Star Wars Cookery

When I saw that Max and Otto were making recipes from the Star Wars Cookbooks, I knew Aleks would love to try it out too. Once the books came in from the library, they mostly sat around for awhile. Aleks pulled the first book out today, though, and made me read all the recipes to determine what we had enough ingredients to make. Most of the recipes are junk, and lots contain things we don't really eat, but the pictures are hilarious.

We ended up making Hoth Chocolate. To our disappointment, we could not find any of our three Yoda action figures. I don't know where they possibly could have gone. They may be at Grandma Cat's house and we can check for that when we head there for Bastian's 3rd birthday.
I take what I said about not finding Yoda back. We found one, but he didn't have a head.

Bastian's Photography

A view of the world by Sebastian Diego.

Me:
My brother looking mean for the camera:
Our homemade calendar.
Intersections.
This series is mama's favorite, depicting my view from the throne:


My lap.
Aleks, taken upside down from the couch.
Mama on the computer.
Mama on the phone (mama must not talk to us kids much).

Messy Party

Supplies: bowls, funnels, spoons, straws, colanders, oats, water, dish soap, food coloring, corn starch, flour, corn meal and two feral children. Directions: Mix and serve.







Bastian's Flower.
Aleks' flour.
Splashin' in the goop.
Muddy flour footprints left on the step.
More water.

Finito!

Heavy Metal Science Club's Ornithological Photo Scavenger Hunt of Death

This week a challenge was issued at Heavy Metal Science Club to go bird watching and bring back photos of as many different native species as one could find in natural habitats (no caged birds or zoos). The challenge is called Heavy Metal Science Club's Ornithological Photo Scavenger Hunt of Death, of course. The "of Death" part is necessary for the heavy metal portion of Heavy Metal Science Club. So I decided to take the kids over to Shaker Lakes to see if we could spot any birds.

First we went inside the nature center to see if the bird feeders had anything lingering about. The kids explored this log while I peered out the windows.
The windows made it difficult to see any birds as late in the evening there didn't seem to be too many about. So we went outside and found some Mourning Doves feeding. I always thought they were Morning Doves. Don't know why.
There was also a Red-bellied Woodpecker.
Then off to the stream where Aleks grabbed a stick and immediately started trying to fish, as is his usual m.o. This time, I managed to explain that you need more than just a stick. He wanted to try a root, which also didn't work at catching or even enticing any fish.
Someone had laid a plank across the stream, which Bastian cautiously tried to cross. It was a little rocky.
He opted to drop to all fours to avoid shaking too much.

Then both boys ventured down the stream to try to catch fish. They didn't catch any.
We saw a Mallard Duck couple. Did you know that the mallard is the ancestor of nearly all domestic breeds? Bet you didn't.
Bastian and I spot these weird red things growing off these leaves. I think they must be eggs of some sort, but I couldn't find them online.
If anyone has any idea, or knows better search terms to use (I tried several), please let me know!
I found a Cardinal.
And what I think is a Gray Catbird. Evidently they make a "mew"ing sound.
There's a Robin perched in a tree.
We made our way to where the lean-tos are and discovered a new one since our last visit.
Aleks tried adding to the construction a bit. Bastian spent some time taking it apart.
On the way back towards the parking lot, I spotted a Grackle...
While the boys played a game of hide and seek behind several large trees.
Around and around they went, while I waited for more bird species that never came.
We made it to the marsh area and saw a deer in the reeds.
Bastian ran way off down the boardwalk. While I corralled him, Aleks found a caterpillar. Bastian ran in the opposite direction, down to where the boardwalk ends deep in the reeds while Aleks and I admired the caterpillar crawling on his arm.
I looked down towards Bastian to realize that he'd escaped into the reeds, trying to chase after the deer! Luckily, he came back without too much prodding and the doe didn't totally freak out.
I enticed him with Aleks' caterpillar, which he enjoyed.I spotted a Song Sparrow perched in the reeds too.
We headed back to the car, Aleks complaining all the while about keeping his caterpillar, which he named Billy. Eventually I agreed to taking Billy home with us, hoping that we could keep him alive at all.

We stopped at the other end of the park to get out to look for more birds when we saw a bunch of people crowded around the edge of the lake. They were just watching goslings, it turned out.
But then, off in the distance, I spotted the crowning achievement for Heavy Metal Science Club's Ornithological Photo Scavenger Hunt of Death - a Great Blue Heron! They're actually pretty prevalent in this area, but they're also sort of loners that are only seen at certain times of day, so you have to know where to look for 'em. Luckily, I knew where.

After we got home, Billy accidentally got squished somehow. Aleks cried and cried. He was so upset. I put Billy out of his misery and we buried him in the garden, wrapped in a leaf. We agreed to buy a caterpillar growing kit that will turn into butterflies. Aleks wanted to go out and get a new caterpillar right away, but I assured him they were not so easy to find. He was quite upset to lose a friend. He's wanted a pet for awhile now, though he doesn't always talk about it. We can't have one right now though. We'll have to visit the boys' chickens in Dayton. We're going there for Bastian's birthday, so they'll get to see them soon.

Magical Childhood

Our upstairs neighbor was receiving a truckload of furniture during the morning and had her dad, niece, and nephew visiting at the same time, so we offered to have the niece and nephew come play with us for a bit. I sat around in my pajamas most of the day, as is my usual, but then was able to help entertain the guests later on. I helped her niece make a necklace of paper beads that she painted and glittered and she spent a lot of time painting pictures as well. Meanwhile, the boys played nerf guns, lego, and video games.

Since it was nice out, I grabbed the beautiful handmade bubble wands the boys got for Easter and poured some bubbles in a pan and let them all have at it.
It was so waldorfy. I felt so proud that I could, if but for a moment, give my kids the enriched, magical childhood they so deserve.

Making Cards

Bastian paints with watercolors to make cards of congratulations for some friends. He insisted on mashing his brush against his paper.
I tried to show him how to paint gently by modeling it.
He would have none of it. He simply repeated what I said about painting soft and continued to mash the brush against the page with his fist. There were lines scratched in both paintings where the plastic of the brush rubbed hard.

My Children are Feral

Papa did make it back from Mexico on Mother's Day. The day was totally lost, but he did make it back with presents, even. He gave Aleks every kind of Mexican coin, which Aleks added to his money jar. For days afterwards, he would take everything out and try to count it, confused about how much pesos were worth in dollars, thinking they could be used interchangeably to purchase things. Papa also brought the boys Zapatista dolls (interesting article about some Zapatista dolls here) . They look like this, guns and all. When Bastian and I were playing with them, he wanted me to do the whole voice thing like Grandma did with the piggy, so I had it talk to him like he was a giant and I used the gun as a tickle stick, so now they're tickle sticks, which I doubt will stick. Bastian pew-pewed with them immediately anyway. On Friday, amidst lots of errand running for several of the things that I am involved in going on over the weekend (Co-op Member Appreciation Day, Hessler Street Fair, Birth art show...), I decided the kids needed to get out of the house. After Papa got back, it continued to be cold and I was again busy as hell, so the kids were inside a lot, being transferred from me during the day to Papa at night.

I took us to the Botanical Gardens (which Aleks insisted on calling Kinder Gardens) and decided to buy a membership since the Children's garden is so nice during the summer months. It pays itself off in less than 4 visits, so I figure it's worth it since admission is usually 7 bucks for adults. I have some grandiose ideas about supplementing our City Fresh CSA participation with children's garden visits and talking about growing things and local foods and life-cycle whatnot. We'll see how that pans out...

The botanical gardens were of course lovely as always, and the sun was out and it was kind of warm with jackets on. Unfortunately, my boys are feral. Earlier in our errand running, they ran around the theater where the art show was to be held and pressed buttons on the light board and generally cause trouble while I tried to have a very brief conversation with the organizer about the pieces I was dropping off. I naively thought that being outdoors would be okay, but instead they both ran off in the lobby and pressed the alarm on the elevator while i tried to buy our membership. I had to hold Bastian between my legs while I signed the credit card slip and I found Aleks perusing the gift shop. People in line behind me were laughing, but I felt nearly out of control myself.

