"I want my Mom"

Discover Pink Floyd!

The life of a two-year-old involves lots of drama. Sometimes, Margaret deals with that drama by moaning loudly and repeatedly on our way home after work. After a few blocks, I'll stop and try to console her. If that doesn't work, I'll try to reason with her about how we're almost home and she doesn't want to make Maddie sad. If she still insists on groaning, I threaten that she's making Papa angry, something that she probably should avoid. Usually, one of those three approaches works, but we occasionally have a very unpleasant walk home, with Margaret moaning, to the amusement of passersby, while Papa steams.

Lately, she's started using a new phrase to express her displeasure. "I want my Mom," she'll whine. Not Mama, which is her usual phrase for referring to Abby, nor Abby, which is the other common reference to her Mom. Instead, she plaintively intones, "I want my Mom."

This phrase has been popping up more and more frequently. On one extreme, it pops up when she's feeling a little bit cranky and wants some consolation. Now, Papa can provide that consolation as well as Mama, but she still insists, "I want my Mom." On the other extreme, when Papa is irritated or is trying to correct some misbehavior, she'll start to bawl. In between heaving sobs, she'll blubber, "I want my Mom."

We're not sure where she picked up this phrase, but she probably learned it from someone in the preschool at daycare. After all, she never uses "Mom" in everyday speech, it's just when she's feeling needy, for one reason or another. But we've been trying to quash it, because it either arises in stupid settings (e.g. when Abby's in the shower in the morning) or when Abby isn't available and there's nothing to be done.

The biggest problem arises when Teddy elicits howls from Margaret when we're at home before Abby gets home. As I discussed in an earlier post, Margaret has become quite busy which often involves putting things in bags and containers that she then carries around. Teddy, being a curious little bugger, wants to get in on the action. But when he tries to grab something, Margaret resists and often starts to scream at him. "Teddddddyyyyy," she'll howl, tugging on her bag and occasionally pushing him in the process. Until recently, Teddy has responded with a quizzical expression, but lately he has also started to howl when Margaret thwarts him. Because Margaret is the more "rational" of the two, I often try to reason with her that she needs to move her toys away from the boy in order to avoid these confrontations. Often, this doesn't work as Margaret will start to sob. The frequent end to these episodes? "I want my Mom."

(BTW, the song at the beginning of this post isn't really "pro-Mom." But I like it because I've always liked Pink Floyd, and less motivated readers won't realize why it's not pro-Mom.)

Additional random thoughts

John McCain was on Imus In the Morning today for the first time in a while. We tend to flip between Imus and NPR (how's that for a juxtaposition) on our shower radio, and I happened to catch part of his interview with McCain. Needless to say, McCain bashed Georgetown cocktail parties again during his interview. Darnit, where are these cocktail parties in my neighborhood? And why are we not invited?

At Teddy's one year checkup, we found out that he is in the 95th percentile for height and head size, and the 75th percentile for weight. All of which is expected except for, I suppose, the weight given that they marvel at how he eats at school. Mr. Ty told me, with some wonder, that he ate six muffins in one sitting today.

Speaking of Mr. Ty, Teddy has officially moved up to the toddler room, specifically to Toddler I. For a variety of reasons, including pressure in the infant room and an outflow of kids from this Pre-K room, they appear to be shifting kids up a bit sooner than they did in the past. Initially, Abby and I were a bit concerned that Teddy wasn't ready for the toddler room, unlike some other parents who seem very concerned that their kids aren't moving up soon enough (doggonit, gotta keep my kid ahead of the curve, they seem to think.) After all, he couldn't really walk until recently. But he seems to be doing well. And his walking has gotten much better over the last few weeks.

At the same time that Teddy is moving to the toddler room, Margaret is moving to the pre-K room. Given that she's not even three yet, I'm not sure if that's a good move, but I'm not sure that there's a big difference between Toddler II and the pre-K room. And the latter is a helluva lot cheaper, so I suppose I'm all for it. And, at the end of the day, Margaret seems happy.

