Caution: Wet Paint

It's the last week and a half of the quarter, which means exams, projects, etc. Harper's birthday is in a week and a half and we'll have people here to celebrate. So of course we chose this week to have the main area of the house painted. Doesn't that sound like great planning? We didn't actively choose this week, it was more of a passive decision. We finally picked out a color and called the painters to let them know and they said, "Can we come next week?" They are in high demand and can be scheduled months into the future, so when their time opens up it's hard to say no. This way we'll have the space painted before everyone comes for Harper's birthday and that's a good thing, even if it makes this week extra chaotic.

Learning that painters would be coming motivated us (read: Matt) to purchase new light fixtures for the hall. After much stress and headache, they were successfully installed last night.

Exhibit A:

Front Hall Fixture

Exhibit B:

Fixture Near the Bedrooms (which is not as yellowish as it appears here)

Matt did an excellent job and we now have brighter and more aesthetically pleasing lighting in the corridors of our home.

As if that weren't enough, Matt earned extra-bonus super husband points by both making and cleaning up from dinner this evening, and taking care of putting Harper to bed.

The main living area in our house is drop clothed and covered in plastic. Add some creepy background music and a few boarded up windows and we'd have a horror movie set right here.

Harper was fascinated by the painters today. I'm sure she would have loved to jump in and help. In fact, when they went on a lunch break, she wandered into the living room and had her hand around the roller full of wet paint before I could reach her. Fortunately I caught her before she actually did any painting, Lord help us all!

Rebound would have loved to help paint as well, undoubtedly by running through the paint tray and adorning the floors with satin finish paw prints. No thanks. We have him spending his days at Nana and Dziatku's the first part of the week. Then he'll be in doggy day care if the painters need more time to finish. They insist they've worked with animals before and it's so cute when cats curl up and sleep right on top of the plastic covered couches. I'm pretty sure a day spent painting with Rebound as an assistant and they'd be changing their animal policies in a big hurry.

I made some crack, while the painters were here, about all of us getting high on paint fumes. One of them told me that it would take an awfully sensitive person to be bothered by the latex paint. So I guess I have to blame my raging headache on all those political "ads" and automated phone calls. Thank goodness that will all be behind us, for better or worse, tomorrow. Don't forget to vote!

It Begins

I'm in danger of missing the day's deadline here, so I'll be brief. Matt, otherwise known as Super Husband, is in the front hall cursing at the new ceiling fixture we're trying to get installed before the painters come tomorrow. We'll probably further discuss the presence of painters in our home later this week.

Today, Harper and I, along with Nana and Dziatku (we had to leave Matt behind for basketball) traveled south to Aunt Kathy and Uncle Dave's to celebrate some birthdays. Nana's mom, Nana J., will have a birthday in about a week and we gathered to celebrate with her. I just so happens that my birthday is the same day and Harper's is two days later, so we all took some part in the celebration. For Harper this meant opening a couple of early birthday gifts. Really, since Nana J. was opening gifts, no one wanted Harper to be left out. She was happy to do her part!


She left the night with two new puzzles and a Mrs. Potato Head! I always wanted a Mr. Potato Head as a child and we just never had one at our house, so I was nearly as excited as Harper about that acquisition. She made it pretty clear that it will be a while before anyone else is allowed to play with the potato.


We also enjoyed some birthday (nut-free) brownies. If you look closely, you can see the remains of the celebration on Harper's face. A good time was had by all.

Stuck on You

Today was the one day, 20% off sale, at our local bookstore. Having done some early research, I decided to take advantage of the day to get a head start on some Christmas shopping (it's not that far away people!). Unfortunately that meant dragging Harper out to the store after her afternoon nap, which is not always a good idea. Armed with snacks, a sippy cup, and lots of prep talk in the car, I was hoping for a good trip. Things started off well when I told Harper we were going to the bookstore and she was going to ride in her stroller; she responded, "Book sore, yea! Ri in swor, yea!" and clapped.

All the way to the store I talked to her about what books we were going to look for and what she was going to do, namely, stay in the stroller! She handled the outing beautifully and only started getting cranky as we were leaving after 45 minutes of successful shopping. I now fear that I may have squandered all her holiday good will already, peaking far too early in the season.

I had told Harper that we could get out stickers when we got home, a favorite activity these days. "How exactly are stickers an activity?" you ask. It goes like this. We get out a sheet of stickers (this time they were Halloween Dora stickers from Nana and Dziatku), Harper points to the one she wants, I peel it off and hand it to her, she puts it on a piece of paper then looks up and says, "On mo peas?" (One more please?) And we do it again. On really exciting days, there are also crayons involved.