We made our way to the Rainforest greenhouse, where it was just time for the daily butterfly release. I didn't see anyone actually releasing butterflies, so I'm not sure how that goes or if we just missed it, but there were more than I'd ever seen in previous visits.
It was so hot inside and so humid, the lens got all fogged up as soon as we ascended the stairs to the upper canopy.
Due to general running amok and not-listening, I guided the boys outdoors to the Children's Garden. Aleks made a beeline for the pond to check out the coy who all swam away at the sight of his gargantuan humanness.
The place in general is really quite nice. Parts of it resemble a hobbit village or something. It's quite fairy-tale-esque and quaint, as though we'd stepped right into Mr. McGregor's garden.
We always visit the tree house first, which overlooks the wetland/coy pond. Bastian ran upstairs, then back down again.Then he rode a giant frog only abandoning it to nearly fall in the stream which flows under the tree house into the pond.
Here's where more feralness comes in. I believe that kids are "permitted" to climb part of the wall of giant stones under the tree house where the railing from the path above ends and the rocks jut out enough to make something resembling steps. I am almost certain, however, that the staff would flip out if they saw children climbing this section of the wall, which, though still not inherently dangerous, per se, is what I perceive would be immediately labeled a liability. In fact, I said as much to Aleks, but I don't think he knows the word "liability" yet and I've no idea how to explain it to him (nor has he the patience to listen anyway).
I rounded both boys up to head off for the rest of the garden to get them away from the wall and the possibility of soaking themselves through in the pond. They sought out watering cans and sand toys in the tool shed.
Then I helped them pump water into the cans to water the plants.
Aleks also tried to fill his watering can in the fountain near the entrance to the Children's Garden. He managed to not get wet, even, making him, for a moment, slightly less maniacal in my eyes. They water radishes, which look suspiciously large for this time of year and the freaking cold weather we've been having...
I noticed this string lattice applied to the side of the tool shed. It seems like such a good idea for growing beans or morning glories.
There's a whole junk garden near the compost bins where trash goes to excellent new uses...

Bastian stripped off his socks and shoes...
To dig in the sand. I thought it was far too chilly for that, myself.
The children's herb garden is particularly attractive to me. There's this little stone bench in the back and a path of stones which winds through several varieties of mint, lavender, basil, rosemary, and all the kitchen herbs one could want... Scattered throughout the garden, there are actually lots of little seats like this, which is precious to encounter, if not exactly something I imagine gets much use, what with feral children like mind who run from attraction to attraction, digging things up and stomping on the pansies.
I rounded the boys back out of the children's garden because they wouldn't stay together and they clearly needed to run. I suppose I must have overestimated the need to run because in the theme gardens, Bastian wanted to play in this fountain and Aleks kept pretending to sleep on the paths.
Bastian joined him for a pretend snooze on a bench in the deciduous forest.

After the children's garden, we headed to the Food Co-op so I could do some work for the upcoming Member Appreciation Day and also to pick up groceries. I asked the boys to help stay together, but having them in the office by myself while running off a million copies proved to be more than they could handle. There was constant running around in circles, playing rough, running away, knocking stuff over, pushing buttons on the fax and copier, and other assorted shenanigans. I made suggestions that occupied them temporarily, but in truth my needs/responsibilities and the children's seem to collide in poor self-control and too much coercion. And yet, I can't seem to just stop what I need and go back to devoting all my time and effort to enriching their lives. Balance is what I am so lacking now...

Papa in Mexico, Day Eleven

I took the last of Papa Logan days to sleep in later than I had previously. The boys woke me less often as well, which was nice. I have no idea of the actual time when I did finally rise. I immediately made my coffee and set to work finishing up Day Ten blogging and dealing with assorted computer-and-internet-y things.

Bastian came up to me with a giant dragon claw on one hand, deeply impressed by his own clever disguise. I cried out when he roared at me, as any good mother should (this despite being unsure that "good mother" is even a title I deserve these days). I made him stand back so I could get the whole of the costume: dragon claw, garden glove, and purse (made of an old Crown Royal bag - and I don't drink Crown Royal, by the way). I remember using Crown Royal bags for purses and collections when I was a wee one as well. I also remember my mom carrying a crochet hook and some yarn around in one, which is funny because she never really did get the hang of crochet. I guess she tried it out enough, however. Inside Bastian's bag were the bits of balsa wood from a Tyrannosaurus rex model that the staff of the Discovery Center gave to me in exchange for filling out the dinosaur guide survey thing. One piece broke within the hour and the other dinosaur was done for by the end of the day. Both went in the trash. I wasn't sure of their chemical content, so I opted for trash over compost.
A few minutes later, the costume abandoned, I heard my dad freaking out about something Bastian was doing. I came into the kitchen to discover it was Bastian climbing into the play kitchen head-first that had him in such an uproar. I myself found it amusing and ran after the camera.
After a bit, though, I acquiesced to my father's paranoia and recommended that Bastian crawl in from the bottom rather than the top. My dad thinks he's going to break his neck or get stuck or something. I'm sure he could, but having crazy wild sons, I can't spend all my time worrying about such things. I'm much more concerned with whether they eat bugs off the floor or brush their teeth often enough.
My dad departed in the late afternoon, after I finally heard from Jon about where he was at. Jon had last emailed me on Wednesday, informing me that they were leaving Oaxaca at 1 a.m. that night to return to Mexico City at 7 a.m. where they would have free internet once again. Then two days went by with not a word. I finally got the following message at 1:16 p.m.:

sorry. plans changed. the short version is, we were kidnapped by the girls in Oaxaca and forced to go to the beach. I just got into Mex. City and will make my flight. See you tonight!

-Jon

I had actually begun to be a bit concerned about them because I got an email from the girlfriend of Jon's traveling partner, Kevin, asking whether or not I'd heard anything. I just hoped they weren't stranded in the mountains or anything. Later on, I got a second email from her that she still hadn't heard from them, so it was left to me to inform her that they ran off with some girls to the beach. Not exactly the thing you want to hear secondhand. I'm wondering if Kevin will kill me or maybe just refuse to further aid me in developing my website. Hopefully the news was not ill-received and I have nothing to worry about.

Shortly after my father left, Ana came with Jonas and Lavinia to visit and help me get my house back in order. I dusted, cleaned the bathroom, made the beds, did all the laundry, and put all the assorted things that were out-of-place back where they belong. Then we decided to take the kids to the park. Aleks and Jonas both insisted on the Dreaded Big Park. We had to take the wagon, in that case. It was really, really heavy with four kids aged 3-6.
Bastian is the only one who let me get close enough to photograph him as the others were all running in opposite directions, ignoring instructions to not climb the three-story slide when eight other children were trying to slide down, and generally running amok. Every time I type that word, it reminds me of this monologue where the character says, "amok! amok! amok!" but I cannot for the life of me recall where it's from. ...So I love Google because I now discovered it's from that seminal classic, Hocus Pocus. But of course.Ana at first questioned whether Bastian would be able to hold onto this plastic pipe to slide across like James Bond. I assured her that he was plenty able, as he'd done it half a dozen times the other day when we were at the Dreaded Big Park with Grandma Cat. He is most excellently strong. Or at least able to support his own body weight with a thick knot of rubber under his butt.
Aleks and Jonas found some sticks and began dangerously-pointy-sword fighting.
I thought they'd outgrown this, but it seems they just choose far more dangerous sticks now that they are school(ha!)-aged.
As we were getting ready to depart, we spied lots and lots of kids rolling down the side of the hill, so our four had to of course join in. Neither Aleks nor Bastian could keep their legs straight. Aleks kept rolling sideways across the hill rather than down. Lavinia did quite well, however. Jonas decided, in the end, that he preferred running to rolling.


After the Dreaded Big Park, we stole a ton of lilacs from the Bank, each of the kids insisting on their own twig, and myself after a full bouquet to scent my home before the flowers all turn and drop off. I love lilacs. Ana and I agreed that aside from Hyacinths, there is no finer scent in a flower. It's a shame their blooming period lasts only about a week-and-a-half. The only redeeming aspect of such short a bloom is that it always coincides with Mother's Day. I have given bunches of lilacs to both of my mothers on so many Mother's Days, it is impossible to count.

We pulled the wagon onward, stopping to get some food from Tommy's for the kids and Hunan Coventry for the mamas. At home, we ate, then hurried to finish cleaning up before we were to rush off to the airport. We got back later than I expected and my insane urge to make Jon acknowledge that I am phenomenal having such a pristinely clean and beautiful home after eleven days virtually alone with the children, set me back a few minutes.

Just when we were getting the boys' jammies on to get in the car, I went to check the flight status. I discovered to much relief that his flight was 19 minutes late, thus I would be perfectly on time for his arrival. Then I decided to open Outlook to quickly check my email. And there it was. Two emails from Jon.

happy mother's day!

so...yeah. i got on the plane, they closed the door, then the ground crew found a leak on my plane so I am back in the hostel. My flight leaves at 930am, I will email you again when I check my arrival time in cleveland.

Really wanted to give you your mother's day presents. so sorry. I will email you again tonight.

love,

-jon

The second email informed me that it would be another half-day alone with the children. His flight scheduled to arrive at 5 p.m. on Sunday. There would be no Mother's Day Peace Picnic for us, no breakfast in bed for me, and the dwindling likelihood of even a dinner of salmon like I get every year for Mother's Day. Instead, Ana and I nursed the youngest children to sleep simultaneously - me in front of that email at the desk and she on the brand-new-gorgeous-red-couch-which-Aleks-is-already-destroying, the scent of lilacs wafting through the air.
After awhile, in which Jonas and Aleks watched the Lego Indiana Jones mini-movies that Rachel sent me and Bastian and Lavinia slept, Ana decided to leave me alone alone, in my pristinely clean house, empty, save for two sleeping children. I stayed up too late drinking beer and watching Everything is Illuminated, and wrote in my journal before finally succumbing to shared sleep with Bastian in my bed, hiding my breasts from him, lest he mangle them any more than he already has.

