Shut Up and Dance with Me

We took a trip to Philadelphia to go to the bar mitzvah of the son of my friend, Anna.  Anna's son was born during our second year of law school.  Anna told stories that were simultaneously hilarious and sad of trying to keep her pregnancy under wraps while working as a law clerk our 1L year.  It was hilarious because Anna is one of the funniest people I know and was laughing hysterically about how she was worried that her pregnancy-related nose bleeds would cause the partners at the firm where she was working to wonder if she had a coke habit. Anna gave a home run toast to her son at the bar mitzvah which was so funny and touching that we are still talking and laughing about what she said weeks later. And her stories about her pregnancy during her summer internship were sad because it is sad in this day and age that women still feel the need to minimize a pregnancy at work. I know I did as well.

But back to the party.  It was one heck of a party. On the way home from the celebration, David said to me "Mom, can we change to Jewish so that I can have a party like that?!?"  I would say inspiring children to seek to convert religions is the sign of a great time.

I loved watching my children dance that night.  Who knew my children could dance?  They definitely didn't get it from Joe (he will be the first to tell you that), and while I took a lot of dance lessons growing up and loved performing routines, I am not an outgoing dancer when it comes to improvising on the dance floor.  Our kids are at that great age where they are not yet inhibited.  Apparently I should revel in this while I still can, because the 13 year-olds at the bar mitzvah definitely were at that self-conscious phase, which is to be expected for junior high kids.  There was no early teenage dancing going on.  It was reminiscent of a middle school dance. My kids, on the other hand, have yet to develop self-consciousness.  The other day I took David to the pool and he did not see why it would be a problem for him to drop his drawers on the pool deck and throw on his swim suit.

Not so great when it comes to public nudity, but lack of inhibition is great when it comes to the dance floor. Those kids can cut a rug!  They were bopping all over the place, requesting songs from the DJ and flying around the room, arms and legs going crazy as they danced with pure joy.  Their dancing was excellent but their musical taste is something that needs a little coaching.  Their playlist of requests included "I Like to Move It Move It"and the "Macarena" ("Where on earth did you hear about that?!?" I asked. "We learned it in gym class!" they said.  Fair enough.  Gym class is where I learned the electric slide.)  Those requests were panned by the DJ, but they did get a winner with their request for the current spring/summer hit "Shut Up and Dance with Me."  It is a catchy song, but I think they like it because they get to yell "SHUT UP and dance with me" about 20 times in a row.  I tried to get them to change the lyrics to "Come on and dance with me" but Julia accused me of "lying" because "those aren't the real words, mom!"  Sometimes songs are just meant to be sung as they were written.  And I hope they never lose their beautiful gift for dance.

Birdie

2015 will be forever the summer of badminton in my mind.  Uncle Andy came home for a few weeks between his stint in Taiwan and his new stint in Colombia.  And he brought a badminton set with him.

The boys were immediately intrigued.  Give them a net and something to whack at and they are in.  I was impressed with how willing they were to learn the rules and to stick it out to play long games. Uncle Andy played some tennis growing up and loves badminton, of course.  But guess who else loves badminton...Grandma Julie!  She is really good at it, too.  She has always been athletic and competitive, so this was right up her alley.  Now are are just warming up for our big Fourth of July festivities when our Colorado cousins are coming to visit.  Can't wait!

In the Zone

AJ had his 8th birthday party at Sky Zone, which is a local trampoline park.  (Note to self: this was one of the easiest birthday parties I have ever hosted. When David asks to do his party here in December, just say yes.  The kids slept really well that night and there is minimal parent involvement.)

When I found out that my first child was a boy, I wondered how I would figure out how to be the mom of a boy.  My older brother was pretty self-sufficient and made parenting a boy look pretty easy.  I mostly hung out with girls and felt more comfortable babysitting girls growing up.  But now that I am the mom of two boys, it is so much fun.  The fart jokes do get old after a while, but there is something magical about a pack of guy friends together. They are quick to laugh and tease but rarely get mean or hurt.  And boys at 7 and 8 are generally easygoing, curious and still wear their hearts on their sleeves.  Their favorite things include Rubik's cubes, Legos and The Guiness Book of World Records.  

At the party, I mostly got to sit back and watch this.  There was one ball to the eye that required an ice pack, but that was it.