Tonight while we were playing stickers Harper decided to walk on the wild side and put some on her shirt. Then she commanded I take a picture. In the kitchen. I don't know why.




Then she backed up very carefully and told me to take one more. Cheese!


We were happy about the trip to the bookstore. We were happy about the stickers. The Wisconsin Badgers won today. Really, can we ask for anything else from a Saturday? I think not.

What It's Like

Living with a toddler that is.

Last night was a beautiful example. After her nap I was changing Harper's diaper and putting shoes back on her. I asked (sometimes a big mistake) if she wanted her tennis shoes. She said, "No sank you." Then I asked which shoes she wanted. She pointed at her dresser and said, "Ook in dewar (drawer)!" So I opened the drawer for her, she picked out the ones she wanted and couldn't be persuaded to change her mind (not a surprise). For the rest of the evening, Harper went everywhere sporting this footwear:



Yes, socks with sandals, not to mention the fact that it was about 35 degrees outside. I guess I'll need to make a raid and remove the inappropriate footwear from her drawer. Or just limit the amount of choice I give her. I have already learned not to say, "You pick," and then fail to go along with the result!

And now, a confession. . . Someone out there decided to make this National Blog Posting Month (or something to that effect). You could actually sign up, which I failed to do, but the idea is that you post something every single day in the month of November. This was created as some kind of "reasonable" answer to National Novel Writing Month, which might be a good idea if you have no job, kids, or anything else resembling responsibility. I thought I would throw my hat in the ring and see if I can post something every day this month; we'll see how it goes. Perhaps I shouldn't have mentioned that until the end of the month, when people would be wondering why the sudden consistency. Hopefully Harper will give me enough material!

The Pumpkin

Halloween was Tuesday. We have had pumpkins for carving since way back at the end of September. So there we were this past Sunday night, after Harper had gone to bed, going, "Hmm, I guess we'd better carve a pumpkin tomorrow." Matt wasn't going to be able to get home until seven-thirty or eight, after Harper's bed time, but we decided to bite the bullet and keep her awake because carving pumpkins is not my strong suit. While it is fun to dress the kid up, I would never loose a moment of sleep if Halloween ceased to exist. Anyway. . . I was worried about keeping Harper up too late, so she and I started cleaning out the pumpkin before Matt even got home.

I hadn't carved a pumpkin in about eighteen years or so, and I was a little uncertain where to begin. I knew I needed to put newspapers down on the table, and that was about it. . . Harper was fascinated when I took the top off the pumpkin. She kept looking inside and asking, "Wha is dat?" Which is actually a question I am hearing a lot these days.

She also kept insisting, "Hawpur do it!" So I would hand her the scoop, she'd wave it around inside the pumpkin for a minute and then thrust it back toward me saying, "Hewp (help)!" We finally reached a compromise in which I would scoop a bunch of pumpkin goop and she would empty the scoop into the bowl. She did not enjoy the orange mush on her hands much, and I can't really blame her.




When Matt arrived home, we just about had the pumpkin hollowed out and I handed the knife over to him for carving. He and Harper had some discussion about what shapes to make things and whether the mouth should have teeth. Harper considered all her options carefully.


As the minutes past bedtime stretched on, we hurried to get things finished up. Matt was going to skip a nose altogether, but Harper insisted. Then, at one point during the carving of the mouth, she inexplicably freaked out.


Perhaps this was Harper's way of reminding us that purposefully ignoring bedtime is never a good idea for anyone. She needed to be removed from the carving station and taken into the living room, where she demanded rocking and the singing of "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star."

When the crisis had been calmed we returned to the kitchen and the finished jack-o-lantern!



Then, since we knew Halloween night was going to be terrible weather, we hopped outside for a few more pictures.


If I knew more about photography I might have been able to get some better shots. I liked the lighting better with no flash, but everything came out a little blurry.



All things considered, I think this year's events added up to a successful Halloween experience.

Ah Be Tat!

I guess Halloween costumes, like many aspects of parenting, seem a lot less important as time goes by. Harper's costume this year was nowhere near the standards I set last year. Last year I had a lot more time on my hands, as well as a much higher level of Halloween ambition. This year I bought a $12 sweat suit and used fabric scraps to make tail and ears. I didn't fret about it too much; as soon as I showed Harper the doctored sweat suit she knew exactly what it was! "Ews (ears)! Taiw (tail)! Ah be tat!" Then she meowed and licked her hand for approximately 17 minutes.


