Hats

As I was beginning to cook some vegetables for dinner tonight, Matthew spotted my 2 colanders in the cupboard where I keep the pots and pans. He looked at them and said "Hats!" He then pointed out that there was a big hat for Mommy, and a "baby" hat for Matthew. Well, sure enough Matthew you are right. In case you are wondering, I did have to wear my colander while cooking, but then I got this fun self portrait of the two of us, and then this shot of Matthew posing and saying "cheese" with his hat.


This is Matthew taking a picture of me in my hat. Not bad really! I weeded out the 7 shots of my arm, the rug, and my feet before we got this one.

Administrative Note, or Why Kristi Needs More Love

Greetings family and friends. A little note from moi to let you know that I finally figured out how to change the settings on this blog so that it would NOT require you to register a login name and password with Google in order to leave a comment at the end of one of my blog posts.

So...now if you would like to respond to something I've OH SO CLEVERLY written, please click on the highlighted "comments" section at the end of the post, and input your comment, selecting the "anonymous" option below the comment box. Grandma...Grandmere...I know you are out there!!

Love,
Kristi

Things you can train your child to do, or why I'm a terrible mother

Yesterday: Well Matthew got home from his weekend at his dad's with a singleminded focus upon acquiring more Cars. He took a 3 hour nap and I noticed on the monitor that upon waking he was sitting up in his bed...quietly...for several minutes....waiting. Eventually he called out to me and I went in, and he asked me to "turn on light".

Of course he was referring to the Magic Light, the special light I have in his room hooked up to a timer that turns on at 6:00am and is Matthew's signal that it is OK to call out and wake his Dear Mama up. (This is only necessary due to Matthew's tendency to wake his Dear Mama at ungodly hours earlier than 6:00am, and was recommended by a work colleague whose brother used it successfully with his son...and by successfully I mean like 7:00am but hey, I'm being realistic here and 6:00am is as good as it's gonna get in my house.) The Magic Light only works with occasional reinforcement via reward...with a poster and stickers and prizes. I know, I know, I am bribing my child. So sue me. You wake up at 5:15 for 9 days straight and then tell me a little bribery isn't a good idea. But I digress.

So Matthew asks me to turn on the light. I accomodate him. He then asks for a Car. (I may have mentioned in an earlier post that we are currently in the midst of a session of remedial Magic Light training and the prize per day is a new Cars matchbox car.) I tell Matthew that the Light and the Cars only work for nighttime and mornings and he cries big crocodile tears of sadness at the injustices of the world.

So nighttime comes and as I tuck Matthew in I remind him that if he is quiet and lets Dear Mama sleep until the Magic Light comes on, he will get a sticker for his poster and a NEW CAR. (Yes, it's Snot Rod but HE does not know that.) What I FAIL to do is change Matthew out of his pull up into a real diaper.

Today: I sleep the sleep of the innocent (little do I know) until approximately 6:00am when a sweet little voice calls out "Mommy" over the monitor and wakes me up. A glimpse at the monitor confirms the room is light, the Magic Light is on, and Matthew is sitting up in bed. I grab Snot Rod and head downstairs and into his room. Matthew says 2 things to me, in this order:

1) Mommy I get New Car!

and

2) Mommy I ALLLLL Wet!

So my Precious Child (because Dear Mama forgot the diaper last night) soaked through his pull up, his pajamas, the sheets, blanket, and mattress pad during the night, and was thoroughly DRENCHED in urine this morning. But because this child desperately wanted that NEW CAR, he sat in that soak for goodness knows how long until that Light came on and did not utter one peep of complaint.

That's why I'm a terrible mother. Because apparently I can train my child to sit in his own urine without complaint if the price is right. Grrreeaaatt.

Since I've been asked

Since my last post I've been asked by several people whether "the people have come yet". I feel the need to report that, yes, I have ordered Snot Rod but no, "people" have not come yet to deliver him. I think you all don't truly appreciate the all things cars/trains/planes existence I'm living, so I thought I'd go out and find a good picture of Snot Rod to share with you all. Here's one courtesy of the Disney Pixar website (wonder how many copyright laws I'm violating here?)

By the way, Matthew's going to LOVE this...when I went to copy this image onto my computer there was an option to save the picture as my desktop image. There's now about a 14" version of Snot Rod on the desktop monitor...COOL!

Who are these "people", anyway?

First, some background. Matthew has taken to calling any person or group of people whose name he doesn't know "people". As in (referring loudly to the checkout clerk while we are in line at Target), "Mommy, what is that people doing?" Well, apparently, "people" also now refers to the mysterious forces at work beyond the walls of our home who might be called upon to provide aid in circumstances beyond Mommy's control...

As many of you know, Disney Cars (the movie and all things related) is Matthew's current passion. We were reading a Cars book before naptime and Matthew spent most of the book pointing out the car characters that he does not yet own (in the die cast matchbox version) and really wanted. The car catching his current passion is a character called Snot Rod (thanks, Disney) which is a subsidiary character that sneezes fire and causes mischief.

