Reading Marathon

Yesterday Jupiter started to act up at supper. She squished her tomatoes into her water mug, stuck her hands in the water, and spit at me when I told her that's not what we do with tomatoes or cups of water. So she spit at me, and promptly was sent to her room.

I went back in five minutes. She said she didn't remember why she was there, or what we have to do after we hurt somebody.

I went back in five more minutes. When I opened the door she stuck out her tongue and made the raspberry at me.

I went back in five more minutes. I asked if she had something to say to me. She said "sorry." She even looked at me a little bit. I asked if she was ready to give me a hug. She asked me to give her a hug. So I did. Then I carried her back to supper. I fed her most of her salad. Minus the squished tomatoes. She had some candy cane for dessert.

While she ate her candy cane, we sat on the couch together and read the new library books. We read 17 library books. We read them for an hour and a half. She leaned on me. She fell asleep for a tiny minute during the 16th book, but woke herself back up. After the last book, I carried her to bed. She asked me to lay down with her. I did. She asked me to rub her back. I did. And she went to sleep.

Tonight we got it right.

Magic Words

Today when I dropped her off, Jupiter said the Magic Words to me.

"Mom..I don't want you to go."

Yay!!!!!!

Okay, the rational part of me knows that 90 percent of that comment was likely transition related. But she still said the words. I'm happy. It's so much better than the days she literally pushes my backside in an effort to get me out of the door faster. Which she hasen't done in a couple weeks. We've had a nice, regulated, fairly even keel couple of weeks. She's been sleeping through the night most of the time. Oh how that helps.

But today she had a physical day at school. She kicked and pushed at some other kids. I attribute part of that to the fact that she's barely BEEN in school for the last three weeks, what with blizzards and and viral crud and school vacation. The routine she relies on has been unpredictable, and that does not help.

The other part is, I suspect, the one girl in the class whose personality clashes mightily with my daughter's. I know something happened with this girl today, but I don't know what. Jupiter has refused to give details about anything that may have happened between them today, but I know from the angry words spewing from her mouth that something must have. I'm caught between getting her not to say she hates people, and using her words instead of her hands (feet, teeth, etc) to show her feelings. But I know if whatever M did or said made her upset enough, she was likely to be out of sorts for the rest of the day.

A week from Friday I get to go visit the class for the morning. Nope. Two weeks. I can't wait to see, even though it will be just one more thing to mess with the routine.

BTW, when I went out to start my car this morning, it was 4 below. zero. THIS IS MARCH!!! ENOUGH WITH THE COLD!!

Just had to throw in the traditional sick of winter note.

more snow a-comin

It's about to snow. Again. One of Jupiter's classmates mother told me today in church (Family Sunday. No Sunday school. A church full of restless kids trying to be quiet for a whole hour. Or at the least, five minutes. Jupiter went to Communion with gum in her mouth (I grabbed the gum and held it behind my back with one hand while holding my Communion bread in the other hand) and managed to get her fingers in the Communion wine while attempting to dip her minniscule piece of bread in the wine. It was easier when she had no interest in the wine :) ))

Where was I? Oh yeah. Snowstorms. I seem to post a lot about snowstorms. Don't know if that's because I'm whiny, or if it just snows a lot. But Timber's Mom said that they've missed five days of school this year. And they only go three days a week, so that's a fine accomplishment. And tomorrow looks like another one. We're going to get a foot, give or take a few inches, this go round.

Welcome to March. I keep looking at the long range forecast, looking to hit 40 degreees two days in a row. I think about mid March last year, I was actually digging my herb garden OUT of the snowbank in which it was buried, because I was THAT desperate. Even Jupiter is ready. Yesterday she brought her scooter into the house. Today, she wore shoes without socks, and a sleeveless dress top over her jeans to church. I did entice her to change out of the shorts she was wearing, but I wasn't willing to wage a three hour battle over socks and sleeves. She wasn't going to get frostbite, so not worth it. One of the middle school girls was wearing sandals, so I guess the spring fever is becoming epidemic.

This morning I found Jupiter in her room. With the cat. The cat was in the doll umbrella stroller and covered with a blanket. "Mom!! The cat LOVES me now!!!!!" I liberated Autumn Leaf from the doll stroller. What a good cat. She went to hide downstairs for awhile. Good kitty. She's starting to appear more often and let Jupiter pat her..and she even got on the bed this week at bedtime while we were reading. Jupiter thought that was great. And good news...I managed NOT to kill the fish last week when I cleaned out the aquarium. They were kinda laying on the bottom for the while, and I kept thinking, oh please, don't let them BOTH die. But they're both fine now. And we can even see them in the water now...bonus.