Papa in Mexico, Day Ten

One nice thing about having Papa Logan here is I get to sleep in a little bit. Of course, Bastian has been nursing a lot in the morning, which is not exactly restful at all for this night owl, but I haven't had to get up and feed him every day. Papa Logan has to deal with whatever ridiculousness the boys dish out about how precisely to deliver food to them. From what I've overheard in dreams, however, it doesn't seem like he's been giving Papa Logan too hard a time. About that anyway.

Once I arose, I again made my giant cup of coffee and sat down to peruse the internets. Papa Logan and Bastian sat on the couch reading The Nose Book, which was Aleks' favorite when he was just a baby. Back when I sat around reading all day. Poor Bastian has not known the joys of being read to hardly at all. He takes it when he can get it. He still likes books though, so it's not like his love of reading was prematurely squashed. There are books all over this house. He'll love books just fine, I'm sure.
While I ate my early-afternoon breakfast, Bastian sat and played with blocks and the marble run, lining them all up in specified orders, according to shape and color, like the good little son of an Obsessive Compulsive should.
Even the marbles were grouped, despite their tendency to roll. The vacuum cord helped keep everything orderly.
The alphabet blocks have four colors: red, blue, green, and yellow. Bastian insists on only ever displaying the green and yellow sides. Always. It must be so. I've switched them before to see what would happen, and he goes and switches them right back. I'm writing it off as idiosyncratic preference rather than weird neurological anomaly. When he's still doing this at 10 with everything rather than just the alphabet blocks, then maybe I'll get concerned. Maybe.
Once everything was all set up, he started pew-pewing with the blocks.


Aleks was busy making lots of Lego ships. I thought for sure this was Janga Fett's Slave I, but he said it was a droid ship. Hence the droid, I suppose. It looks remarkably like Slave I though.
Bastian played with the Millennium Falcon and Star Destroyer that Aleks made. He made pew! pew! noises, as is to be expected.
We decided to take a walk to Turtle Park to spend some time outside, and let the children wear themselves out (as though that ever works). The boys both conned Papa Logan into pushing them. Aleks is slowly learning to pump his legs, but still prefers the baby swings for some unknown reason. Okay, I asked. It's because he doesn't know how to swing on his own yet, so it's easier to be pushed in the baby swings than on the big kid swings.
Aleks kept requesting super pushes, which Papa Logan didn't really get at first. I joined in after a bit. I've got the coordinated effort down by having them not swinging at precisely the same time so you go back and forth between the two with each arm. I prefer sitting and reading or knitting while they play, to be honest.
Aleks wanted to dig his giant whole to the Earth's core again.
I sat down with him so I could ignore the med student families yapping away. I did a big portion of the digging.
I'm not sure if this was the biggest hole to date or not. I don't think so. I'm pretty sure that we've had them wider so a small child could fit quite comfortably inside instead of having their feet all squished up.
It could have been much wider, but Aleks climbed in and took a bunch of sand with him, so I gave up.
My dad thought it would be great if Bastian came to sit down in this boat instead of playing near Aleks and I and sending sand down into our pit of despair, but I warned him that he likes to be pushed around in this thing whenever he sits down. To my surprise, Bastian did not require pushing about.
He found a plastic saw on the playground and ran around sawing sand all over the place. The place is kind of weird. People "donate" toys to the place all the time. I think that's great and have picked up many a dollar store shovel-and-bucket set for our own contribution, however, the thing that bothers me is when the toys are not actually designated for sand use and have no real practical purpose at the playground. Yet the kids play with them. I'm the only person I know that has ever gone around and thrown the old, yucky, broken toys away. If I say it too loudly, though, I'm afraid that one of the Stroller Brigade will hunt me down. Seriously, though, a rubbermaid tub? On the playground? At least there's no lid, but c'mon...
Aleks had designs early in the day on going to Tommy's for some meal or another. I agreed, but told him he had to calm the hell down and cooperate with us because it has been so hard the last few days and his wildness was not improving my or my father's moods at all and our unhappy moods were certainly not improving Aleks' wildness.

I want to love my kids' wildness, their tendency to ignore authority, to do what they want, to be free and creative and whatnot, but... I find it very difficult. Particularly when stress is running high due to Papa being in Mexico and my dad being paranoid about the kids falling off some high surface or another or wrestling like maniacal chickens. So...I'm not thrilled with the manipulation and the total coercion of the situation, but shit, it is what it is. I'm not even approaching a good way of doing this right now, let alone having the energy and willpower to contemplate and practice my ideal.

But, we went to Tommy's. At about this time, which was around 4:30 or 5 o'clock, I was pretty much ready for the day to be over and for the kids to go to bed already. We almost walked out of Tommy's, in fact, because Bastian was screaming about nursing, which I couldn't handle just then. I am so far from that AP/NFL ideal right now, it's not even funny. We ended up staying, enjoying our food, and managing the walk back home okay.

Back at the house, the boys played outside with the neighbor kids while my dad kept an eye out. They made a big soup in a puddle in the neighbor's driveway, tossing leaves inside and stirring with sticks. When Bastian came inside, I told Papa Logan it was okay to leave Aleks outside alone so long as we checked on him now and then. He was fine, though he did eventually go inside the daycare lady's house, which I have explicitly explained many times is not okay when I'm left under the impression that he's outside. When I went out to look for him, I saw that the kids had taken bits of the compost pile and added it to the puddle. My neighbor, Chris, saw it later and I told him I'd planned to get it out, but hadn't and he said it was okay.

We tried to finish painting the dollhouse together, but things went awry pretty quickly. Bastian stuck his hands directly in the paint and started painting himself and others, specifically Papa Logan's bald head. Papa Logan was not pleased. Into the bath Bastian went. A few minutes later, Aleks stuck his hands directly in the paint and made quite the mess and became a danger to my house and furniture, so into the bath he went. My dad helped the boys, who were putting paint-flecked water into their mouths and throwing things about in the bathroom while I finished up the doll house. My dad is not particularly adept at handling the boys' craziness. We should have reversed the responsibilities.

After their bath, the boys ran around crazy. And I mean crazy. Aleks was mad at Papa Logan about the bath, so he started throwing cars at him, which I had to stop him and tell him was not okay. Finally, I got them to sit and watch the rest of The Waterhorse since they'd both fallen asleep the night previous, and then I had a big drink.

They finally went down around 10 or so. I watched movies alone and then Heather came and watched Wristcutters with me. I'd already seen it, but she had not. It's really funny.

Papa in Mexico, Day Nine

Overly tired from Heavy Metal Science Club (again), I tried my best to sleep in despite my father's routine early waking accompanying my own sons' bizarre urges to wake in the morning hours (unlike their former sleeping til 10 or later). The boys ran amok, watched cartoons, played video games, and built Lego. Upon waking, Papa Logan gave me a full report on what the boys did and did not eat. Bastian had some eggs and Aleks had nothing. I made my giant cup of coffee and checked on the internets where nothing phenomenal was happening. Somehow I managed to remain glued for quite some time, nonetheless.

Bastian ran around with a sticker he pulled off Aleks' jacket (some leftover from a doctor visit or speech therapy) on his fist, like a power glove, making shooting/fighting sound effects, feeling powerful.
Aleks has begun to destroy my new couch already by climbing on the back of it, stepping on the back cushions which are unfortunately sewn on to the back of the structure, meaning that they are now already pulling away. We had quite the upset discussion about this and about the need to not climb on the couch, but I honestly have no idea how to deal with it and it sickens my stomach to think about paying for a brand new couch and having it destroyed directly. I hate having rules like "don't climb on the couch" or "don't jump on the bed" as they feel so arbitrary and unavoidable, but what do I do? Neither can I allow my children destroy the couch nor prevent them from doing destructive things to it.

Then we saw some more ants on the floor, swarming a bit of popcorn. You probably can't see it real well in this picture, but there it is. As I type this, there are even more ants beside me, swarming some bit of food. I need to go buy corn syrup...though I'm also interested in acquiring a hedge apple, as my mother swears this works as well. But where the hell to find a hedge apple???
Bastian was really destructive all morning, pulling out tons of stuff from all over, including the coloring books/drawing pads out of the art cabinet. In there was a Jurassic Park book, which I can't for the life of me recall the origin of. It has a big 3D poster in it. After said poster sat on the floor for more than an hour, Aleks started examining it, then ran off to find the 3D glasses (appropriately stored in the costume basket). He reached out his hand a few inches above the paper and smiled, saying he was touching the dinosaurs hand.
Then Bastian had to get in on it and an argument ensued about taking turns. We eventually straightened it out and turns were settled on.
By mid-afternoon, we decided it might be a good idea to go do something. Papa Logan wanted to make his mother's Spanish rice with chicken recipe for dinner, so we needed to go to the store to get more supplies. He was also interested in checking out the Natural History Museum, which we happen to have passes to. So we headed out for the museum.

