On Communication, the Occasional Consummate Failure of

A conversation I had with Pete today:

Me: Would you like to read a book?

Petey, assertively: DUCK.

Me, proud as can be: Oh, you want to read about a duck? We can read about the duck. Why don't you go get the book about the duck and I'll read it to you.

When the object of my pride and affection made no move to fetch the duck book, naturally I offered to get it for him and put it on a silver platter. 

Me: You want Mommy to get the duck book?  I could go get the duck book and we could read it. Shall I go get the duck book?

Petey: Duck.

Taking that as a yes, I began a mental review of the options: We could be talking about the one book we own that is actually about ducks, or, and less auspiciously, it could be any of the three dozen others that include ducks  in their subject matter, as does anything ever written by Sandra Boynton.  I made the trek and came back, my arms piled high with books about ducks (fish, geese, cats, rabbits, and Curious George).  

And it was at this point, as I hefted my unbudging offspring without result, that I found out his foot was STUCK in the recliner arm and, presumably, had been for the entirety of our conversation

Scenario

With the advent of self-checkout lines at the supermarket, are you concerned that all those nice checkers could lose their jobs?  Don't be. I am here to assure you that so long as mothers take their children to buy toys and groceries in one fell swoop (and whose bright idea was this one-stop-shopping business, anyway?), checker jobs will be secure.  This is because self-checkout never goes smoothly.  More often than not, some sort of Green Beret style rescue extraction becomes inevitable before the ill-fated shopper can be released from her scanning process. Don't believe me? Picture it like this, and let's just pretend it's me we're talking about.

Scene: I arrive at the final leg of a two hour pilgrimage around Huge-mart.  I am surrounded by my whizzing offspring like a nucleus is plagued by its electrons.  Mona is perched in the cart, high atop a pile of merchandise, her skirts spread decorously around her.  I'm not sure how she is keeping her balance up there on that box of diapers.  All the lines are full.  My heart quails at the thought of having to wait even thirty seconds to get to the car--we already had one potty trip despite all my sinister threats, and another one is looming in the probable future.  Suddenly struck by a flash of creative genius, I swerve left and pull smugly in at one of those empty lanes.

I confront the colorful touch-screen, which recommends that I scan my first item.  After only two or three minutes of searching for the barcode, I successfully swipe it across the counter and am rewarded with a beep. At this point, a Voice gets involved. "Please place the item on the bagging platform," it kindly instructs me.  At the same moment I realize my son is sucking on the cart.  Prying him loose with my left hand, I lob the bag of onions vaguely in the direction of the bagging platform with my right.  My other son sweetly maneuvers himself around so he can help me bag and, in order to make himself more comfortable, takes a seat on the platform.  At this point we find ourselves transitioning into more of a dialogue between me, five kids, the Voice, and (ultimately) the Professional Associate who arrives to save us from ourselves.

Voice, a little panicky: THERE IS AN UNFAMILIAR ITEM ON THE BAGGING PLATFORM. (It doesn't say so, but I know the unfamiliar item is a heavy one.)  PLEASE REMOVE THE ITEM FROM THE BAGGING PLATFORM.

Me: Lewis, don't climb on that. Pete, stop sucking on that.
Voice, somewhat mollified: You may scan the next item.
Michelle: Hey Mommy, where is my new dolly?
Mona: Hey Mommy, I need to go potty.
Lewis: Hey Mommy, what is the bagging platform?
Inge, revolving gaily around me: Hey Mommy, here's the money for my new jump rope.
Me, waving a bunch of radishes and calmly restoring order: EVERYBODY HOLD STILL AND...hey, where did this onion come from?

Let me pause to explain something I have just learned: That (although this onion was a refugee from a previously scanned bag) when self-checking you must never simply set something on the bagging platform because it confuses the Voice. This is, of course, precisely what I went and did.

Voice: THERE IS AN UNFAMILIAR ITEM...
Me: I know, I know.
Voice, disapprovingly: Please remove the item and wait for assistance.
Michelle, skipping back and forth with her dolly: I really love my dolly, Mommy, I really want to get this dolly.
Inge, referring back to a (much) earlier conversation I thought we had put to bed: Mommy, do you think Sea-monkeys have legs?
Lewis, considering deeply: Hey, Mom, I think maybe I should go back and get that fish.

At this point I notice that Lewis has drifted around to the non-bagging-platform side and is trying to scan his fingers.  Inge leans conversationally on the bagging platform to ask a question, and Michelle wonders aloud whether those chips on that display over there might not be a good thing to get as well.  Meanwhile, I still cannot find out how to scan radishes. I send Lewis to fetch the Professional Associate.

Voice, growing a little weary of this: There is an unfamiliar item on the...
Me: Inge, get off of the bagging platform.
Inge: What is the bagging platform?