A cannoli cake imported from Chicago, AJ's new favorite.  He told me the other day that he thinks his Italian heritage really dominates given that his favorite cake is cannoli cake and his favorite food is Pasta Alfredo.  Must be genetic, right?

These awesome Rubik's cube cupcakes (with edible Rubik's cube) were made by a lady who makes cakes out of her house.

AJ trying to solve his cupcake Rubik's cube.

Julia was so proud to have a seat at the table with the guys.

This picture reminds me of a picture of my brother's second grade cub scout pack den where they are all making bunny ears and goofing off.  These boys have become AJ's very good buddies and he is so happy around them.

Eight is gonna be great.

Conquering the Big Slide

This summer for the first time, we conquered the Big Slide.  In the Big Pool.  Last summer there was zero interest in this slide.  This summer, it was an obsession by both boys.  David barely cleared the "tall enough to ride" slide by 0.001 of an inch.  He was so excited to be one of the big kids.  I love how these pictures capture the joy of doing something that previously intimidated them.

Eight is Great!

So this happened.  Eight?  I am starting to feel like I deeply and personally understand the sentiment of all adults I encountered when I was young who were in disbelief that me and the kids around me were getting older as fast as we were.  "Seemed like just yesterday when you were only up to my knee!"  This guy is already up to my shoulder.

But eight is great.  Eight is solving Rubik's cubes, masterfully putting together nearly any Lego set encountered, easily picking up on new games, becoming more skilled at sports and loving jokes of all kinds.  Eight is having a best friend who you write stories with.  Eight is beginning to be aware of being embarrassed by your parents.  Eight is coming down to the kitchen when you can't sleep for a midnight snack and talking to your mom about all sorts of topics from outer space to world wars to weather.  We are loving eight around here.

The One with the Punching and Biting on the It's a Small World Ride

This is just the latest installment in the chronicles of Mr. Logical and Mr. Dramatic.  Prior installments are available in earlier posts here, here and here.

Before we went to Disney World, I tried to get the kids ready by explaining how awesome it would be, how many things there were to see and how great the rides were.  I thought long and hard about which YouTube video to show the kids of the rides because I didn't want to scare the four year-old or the one who is afraid of heights and gets motion sickness.  Roller coaster rides were out.  So I decided to show them the video of the It's a Small World ride.  That is the ride that stuck in my head the most from my Disney experience when I was ten (it even beat out Space Mountain), and I thought the kids might all like it.

Like it would be an understatement.  They watched the YouTube video three times and then kept telling people we were going to Disney World to ride It's a Small World.  When I told our Disney planner that we wanted to use a FastPass on It's a Small World, she tried to convince me that the wait is not that long and we really didn't need to, but I told her to reserve it anyway.

When we got to the Magic Kingdom, the first thing we did was go straight to It's a Small World.  The kids were asking a million questions and so excited to see it in person.  The wait was short and they were beside themselves with excitement as we loaded into the boats.  It was constant chatter throughout the various "rooms" of the ride as they tried to figure out which continent the rooms represented and which countries were represented in each continent.  It was an awesome moment and I wished that I could stop time to enjoy it.  They loved it so much that we ate lunch at the Pinocchio restaurant that has windows looking into the ride and they spent the entire lunch time watching people load into the boats with their noses pressed to the glass. It was all rainbows & butterflies.

Until we decided to ride it a second time.  It was just me and the three kids because I figured what can go wrong on It's a Small World, right?  And all hell broke loose. It started when the boys argued about which dolls were from which country.  The first time through, they were just taking everything in, and while they had a few ideas on which countries the dolls were from, they were mostly watching.  The second time through, they became militant anthropologists hell-bent on classification.  I tried to tell them that no one knows for sure which countries the dolls were from and they could agree to disagree.  AJ, Mr. Logical, became increasingly agitated because there must be one definitive, correct answer.  (As a side note, law school would be an utter torture to him.)  Davey, Mr. Dramatic, decided that as long as he shouted louder than AJ, his answer as to which country was represented would be correct.  "AJ, THAT KITE IS FROM JAPAN! I KNOW IT IS!" Mr. Logical's response, "No, David, you idiot.  It is from China, not from Japan.  I know because I saw a Chinese dragon parade once and there is a dragon right below the kite." Me: "Boys, it doesn't matter.  Just calm down and enjoy the ride."  At this point, I am wishing I can fast-forward to the end of the ride and get the heck out of there.  The bickering continues through the Pacific Isles and Australia.  It is a small world of bicker.