First thing upon arrival, Bastian ran to the stegosaurus and started climbing up the tail. He slipped a few times, but did pretty well despite the lack of grip on his frog boot bottoms.
He didn't want to go inside at all. Eventually I pulled him off and started walking that way, enticing him with animals. I discovered Papa Logan loitering outside the entrance and Aleks already inside, talking to a guard.
We examined the room outside the planetarium, looking at the star dome where you can change the night sky for each month of the year, to see where all the stars are. Unfortunately, they're all of nearly-equal brightness, so it's hard to make out the constellations.

Then we ran off for the Human Ecology hall, where all the big cats and other stuffed animals are. Bastian was drawn to the lions as always.
Aleks encountered a giant picture of the Eagle Nebula in the Earth & Planetary Exploration hall, recognizing it from the Earth & Space book the other day. Papa Logan asked about it and I told him that nebulae are clouds of dust and gas where stars are born. Again. I've got that definition down pat now.
We only stayed upstairs in the exhibit halls briefly because I could tell that the boys were in the mood to run off. We headed to the Discovery Center where we spent a good hour, exploring lots and lots of interesting stuff. Mostly it's the same stuff as upstairs, except you can touch it all.

Bastian played with this balancing game a bit, which is remarkably similar to two games we have - one being our boat balancing game and the other the Haba animal stacking game. I think he preferred the stacking to the balancing, but the movement interested him as well.
Aleks got to pretend to be a paleontologist and uncover a T. rex skull fossil.
The staff of the Discovery Center also had me fill out a survey about a dinosaur guide for care-givers that they're creating. The book wasn't done, but I did learn a few things, which may come in handy for answering questions. Particularly interesting was the information on the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, which I perhaps heard of before but never fully absorbed. The code sets forth that

Each species [is] to be designated by two latinized names, the first being that of the genus to which it belong[s], and the second the appellation peculiar to the species.

Additionally, the first part of the name is to be capitalized, the second part not capitalized and the whole thing always written in italics. I never considered that names of species must be italicized by international law. Thus, the T. Rex is really Tyrannosaurus rex.
In the corner bookshelf, I observed this title, You Can Be a Woman Botanist, which seemed odd. I mean, I consider myself a radical feminist, while also readily acknowledging biological differences between the sexes and physiological reasonings for differences between genders, but I didn't see the necessity of the woman part. It seems a throw-back to second wave feminism, when "Women's Lib" appeared in advertisements, on The Electric Company, and in children's books all over. I'm all about third wave, I guess, and readily recognize the complexities of the world, and see it unnecessary to call such attention to the gender of a person. Or maybe, I'm wrong and it's the whole second wave urge to build a genderless world that I'm gravitating to with my objection to this title. In fact, I don't entirely object. It just seems...off. I'm babbling now and not coming to a cohesive point. Onward...
Aleks brought me these two rocks and said that he thought they went together. I said, "yeah, they're both crystals, you wanna go look at the big crystals upstairs?" He lost interest immediately after "crystals." A bit later though, he pointed to a skull and asked if it was a beaver's. Indeed it was. It was the teeth that clued him in. He pointed to another skull later and asked if it was a gorilla's, but it used to belong to an orangutan. We later looked at some stuffed gorilla and orangutans upstairs to compare them. I had to remind him of the live gorillas he'd seen at the zoo, though.
There were several aquariums set up with different things to look at including tarantulas, a bunch of creepy looking stick bugs, Madagascar hissing cockroaches, a toad, butterflies, ladybugs, and Speedy the gecko, who Bastian stared at for a bit. Geckos, as it turns out, store food and water in their tails, which is why the tails are so fat.
The museum rehabilitates injured animals which hang in cages outside. There are three deer in a fenced-in area that are positively desensitized to humans. They didn't even flinch, no matter how much the kids ran or screeched. I don't think they'll be released back into the wild. They'd be immediately killed, their instincts are so ruined. At least they're alive, I guess.
There were these raccoons all huddled together on a ledge in their cage. They were pretty cute. There's actually a third one there, though you can't see it. Raccoons are of course much cuter from far away than up close, in my experience.
After the museum, we headed to the Food Co-op for the extras necessary for dinner and I remembered to take my own peanut butter tub finally for the bulk peanut butter. Bastian fell asleep in the car, but my dad insisted on coming in with me, so he slept in the cart, much like he did at Zagara's last week. There was also a whole thing that I have to deal with yet about the upcoming member appreciation day, which I am really not looking forward to.

In the evening, Aleks and I suffered loads of tension and argument and emotions ran high in the household. It was a nightmare. I swear my legs hurt from the stress. I'm not entirely sure if my dad is stressing me out more than if I were just alone or not. And I have no idea what's going on with Aleks - is it my dad's presence or Jon's absence or my stress or something else entirely? We watched The Waterhorse after dinner and the boys both fell asleep. I stayed up late to decompress on my own, calling a friend in L.A. to babble about how stressed and depressed I feel. Absolutely nothing was solved.

Papa in Mexico, Day Eight

Grandma Cat left before any of the rest of us were awake. A little while later, Bastian woke me up by bringing me the Hartzler bottle in bed again. We still don't have any cereal though, which I had to remind him. So he just left the thing in my bed. Good thing it wasn't opened yet, because those lids leak.
Bastian also piled puppets on me. They're both really into this piggy thing my mom started, so I'm assuming he was trying to wake me to participate. It did not work.
After getting out of bed, getting coffee made, and setting up to hunker down in front of the computer for awhile, Aleks called out to me to come see what Bastian had done in the kitchen. He got into the fridge and spilled yogurt all over the floor. Oh boy.
First he tried to wipe it up himself with the shark towel he was wearing after a bath necessitated by pooping in his pants. The shark towel does not absorb yogurt well. It mostly just shmeers it around on the floor, into the cracks, where the ants can come and lick it up and carry it back to their colony stuck on their antennae.
Then he started to lick it off the floor because he still wanted some.
He thought it was pretty hysterical.
What I found hysterical, is that he was eating plain yogurt. We have maple in the fridge, but the only difference besides the word printed on the label (and, uh, Bastian can't read) was that the oval in which the word is in is in blue on the maple instead of green like the plain. Maybe the floor added some yummy sweet flavor.
In an effort to curb Aleks' consumerism, and because I wasn't planning on moving much during the day, I finally had time to sit and watch The Story of Stuff with the boys. Aleks' favorite part of the whole thing was the golden arrow, which may be a bad thing. Actually, he was just disappointed that the rest of the animation wasn't in color. I'm not sure if the film will help in my efforts to buy less, or if it's just something the boys felt confused about and forced to endure. I'm not sure that they understood a fraction of what she was saying.

Regardless, there must have been something in there they absorbed. We'll just have to watch it again and again and talk about why we don't buy things. If I ever get the energy required to do such things as talk extensively while we're picking up bread and not ice cream or random heavily-packaged goods at the grocery. I cried several times throughout it though. The Golden Compass the night before had this whole thing about polar bears at the beginning that made me cry too. I'm a softy for global devastation, I gotta say. And totally on edge due to the stress of being alone.

I spent most of the morning and afternoon in front of the computer, not accomplishing much. My father came in the later afternoon to stay for a few days to keep me company. The boys refused to get dressed at all. My only concern is that they keep climbing up on the couch in front of the picture window, totally without clothing or inhibition. They gotta knock it off. There's no place to move the couch to.

The boys watched the entirety of The Golden Compass since they'd both fallen asleep during it last night. Aleks played video games and watched cartoons and played Lego all day long, as is usual. He sorted tons of red pieces of Lego from his Lego tray, and at one point I heard him directing some Lego guy or Lego ship that the red was lava that they must not touch. At first I thought he had grand plans for some giant red robot, but perhaps it was always just lava.
He built a bunch of ships too, using odd pieces from different sets to create wings. Perhaps these are more Dora Devastators. There's a Lego set he's been eying online for a long while now called the Mobile Devastator. Ever since he watched a bunch of Dora the Explorer that we got from the library the other day, he's been creating something he calls the Dora Devastator. It's hard to even imagine what such a machine would look like if Lego took it into consideration. Perhaps it would be one of those nice, cross-gender sets they're always after, mixed with a little cross-marketing to include Dora's stupid show and all her bilingual minions of the enchanted forest or wherever it is that she lives. Abuela could have some tricked-out version of the Claw Crusher in gingham or something and boots could ride around in a Storm Lasher with red boots on.

I considered getting them out of the house, but didn't manage it before it began to rain and get much cooler again. I am very bummed out about the weather right now. We made dinner, Aleks hardly ate anything at all. Eventually, we got them to bed and I was able to take off for Heavy Metal Science Club yet again, where we listened to Gwar and D.O.A. then had a Weezer singalong in the wee hours of the morning. I still missed my husband though.