The Professional Associate arrives, also looking blase.  I am not the first maladroit customer she has helped today, and I will not be the last. She helps me scan my radishes, but I have become disillusioned with this system, and I am ready to go home.  I scan and bag from this point on, to the Voice's evident discomfiture, with a sort of desperate abandon: tomatoes, shoes, toilet cleaner, dollies--all mingle in bags together on that persnickety bagging platform.   I swipe my card and collect my rowdy electrons, and we spin on our merry way out to the car.  I wish I could say that the Voice and I parted on good terms, but that might be stretching the truth. I think next time I'll stick with the regular line.

If you don't know us...

... you might be a little confused by the name changes that just happened.  Explanations can be found on the "us" page.  In summary: we just feel funnier when we go by our proper names.

Notification System, on the Frequent Failure of the:

Having noticed a certain sluggishness of response with the toilet, I approached a group of bystanders--likely suspects all.

Me: Kids, did something get dropped in the toilet?
Nelly, looking like somebody who has suddenly remembered an item likely to be of conversational interest: Oh!  Yes!!
Me: Well? What was it?
Nelly: It was...um... it was one of Inge's headbands.
Me, suddenly aware that there might be more than one time sensitive problem on the table: Which one? Where is it?
Nelly, deep in thought: Hmmm. Well, it was the one...the one that is...well, you know, it was the one that...

She paused, clearly stuck for a description.

Me, ramping up the intensity: Where IS it?
Nelly, suddenly achieving clarity: Oh! It's the one on the bathroom counter that looks a little moist.

Captain Disaster in the Pantry with the Can Opener

When Captain Disaster disappears for more than thirty seconds, a rescue party has to be dispatched to find him. Their stated goal is to learn just how much of the house he has destroyed at speeds worthy of a special ops team, and to recover him bodily to the home base.

Often the process of location is prolonged into a series of tantalizing discoveries that may be either hopeful or sinister. For instance, it may happen that he is neither climbing the pantry shelves in search of edible goods nor in the bathroom; better yet if there is no water on the floor. Check those finds off on the hopeful side, but a choice then lies before you. You must next determine whether to hone in on the back of the house (death by electrocution, death by falling off the horse, the bunkbed, or the stairs, and death by choking on legos), or the front (with its knives in the dishwasher, its climbable tables and bookshelves, and--most horrifying of all--its litterbox).

Weigh the choices carefully, but not for long.  It will always be worth your time and division of manpower to send a scouting party upstairs.  Meanwhile, he isn't messing with the bird cage.  That's good; shut that door behind you and check the girls' room off the list.  Astonishingly, he isn't on the stairs. That leaves Mama's room and the boys' room.  In this particular instance, a glance in the latter reveals our missing man, wearing a flamboyantly guilty expression, holding a bar of soap he swiped from the bathroom, and hastily plugging in the fan.

A Little Nap

Today I thought I would lie on the floor and take a little nap.  Not really a nap, properly speaking; more of a horizontal hiatus in between activities.  The only potential glitch was the company I was keeping.  And indeed, during the course of a two-minute rest:

Buttercup climbed on my back (in my sleep I told her to get off).

Columbus climbed on my back. (I ignored him because telling him to get off does no good.)

Buttercup and Columbus together climbed on my back.

Columbus made me a gift of several crayons, and since I didn't seem to be appreciating them he tried to poke them into my eyes, evidently reasoning that that way if my eyes ever opened up I would see the crayons first thing.

Buttercup gave me a nice back scratch, and coincidentally, Columbus discovered that the pastime of nipping my shirt up by about six inches and putting his cold fingers on my back elicited an attention-grabbing response.

Columbus found a brush and brushed my hair while Buttercup finished my spa treatment.  Naturally this involved both of them sitting on my back.

The nap ended when I felt a small body snuggle endearingly up against me.  It was Buttercup. She nestled against my side so that we were essentially nose to nose.  Then, oh so delicately: "Mommy?" she breathed.  I opened my eyes to see her sparkling and not-at-all restful ones, only about an inch away.  "Yes?" I asked resignedly.  She smiled. "Your lipstick's comin' off."

A find!

I really, really like this book.  We don't own it yet, but we will:

Books You Should Read

Book time!  Here is a recommendation from each of my people:

From Columbus, his favorite book. If he sees you standing still, chances are good that he will coming running with this:



From Buttercup. We gave her this for her birthday and it kept all five children and me riveted.  The illustrations are beautifully drawn--gorgeous, in fact; and the fearful dragon as horrid as could be hoped. We all have a new respect for St. George, and (what's even better) got a new and non-Disney princess to add to our repertoire of princesses we want to be:



From Tinkerbell, who read this all by herself during naptimes. It is a fun, simple story with sweet, line-drawn illustrations.