Last thing. As you might notice in the pictures in the previous post, Teddy is a spotty little dude. He hasn't exhibited any allergic tendencies, but he's always been pretty spotty. During his last checkup, the doctor noted that some kids are sensitive to their own saliva. Given that Teddy's a drooly kid, and likes his nuk-nuk (although not as much as his sister), this seemed to be a pretty reasonable diagnosis. We've tried to cut back on his contact with his drool, and he seems to be more presentable.

Dancing princess

We went to my cousin's wedding in eastern Ohio this past weekend, and I have a few observations.

Because we were in a "battleground" state (unlike DC where the only battle is whether the Democrat breaks 90%), we paid special attention to the distribution of political signs and stickers. Interestingly, we saw about a 50-50 split of McCain-Palin and Obama-Biden signs. And while looking for a bow tie for the boy at the Eastwood Mall in Warren OH, Teddy and I saw Obama stickers on people who sure looked the McCain-Palin part. That's certainly not scientific evidence, and I'm not sure if it means anything at all, but we were in the heartland of America that is eastern Ohio. I'll just leave it at that.

When dressing for the wedding, I pulled out my tie carrier, opened it up and found. . . a yellow rubber glove. At which point, I recalled Margaret fiddling with my tie carrier while helping Rodah clean the week before. Come to think of it, I still haven't tried to locate where she put my ties. . .

At the wedding, we spent a lot of time chasing Teddy. In fact, the boy was the big problem as he didn't want to sit still. Instead, he kept walking around wearing his little bow tie with his belly sticking out from under his little oxford shirt. Luckily, a number of other toddlers, including his second (?) cousin Brady, were trundling around the reception, so he wasn't a big problem. In fact, I noted to another toddler-chaser that we should've set up, and taken bets on, a toddler race. Notably, however, the best part was when someone else, like my Mom or Lizzie or Anna, watched Teddy.

But even still, the existence of the kids has definitely changed our "status" at weddings. As Abby noted, we now have a very different role at weddings. In the past, I would note the presence of kids, register how cute they were, and perhaps note their parents, at which point I would immediately go back to my conversation or whatever else I happened to be doing. "Gosh, aren't those cute kids on the dancefloor?," I'd think, before putting them out of my mind. Now, I am the source of those cute kids. And I'm the one being ignored by the younger set at weddings.

On the one hand, I'm sure that Abby and I could still be "fun" at weddings, even with the kids, although I'm not sure that I have the enthusiasm or stamina for such a feat. On the other hand, dancing with Margaret or watching her dance with her cousins was a lot of fun. In fact, I'm not sure whether anything that I've done at previous weddings beats dancing to some silly disco song with Margaret, Alex, Lizzie and Cousin Sarah (as Margaret refers to her).

Discover ABBA!

In the end, Teddy was completely wired. At some point, he was calmly sitting on my Mom's lap, and I asked my uncle, who could see the boy's face, whether he was asleep. Nope, he indicated, making a boooiiiingggg!!!! signal with his eyes.

And Margaret had so much fun dancing. Just before we go to bed each night, we have a routine that involves a discussion based on the question: "What do you want to talk about?" In the past, her preferred topics have been "fireworks" or various kids at her daycare. Since this past weekend, she's started to request a discussion about "dancing."

Another celebrity sighting

Washington can be a very exciting city due to the political celebrities that we pass on the street. For example, George Stephanopoulos (sic?) has lived in our neighborhood for a while. We see him on the street occasionally and say hi when see him. We used to pass his house where his little dogs would bark at Maddie while he peered out of his second floor when we walked by. (BTW, he's really pretty short, and his dogs are reportedly responsible for the death of a DC cop. But that last point should be the subject of another Georgetown gossip-inspired post.)

Earlier, I posted about passing another political celeb, Ralph Nader, on the street.

The other day, we passed another one. Abby and I were walking the kids to daycare together, an unusual arrangement that reflected the fact that she was taking a "continuing legal education" class in a building by their daycare. As we crossed Rock Creek Park on Pennsylvania Avenue, I spotted someone who appeared to be asking for directions from repairman.

"Did you see who we just walked past?," I asked.

"What? Who?," said Abby.

"That guy, over there."

"The one who passed us on the street?"

"No, that guy over there, asking for directions."

"Who are you talking about?"

"That guy over there!"

"Is that Karl Rove?"

A few blocks later, I asked my previously inobservant wife whether she thought that Rove gets heckled in the same way that I was inclined to heckle Nader during our earlier encounter.