Papa in Mexico, Day Seven

When Bastian saw Grandma Cat, the first thing he asked was where Grandpa Jim was. Well, okay, not in so many words. It was more like, "Dim???" so I knew. He also proceeded to call Grandma Cat "Jim" the whole time she was here, though I got him to be able to say something like Grandma Cat. Of course it didn't stick. That would too much resemble the children listening to anything I say at all.

Aleks got up way way too early. I tried to sleep in a bit while Grandma was forced to watch Alvin and the Chipmunks (which is horrible, by the way) then gave the boys a bath. She made a pig and lion puppet talk while they bathed, which meant that she had to carry them around all day long, constantly being forced to re-wake the puppets. They especially liked her doing the pig.

While I got myself together (and shipped that package, I talked about yesterday, woot), the boys and Grandma played outside with the nerf guns Papa bought (not my idea) and the water guns sans water.Bastian sat in the flowers. Mom wanted to take this oak tree home. I'll have to dig it up for her for Bastian's birthday.
Bastian swinging on the porch swing while Aleks and I look for the entrance to the home of the carpenter bees that were flying all over. We usually have one during the summer months, but there were consistently three flying around. We'll need to find their home and seal it up, lest we get stung.
Grandma Cat took us to Tommy's for lunch. We washed our hands in the bathroom while she went to the bank. Bastian was particularly fascinated by the hand dryer and the whole concept of wind velocity, heat, electronics...lots to learn there.
Then we sat and waited. Tommy's has crayons and coloring sheets. Aleks spent time coloring while I tried to keep them both in their seats and take pictures.
Bastian was distracted momentarily by an Eric Carle book. I love Eric Carle books. His art is so rich. Sometimes I want to make some like it. Maybe one day I will. When I have the time and inclination...
This is Bastian's pouting face he's taken to doing lately. He'll be fine, then one second decide that he's grumpy, so he makes this face. It's usually the "fake" grumpy, where he's not really too upset, but wants me to think he is so he can get what he wants. Oftentimes, he doesn't even really want anything. He just wants me to think he's dissatisfied so that I can change whatever minuscule thing he wants changed, even if he doesn't know what that is. In the background there is our waitress, Claire. Aleks wondered why I knew her name. I told him I knew her socially.
After lunch, we walked home, did some more pig and lion on the couch, then got ready to head to the post office. Aleks ran off to play with neighbor kids once too, which I was very displeased about. He had agreed to stay right in front of our house, but when I went out I had to go hunt him down. I just don't know what to do about it.

At the post office, Grandma Cat went in to mail her stuff while the boys and I sat in the car listening to Harry and the Potters. Aleks started squealing (right when I was in the middle of a sentence of Everything is Illuminated) about a bug flying in. He said it was a bee. I looked in the back seat, but didn't see anything. He was pointing to the window where I still didn't see any bees or bugs or anything. Then I saw down between the rubber strip by the window which was folded down weird and the window was this weird furry beetle-looking thing. We got it out with a Lego light saber. It was really strange looking. It looked like part beetle and part moth.
I took some video even to show how weird it was before it flew out and scared me.


While waiting for Grandma, Bastian finally checked out his Charlie and Lola sticker book we got several weeks ago. Then he threw it out the window and I had to retrieve it before we left. He kept saying, "book," which I couldn't understand, as I had not seen it go out the window. I started backing up the car and had to stop and open the door to grab the sticker book before it got run over.
Aleks sifted through Attison's Lego to pass the time. Attison's mom gives us toys every time we leave her house.
After the post office, we headed to the dreaded Big Park.
Aleks loves it there, if I hadn't mentioned it. Luckily, my mom was with me, so I didn't have to keep track of both children up the giant hill and behind all the million nooks and crannies by myself.
The slide there is about three stories high. Or maybe only two-and-a-half. It's a lot.
Grandma Cat played too.
Bastian's favorite feature is this tire dragon. Three kids who knew each other came over and kind of forced him out for awhile, so he sat on a bench watching for an opportunity to get back on.
He was particularly cute today, especially in this plaid shirt with little spiders on it that I thrifted for him.
Bastian finally abandoned the dragon to ride on this big tire bouncy swing thing that Grandma was pushing Aleks on.



After the park, we returned home to make a dinner of broccoli quiche and chocolate cake.
Ana called while we were cooking to ask if I could give her a ride to pick up her car. I told my mom that everything was in the cupboard before I left. When I got back, Grandma informed me that the cocoa in the cocoa tin was weird and that the icing thus tasted weird. I tried it and could not figure out what the flavor was. The icing was also a tan color. I looked in the tin and whatever was in there was red. I'm guessing that it was a blend of some sort of Indian spices, or maybe chili powder. At any rate, I had to go back out to get new cocoa and powdered sugar for more icing. We ate quite late. Ana and Barbara joined us.

Aleks was really impatient for the cake. Because it was so late, I think he was really hungry and had lost his ability to reason at all (as opposed to his usual ability to reason rarely). He refused to eat dinner first, though I offered him all sorts of things other than quiche (for the record, I wasn't trying to force him to eat dinner first, he just was very upset and difficult to talk to, which was our fault for not feeding him sooner). Then he had a butter knife (though it was serrated on one side) which he was going to cut the cake with, but ended up holding up threateningly to us. It was very, very hard. After I took him to calm down in another room, he agreed to eating hummus, carrot sticks, and pita chips in the place of quiche. Then, because the cake was whole wheat, he only ate the icing!

After our guests left, Aleks, Grandma and I tried to watch The Golden Compass (which is also horrible), but Aleks fell asleep right away. We all went to bed early (only early-ish for me though), as Grandma had to leave before the rest of us got up the next morning.

Papa in Mexico, Day Six

First thing's first. I woke up late enough to have missed the garbage truck, but early enough to see the recycling truck. Thus, I now have proof that you don't have to have your recycling in a blue bag: Day Six I didn't do anything at all. I gloried in the freshly arrived Radiohead tickets and posted on message boards to show how smart and lovely I am. I talked about shipping out a Domestic Greening order that was placed last week, but decided that I was too lazy to mess with UPS at the moment. I stayed in pajamas at the table, helping Ana decide between the Britax Frontiers and the Radian 80s for her kids' new car seats, the sounds of video games beeping in the background.

While I enjoyed an omelet for breakfast at 2 in the afternoon, Aleks rejected the "milkiness" of the peanut butter on the sandwich I made him, insisting that it was the fault of the bread. None of which makes any sense to me. His solution was to acquire a spoon and the jar of peanut butter and circumvent the whole bread situation altogether.


We are now nearly out of peanut butter. Bastian's breakfasts are in trouble...If only I could ever remember to take the plastic tub to the Co-op for bulk peanut butter like I intend.

Beside Aleks on the table, Papa's pepper plants are starting to look like actual plants. He will be so excited when he returns from Mexico. I'm still not sure why we're only growing peppers, however.
Bastian brought me a Darth Vader action figure to show off how he reattached the arm himself. He was quite proud. I didn't mention that it faced the wrong way and that he'd have to have his elbow relocated, something I'm pretty sure hurts like nothing else.
At around five in the evening, I decided that I'd really put off going outside to enjoy the weather long enough and that we must leave. Initially, I just thought we'd go to the park or on a walk to the library to return the videos, but then Ana and I talked about getting together so we headed across town to share pizza with her, Jonas, and Lavinia.

In the car, Aleks asked if it was Spring. I told him it was. He asked if Spring meant that there were pink flowers on trees. I talked about all the different colors of flowers on different plants and how so many come out in Spring, but especially on trees. Then he pointed out a white flowering tree, excited to see a different color.
Bastian just discovered the kaleidoscope, which he brought in the car with him to take to Ana's. He seems quite fascinated by the spinning shapes. I remember being roughly his age and using one and loving it. Aleks has shown no interest in it or the nicer wooden one I bought him last summer.
Ana and Lavinia were matchy-matchy. Lavinia was very tired. I offered to try to be her mommy and to nurse her, but she just screeched and clung to her real mama, whining to be carried around even while Ana tried to throw things away and pick up the house and order pizza.
After dinner, the kids all played in the backyard, jumping on this mattress left behind by a neighbor recently moved. It was kind of gross, but kind of fun too.
We tried to discourage them from touching the mattress with anything other than their shoed feet, advice that went completely unheeded like most things that exit our mouths.
We set up an "obstacle course" for them that involved jumping off the picnic table onto the mattress, going down the slide, then rocking on the see-saw.
The bouncing on the mattress was my favorite part, but then I'm a little big for the other toys. They were sufficiently worn out as Bastian fell asleep on the car ride home.



Just before leaving Ana's house, Aleks and Jonas were playing Lego inside and Aleks kept talking with a robot voice. At one point, we overheard them discussing a bad guy scorpion who was really just looking for its mother, who was also a bad guy.

My mother pulled up to our house a few minutes after we returned form Ana's. Bastian woke up when I put him in the bed, but went back down easily. Aleks took a little longer, but Grandma read to him while I took a break.