Enter the final room, the white room.  The entire room is white and the children are dressed for winter. Julia suggested this was Antarctica because she had studied Antarctica in school this year and knew it was cold and snowy.  AJ, Mr. Logical, got all wound up.  "No, Julia, STUPID! There are no inhabitants in Antarctica!" Julia got upset and said "Mom, AJ called me stupid!" I chastised AJ for name calling and to change the subject, suggested to the kids that perhaps the room was supposed to represent kids at the North Pole with Santa.  David, Mr. Dramatic, said "WHAT. ARE. YOU. TALKING. ABOUT?!?  I DON'T SEE SANTA ANYWHERE!!" AJ, Mr. Logical, nearly lost his mind and said "Of course it is not the North Pole! That is a mythical place that does not exist!  This must be North America because we have not seen North America yet in the other rooms!"  David, Mr. Dramatic, freaked out and started shouting at AJ "THE NORTH POLE DOES EXIST!!! I SAW IT IN A BOOK!" AJ could take it no more and lost his cool, biting David hard on the arm.  And the music of the ride played on.  "It's a world of laughter, a world of tears. It's a world of hope and a world of fears."  Let's just say there were tears, lots of tears, at this point.  Mostly David's but some of mine as well.  And fears?  I was wondering how I was going to pin two boys down on the seat while keeping Julia from getting cold-cocked in the fray.  And why the boats on that ride move so insufferably slow.  David was sobbing from the pain of the bite and AJ was still raging.  David took a retaliatory punch at AJ.  The people on the boat in front of us just thought we were completely nuts.  I think they were half horrified, half amused at the ridiculousness of the situation.  Finally I was able to get semi-calm by telling the kids we would ask the attendant when we got off the boat what the last room was supposed to represent.

They ran to the guy as soon as they got off the boat and demanded to know which continent and country/ies were in the last room.  "Well," the guy said "it is not really anywhere specific, just sort of a Fantasyland."  I turned to the kids. "See guys?  It is up to your imagination."  AJ couldn't help himself. "Fantasyland is NOT a real place" he muttered under his breath as we wandered out of the ride, bruised and ready to escape.

The One Where Tinkerbell Flew

On day 3 of our visits to the Disney parks, Julia was so tired from all the walking that I broke down and bought her a stroller.  I should have known better when my sister, whose kids hike through the Colorado woods on a regular basis and attend an outdoor adventure preschool where they walk more than 90% of American adults, told me she was really glad she had a stroller at Disneyland for her girls. If we lived in an urban area with lots of walking, I might not have parted with the stroller so soon, but living in a car-based suburbia meant that our neighborhood walks are just for fun to nowhere, and a kid's scooter or bike with training wheels does the job fine.  Julia has not ridden in a stroller in more than a year when I sold or gave away our remaining strollers.  It felt like the end of an era.  We were done with the diaper bag and the strollers.  Vacations were starting to look like we had entered the fun, big-kid era of swimming and history tours and things like mini-golf.  And with the craziness of getting work wrapped up and packing for vacation (or maybe I just was not ready to go back to the toddler/baby era), I did not get around to buying or borrowing another stroller.  So fast forward after a day at Legoland and two days at Disney without a stroller.  Julia was sitting down in the street at the Magic Kingdom and refusing to walk another single step.  And I don't really blame her. That place is huge. So after a trip to the local big box store and $19, we were the owners of a stroller once again.

Even with the stroller, Julia was generally more crabby than her normal self from all of the over-stimulation and the 95 degree heat.  After a couple of great days, she had reached her max.  At one point when she lost her temper with me, I told her she needed to use her words to tell me what was wrong and she said something to the effect of "but mommy, I feel happy and sad and really, really mad and tired all at once and I don't know what to do!"  I give her credit for being able to verbalize pretty well what it feels like to be four years old at big theme parks for multiple days in a row.

But then the sun went down and Julia discovered that the Tinkerbell clip that came on her drink at dinner was a light-up Tinkerbell.  She was giddy with excitement and as re-energized as a 38 year-old woman with a double latte.  After ferociously guarding her stroller all day from big brothers and refusing anyone else a turn, she actually asked me to stop the stroller so she could get out and dance as she walked.  Then she discovered that a glowing Tinkerbell looks like she is flying, really flying at night with a trail of light zipping behind her.

