Life was so much easier when Jonah was two and into Elmo since I already knew of Big Bird, Cookie Monster, and the Count. But now that J is almost five its getting more complicated.
Recently I've been quizzed on the alter egos of all super heroes and fail most of the time. I've got Bruce Wayne and Clark Kent down, but I cannot keep the aliases of the Flash, the Green Lantern or Robin straight. I can get away with calling Wonder Women "Princess Diana" (what is her last name???).
And to further throw me off we randomly checked out a Rescue Heroes video from the free kid shelf at the video store. I have no idea how many differnt Rescue Heros there are, but its a lot! J has this game where he gets out his 7 or so small stuffed animals and gives them all a name based on the "thing" that he is into. Elmo, Gorilla, dinosaur, and the rest then act out the story. He was so mad at me because I could ONLY think of the names of 6 heroes. Poor Beary {a stuffed bear dressed in camo) did not have a name and therefore the game just wouldn't work!
The Name Game
Too Many Eggs
No, this is not a trip down memory lane, this is a picture from last week, not last Easter! Somehow I ended up with 1 1/2 cartons of eat-me-now-eggs. For some reason I lose the ability to look at expiration dates when I walk across the aisle from the milk to the eggs.
So I hard boiled 17 eggs and had them cooling in a large pot. Jonah came in the kitchen and asked what I was going to do with "those eggs"? He doesn't like eggs so I wasn't really sure why he cared to know but I told him that I was thinking about making some deviled eggs. He then asked what is probably on all 4 year old's minds when they see a large pot full of WHITE eggs- can we color them? I was to tempted to give a boring mom response such as
"Its not Easter!"
but instead I asked a logical mom question "What are we going to color them with?"
He obviously wanted the creative mom response because he asked if I could find something in the cabinet.
I then remembered my childhood days when you associated coloring eggs with the strong smell of vinegar. Then I recalled my friend Lisa mentioning that her mom always just used vinegar and food coloring. I DID have those things in my cabinet! I probably could have found a more accurate recipe online but we were being creative, right? So this is what we came up with:
Homemade Egg Dye
(measurements are app., we just poured...)
3 cups (one each in yellow, blue and red- if you have it)
1/8 c. water per cup
1/3 c. vinger per cup
6 drops of food coloring per cup (we just used primary colors and then dipped our eggs in 2 cups to make more colors, or sometimes all 3 cups or the same cup twice...).
Our eggs ended up with several finger prints on them when J handled them right away, but they dried nicely. Maybe we shouldn't have added the water. Oh well, it was an experiment and kept us busy on a cold January morning!
What happened to "cheese"?
So I realize that I have been slacking in the blog department lately. Normally a situation occurs and I think "I should blog about that". The blog might stay in my mind for a few days until I remember to "spit it out" while working on the computer. But recently my blogs, or my could-be-blogs have been about words. By words I mean something that little J has said or words he confused or something along those lines. For some reason they are not sticking in my head, they leave before I have had a chance to spit them out. Is that my age talking? But today a friend e-mailed and asked where some recent pics were. I then was able to connect that with this story, the only "word" blog that I can remember. Maybe I just need concrete associations... Anyway, here goes:
I hope this story doesn't offend anyone or gross anyone out, but the above picture was taken during our Christmas picture photo shoot. During that time little J was becoming a little restless and as a result was saying several words instead of "cheese". Most of these words were Christmas words, such as Christmas tree, presents, snow and stockings. What we didn't see coming, as you can see from the above picture, was the next photo buzz word, which was diarrhea (of all things). Now, to give you a little background, he did have an unfortunate bout of the above illness at least a month prior to our "photo shoot". He was staying with Grandma and Grandpa and had an incident that was both messy and embarrassing for him (maybe it was more messy for Grandma). But Grandma explained that what he had was diarrhea and that people get it sometimes. She also said that its not something that we talk about often, especially around girls because they do not like to talk that kind of thing. Since then he has been very matter of fact if he mentions the D word and also showed concern if thought someone else might be experiencing it.
So I'm not sure why he brought it up in such a way that day. I guess Mommy doesn't count as a girl, he knows that Daddy will talk about most ANYTHING of that nature and that our photographer, a young male recent college grad (Jake's office mate) was all about the bathroom humor. But it got us to laugh, so I guess if cheese doesn't work next time...
Super Why
Super Why, a new show on PBS, is the ONLY thing that Jonah wanted to be for Halloween this year! Super Why has the power to read and with his friends, the Super Readers, they are able to look into books and solve problems. No one had a clue who he was, but he loved his homemade costume (and he REALLY wants to learn how to read now!). And he insisted that I be Princess Presto (with the power to spell, I love to spell, S-P-E-L-L) for Trunk or Treating!
Indecisive Gene
Last week I had a "blast from the past" which I loved and disliked all at once. We were standing in front of church discussing with friends where we were going to go out to lunch. We had the friend who said where he didn't want to go and Jake who was scraping every one's suggestions. We had the family in the mini van who just wanted to be told where we going so they could put their van in drive and go.
It reminded me so much of our New Springs days (our old church). We went out for lunch every Sunday following an episode like the one mentioned above (except for the stint where a restaurant was drawn out of a cup each week, announced and that is where we would go- why did that end?). Although I'm happy to have friends again that occasionally like to go out on Sunday, they're really not working out- we need decisive friends (please still be our friends, friends, just kidding)!
The problem is that Jake and I are a very indecisive couple. Many nights we spend laying on opposite ends of the couch wondering what we're going to do that night. And when it comes to going out to eat- Jake only knows where he DOESN'T want to go and nothing ever "sounds good to me."
So the question of the day: is there a gene for indecisiveness that you can pass on to your offspring? If so, our poor child has received it. I noticed this when one day this week I told him he needed to take a bath. He got into the bath tub and said "which one should I take, a bath or a shower?" I assured him that it didn't matter to me, it was his choice. "Which one do you think I should take?" he asked me. I suggested a bath. He looked sceptical. I then said "how about a shower?" He then told me he would "ask these guys" meaning his washcloths and cups. He sat down and had a conversation with them. Apparently, they like baths. Maybe I should ask them the next time we're standing in the parking lot deciding between Chinese or breakfast foods.
Fearless First Day
Pre-school resumed this week after four summer months off. Even after a long break, there were no tears or fears (for either of us) when it came time for drop off.
Although I'm pleased with the easy transition I'm not happy with the lack of reports I've been getting from him. He has a great memory and is perfectly capable of telling me about his day, at least he would last year. But this year he is "all boy" in his reports, which are "I can't tell you, its a secret." I suppose I shouldn't be surprised when next year his answer to "what did you do at school today?" is a very informative "nothing"! (On a similar note he expects a 12 step answer to all of his questions. Here is a replay of a conversation he had with my friend, Brooke: J-"why is your hair yellow, I thought it was brown?", B-"I colored it." J-"How did you color it?" B- "A lady did it" J- "How did she do it?" B-"She put chemicals on my hair and it changed colors" J-"What after she put chemicals on your hair?, "Why did you want it to be yellow?" "Where does she live", "Will it turn back to brown?"....)
Pictures above: His first day of school with his family banner, a play date to the zoo following school, and a photo session that Jonah arranged prior to church this past Sunday.