Papa in Mexico, Day Five

High
55° F

What is up with this crap??? I turned the heat back on again because it was too too cold for naked bodies. No time to post, need to ready myself for the mama blessing ("no time for infinity, gotta piece together a theory"), but will return this evening with tales of usual woe, I'm sure.

Getting ready is something that takes forever in my house. I'm so anal and uptight in general that I can't just walk out the door. I have to shower and get dressed and make sure the kids' teeth are brushed and the dishes are done. Call me crazy, that's fine. I am probably pretty ridiculous. It is what it is though. It takes me forever to get ready to go, however. The kids weren't even going anywhere - they were just getting babysat. My friend Jenny was supposed to come watch the kids for just a little bit before the babysitter Heidi could get here due to some rather complicated borrowing of cars and driving across town stuff. As is completely typical, we were all running late and this didn't happen. Jenny and I just left for the mother blessing together when Heidi got here and were on time rather than early as I planned to be.

I was trying to get the kids ready for the babysitter, at least. Ready enough that they were not naked and somewhat fed. That's kinda hard though when Bastian finds that damn Blendy-Pen again and starts attacking Aleks with it.


So my tattooed boys were going crazy and I kept telling Aleks, "put on your clothes!" I tried to entice him with the fact that people were coming, but he didn't care. I eventually managed both their clothes and all their teeth brushed and myself dressed and make-uped and ready, but as I said, I got to the dang party on-time, which was fine as Barbara was still doing dishes and one guest was helping arrange flowers. I brought snacks and programs and beads and cord for the wrist-wrapping ceremony and the lovely cake that Jo made, which has become sort of a tradition. I let the cherries drain pretty well this time though.
We did some Henna on the mama's belly too. I am not too great at this, but it turned out well.
Apparently while I was gone, the boys went to the big park, which is where Aleks always wants to go. I don't like going there because it's hard to see both boys at once because of the bigness. They had a good time though. Aleks also ran out the door a few times, which is disconcerting. I still haven't figured out what to do about it, though our rule about all staying together while Papa is gone seems to be working for now.

I gave the leftover cake from the party to Brad next door when I got home. Unfortunately, Aleks saw it when he ran out the door again and decided that he very much wanted some. Brad went back to his own house and I promised Aleks that after everyone left, we'd go get some. He didn't let up about the cake at all. He was ready for cake now. Everyone left and my dad called and Bastian didn't have any pants on, so I put some french fries and chick patties in the oven while I chatted with my Dad about how sad I was that nobody had come to see me at all and I was all alone and everybody had canceled on me. He might come up on Wednesday, after my mother leaves. The whole mama blessing thing was actually quite the reprieve, so in general I'm feeling better about being alone. I decided that bothering to do everything and cook is just too much, so I'll do what I can and get to that quiche soon enough (like maybe Tuesday while my mother is here).

After talking to my dad and getting Bastian in underwear and sweatpants, we headed next door to see Brad and Chris about the cake. The boys walked right into their apartment and started checking stuff out. Bastian made sounds like "Look at this!" as though he was so excited to see that they had a bathroom. They went out on their balcony to check out the view and were shown how Brad and Chris have the same couch that we do, only in green. Aleks was quite interested in the bike pieces and skis in the dining room. He'd never seen skis before and I asked him if he knew what skiing was, but he didn't answer. I'm still not sure if he's ever seen it. We managed to get our cake and get out of there pretty quickly, all things considered.

During dinner, Bastian ignored the food placed at his seat and prepared us wooden dishes instead.
He brought the basket of fruits and vegetables, the wooden pizza, and the box of wine corks over to the table for dinner. He still didn't touch his real food.
Then he climbed in and out of his elves & angels play kitchen again and again. He thought this was pretty hysterical. In and out. In and out. In...
...and back out again...
...and in again...
Aleks retreated to the living room for more Cartoon Network cartoons. Eventually, Bastian heard this and ran after him. I cleaned up the play kitchen mess while talking to my sister (who did not come visit this weekend) about her (ex)boyfriend and her potential job at the state department this summer and whether stainless steel was okay or not in a pan. Then I remembered that it was trash night, which Jon always takes care of. I got to work sorting the recycling while periodically Aleks came in and reminded me that he still wanted the cake we'd brought home. I put him off and put him off, sorting the recycling, taking out the trash, scrubbing the insides of both the recycling bin and the trash can, and scrubbing the nastiness off the floor beneath the recycling bin. Afterwards, things smelled much better and Aleks was quite pissed off about the lack of cake in his belly.

I gave them cake. I did the dishes, took the gross rug I'd pulled out of the kids room two weeks ago out to the tree lawn for trash, took out the compost, then came in to see Bastian with cake crumbs and icing on his head from having licked the bottom of the container clean. Into the bath with him.

I never sit with my kids while they take a bath. I mostly check on them often, listen carefully for their sounds, and keep working on all the stuff I have to do. Sometimes I clean the bathroom. For some reason, tonight I sat and talked to Bastian while he played in the bath. He made me clap my hands together over and over by putting his on mine and moving them together. I sang "Pat-a-cake" to him, showing him the hand movements, something I don't think I've done since Aleks was a toddler. He really liked it. I enjoyed it too. Which is so weird for me. Then I sang the "Itsy Bitsy Spider." So not like me. It occurred to me that maybe Bastian is missing out on this sort of thing and maybe I should do this stuff more. Then I rationalized that away by remembering that other people in his life do this stuff with him too - like Grandma. Grandma's are good at stuff like that. And aunts. Let them sing "Pat-a-cake" and teach him card tricks and how to jump rope. He'll be fine with me being his mom, washing his laundry and reminding him to brush his teeth. Right?

I sat and watched him play with the boat for awhile. I was mostly zoning out, until I realized that he was playing make believe. He does this all the time, but it's always the "Pew! Pew!" game. This time, I noticed he was using the megablock pieces to be something like people. They kept moving about the ship, climbing the ladder and making different sounds with different voices. He didn't use words, just his own little gibberish, but he was definitely pretending that these things were people and they were interacting. That's something Aleks still doesn't really do, and most of what he does do is prescribed by the media he absorbs (something I don't like at all, but...). (As an aside, I didn't get this on, er, film, but Aleks built a Lego structure the other day called the Dora Devastator, which makes me laugh!)

After his bath, I coated him in cocoa butter lest he does finally end up with chicken pox and his skin is too dry from all this bathing. Then he screamed and whined at me until I laid down to nurse him to sleep. He got too tired and was not happy that I wanted to do things like put his pajamas on or hang up his towel.

Aleks stayed up for a long time after, though he got really really tired too. He was laying on some pillows on the floor of the living room waiting for me to be done with posting on message boards, nearly falling asleep, but keeping up this whole little monologue. At first I wasn't paying attention because I had important things to tell people about...uh...babies? discipline? Something. After a minute though, something caught my ear. He was mumbling a lot because he was so tired, so I didn't catch it all, but it was something like this:

Aleks: ...is electricutable, which is fire, and if you add water...
a little later...
Aleks: ...40 plus 5 creates 45. 5 plus 1 creates 6. 3 plus 3 creates 6....

My baby does math! No one ever even told him how!!! He also spent some time looking at the Earth and Space book again and talking about shooting stars. I told him they were meteors which were rocks that shot down from space and just looked like stars because they're just pinpoints of light to us. He was actually pointing at a comet in the book though, which I reminded him is ice and rock with a luminescent tale which orbits the sun. He was into it. He kept babbling about Mars and where the aliens live and whether it's on the surface or underground and how if you went there you'd have to land underground. I'm not sure that I followed him exactly.

Papa in Mexico, Day Four

So I stayed up really late again. First I talked to Rebecca upstairs after the kids were in bed. She's having a rough time too, so we commiserated. Then I came back down and even though it was almost 2 a.m., decided to watch Charlie Wilson's War from the library and eat sunflower seeds. The inside of my lips still kinda tingle from all the salt. So it was after four when I got to bed and I'd had a good amount of organic sulfite-free wine, which I'd picked out for Lyz's overnight visit this weekend, but since she canceled, I felt free to drink myself. It was kinda sweet and weird.

The boys wrestled in my bed this morning while I preferred to be sleeping, so I kicked them out. I dealt with the usual morning routine of indecision and screaming over which foods should be prepared and in what precise manner they should be prepared. It was peanut butter and jelly again for Bastian, but he also wanted milk, on cereal, I think, though we don't have any of that. Yet he insisted on the milk and I ended up pouring some in a bowl with a spoon which he promptly decided he did not want at all and which went to complete waste. This food business is starting to become really wearing.

Then I went back to bed.

The boys entertained themselves with video games and cartoons again. It was another horribly dark rainy day. My little sister was supposed to come up and visit tonight, but called around two while I was cleaning the bathroom and decided that she didn't really want to. This depressed me further than I already was, because I was looking forward to the company and the respite. Alas, it will not be.