To conclude this silly post, McCain apparently bashed those of us who live in Georgetown for a variety of reasons. I feel so abused.

Margaret's make believe world

Margaret has recently started incorporating a lot of "make believe" into her play. I don't exactly remember what her play was like before. In fact, I don't really recall how she played at all. Basically, she would pull down a container full of kiddie cups and bowls that she then scattered aimlessly around the kitchen while I cooked dinner. But in the last few weeks, she has started to exhibit substantially more focus with her playthings. She now carries the Tupperware and other food containers around the living room, putting them in bags and putting things in them with some clear objective. She pulls the little chairs from her table around, puts things on her table, on the windowsills, and in bags, and moves around her various dolls. It not clear, to me, what she's doing. And she rarely articulates her objectives, although she'll occasionally make statements like "I'm a mama!" Most of the time, she fiddles around with various stuff while I watch with bemusement trying to figure out what she's doing. As the haphazard nature of this post suggests, it's a bit difficult to explain. But basically, she's started to show a lot more concentration and focus in her manipulation of various toys. I guess that I need to ask her what she's doing while she plays.

She has also started to become much more annoyed with Teddy when he interferes with her play. Teddy isn't nearly as focused as Margaret, but he is interested in whatever his sister is doing. So, reflecting his increased mobility, he heads in her direction and grabs her bowls, shopping bag, Legos, or doll. And she hollers at him. And sometimes pushes him, yelling "No Teddy!" With the end result occasionally being a Margaret meltdown while Teddy stares at me with an innocent expression. It can be very difficult to quell the confrontations when I'm trying to cook dinner while they mill around my legs.

As for the boy, he's starting to vocalize more and more. Tonight, he tried to "sing" the Itsy Bitsy Spider, one of Margaret's favorites. He wasn't able to do much more than wave his hands in the air, sing in a off-tune kind of way, and clap at the end of the song, but he clearly had the right idea. We tried to get a video of his performance, but he mocked me by just grinning at the camera. Still, I think that he's showing an inclination for music before his sister did. Hooray, Teddy!

Teddy's big day

The boy is one year old today. And he's managed to hit a few milestones of note over the last week on his way to his first birthday. Most of these milestones were reached over our long weekend in Chicago...

Where the Cubs, once again, let us down in dramatic - or, should I say, pathetic - fashion. While I wouldn't have said it at the start of the playoffs, this Cubs team was honestly the best Cubs team I've ever seen. They had the complete combination of good starting pitching, relief pitching and hitting that it takes to win a World Series. Again, I never voiced this opinion before the start of the playoffs for fear of inducing negative karma, but goddamit, this was a good team! How could they just roll over against the Dodgers? Watching them boot the ball all over the infield in the third inning of game two, which I was so fortunate to attend, was indescribably painful. And the atmosphere at the ballpark as the events of that inning unfolded was unbelievably depressing.

Now that I've gotten that out of my system, what did Teddy manage to accomplish over the weekend? First, he's started to "talk." Not in any meaningful way, although he does appear to be able to say "Mama" - he can repeat it along with Margaret and me (we had a group chant going on as we waited for her to get home tonight) and he seems able to actually identify who his Mama is. But he's also started to vocalize in interesting ways with modulations of tone associated with questions and emphatic statements. All nonsensical, but he's getting the idea. And he really started doing this vocalizing over the weekend with the grandparents.

He's also walking. Over the last few weeks, he's gotten better at taking a few steps, but he managed to put it all together this past weekend. When I last saw him on Thursday, he was walking a few steps before taking a seat. By the time I saw him on Sunday, he was stringing together dozens of steps before eventually losing his balance. When I first saw him again at our friends' house on Sunday, I watched with bemused amazement as he went step -- step, step -- step -- step, step, step -- step and so on, before he finally collapsed. I don't think that I had ever seen him take more than two steps in succession, and all of a sudden, he's trundling around the room.

I'm not sure what magic occurred at the grandparents' house, but I do know that both of the kids slept in until around 8:00 on Saturday and Sunday morning. That's 8:00 CST!!!! What the hell! We can't get the boy to sleep past 5:00 EST. And then today when Abby was admonishing Margaret for some sort of misbehavior, she whined, "I wish I was at Grandma Mary's house."

