Vivid Descriptions

Here's proof positive that we unlearn how to describe things clearly as we age.

Lego Club met yesterday -- that's the forum in which our boy gets to dictate to one of his parents what he or she will build by theme (small vehicles, spacecraft, and robots are just a few of the categories). We were working on security guard stuff during this particular session, and I had been instructed to create "a station the security guards could use for relaxing."

I don't know about you, but when I want to relax, there's usually coffee or tea involved. Thus, I immediately began making the security guards a cozy kitchen with a nice, long table at which they could sit and kvetch between shifts.

The Lego Club director disapproved. "They don't need a table like that, Mama," he told me.

"They don't?" I asked.

"No," he said. "If they need a table at all, it would be just a little Oprah table."

"Oprah table?" I asked. "What's that like?"

"It's just a little table, maybe with some flowers on it sort of toward the front, and it's by some chairs," he said. "It's for sort of like a meeting."

"Where did you see that?" I asked. "On Oprah?"

"Yes," he said.

"And the meeting?" I asked.

"It's usually two women," he said.

Of course it is.

Interesting Wordplay

Our kids have been watching a lot of Scooby-Doo lately. My beloved rented a DVD of the first five episodes of the show from the video store a few weeks ago, and they've been into that groovy scene ever since.

This interest has manifested itself in clever word games, usually involving "Scooby speak," in which they start each word they utter with an 'r'. But even that gets a bit dull at times, so they mix it up with nonsensical rhyming words beginning with other letters.

Our daughter demonstrated for me today. She was insisting that she wanted to help me fold laundry (hooray!), but I told her we needed to clean up the kitchen from lunch first.

"Clean up the bitch-bin?" she said.

Some days, that would be a pretty good descriptor.

I Deserved It

This evening before bedtime, my girl and I were snuggling in the hall when I noticed a suspect aroma. I sent her to the bathroom and, as she was situating herself on the potty, I asked, "Is your bottom stinky, honey?"

"No," she responded, looking at me. "Is yours?"

Halloween Warm-Up

I don't know where the notion came from -- perhaps it was the book Clifford's First Halloween, one can never be sure of these things -- but our kids got a bee in their collective bonnet about bobbing for apples. The day they first asked if they could do it, we were unfortunately out of apples. Because they asked so persistently (read: I wanted to make them STOP), I decided to let them try the cherries and blueberries I had in the fridge instead. The bad news: those fruits don't float, leading to a couple of near-drownings.

When next we got to the store, they helpfully reminded me to buy apples and asked me to get out the "bobbing bowl" before we were even out of the car. Because the specimens we had chosen were so huge, I cut them in half to ease the process. It was still pretty impossible for them, but nonetheless, they had a good time.

Every Girl (and Boy) Is a Princess

One of us appears to be enjoying playing dress-up more than the other. Our boy reminds me just a bit of Victoria Beckham in this photo.

HGTV in Her Future?

Our daughter has a decorating style all her own. You might call it "bark deco." She has emptied out her overstuffed stuffed animal bin and has put its contents on display over every flat surface in her bedroom. It's charming, disarming, and hard to dust. (Like I dust.)

An Exciting Afternoon

Despite the 90-plus degree temps today, the kids and I took an outing to an area middle school for a bike-riding lesson. Our not-so-little guy was just about ready to roll on his own, but it's hard to help him build confidence on city streets with bumpy sidewalks and ramps onto and off of the street.

So we took to the track, which had been freshly re-paved, adding to the sweltering heat. Back and forth we rode on one of the 100-meter straightaways, having better luck with balance when the strong winds were at our backs. And quickly, I was running along beside him, reaching out only every so often for a minor course correction. He did it! Even starting and stopping.

Don't tell anyone we forgot his helmet at home.

How About That?

If communication is the key to solid relationships, then our kids are building a firm foundation for a long and beautiful friendship.

They play imaginatively together often -- just about anytime they're not fighting, as a matter of fact -- and when they do, they continuously consult with each other about exactly what it is they're doing.

"How about you're hunting in the forest for a cat, but you find a kitten instead? And how about I'm the kitten?" our girl will say.