My sister asked if I drank the Disney Kool-Aid while I was there.  For the most part, no, but in that moment, it was a little bit magical to see the world through a four-year old's eyes again.  And then in her euphoria as she danced and skipped along with Tinkerbell, Julia somehow tripped and Tinkerbell sailed out of her hands, through the rails of a fence.  Julia's face went from happiness to confusion to horror when she peeked through the fence rails into the bushes 15 feet below to see in the dusk, Tinkerbell, still glowing through the dark below the pine bushes but out of reach.  "Get her mommy!" Julia begged.  My boys urged me to climb the fence.  But it was next to a river in the middle of Epcot and the fence was high to keep people out, running all the way down the riverbank.  Julia was wailing now, begging me to get her Tinkerbell back.  "My heart is broken into tiny little pieces now without my magic Tinkerbell!" she kept repeating.

I had read in a guidebook that the Disney staff goes above and beyond to make guests happy, especially the little ones.  I told Julia that if she stopped crying, she could ask the Disney employee directing people on the bridge toward the light show if she could help Julia get her Tinkerbell back.  Julia gulped away her tears and said to the lady "My Tinkerbell flew into the bushes and I can't get her back and can you please-please-please help me?"  The lady said there was nothing she could do but said I might be able to buy another Tinkerbell in a nearby gift shop.  Julia first said "but I want MY Tinkerbell!" After it became clear to Julia that her Tinkerbell was stuck, she changed her mind about only wanting her Tinkerbell and asked me to buy her a replacement in the gift shop.  I thought about it but told her that I wanted her to learn to be more careful with her things.  This made her wail all the more and tell me that it was an accident (which it was) and she hadn't meant to lose Tinkerbell.  Even so, it somehow felt wrong to me to just buy her another one.

By this time the light show had started and I hoped Julia would be distracted.  But she continued to wail and cry as the light show began, heart broken for her lost Tink.  Then a boy and his dad walked by with about 20 glow sticks they had purchased outside the park and brought in with them.  The boy came up to Julia and asked her if she would like to have one to make her feel better.  Julia hesitated for a second, told him about her lost Tinkerbell and then took one of the glow sticks he offered.  I thought it was a good way for her to see how the kindness of the little boy had helped her feel better and how sometimes the universe has a way of making things better.  After the boy walked away, she started to cry again and said "but this is a blue glow stick and I wanted a green one like Tinkerbell's dress."  "Sorry kiddo," I told her.  But you get what you get and you don't throw a fit.  Besides this one is blue like Elsa (the queen from the Disney Frozen movie) and I think this looks like Elsa's magic wand, don't you?" Julia studied it for a minute and said "I know this isn't Elsa's real wand but we can just pretend that it is to make me feel better."  And after that, she was all smiles again, dancing around and laughing at the magic of her light stick.

Reds

Davey played on the Reds this year.  He had great coaches and a great team. His main struggle is to figure out how not to coach every other player.  Ever the helpful one, Davey has lots of suggestions for his teammates that he shares with them loudly and without request.  "Keep your bat level or you will never hit the ball!" or "You gotta throw it harder!"  His coaches remind him frequently to leave the coaching to them. He even shakes his head in frustration and puts his head in his hands like many people who play coaches on tv and in the movies. If Davey ever becomes a professional coach one day (which I totally could see), let's go ahead and call it now that this was his passion and persona from a very young age.

Notice anything unusual in this picture?  We lost David's Cincinnati Reds baseball hat around halfway through the season. I substituted this Cubs hat because it was red and had a big C and I figured close enough, right?  It did make it easier to spot my kid on the field.  I sorta got away with the substitution until we played...the Cubs.

But helping all of the kids keep their things organized is one of my biggest challenges as a parent.  I used to think I was organized.  Until I had kids.  And then I realized that I am sort of organized, but I have just enough organizational skills for one person.  Add three more to my responsibility and the true me emerges as unorganized.  If you asked my friends and colleagues, I think most people would say I am decently organized, but there is a difference between thorough and responsive versus a true type-A organized individual.  I am the former, not the latter.  Add two baseball teams, two soccer teams, one lacrosse team, religious education classes and gymnastics plus accompanying gear and we are frequently missing a thing or two.

And that Reds hat never did show up again all season.  Who knows where it got to.