Hmmpphhh.

We have other news associated with Teddy's (possibly premature) graduation to the toddler room at daycare. But I'll save that for another time. Instead, I'll close this post with a variety of pictures, including some from his birthday party at school and at home.



And some videos of the boy (with the girl always in the background - something that is likely to become a common theme in Teddy's life.)

Ombama, part II

Margaret and I were lying in bed yesterday night. I was reading the paper as Margaret got comfortable for her evening books. I turned the page, reading something about the failed bailout package in the House, when Margaret reached up, pointed at a picture on the other page of the paper, and said, "Ombama." I glanced at the picture and said, "Yep, you're right."

"But who's that?," I asked, pointing at a picture of McCain that was immediately next to Obama's picture.

For full disclosure, despite the impression that dedicated readers may have gotten from my last post, I don't consider myself to be a real partisan, unlike Abby, as I liked McCain ok pre-2006, pre-McCain-Feingold, pre-pandering to his base, and, most of all, pre-his VP selection. While I'm inclined to favor Obama at this point, I've really just pointed him out to Maggie because his image is everywhere, especially online. Her ability to identify him is cute, in the same way that her ability identify Dora is cute. But if it happens to make Abby happy, then I'm fine with it.

Returning to my question for Margaret, she responded in the way that she often does when she doesn't know the answer, by repeating the question. "Who's that?," she asked. "McCain," I said. Got no reaction.

Then tonight, we were watching the Cubs and surfing the web while waiting for Mama to get home from work. Margaret was very excited about watching the game. She always refers to the Cubs as "Go Cubs!", and she was very adamant: "I want to watch Go Cubs!" At some point, Margaret spotted a picture on the computer that she correctly identified as Ombama. "But who's that?," I asked, again pointing to McCain. And again, no response. But she doesn't really have it down as she saw another picture of someone with his back partially turned to the camera and proudly said, "Ombama." "Nope," I said, "That's Bush."

Speaking of the Cubs, they're currently down 5-2 to the Dodgers. I haven't posted any pics of the kids in their Cubs regalia because I didn't want to jinx anything. Hopefully, the Cubs will be able to pull this one out. Regardless, we're heading to Chicago this weekend for Abby's 10th year law school reunion. We're kicking the kids to the grandparents' house for Friday and Saturday nights while we'll stay with friends in the city. Needless to say, we're pretty excited. Even better, I got a call yesterday from some friends who told me that one of them had a ticket for tomorrow night's game that he can't use. Could I take it? If I do, Abby and the kids will head to the 'burbs while I go to the game and stay in the city. I said that I had to check with Abby first. Her response: "Of course, you should go. If you don't take the ticket, I will!" So tomorrow night at 8:30 PM CST, Abby and the kids will be in the 'burbs watching the VP debate with my parents while I'm at Wrigley. Go Cubs!

"Where's my Ombama (sic) sticker?"

Abby and I tend to be fairly reserved when it comes to politics. More specifically, we're not inclined to engage in public displays of our political leanings. This doesn't mean that we're not willing to argue about politics with various people (e.g., my in-laws, my co-workers, etc.) in private settings, but we don't tend to post signs or engage in politics in overt ways. Among other factors, the politically reserved nature of our families (at least mine) have contributed to that behavior.

In the current election, this has changed somewhat. Unlike the Philly relatives (Rachel appears to have been able to overcome our family's ingrained aversion to public politicking), we're not to the point where we've posted an Obama sign in our front yard. (Actually, as urban elites, we don't have a front yard, but that's immaterial. Still, as evidence of how out of touch we are, Margaret stood slack-jawed while gaping at Uncle Joe as he maneuvered some odd device around their yard during our last visit. Turns out it was a lawnmower, something she'd never seen before.) But Abby donated money to Obama in the primary. And so did I, although I was really motivated by a desire to avoid another Clinton White House following the debacle that was the Ohio/Texas Democratic primaries.