Despite the fact that Harper had a less elaborate costume this year, she is a much better actress and enjoyed playing the part of cat for the day. Last year we kept telling her she was a dog, but she never quite caught on.


She has this little strut, very befitting of the kind of cat that owns its neighborhood. We got dressed up for story time at the library and she told all the other kids, "Ah tat!" Then she pointed at me and said, "Dat's my mommy!" So she was proud of her costume and the one who made it.

The only downfall of the day was trying to get Harper out of her costume for her nap. She kept telling me, "No Mommy, I no take nap! I wear tat cosfume!"


The only bad thing about dressing up for story time was the part when the kids went trick-or-treating through the library. Harper couldn't eat any of the treats: lollipops - they didn't have the bag for me to check the ingredients, candy corn - made in a facility that processes peanuts, Synder's pretzel packs - made in a facility that uses peanut butter; no, no, and no! So Miss Sue snuck back behind the circulation desk and found some miniature boxes of raisins. Fortunately Harper loves raisins and was thrilled to put them in the little bag she'd decorated. I have a feeling this will get more difficult as she gets older, at least until she understands why she can't eat that stuff. Food allergies are going to make many aspects of holidays difficult.


I was glad to have the chance to take Harper to the costume afternoon at the library because I was in class last night when she actually went trick-or-treating. It was also great to take some pictures because Monday was a beautiful autumn afternoon, but Tuesday was gross and rainy. Matt took her trick-or-treating to a couple of friends' houses and she did get some candy she can actually eat! Hopefully it was some good daddy-daughter bonding time.

Coming soon. . .pumpkin carving pictures!

MIA

Once again, it's been a while since I last posted. This is directly related to the amount of class work I have to do, which has been quite a lot lately. Only about three more weeks and the quarter will be finished. Then I'll have a break until the first week of January!

Here are a couple of pictures of Harper, opening a package from my mom. Mugga sent her a box of Halloween books that we've been enjoying the last couple of weeks. She is especially fond of one starring Coduroy. Opening the package also provided a nice warm-up for the birthday celebrations to come.


The best part, of course, was shredding all the wrapping material with the help of a manic Rebound.


I'll be back soon with pictures of Harper in her Halloween costume, or "cofume" as she says, as well as highlights of our last minute pumpkin carving.

Party Plans

Here is a photo of Harper wondering whether or not we'll have to move her scheduled birthday party, now that this event has been announced.


Personally I'm just relieved the paparazzi will have something better to do that day than fly helicopters over our house to see who exactly we've invited.

(And no, I don't know about the conflicting event because of what I'm reading online or because I watch too much E! Sadly, it was an item on our local evening news.)

Happy Birthday Midwest Mom!

Today this blog is one year old. I didn't bake it a cake, but I do feel like a little celebrating is in order. It also happens to be the 150th post. 150 pieces of our life, out on the Internet, for your reading and viewing enjoyment.


A couple of weeks ago, I asked people to let me know what some of their favorite entries have been. Through comments, email responses, and conversations, I have put together a sort of blog highlight reel. If you've missed anything, this might help you catch up. Just click and read:

1) the first post

2) a culinary adventure

3) oatmeal art

4) 9/11 thoughts

5) Daddy time

6) first steps

7) track and field

8) Dr. Seuss

9) first birthday letter

Who knows where we'll be next year at this time. . . I promise to document the journey.

Living in the Land of the Literal

Welcome to toddlerhood. Today we were dancing around in the living room and Harper's pants were falling down so I asked her to pull them up. . . And she did.

*****

I find that Harper, in all the glory that comes with being a toddler, makes me think twice about many decisions, not only the words I choose to use. Sometime this summer I had the measuring tape out of my sewing basket. Harper was enjoying chasing Rebound around the house and "measuring" him, which basically meant flinging the tape at him and laughing hysterically. Allowing Harper to run around with something as harmless as measuring tape seemed like no big deal; until I wanted to use it yesterday. 45 minutes and lots of dust bunnies later, I fished it out from under the couch in the family room. There are probably better ways I could spend my time. Once Harper's Elmo spoon went missing for about six weeks and I found it under the treadmill. I'm thinking of stitching a sampler that reads, "Have toddler. Will lose things."

Two More Things

(Two posts in one day, can you handle it?)

1. Leaving comments is a great way to encourage posting! I've mentioned before that comments are fun, kind of like getting actual, personal, non-bill, mail in the mailbox. Don't leave a comment if you don't have anything to say, of course, just know that reading comments lets me know that people are reading this and want to continue to do so.

2. In exactly one month Harper will be TWO YEARS OLD! Is this as surprising to you as it is to me? It goes too fast. . .


(Harper's impending second birthday is especially disturbing to the part of my brain which still believes I just graduated from high school a few months ago.)