I managed to sit down for a few minutes and started taking a look at a book we got from the library by Lucy and Stephen Hawking called George's Secret Key to the Universe. It doesn't seem to be especially well written at all, but Aleks was intrigued by the pictures of space objects. Of particular interest were some comets, which we learned are bodies of ice and rock with a luminous tale that orbits the sun. We learned that Haley's Comet is visible on earth only every 76 years. He seemed into it.

We didn't see much information with the pictures themselves, so he had to run to grab his Earth and Space book that Papa Logan got him for Christmas (along with the complete solar system in classroom-friendly full-color cardstock cut-outs which now decorate his bedroom walls). The glossary in Earth and Space gave us the easy definition of comet and also let us in on what nebulae are. I already knew what nebulae were, but had trouble finding the words to explain to Aleks. That's why space books written for children are so handy. Simplification. A nebula is a cloud of dust and gas in which stars are born.

I first discovered how awesome nebulae are on our trip to the nature center in Bay Village back in October, where there was a huge photo of the Orion Nebula, which is gorgeous. I think though, that the Hawking book really helps me to see how incredible the Eagle Nebula is:

And how cosmically awe-inspiring is the Horse-head Nebula:
Makes me for sure want to talk about nebulae for my Heavy Metal Science Club presentation, should I actually decide to have the time to do such a presentation. After what might have amounted to an anxiety attack yesterday about the sheer volume of stuff that is making life complicated for me, I decided that I may just have to cut myself out of Mix Tape Meltdown. It may have to be one of those things that goes. Unless, of course, I find making a mix tape to be highly satisfying and relaxing. Maybe. We'll see. If I do, I'll have to definitely include Eric Idle's The Universe (which reminds me that Jon and I thought it might be a good idea to expose the kids to some Monty Python - I'll have to get on that):


Aleks gave up his interest in space when I started pointing to a picture of the Milky Way and telling him that we live there. Then he ran off. Back to cartoons, video games, and Lego. That's all it is these days, over and over. And I don't seem to care because I can't even muster the energy to not freak out about messes and insolence and other things that intellectually I tolerate and understand the root causes of but which emotionally drive me to the brink.

And so it went. While I took a shower, I heard crashing throughout the boys' room. I knew Bastian was throwing stuff on the ground. Since I was in the shower, I wasn't quite aware how much. I found out.

It was everything.

And Bastian thought it was great. He climbed up to the top of his mess hill like he was king of the world; Captain Destructo! That name used to be reserved for Aleks. No more. No more.

I was trying to get out the house when all this went down, so I don't think we actually made it to the grocery store until after six o'clock. We went out for the wheat germ and rolled oats for the quiche I have yet to make, as well as more broccoli because I forgot we already ate the other head and you can't make broccoli quiche without broccoli. I also needed cherries for nipples for a pregnant woman torso cake for the mama blessing I'm hosting tomorrow (not at my house, thank god). We had to go to two stores and it started pouring down rain in the midst. Bastian fell asleep in the car in between the Co-op and Zagara's and when we got to Zagara's, didn't exactly wake up at all. As I was pushing him in the cart, scouring the aisles for maraschino cherries, his poor little head was bobbing back and forth with the cart, which kept waking him up. There was one of those little wallet trays on our cart, so I pulled him towards me and put his arms under his head. He slept hunched over like that the whole time we were there. I carried him back out through the rain with no umbrella and he slept the whole car ride home and on the bed for another 45 minutes or so. He must be fighting something off. I keep checking his head, though, to no avail.

He woke up, ate some pizza (again we got back too late for me to bother cooking - the house is clean though!), and peed in his pants for the second? third? time today. Back in the bath he goes. In the tub, I sang the alphabet song for him and pointed out all the letters. He was mostly concerned that the G wouldn't stay sticking to the side of the tub, probably due to the fact that he's chewed it all out of shape. Then he lined all the letters up, then put them in the bucket, then dumped them all back out again.

Meanwhile, Aleks built some Lego structures for Jo, our neighbor who was coming over to bring the belly cake she made for me.

Aleks: This is Indiana Jones' Temple. It has a spear shooting trap that's electricutable, laser shootable, and spears flying at your head thing-able.
Me: walking away Okay. Cool.
Aleks: calling after And a super bladey thing!!!
Me: Wow!

I have an itchy cough and am tired now. Still lonely. Still desperately longing for Jon, in all his beardedness.

Papa in Mexico, Day Three

There was not enough sleeping last night. First thing upon waking, the kids had serious ideas about food. Aleks drew a picture of a chocolate chip cookie that he wanted for breakfast. I suggested alternatives and eventually he drew a picture of a waffle. He seems to communicate best by drawing rather than by speaking. Which is great, of course. It concerns me though that perhaps he's not progressing very well with speech therapy and it's all my fault for not encouraging his daily use of proper sounds in normal speech. But then, I'm so busy I haven't time to think about such things.
Bastian had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, which seems to have become his new favorite. He brings the jam to me in bed the way he used to bring the giant glass jug of Hartzler non-homogenized milk which was scary as hell. The Amish jam from Geauga Family Farms is less terrifying, but still cold against my cheek. Later there was a bit of it laying about:
Hungry again, Bastian refuses everything I offer by screaming and searching the fridge and freezer. When Aleks settles on a waffle, Bastian complies as well. Thank god. It is way too early for this nonsense.
Here are the letter plates that we use for almost everything the kids eat. We used to have C too, but it broke, I think. Or else it's hidden somewhere I can't see. With just the A and B, they stand for Aleks and Bastian, so that works nicely. Jon is not as anal as me about insuring that Aleks has the A and Bastian has the B, though sometimes Aleks will complain if he notices they are reversed. Which usually results in a fight because you can't take anything away from Bastian, whether he wants the thing or not.
Instead of wasting all the gas lighting the stove, this morning I melted the butter over the toaster. Much more green of me, I'm sure. Makes me wish I just had a toaster oven.
Mama's very large cup of coffee, daily necessity.
This morning is cold again and raining. It's so dark. We turned the computer off for awhile due to the lightening and the kids played with Lego in their room. Aleks would occasionally call his brother a name and likely hit him and Bastian would come to me crying. Aleks is very protective of his Lego. I'm not sure what to do about it exactly, though, except to keep reminding him why Bastian deserves to play with some too and that it's never okay to hurt. Another thing I don't understand is why Firefox doesn't think the word "okay" is spelled correctly.

The weather weighs me down, so I pledge to not bother doing anything at all. I have a vague idea about going somewhere with the kids later, but know deep down that getting dressed and out of the house is far too complicated for me today. After waffles, some video games and Lego, Aleks decides to head to the basement to ride bikes. Bastian catches up with him after a few minutes, running naked in frog boots after his brother. I can hear when the bikes have stopped, but just pray that nothing huge has gone wrong like the time they spilled a neighbor's fabric softener (yuck!) all over the floor, using the blue goo to make handprints and footprints around and around the central cluster of furnaces and water heaters. After a bit, I pry myself away from my message boards where I am wasting my life to go check it out. Aleks has found the Blendy-Pen discovered in the driveway the day before inside the seat compartment of the push rider and drawn on the dryers (incidentally, some neighbor kids drew on the back porch with the thing before leaving the weapon behind as evidence).

This one appears to be Yoda in the center, but I'm not sure who the other characters are. Aleks is currently unavailable, or I'd ask. Wait, here he is now. On the right there is Darth Sidious who is throwing rocks and force lightning at Yoda and R2D2 (below Yoda in the center). The thing on the left is a prickly tree that Yoda is standing on.

And on our dryer, Darth Vader. I took these photos then wiped them off. The white dryer may be a little stained with red, but nothing horrible.
Later, the kids harass me more for food, resulting in lots of whining and screaming and argument about what is suitable food to eat. Bastian decides he wants to be like Aleks and climb up and find his own stuff. He's looking in the wrong cupboard though.
They settled for carrots, which they then chased each other around with, fighting as if with swords. Here's Aleks hiding for Bastian around a corner, the picture he painted of Dora there on the fridge behind him.
My day progressed with lots of hanging out on discussion forums, wasting my life, while the children pretty much did the same thing again and again - video games, Cartoon Network cartoons online, and Lego. Bastian would periodically make a giant mess or pee in the potty and miss a bit so I had lots to clean up. I also finally got to the cereal on the couch with the vacuum cleaner. I actually managed to vacuum the whole of the living room pretty well, getting up the ants and then spraying along all the baseboards with vinegar to try to deter them.