(By the way, it's a bit creepy how you can track down donors on the web. When I was in Chicago a few weeks ago, I was sitting at a friend's house and stunned him by punching his donations up online. Actually, I intended to stay under the FEC's limits that would require such disclosure, and I berated Abby when she didn't do so with her donation. But the Obama website gave an error message on my first donation, so I hit the back button and resubmitted my donation. I ended up giving twice. Which ironically also put me over the FEC's limit and, as a result, made my donation records publicly available online. Abby was much more equanimous about my donation error than I was about hers.)

In any event, today we went into McCain territory. Specifically, we drove "outside the Beltway" to attend the Occaquan arts and crafts show. As I anticipated, the show involved more kitchy arts and crafts than actual art. But that's just me being an elitist. Even more elitist was my impression of many of the people wandering the streets of Occaquan. As I told Abby afterwards, the mean waist size of the men was somewhere over 40 inches, and the women tended to give the men a run for their money. Reminded me of Pittsburgh. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but waist size was also highly correlated with the political stickers that people wore. Those chunky guys and their portly wives tended to wear "Nobama" t-shirts and McCain stickers. I saw a number of beefy guys wearing t-shirts that said "Damn right I'm clinging to my guns and religion because I'm bitter (and I'll keep the rest of the constitution too)." I'm not sure what that last point meant (except perhaps the 2nd Amendment part, although the statement on the t-shirts seemed, to me, much broader), but I wasn't about to argue with them over it. And after spending way too much time north of the Potomac where almost ever sign and sticker is Obama, it was refreshing to see women wearing pink t-shirts saying "Sarah's Team."

When we first reached the outskirts of the festival, there was a booth handing out blue balloons for some Democratic Congressional candidate. As someone not represented in Congress (a Constitutionally correct position, I believe, although I do like to give the rest of the country the finger with our "Taxation Without Representation" license plate), I didn't really care about the balloon, although Margaret was pretty happy to get one. But getting a balloon for a kid isn't really a meaningful political statement, as she would've taken a ballon from Idi Amin. So Abby went to the booth and grabbed a couple of Obama stickers, putting one on Margaret and the other on her own shirt. Feeling a bit uncomfortable about such an overt political statement in Nobama territory, I pulled the sticker off Abby's shirt and put it on the stroller (and got admonished by Abby for doing so.) Margaret, on the other hand, was very pleased with her sticker. Although she complained about many, many things during our visit to Occaquan, one recurrent theme of discussion was the location of her "Ombama" sticker. (Maggie also got a free little basket from a black woman selling African crafts who, when Abby protested and tried to pay for the basket, quietly said, "I like your sticker." Actually, my suspicion is that her gift says more about the mark-ups on her wares than it does about her politics.)

Naturally, Margaret doesn't really know who Obama is. However, since his ads are so omnipresent on the web, I have pointed him out to her a few times when we're surfing the web together, so she can now spot him and say "Ombama." Unfortunately, she doesn't appear to be very discriminating as she has yelled Ombama at various other people (with specific racial characteristics) that we pass on the street. Of course, this happens much more often in DC than it did in Occaquan, so we didn't risk any embarrassment there.

In the end, Margaret's Obama sticker ended up making it's way to the back of her shirt. Since she spent most of her time in Occaquan in her stroller, we didn't get many comments. (Although I heard a group of older women wearing McCain-Palin stickers muttering about Obama. Almost certainly not directed at us, but I was feeling paranoid.) We then went to the Workhouse Arts Center in Lorton, VA which is an old prison that has recently been converted to an arts center like the Torpedo Factory in Alexandria. Very cool, especially for NoVa (damn, I'm being an elitist again!). I suspect that Margaret's Ombama sticker would have been better received there, but she spent most of the visit snoozing the stroller. We then went to the multicultural melting pot extraordinaire where Margaret enthusiastically ran around with her Ombama sticker on her back, and I'm sure that most of the patrons were at least moderately inclined to favor her candidate. That multicultural melting pot extraordinaire? IKEA.

Walk tall

Discover Cannonball Adderley!

Dear god, the boy can walk. At least, he's starting to walk. This will not end well....



Note also how Margaret refers to Mama as "Abby." Margaret has been referring to her Mama in this way for some time. Abby doesn't like it, but we haven't been able to stop it.