Frequency

It has been brought to my attention (Erin) that there are a few people out there who would like for me to update this blog a bit more often than once a week. I will try to be better about at least putting up some short posts more frequently. Then people who are a tad obsessive, like me, will have something new to see if they visit every day, or several times a day. . .

Occasionally I forget to stop and be amazed by the new things Harper does and says every day. For a long time she loved bananas. Then she didn't want them at all and she would just play with the cut pieces, building slimy banana towers and slipping bites to the dog. Yuck.

Earlier this month I wondered if she'd be more interested in a banana if I just got it started for her and handed her the entire thing. Ta-da! Bananas were once again an acceptable food. Harper is proud of herself for just about everything she does, now she can add master banana peeler to the list.






Unfortunately I forgot to share this new banana procedure with everyone and when Nana was here the other day, she started to cut a banana for Harper. Harper immediately freaked out and, though I wasn't there, I'm sure she yelled something like, "No ca (cut) up!" Of course what she meant was, "Nana, due to my increased maturity, my parents no longer feel it necessary to divide this particular type of fruit into bite-sized pieces for me. But thank you for your willingness to do so. Now if you'll just place the entire banana before me, I'd be happy to demonstrate my peeling and biting skills."

My friend Christine once said something really wonderful and true about toddlers. I hope she doesn't mind my quoting her here. She said, "A two-year-old will walk through tornados, lightning, or fire without batting an eye, but put the juice in the wrong color cup and all heck breaks loose!" And it's true, although in Harper's case it's less about the color of her cup and more about her fruit being intact, but I think the same idea applies.

We've also had some humorous banana related moments, like when one broke as she was eating it the other day and she implored Matt to, "Feec (fix) it, Daddy!" Now Matt's a talented guy, but banana repair is not listed on his resume. Luckily Harper managed to cope with her broken fruit.

Time Flies

Hmm. . . I don't know if any of you look at the comments, but I just removed a really strange one from someone I've never heard of. I normally have no reason to edit, but it was pretty weird. Hopefully it wasn't there for too long. Did anyone else notice?

I can't believe it's been a week since I last posted. It has been busy around here. I was in Columbus twice in the last week. Once again I find myself feeling so grateful for all the help we get from Matt's parents. I am pretty sure I wouldn't be able to do the whole graduate school thing if they weren't around to lend a hand.

Last week Ann, otherwise know as Nana, accompanied us to a free trial gymnastics class at Tops Gymnastics Club, which isn't too far from our house. They have a special set of programs for young children in a gym they call Tumble Bunny Land. If we decide to attend class there on a weekly basis, Harper would enter as a Hopping Bunny. We are up in the air about continuing at this point. There was a little group stretch at the beginning. The kids did a stop, drop, and roll song, since it's fire safety month. Then the instructor demonstrated the stations the children were supposed to go through. It was pretty complicated and I was a little worried about the extent to which they really expected the directions to be followed. I knew I wouldn't be able to remember the whole thing. After the explanation, the instructor told us we could start at any station we wanted and I realized it probably wasn't as structured as it seemed at first.


There were only two things Harper was really interested in doing. One was a long trampoline built into the floor, which more skilled children probably tumble on. The direction was for the Hopping Bunnies to jump from one end to another, bringing their feet together and apart like jumping jacks. Right-o. Harper just kept running back and forth on it, exclaiming, "Ah jumpy! Ah jumpy!" Um, not quite. But she loved it, and surprisingly, agreed to get off the thing when another kid wanted a turn. The other piece of equipment she enjoyed was a large wedge the children were supposed to roll down. Instead Harper slid down it on her stomach. Ah, close enough. She was highly suspicious of any area filled with foam squares and also wary of tunnels. I wonder if she has some sort of tunnel-phobia which can be traced back to the fact that she had to be delivered by c-section? (Just kidding.)

My guess is that Harper might broaden her horizons and actually learn a thing or two if we keep going to the class. Plus, it will give us a reason to leave the house this winter, which I am sure I will be desperately needing to do. I would like to assure everyone that we would not be enrolling her in this gymnastics class in some bizarre quest for a gold medal in the 2020 Olympics. The fact that Harper does not realize jumping requires both of her feet leaving the floor at the same time leads me to believe that she doesn't have a lot of raw gymnastic talent! And I'm sure Matt would tell you that any quest for Olympic gold will be on a basketball court rather than a balance beam, at least if he has any say in the matter.

Violent Streak?

Here's a disturbing little story. . .