Well we're off to go to Home Depot and give them bathroom money. Which I had planned to do tomorrow, but the Weather Channel's MEGASTORM should be in full force then. Maybe we'll make it to the pool for a little while too....I love the sauna part at the end!!

Happy March, everyone!

More snow

So we got another big snowstorm Sunday night. This storm was different from the other storms that we've had this winter because it was heavy, wet snow. The kind to take down trees and power lines..which it did. Fortunately the power stayed on at my house (yipee for being close to the substation and the electricity producing dam. I've decided that when I sell my house, I am going to feature proximity to the electric substation and the El Weir dam prominently in the sales ad. Around here, it's a BIG SELL.). I got up at 4:30 am to shovel, managed to get to work, and at 4:45 PM when we got home, I was working on finishing shoveling. When my Great Snowblowing Neighbor came home from work and fired up his snowblower to finish removing the Great Wall of Snow from the end of the driveway. Just before that, Jupiter pointed out to me the half a maple tree laying on the garage roof. It's still there, at the moment. It's hard to get to at the moment considering the mountains of snow out back. Since there isn't an actual hole in the roof, I'll let it go for awhile.

We have some new neighbors who are moving in up the street. I haven't met them yet, other than a quick wave last night when we were driving by on the way home. I'll have to go introduce myself, because while I was driving by, I happened to notice the license plate on the car was from Iowa.

I lived in Iowa from 1990 to 1995. I went to college in Iowa. And it kind of works like this. Anytime I see a car from Iowa all the way out here in Maine, I assume that somehow I know them. I think this stems from my first fall in Iowa. Iowa car license plates all have their county of registration on the bottom. BTW, in case you're interested, Iowa has 99 counties. I always tried to memorize all 99. I could get up to about 75 or 80. That's the kind of stuff I used to entertain myself with when I was working allnighters at the Super 8.

Anyway, back to the memoir...my first fall in Iowa, my friend and I went from our college town to Des Moines, and while we were walking around I saw a license plate from the county where my friend was from. (She was from a very rural area. And part of the actual Mormon Trail was on her family's farm.) So jokingly, I said, "There's a car from Decatur County..Do you know them?" And of course she did know them. And so I determined that everyone in Iowa knows everyone else.

When I was flying back and forth between the two states, I could count on seeing somebody I knew at the airport in Chicago during the layover. It got so I came close, a couple of times, to not bothering to have someone pick me up at the airport in Des Moines, because the odds were so good that SOMEONE I knew was going to be on the plane. ( I went to the college in my town and worked at the gas station on the town square. I knew just about everyone.).

I've moved back to Maine, but I still assume that if I see a car from Iowa, I will know who is in the car. So driving down my street last night I saw an Iowa license plate, did a double take, and promptly stopped in the middle of the street so I could see what county they were from. Polk County. Which generally means Des Moines. There are a few towns in Polk County that are not Des Moines..but Des Moines is by far the largest. So anyway, if it turns out I actually DO know them, I'll let you know.

BTW, Maine has 16 counties. We even have a song to the tune of Yankee Doodle to memorize all 16 counties which is part of the fourth grade curriculum. I never could make 99 counties fit to the tune of Yankee Doodle. I only ever got as far as "99 counties in our state..Marion, Mahaska."

Today was blood drive day at work; I may be a little punchy from lower blood volume.

Jupiter finally went back to school today...she missed the last Friday before February vacation because she was sick, had all the next week off, and then missed Monday because of the snow. I was afraid she would balk at the seperation for the first time in two weeks, but she did fine. She got some of the Valentines she missed because she was sick, and it was her show and tell day. But tonight she was very tired and the ATTITUDE started to come to the surface. So she rocked to sleep with her music tonight..

She's added a series of hugs and kisses to our morning goodbye routine...I LIKE this routine!!! I hope it lasts!! AND she's been sleeping better at night since the viral crud went away, so I've been sleeping more as well. And it's gotten warm enough she can have some outdoor time. Every bit of that pays off. Tomorrow she goes to the pottery paint shop with B for four hours...better clear off another shelf for a ceramic something that she'll come home with. Gotta love the Free Shelf!!

My favorite baby pic's

referral photo..October 2004

October, 2005

September, 2005

September, 2005

August, 2005

July, 2005

The night we came home. At midnight. 8am Moscow time!!

19 months old. In Ekaterinburg.

Leaving the baby home!!

Leaving the baby home!!

The photos all uploaded in the wrong order, but I tried. I also tried to do a slideshow, but couldn't figure out how to get the slideshow to accept the photos that were already on my computer. It wanted me to send the photos out to the web, and then get them back. Hmm.