Also, as the video suggests, Margaret loves her books. Especially her Skippyjon Jones books, which are really strange books that involve a Siamese cat who encounters all sorts of odd adventures when he morphs into a Chihuahua. As the reader of many kids books, I've started to learn what works and what doesn't. For example, Margaret and I love the Madeline books, and I can recite the text to my coworkers on demand.

"In an old house in Paris that was covered with vines, lived twelve little girls in two straight lines. In two straight lines they broke their bread. Brushed their teeth and went to bed..."

But it's almost impossible to describe the Skippyjon Jones books. You just have to read them to see how bizarre they really are. By the way, Maggie's cousin Andrew introduced us to Skippyjon Jones, which is very fitting.

This past weekend, we met some of my college friends at a park in suburban Maryland. There we found a carousel and a train. Margaret wasn't too sure about the carousel as she kept grabbing onto me. But both of the kids loved the train. As for our friends, they both work for Bank of America, so we spent some time discussing the turmoil in financial markets. "What the hell is going on?," they asked. "I dunno," I shrugged as we watched our kids running around the playground. (That's not really true, but what could I tell them?)

The boy's comparative advantage

Teddy is disadvantaged for a number of reasons. First, he's the second kid. As my last post suggests, this implies that he doesn't get the same credit for his tricks that his sister did. Second, his sister is, and I have to be humble here, exceptional. She's speaking in complete sentences, using pronouns in the appropriate way, almost reading books - she's just a really, really smart little girl. (To be honest, she's probably not that exceptional, but I have only one data point and she's my kid, so I'll conclude that she is.)

But one area in which Teddy beats out his sister, even now despite their age difference, is his coordination with balls. In particular, when you toss a ball to Teddy, he can actually grab it. And can then toss it back to you. In contrast, Margaret consistently gets bonked on the head during such an exercise despite her participation in Power Tots at school - she'll come home and wave her legs around to display the tricks that she's learned in class, but she still can't catch a ball. Teddy, however, can. In fact, it was a bit amazing when we first started rolling balls in his direction. We expected him to flail futilely, trying to grab the ball, but he'd end up missing. Yet, he was able to corral the ball, gather it, and then send it back in the direction that it came. This leads me to think that we may have a future sports star on our hands.

While this isn't the best video, it at least indicates his skill with the ball.

Changes in childraising strategies and philosophy

As a comment on my last post suggested, your view of children, and your approach to raising them, changes drastically with the arrival of the second child. The first child experiences doting parents who jump at every cry and monitor and chronicle every development. The second child doesn't get the same level of attention. Instead, you know that they aren't really suffering when they cry (at least, they're not suffering that much.) And that they won't kill themselves if you aren't constantly monitoring them, given that you've taken certain base precautions - like blocking the stairs - to keep them out of trouble. (When talking to a soon-to-be dad at the dog park, I searched my mind for any piece of wisdom that I could give, and I came up with: "They're pretty resilient little things. They seem so fragile, but they're really pretty tough. So you're unlikely to hurt them when you change their diapers, even if they cry a lot.")

Every achievement of the second kid also isn't documented as assiduously. The boy can pull himself up on stuff? Well, he'll fall back down to the ground pretty soon, so at long as nothing sharp is around, that's ok. The boy can walk a few steps? Same attitude that accompanied pulling up. The boy is babbling? Is he interacting when doing so? If so, that's pretty fun (Teddy likes to go "Uhh" to which I respond "Uhh." We'll then go back and forth grunting at one another, which is a blast. I don't recall Margaret doing this, but maybe grunting is a boy thing.) If not, let me get back to cooking dinner.

A friend of mine with four (yikes!) boys (double yikes!) noted how few photos were focused on his fourth kid, especially compared to the first. Instead, the fourth kid mainly shows up by chance in various pictures.

Now, this isn't a very insightful post because a decrease in attentiveness has to arise with later kids as does a decline in the novelty of the tricks that they display. But I got a chuckle out of the difference when archiving photos and videos tonight. For example, observe the care with which Margaret is fed in the first part of the following video. And the clear wonder that accompanies her ability to put food in her mouth. Contrast that to the clutter on the boy's tray and the absence of any concern about whether he's actually eating much of his food or is just making a mess. (Turns out that until very recently, he has generally missed his mouth with a good portion of the food that he has tried to eat manually. Maddie loves that.)