From Luigi. A book he just finished, and liked almost as much as Tintin and Asterix:

Om-Kas-Toe Blackfoot Twin Captures Elkdog autographed 1992 paperback

But for the sake of a good picture, here's another:



From Petunia, who is working on this right now. To my surprised delight, it actually has the same illustrator as St. George, above.



We have begun to acquire quite a library, and at the moment I'm glad to have it chock full of recommendations from this curriculum supplier/advisor, because their book lists are invariably top-notch.  But we always stay on the lookout for more, more, more to read.  I hate nine out of ten books the kids find at the library, so in my book (heh heh) personal recommendations are really a must.  What are some of your favorites? And which of your kiddos has you chronically challenged to find something new? Petunia keeps me hopping, because she can casually knock off two or three books per afternoon rest.

Taking Sunshine for a Ride

What started out as a little stroll around the neighborhood yesterday afternoon turned into our thrill of the week.  Here is the story, embroidered a little arbitrarily with photos.

It begins with deceptive simplicity, as so many stories do. We were out for a walk. On that walk Columbus discovered something I wish he hadn't: namely, that if he can squirm free of the stroller, he has carte blanche and can go where he likes.  What you can't see in this picture is me behind the camera, juggling the camera and the now redundant stroller.

Always a girl with a keen eye out for birds, Petunia spotted a chunky little yellow guy hopping along the ground; and here is where my photos become, for a moment, sadly inadequate.  I failed to snap a shot of the yard, the Jehovah's Witnesses, and our collective involvement with them, their van and their notebooks; or even of the pervasive fluster when it was first discovered that the bird had a broken wing and couldn't fly; but I will just mention that keeping track of three kids, an incoming phone call, a walking baby, a hurt bird on the move, a slippery camera phone, two informational missionaries, and a bike, got a touch dicey before it was all done. We almost left the bike behind.  

The missionary ladies were good for two things. They told us our hurt bird was a grosbeak, and they told us to call WSU's Veterinary Hospital.  Which (having several attentive small people closely observing our every move) we did.  Half an hour later, we had met some new neighbors, charged en masse all over a backyard not our own, and contained a fat yellow bird in a box labeled for beer.  

He turned out to be a friendly, inquisitive little fellow...

...who only got away once and enjoyed the ride almost as much as we did.  

I explained all about wildlife preservation laws and the host of reasons why we couldn't keep a wounded grosbeak, especially not in the cage with our parakeet.  That topic had still not been dropped as much as an hour later, and since I had felt all along that I should pick my battles, the bird was first named Sunshine--a name wildly unpopular with the backseat bourgeoisie--and then hastily renamed Peanut, for reasons as yet not fully understood.  By this time we were at the hospital and it was too late to change his name again.  We handed him over to an assistant named Cody, who, it turns out, has her own wounded pet grosbeak at home. A female.  If Sunshine-Peanut is unable to be mended, the likelihood of him finding true love at Cody's house is very high.  

He sat on Cody's knee, and on Petunia's shoulder, and we said our goodbyes and went home. As we exited the hospital we met a guy from the Raptor Club, and an owl named Sprite. 

We talked to them extensively, and beyond extensively, until I disengaged us from the fascinating spectacle of a man wearing an owl. 

On the way home we stopped to smell the bears. You can't see the bears in this photo (neither could we see them in person) but I promise they were there, stalking around somewhere behind the thirty-three layers of chainlink fencing.  

I would love to pretend that days like this are a direct result of my vibrantly creative approach to homeschooling.  But the truth is, although it might have something to do with having a lovely, flexible afternoon schedule, they really aren't.  

Trying again

Take two

A test

Of blogging from the phone.

Cooperation

Just found this cat

and this boy

involved in a project together--two souls with but a single thought.  They were pretty sure that if they opened Buttercup's bottom drawer and dumped out all the clothes on the floor, they could then step into it and climb up where they could reach the bird.  

Announcing New Category: The Hot Tip

I am making no promises about what kinds of hot tips you'll find here, but I do love things that streamline my day, even ever so slightly: such as this.

Another variation on this is to say that whatever kind of rice you may be using, whatever shape of pot you've got, and regardless of how much you want to cook, you can simply pour your rice in the pot, touch it lightly with your index finger, and add water until it reaches your first knuckle. Aside from the fact that you're sticking your finger in your food, isn't that elegant?

And what about you? Got any hot tips for me?

Funny Photos

Just a couple of funny photos from my husband's site. Thanks, hon!

I love the looks on their faces.  Did you ever see a better expression of small boy bliss?

And here, I mostly just think it's great that the girls are working so hard while Luigi looks on.  Upper management, anyone?

Book Recommendations

We read a LOT around here.  I have been featuring some of our favorites up on my sidebar, but I'm thinking of changing that.  From now on I will do an occasional post with links to some of our top recommends, and tell you what we thought of them. I'd love to hear about yours in return.