The other morning Harper was playing with several of her stuffed animals. She has a little lamb which is also a sort of music box. When you wind it up the music for "Jesus Loves Me" plays and the lamb's head tilts back and forth. It's very sweet. So Harper asked me to turn the lamb on, which I happily did. Then, as it was playing away on the ottoman, she put her hand in her pink bunny purse like it was a puppet, walked over, and slammed it into the lamb, knocking it over.

How do I have a picture of this? Did I happen to have my camera out at that exact moment? Oh no, Harper was so delighted with herself, she repeated this little act about fifteen times. After each time she cried triumphantly, "Ah knock amba!"


I hear therapy calling. . .

A+ For Knowing What She Needs

Today Harper was playing in the living room and Matt was sitting nearby, reading the paper. Harper tripped over her slipper, or a toy, or thin air and fell on the hard floor, bonking her forehead. She started to cry and Matt picked her up to comfort her. Through her tears she looked down and said, "Wok," she wanted to sit in the rocking chair. Then she managed, still crying, to choke out, "Ah need mik," she wanted the cup of milk off of the coffee table. Finally, she demanded, "Sing kinka," wanting Matt to sing "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star," to her. Then she stopped crying and felt better.

And you thought they didn't come with instructions!

Posting is an Excellent Form of Procrastination

Last week was a very productive week for me, school-wise. Do you want to know why? My mother was here! And since she was here, there was another human being to tend to Harper's every waking need. I got to spend one entire day studying and working, and somehow that felt like a luxury. Also, there was one day that my mom got up with Harper and I slept in until about 9:30. That, my friends, is better than winning the lottery.

My mother is not here this week and there has been a marked decline in both the amount of work I've accomplished and the hours of sleep I've gotten. Mom, any chance you could just, like, move in for the next year or so? Just checking.

We were still swimming in buy-one-get-one admissions from The Boonshoft, so we did spend a morning there with my mom. Harper enjoyed:

1) Driving Mugga around in a pretend truck.


2) Eating plastic vegetables in the log cabin.


3. And playing with Mugga in the box full of (I'm guessing) tire shreds, which looked remarkably like soil.



We also visited the slide, color wall, water works, a tree house, and the "Wild Ohio" zoo -- which has some cool animals. Albino alligator anyone? Maybe it was a crocodile. I'll double check next time we go. You know how most zoos are basically outdoors? There's a good reason for that! Wild Ohio is completely indoors and thus pretty stinky. Fortunately this didn't seem to keep Harper from enjoying local favorites like a fox and turtles. And really, who is she to hold being stinky against anyone?

Pumpkin Patch

On Saturday, Harper went with Matt to get "a pumpkin" from a garden center/nursery near here. Sadly, I'm not even sure exactly where it is they went. (I am not clued in on many of the trip's details, as I was in my Cataloging and Classification class. I know, I know, you really wish you could take that class too, just for fun.)

While Matt didn't seem like he was chomping at the bit to be a guest blogger and write about their experiences, he did take lots of pictures. Apparently Harper was most interested in the cute little pumpkins. Think the toy category of the dog show, just apply it to produce.




Matt did convince her to pick one (barely) larger pumpkin.


He took it upon himself to bring home one decent-sized pumpkin which, in theory, we will actually scoop out and carve. We'll see.

Last year I went as far as making Harper a poodle costume, as in cutting out a pattern and sewing it. I believe this was some kind of attempt to prove, if only to myself, that I would not let my aversion to Halloween ruin my daughter's childhood. We did not go as far as to carve a pumpkin. This year, since she can actually say pumpkin, we thought we might give it a try.

I have somewhat fond memories of gathering around our kitchen table as children, attempting to keep the pumpkin guts on the newspapers that had been spread out, and trying to communicate our elaborate design details to Dad, who did most of the carving when we were little. Mom was nearby, groaning if we begged for her to save and roast the pumpkin seeds. I am quite sure I always promised I'd eat them, and they probably never tasted quite as good as I seemed to imagine they would. I still remember the smell of pumpkin soaked newspaper and roasting seeds. And I remember the way the pumpkins never quite looked the way you'd imagined when you were finished. Although, for me, that's true of most any kind of visual art. I'm more with the words and not so much with, well, anything that requires manual dexterity.

Perhaps Harper will astonish us with both her coordination and artistic genius and carve her own pumpkin. With a safety knife of course.

We're Still Here!

Have you missed us?

Here are some photos of sweet Harper to tide you over:

Back at Boonshoft

Stuffed Animal Avalanche

Picking Pumpkins

More content soon, I promise. The management thanks you for your patience!