He knows that I have a hidden supply of Cars cars that I am currently using as remedial training and reward if he "sleeps in" til 6am when the Magic Light comes on and thus launched this conversation:

Matthew: Mommy have Snot Rod?
Kristi: No, Matthew, Mommy doesn't have Snot Rod. I have some other cars, but not Snot Rod.
Matthew: Matthew want Snot Rod. Matthew want to play Snot Rod.
Kristi: Well, maybe some day you can get Snot Rod.
Matthew: People have Snot Rod?
Kristi: Well, I'm sure somewhere, some people probably do have Snot Rod.

At this point Matthew jumps off the couch and I am pleased that I have satisfied him and ended the conversation. Oooh no. Matthew runs to the front living room window and looks outside.

Matthew: People coming?
Kristi: WHAT?
Matthew: People coming Snot Rod?
Kristi: What? You mean are people coming to bring you Snot Rod?
Matthew: Yeah! People coming Snot Rod Matthew?
Kristi: No Honey. People are not coming.

Matthew went off to take his nap a few minutes later and wouldn't you know, the first thing he asked me when he woke up is "people come yet?" Guess I'm getting online and ordering Snot Rod off ebay...

Valentine's Gifts

One of the very sweet things about Matthew is how appreciative he is (and how excited he gets) when he receives a gift. He loves the opening of a present, and the new gift is "oohed" and "aahed" over, and immediately warrants extra special attention. In fact, on Christmas Day this year, the gift unwrapping took from about 6:30am until mid-afternoon because Matthew insisted on stopping to play with each new present he got before continuing to unwrap new gifts.

I was under the weather (a cold) on Valentine's Day...so the presents that POGG and Mormor had sent home with me for Matthew were forgotten until yesterday. So I made a big production of yesterday being Valentine's Day (it'll really be too bad once Matthew can read a calendar...) and we unwrapped gifts. Here are a couple of video clips of him enjoying his new Cars book from POGG, and opening his present from Mormor (in the Mormor clip, he hasn't even gotten to the "real" gift...but the box of candy hearts was a BIG hit!).




We rationed the candy hearts throughout the day...but they were gone by day end. Today when he asked "more candy!" I had to explain that the "Candy is all gone." A sad day.

Love,
Kristi

ps. Just so you all don't think I live in a pigsty...after reviewing these videos I feel the need to point out that shortly before opening his presents, Matthew was playing the "lets dump out the full laundry basket of clothes all over the dining room floor" game. It was on its way to the basement into the washing machine. I don't usually just have clothes lying around the dining room like that. :-)

Happy Valentine's Day!

Before vs. After

I can't remember the last time I worked so hard...or accomplished such a visible change in such a short amount of time. We descended on Grandma's house on Wednesday morning and started scrubbing floors, cleaning miniblinds, dusting ceiling fans, and generally de-griming everything we could get our hands on and when we ran out of stuff to clean we started painting, replacing light fixtures, installing new blinds, sewing curtains, and decorating. When we were done it looked like a new house!

Here are some before and after pictures. The kitchen before....

The kitchen after....

A view of the living room (looking into the dining room beyond) before....

The dining room after.....

I don't have a "before" picture of the master bedroom...but here is the "after" picture. Trust me, it's an AMAZING improvement!

So...if you know of anyone who wants a 3 BR/ 1.5 BA house in Fresno, CA....you know where to call! It's ready to go, we just need a buyer.

Swinging

On Saturday before Dad left we went to the park again...and he took this picture of Matthew and I on the swings. Not your typical "on the swings with your kid" picture!

Yesterday we had 2 more inches of snow, and tonight is a dense fog that has Midway airport totally shut down. Tomorrow night and Wednesday they are predicting another snow storm with 3-6" of snow, so everyone keep your fingers crossed that I will be able to get out of O'Hare Wednesday morning for my trip to Fresno. This will probably be my last post until I get back, but stay tuned for updates from the major home repair/redecorating/staging weekend!

Super Fantabulous Fun in the Snow

When I made my list of things I love about Chicago earlier in the week, I forgot to add one...Snow! I love snow! We got a storm Thurs/Fri that dumped 7-8" and it's GREAT. I don't care that it's hard to drive in, a mess to commute in, it's FUN! Growing up in California snow had associations with Christmas vacations in the mountains, skiing, and other super fun memories, and the associations for me are still there. And snow and kids are a terrific combo.

The timing with Dad's visit was great, so I took yesterday afternoon off so we could head to the local park (home of Oak Park's only sledding hill...2 blocks away!) and boy did we have a blast.

Check out the video evidence of Dad and Matthew taking a run down the sledding hill. Turns out you can get up quite a bit of speed on that hill!

Matthew was a bit ambivalent about both the excessive speed and also the snow spray kicked up by the run...here's the "after" photo at the bottom of the hill...

After the one run down the hill Matthew pretty much decided to avoid vertical descents on the sled in favor of horizontal pursuits....which he found thrilling but were a lot more exhausting for me and Dad. Somehow, Dad still found ways to make the experience more exciting for Matthew (see next video)...




Dad and I took turns pulling Matthew around...and around...and around on the sled. By the end, Mommy was tired!

It was a great, great day in the snow.