Then I heard some great Lego crashing from the bedroom, which I ignored in my internet stupor. I didn't have to wait long to discover the source, however, as the boys dragged the Lego tray from the bedroom, through the hallway, kitchen, and dining room to me in the living room. I was not at all pleased. I managed to keep my cool a little bit by taking this photo though, so there's that. Stress levels are high right now, so that's saying something. Shortly thereafter, however, Bastian dumped out all six baskets of blocks in the dining room just for fun.
Aleks called me into his bedroom to come see a spider (not in fear, but in interest). I, in my depression from being alone which was quickly building to anxiety due to the insane number of things I've been doing lately (not counting today), declined going to see it and suggested they take a photo instead. This is one of several of the photos they took, none of which depicted anything resembling a spider.
Here's the Lego mess. It extends under the bed and Bastian had strewn some other items about as well, not pictured.
After all that doing nothing interspersed with great amounts of clean-up activity, I had no energy to go to the store for the wheat germ and rolled oats I'd neglected to pick up for my quiche crust the other day. I also didn't realize that it was after 8 o'clock. So we had frozen pizza for dinner which I made while whining to my mother on the phone about how hard everything is. Bastian saw me cut it with the pizza cutter and promptly retrieved his wooden pizza and wooden pizza cutter from the play kitchen to be like me. He ate a slice of real pizza followed by a slice of wooden pizza and insisted I do the same. Immediately following dinner, he fell asleep nursing. That was the only easy bit of my whole day, I swear.

Papa in Mexico, Day Two Continued

I promised Aleks that after painting pictures, we'd go paint the dollhouse outside. We needed to get outside since the boys have been stuck indoors the whole winter and now I keep explaining how we don't want to potentially expose anyone with a weakened immune system to chicken pox, should we actually be incubating the chicken pox. That's still a pretty big "if." So far, Bastian had a pimple-looking thing under his arm on his right side, which turned out, remarkably, to be indeed just a pimple. There are several red marks here and there on his body as well, but they look like they could be anything at all and do not strike me really as being actual pox. Mostly we just have this crummy cold, which we also picked up at the chicken pox party.

Bastian claimed the mailer bag with the two diapers inside as his immediately, and after some time, put the bag on his head and wrestled with his brother. They do this sort of thing often and find it to be hysterical whereas I just get irritated whenever Bastian actually gets hurt from all the rough-housing and comes to me crying, wanting to be nursed. I am pretty much done with nursing, but he feels totally opposite. He wants to nurse often. Ugh.Aleks is not always very good about realizing when Bastian is actually hurt or acknowledging that perhaps he should not play so rough. He can take whatever Bastian has to dish out and usually is pretty amused even by Bastian sitting on his head. He's a strong big kid now. He can take anything, except perhaps gum in his hair or whatever a very hard wall has dealt to his hard-as-a-rock cranium.
After I made dinner (before anyone was hungry this time), we ventured outside to paint the dollhouse. This was my dollhouse when I was teeny and was originally orange. In high school, I painted it blue with a girlfriend when we decided to paint anything we could find with the only paint I had, which was of course, blue. Then the house got transformed yellow when I was pregnant with Aleks and my sisters and I painted Aunt Natty's room orange and yellow while waiting for me to go into labor (incidentally, we had plenty of time and finished a week or more before I ever actually started labor). Natty used it as a bookshelf. A few years ago, I asked Natty to bring it up so Aleks could grow up free of gender prescriptions. He has shown absolutely zero interest in playing with the dolls and furniture I acquired for this thing, merely throwing them about breaking my ebay-earned wooden doll furniture periodically. Thank goodness for wood glue. Not too long ago, we put most of the doll furniture in storage, leaving but a few pieces so the bendy dolls would have enough places to sit, but avoiding the constant chaos of two boys who care nothing for their decor nor well-being, for that matter. Aleks was keen on painting it, however. So much so that one day he randomly took what he was using to paint pictures with to add a couple of big red blobs to the structure.
We didn't get very far on the painting, ultimately. Our paint was an ancient acrylic ultramarine blue inherited from my schizophrenic aunt and is now overly thick and goes on sort of blotchy.
The boys quickly abandoned attempts to coat over the yellow in order to play soccer with our bio-engineering major neighbor, Brad and his bio-engineering major roommate, Chris. Chris and Brad met on Facebook and are remarkably similar in taste and disposition. They make a good team and humor me and my sons by playing ball with them on a Thursday evening.
Bastian and Aleks didn't have any particular game in mind when it came to the half-deflated soccer ball. They were content to run around in circles chasing after it, knocking one another down into the grass.
Aleks wanted Brad to throw the ball really super high, pointing to some invisible spot in the sky. I believe he meant to the sky itself, but he seemed content when it didn't even quite make it past the second floor.

In his attempts to join in the game, Bastian frequently fell over the ball, failing to kick, catch or even really throw the thing.
When Brad left for a run and Chris left for a shower, Aleks refused to go to the park, preferring to await the neighbors return so he could show off his awesome Legos. So I got out the bikes so Bastian wouldn't go running into the street instead.
Aleks got a two-wheeler for Christmas, complete with a bike helmet and training wheels, yet prefers to ride the tricycle. In my naiveté, I thought that Bastian would upgrade to the tricycle and Aleks would make his way towards riding the two-wheeler, steadily gaining enough confidence to forgo the training wheels. Instead, they stick to what they know: Aleks on the trike and Bastian on the push-mobile.
Aleks decided he was hungry (big surprise since he didn't eat his dinner that I worked so hard on) and went back in to make himself a peanut butter sandwich. Bastian obviously decided he needed one as well and they sat down on the lawn to enjoy them while Brad rested after his seven-mile run.
Still chock-full of plenty of energy, the boys ran around the house a bit. Bastian wanted to climb on a neighbor's car, but opted for ours after I dissuaded him. Then he discovered the "claw" in the garage and the boys joined forces to try to turn the compost pile. Papa would be so proud. There are many, many worms under there these days. We may yet have very good soil for the growing season.
After all, the growing season comes fast upon us. The lavender is starting to come back, one of two perennials I planted last year. We are waiting for later in the summer to see if the mums made it for once. This is the second year in a row that we have attempted mums, but we have yet to see the green return to their heavily browned and dried stems.
Since they both were filthy after all that running around, eating peanut butter and painting, I persuaded them into the bathtub for a citrus and lavender bubble calming fest. They both got sufficiently zoned out and Bastian fell asleep in his shark towel in the office chair watching cartoons while I cleaned up and talked to Jon's dad on the phone. Aleks passed out later in the same chair watching a video about creepy crawlies produced by National Geographic. He thinks exploring sounds cool. I agreed whole-heartedly.

Papa in Mexico, Day Two

After updating the blog last night, I headed out to Heavy Metal Science Club on my own while Laurel watched the boys. I nursed Bastian down just before leaving. It was a long, hard day. I deserved a couple of beers at Heather's while listening to heavy metal and discussing giant squid. It was the second week of Mix-Tape Meltdown which is like a graduate seminar on mix-tapes complete with peer review, note taking, questions, and a presentation on the tape itself along with a topic related to science.

Heather's tape is called Blood and Thunder and her scientific interest was in giant squid. Interestingly, the book about Giant Squid (Architeuthidae) that she had talked about how people used to mistake giant squid for sea monsters or serpents. So the whole Loch Ness thing could be a transplant Giant Squid, I suppose. Or something to that effect anyway. Aleks has had an interest in Sea Serpents for quite some time now, likely due to watching Scooby Doo and the Loch Ness Monster five million times, and has had lots of questions about them, as though they were a real creature that I'm supposed to just know about. We looked stuff up on the internet about sea serpents, but mostly found information on myths and eels. Never had I heard this Giant Squid theory. So I encouraged Heather to stop by sometime soon with her book and show Aleks what it's all about.

I checked in on my internet arguments when I got home, then went to bed and slept long and deeply. This morning, Bastian threw a whole fit about the proper way to feed him (again), then I went back to bed. The boys played computer games in their pajamas for a long time, also playing with Lego, action figures, and eating gads of snacks all over the house. Bastian emptied the remains of the cereal all over the dining room at some point. Here's where the ants come in...
And on the couch, where he sat eating out the cereal out of a small cup while watching Aleks play free online games.
I sat in front of the computer too, eating breakfast at an ungodly late hour, talking on the phone, and accomplishing almost nothing.
In this photo, it's three-thirty in the afternoon. The boys are still in pjs, playing with Lego. Note the slice of bread on the floor beside Aleks, which he's been munching on since about ten o'clock. It was toast he'd made himself. Such a big boy using the toaster.
Bastian's true all-in-one training pants from Bum-Ware arrived today. He wanted to put them on immediately, but I assured him that he's completely capable of using the potty. I'm hoping that since I just bought these fairly expensive, custom-made diapers, he'll of course promptly potty learn. Or perhaps I just have high hopes.
Since we'd had a couple of days of not doing much and the boys have been watching movies and playing video games non-stop, I pushed them towards some art-making. The paints are unfortunately running pretty low...
Aleks painted a picture of Dora from Dora the Explorer, a cartoon I can't stand, though they have learned a bit of spanish.
He concentrated very hard, copying the picture from the DVD case.


So far, so good. I still miss Jon terribly. I did indeed get an email from him (and Kevin) yesterday, but it was brief:

Mexisafe
All is fine ladies. We have warm dinners in our stomachs and are heading up to the terrace for drinks. Miss you madly.

Jevin Wlidden

I was feeling pretty down at the end of the day yesterday, but today is just like any other. I'm not on my absolute best behavior, but I'm trying... They boys could care less, as usual.