But anyway, we were looking at baby pictures the other day, so I decided to post just a few of them for fun. And it gave me a good reason to look at them again :). Enjoy!

Earache

Last night Jupiter woke up around midnight. Her ear hurt. She whimpered about her ear hurting for the longest time, while I cajoled, begged, requested, etc...her to take some bubble gum tylenol so she could go back to sleep. But apparently she no longer likes tylenol. She also does not like orange advil, grape tylenol, anything liquid, or anything remotely ressembling medecine. So we rocked in the rocking chair for awhile, while she cried about her ear hurting and then whimpered for the kitty to come in (who, sensibly, was staying far away from the noise). She didn't go back to sleep while we were rocking, and finally I bribed her with a full Lindt truffle ball. She still hesitated to take the pink tylenol, but finally did. At least two of them...I'm still not convinced that the third one made it to her mouth. Then she talked about missing her Valentines Day party at school on Friday, and she was sad because she missed the "round crackers" they knew they would have. After some more conversation, I determine that they are Ritz crackers. Which we have in the cupboard. So then she wanted Ritz crackers. Then she wanted me to go back in my bed so she could rock and sing her heart out to Troy for the 39 and a half minutes until the tylenol kicked in and she went back to sleep. But at least the singing kept me awake so I could go back in and put the blankets back on her. It's 2:3o before I truly get to go back to sleep.

So tonight, I'm a little tired. Jupiter isn't tired, since she got to have a nice nap this afternoon. I ended up skipping exercise in favor of a nap today, because I suspect it will be close to nine pm before she goes to sleep tonight. And besides, its going to snow overnight, so I get to wake up early to shovel. I intend to dose her with tylenol before she goes to sleep tonight, just on the off chance she'll sleep all night.

I don't know what's up with the medecine refusal. I know better than to try liquid medicine, and after the liquid flagyl fiasco, I understand her reasoning on that. But she's taken tylenol in the past, so I don't know why the last couple weeks she's outright refused to take it. I even asked her if it was more important for her to get her own way, or to feel better. I have about every kind of children's pain reliever known to mom's in the cupboard, and she doesn't like any of them. Her doctor suggested buckwheat honey for cough if she didn't like liquid medicine. But she doesn't like honey either.

Yesterday she used her tball bat to hit balls that I pitched to her. She got some good hits, but does not want me to sign her up for tball in the spring. She even let me coach her a little, when I suggested that she use her eyes to look at where she wanted the ball to go. Otherwise she just closes her eyes, swings her whole body around, and the ball either goes into the snowbank or right at my head, depending on the trajectory. It didn't last long, since it was about 28 degrees and I can't pitch wearing mittens. But it was a fun few minutes.

Spring update in Maine: I smelled skunks yesterday and this morning on the way to work!! You know it's been a long winter when the first smell of skunk is exciting.

Goodbye for now from germ central...

Mr. Monk and Jupiter

Did anyone else see the Monk episode a few weeks back..the one where Natalie made Monk investigate a stolen bicycle and in the process of the investigation Monk got shot in the leg and was confined to a wheelchair?? I think it was the best Monk episode I've seen in a long time. One of my favorite parts was when they dragged Monk off to the scientists house and he was trying to get out of the car. He kept whining..."I can DO it!!!" and trying to get out himself, and then going "I can't do it." But as soon as the others tried to help him, it was right back to "I can DO it!!!!" And I said, "Whoa, it's Jupiter!!" And he blamed poor Natalie for absolutely EVERYTHING, and complained about everything, and Natalie was pushing him up and down the hills of San Francisco in the wheelchair (while he sat under a sun umbrella and drank bottled water through a straw) and STILL he complained.
It may be I identified a little with this episode. I saw a lot of Jupiter in this particular Monk. At the end of course, Monk was able to see it wasn't Natalie's fault that he got shot. (and then, it being a TV show, Natalie herself did accidentially shoot Monk in the other leg). And I'm sure at some point today, Jupiter is going to figure out today is the day we were supposed to go to the Children's Museum to see the preview for The Magic Flute, and the fact that we did not go will be my fault. (Still coughing and runny nosed and the snot had blood in it for awhile this morning. So no, we're not going to the Children's Museum.). And on Friday I said she couldn't go to school so she missed her Valentine's Day party. Yes, my fault too. It's tough being 5 sometimes.

Yesterday, Jupiter said something nice to me. We were painting, and I am not, in any sense of the word, an artist. And I said something to the effect of not liking my painting, and she said "It's beautiful."

Whoa. I wondered if she was just being polite...but then again, tact and politeness are not high on her list of priorities. If she thinks your painting is ugly...she'll let you know. So maybe she really meant it.

Today she's been playing the keyboard with her toes....very talented!!