To start things off (and to see if I know how to put a link in a post) here is one of the all-time best--yes, yes, in my opinion--for toddlers:

I must have been reading this book on average at least ten times a year since my little brother was three.  He's a pretty old guy now, so that's a long time; but I am still not tired of it, and chances are, never will be.  The illustrations are adorable and I venture to say there is not a three-year-old or a three-year-old's auntie alive who would not be intrigued by the story.



Now, your turn. If you were to be stuck on a desert island for 24 hours with just a toddler and a book...which book would you want?

A Little After the Fact

Don't ask why it has taken me three months to post this, I really don't know.  But between Thanksgiving and Christmas the kids all had chickenpox.  It was the most convenient set-up I could have imagined.  Columbus got his bunch just as Pietro and I were leaving on a little getaway for our tenth anniversary. They were awful, truly awful; he had about ten times what you might expect for a little gadget his size.  But that's a separate story.  I was telling you all about the convenience: the easy part was that the other four caught theirs from Columbus, who seemed to have been super-contagious on one particular day because Petunia, Luigi, Tinkerbell and Buttercup all presented with dots together on the same morning. Together they did almost nothing but moan and watch movies in communal misery for the next three days...and then we were done!

But the whole point of this post is that while we had the plague we took a break from the movies to make some gingerbread men.  So of course, we made gingerbread men with chickenpox.

Ornithological Metaphors

Hope is the thing with feathers 
That perches in the soul, 
And sings the tune -- without the words, 
And never stops at all,


And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.


I've heard it in the chillest land,
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.


~Emily Dickinson

A lovely poem, from a familiar poet.  


And I am here to tell you that Consternation is also a thing with feathers.  It perches on a finger and says a number of desperate and searching things when its tail is grabbed and held--with what no doubt feels like a state of permanency--in a one-year-old's chubby fist. 


On a separate note, a one-year-old's chubby fist can be uncommonly hard to pry open, when you are trying not to damage your parakeet's pride and joy.   

Captain Disaster

Around here, Columbus sometimes goes by "Captain Disaster."  This is a new experience for me. I have not had a Climber Type before.  They say smart birds (and some monkeys) can figure out how to use specialized tools to get food out of an oddly shaped container.  Well, Captain Disaster uses tools to get tools, and seemingly all for the direct purpose of self-annihilation.  Did you know that the mere procurement of a stool allows a very short person to: 

...Reach the birdcage and hurl it onto the floor?

...Find knives in the sink.

...Reach much too much in the bathroom.

...and climb with ease onto the table.  Or the piano.  

(Here is a closeup:)

On the bright side, chairs and stools are wonderful because they let you say goodbye to Daddy from the window in the morning. 

And now, if you'll excuse me, there is probably a small person I should be looking after. 

Threat

This bird should be alarmed.

Classy Winterwear

Reading in Bed

One of the beautiful things in life.

Instantaneous Realizations

Maybe it's because I don't have time for lengthy realizations these days, but I do get a lot of instantaneous ones.  Here is a noteworthy one from this morning:

"MOOOOM! He's spilling the water so he can taste it!!"

and

"MOOOOM! He's spilling the glitter so he can taste it!!" 

sound remarkably similar from two rooms away. Their ramifications, however, are worlds apart.

Breakfast

I found out once again, about twenty minutes before breakfast this morning, how passionately non-positive most of my people are about oatmeal. Add what I will to it--apples, cherries, almonds, fresh pears--it only makes it worse.  Buttercup loves it. Everyone else would rather start out Monday with a sock in the nose.

We made these instead and had an immediate consensus: They were delicious. http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Orange-Oatmeal-Muffins/Detail.aspx?prop31=1

Because I love it when other people do this:

Here is what we are (probably) having for dinner this week.

Chicken parts roasted on a bed of sweet potatoes (olive oil, sea salt, whatever herbs I find in the drawer)

Sloppy Joes

Persian beans and rice

Minestrone

Steaks on the grill with roasted red potatoes

We have this puzzle

And all I want to say about it this:  This perverse child's toy has two features.  The batteries last for.e.ver, much longer than any other batteries you will have ever seen, and it is also acutely sensitive to light.  Should you lose a rooster, say, or even a cat or a duck, and should you have taken the precautionary measure of tucking it under your bed inside a box, prepare to be annoyed.  When the light changes, the rooster will crow.  If the sun goes behind a cloud, the cat will mew.  Let someone walk past your bed in the middle of the night, and the horse will go off.  If you're thinking of getting a new puzzle, I would recommend avoiding this one.

Dinner tonight...

...was super-gourmet: cheese toast with jam, and fried eggs on the side.  Can't get much simpler than that, right?