but my first one.  I noticed the sky getting darker as the wind picked up, so I thought it would rain.  Instead we had dust flying.  Visibility was still good here at the house, though I could tell something was blotting out things in the distance.  I actually went out back just to see if I could feel dust in the air, but I couldn't.  Afterwards a thin layer of reddish dust covered the patio and a lot of leaves had been blown into the pool.  When she heard me mention dust, e went to the door of the laundry room, indicating she needed help.  I opened the door and she pointed to the broom, wanting to sweep up dust.  Her mind is always working, making connections.

Later I pulled out a couple of jigsaw puzzles for e to work.  A piece was missing from one, so I got down on my hands and knees to look under the couch.  I saw a couple of golf balls and mentioned them to e.  She smiled and went to retrieve the bit of broomstick used to block the sliding door, then lay down and swept it under the couch.  Clever girl!  I guess she had seen one of her parents do that.  So we got the balls out but no puzzle piece.

We've read a Dr. Seuss book many times about feet of various kinds, including "up feet, down feet."  So I made a wall with steps out of e's large blocks and then helped Peppa Pig (a 10-12 inch stuffed toy) climb up and down while saying "up feet, down feet."  What fun e had with that!  She tried other animals as well and wanted to put her feet on the steps but, of course, they were way too big.  Since the blocks are designed for toddlers they don't latch together too tightly, and as we played the wall fell frequently.  But it was easily redone and play continued.

Words

Children probably understand a lot more words than they can say.  Certainly e does.  Sometimes I think we need to remember that old proverb about little pitchers and speak carefully around e.  Her vocabulary grows almost daily, though I can't always understand what she is saying.  "Noise" is pretty easy and " outside" (she often points to the door), but she can't do a hard "c" sound yet, so words like "buckle" are interpreted in context, generally.  She loves to stand in front of her high chair and fasten the straps, and when she's in the seat in a shopping cart she can buckle herself in, but then she asks for someone to undo things so she can fasten them again...and again.

Yesterday we played a new game using the 30 or so animal picture cards.  I spread them in a big circle on the rug and had her find and pick up the lion, the dolphin, and so on.  She did very well!  She likes to place the cards back in their box, about the size of a VHS tape, which can be a challenge due to the semi-circular cutout on each edge of the box.  But she is very persistent and works at it for several minutes, putting cards in, then dumping them out and putting in more.

Back in Phoenix

Kyle, e and I left home Friday a little before 6 PM and had a fairly smooth drive to Palos Verdes, where K's mom lives.  Traffic slowed to a crawl on I-5 twice due to accidents.  We saw one car up on its side on the shoulder.  Other than that, we made good time, stopping just once for fuel.  e stayed awake till nearly 10.  I didn't count how many times I sang "Hush, Little Baby" and other songs like "Down by the Bay."  At one point K chimed in with a verse about a parrot eating a carrot, and believe it or not that is exactly what I was about to say!  We arrived about 12:40, carried in our luggage and went to bed, though e decided to stay up for nearly an hour her dad reported the next morning.

Saturday afternoon e's aunt and cousins came up, and we enjoyed seeing the three little girls together.

We left PV at 4:00 this morning, stopping a couple of times.  Soon after crossing into Arizona we stopped again, about 8:30, and e woke up.  She was a great traveler.

Randy cut the back of his right hand last night and ended up calling Dena and Alan to take him to the ER at Kaiser, but it was a fairly minor cut.  The doctor glued the edges of the wound together and suggested Randy not make a fist for a few days.  When I spoke to him a few minutes ago, he had taped a plastic glove over his hand and was about to clean the litter box.  He'll be fine.

Tears

Monday e had two crying spells, both of them my fault.  I like to take a morning walk so we headed out.  Usually e rides in the stroller to start then she pushes it as we approach the house at the end of our walk.  For some reason I let her push at the beginning then she didn't want to sit in the stroller.  Weeping and wailing ensued, lying on the sidewalk, frustration on my part at being thwarted by a toddler.  Finally I picked her up and took her home.  No walk that morning!

Later I made the mistake of showing her Elmo on the front of her diaper.  She decided it simply would not do to use that diaper, so I pulled out another one and showed her it did not have Elmo.  Well, she didn't want that one either.  Back and forth we went until I played the "I'm bigger than you are" card and just fastened one on her.  Lesson--don't show her the front of the diaper.

E said e was fussier the week K was up here without them.  Perhaps these squalls were partly due to E's absence.