"And how about when I find you, we both curl up in the chair and you pretend you're sleeping, and I'll sleep next to you?" our boy will respond.

It goes on and on like that, the two of them "how-abouting" over and over until they agree on a scenario to play out.

I'm glad they're collaborating. It's a lot better than any other option I can think of.

Words I Never Thought I'd Say

Early this morning, I was outside watering plants, a fact to which I alerted my children so they wouldn't wonder where I was when they noticed I was gone.

Since they had been engrossed in play, I wasn't expecting them to wander out to find me, but naturally, they did. Such is the allure of a mother.

Fortunately, I had progressed to the front yard by the time they ambled out the front door, dressed inappropriately for the outdoors.

"You can't be outside in underwear and a boa!" I said.

And that was to our son.

Curious

We got a sitter last night so that my beloved and I could enjoy a luxurious TWO-HOUR dinner at the Appollon, this great Greek place in downtown Appleton. With conversation veering from his upcoming milestone birthday to our wedding almost eight years ago, we had a wonderful time.

And we came home to discover a wonderful surprise. Our sitter had made brownies with the kids and had done all the dishes, many of which remained in the drying rack. What could be better than coming home to a clean kitchen?

This morning, when I was putting the dishes away, I found my potato ricer in with the mixing bowls and measuring cups. Puzzling. I haven't used it in years, so at least it saw some action...whatever it might have been.

Just Mom and Me

I usually reserve this space for writing about my kids, but today I'm going to write about me being a kid--my mom's kid, in particular.

You see, Dad's gone on his annual fishing trip to Canada, which leaves Mom gloriously alone for a week. My use of the word 'gloriously' should communicate that she loves it...not the absence of my father, but the solitude of living alone that she never really had moving from her childhood home to her marital one at 21.

I almost felt guilty asking her to share her alone time with me, given how rare it is. But I did, offering to take her out to dinner. She suggested we stay in instead, eating take-out Chinese on her new patio.

I'm so glad she had that idea, because it was fantastic to sit beside the new fieldstone fountain looking out at the old yard that I knew and loved so well. Mom had a vase of cut flowers on the table, got out some funky triangular plates, and poured us each a glass of wine. We ate, periodically checking the jars of pickles she had been canning when I arrived to see if they'd sealed. (When I walked in the back door, the smell of garlic, dill, and brine took me back about a quarter-century in an instant.)

After we'd finished our meal, we toured the gardens...beds that have multiplied exponentially in the time the four of us girls have been out of the house. We talked about which plants were thriving and which were failing, and what ones might be divided and shared this fall or next spring. Then we stopped and picked heaping handfuls of raspberries, carried them back to the table, and ate them with our fortune cookies, both of which held messages about adventure.

What an adventure motherhood and daughterhood are! Some of our efforts thrive, some fail, but like the perennials in my mom's garden, there's always plenty to share.

Busted

After emptying the dishwasher this morning, I stepped into the dining room, where the kids were practicing letters at the table (it's almost back-to-school time!). There, I was hit with a barrage of most unexpected questions.

"Mama, what is the Easter Bunny really?" our girl asked.

"What do you mean?" I said.

That's when Mr. Inquisitive piped in. "I think it's the mommies and the daddies, and they sneak out at night (there was cartoonish tiptoeing pantomimed here), get the treats, and sneak back in," he said.

"Hmmm," I said, not really prepared for this conversation in early August. "What's got you thinking about that?"

"Well, it's like a magician does magic TRICKS and not real magic, Daddy told me once," our boy said. "And sometimes they make a rabbit come out of a hat. But I think that really, the rabbit is just hidden down in the bottom of the hat (again, cartoonish crouching), and there's a lid over it or something. And then the magician says, 'Close your eyes!' And then he throws the lid off to the side or something and says, 'Open your eyes!' and then the rabbit hops out."

"And what does all that have to do with Easter?" I asked.

"It's just an example of how bunnies aren't magic," he said. Hard to argue with that, so I punted instead.

"Well," I said, "I think we should talk about this again when it's closer to Easter." And then I gracefully exited, stage left. Smooth.