Ten things we did this weekend

1. Jack had his 5-year-old checkup. It included a finger prick (he cried a lot), four shots (more crying), and peeing in a cup. Since he'd gone before we left, that wasn't easy for him, nor for me with him, Kate, and a cup in a tiny bathroom. Got it on the second try! For the shots, they gave him the first one, and he wailed and writhed on the table, at which point they brought in two more nurses -- one to hug Jack tight so he wouldn't move too much, one at each arm to administer the shots. Ouch. Over the nurse's shoulder (I was holding Kate), I tried to tell him it would be OK and smile reassuringly. He'd have none of it, instead looking at me with an anguished "Why? WhYYYYY!" in his eyes. Afterward, he got a bunch of sticker, as did Kate. And gummi bears at home.

2. I played dodge ball in Port Chester, a fundraiser for local schools. Emily and the kids arrived moments after my first game, and left moments before my second game, 45 minutes later. The timing was poor. The next day I described it to Jack in vivid, semi-accurate detail, which he enjoyed.

3. We had family over, Emily's cousin Marik and girlfriend Maureen. Jack and Kate were both shy at first, but by the end Jack was putting his blue toy lizard on Maureen's shoulder, which I take to be a sign of kindness.

4. Jack and Kate played with their cousins at both Cathy's (prior to dodge ball) and our house (the next night). Kate said hi to Ian, which is a step for her; she's equally fascinated by and wary of him. He said she seemed pleased when he said hi to her: "The monster spoke!"

5. Jack and I drew pictures together. We took turns making dinosaurs on a page, and then their skeletons. So if you drew a picture of a T-Rex, you also had to draw a T-Rex skeleton. This extended to our next picture, which included random animals like a fox. Jack draws a cute fox skeleton. I realize it sounds a little odd.

6. We went to Luciano's birthday party. It was basically kids running around a large gym at a New York Sports Club, playing games led by gym employees. For the most part they had fun, it seemed, although Jack did lament afterward, "It was fun, except you had to sit and listen to what they told you to do." Jack's a bit of a ham; every once in a while he'd look over from running or dancing and give us a goofy smile and a big wave.

7. We had various meals. Jack ate well; we think he's in the midst of another growth spurt. Kate ate sporadically; she's into grazing breakfast and lunch, eating some, saying she's all done, wanting to come back 10 minutes later to eat more. A little aggravating.

8. Jack and I went to the grocery store. We used this scanner which totals your purchases as you go; I'd never done it before but Emily recommended it and Jack insisted. Took me a lot longer but Jack had fun pointing it at things. I would like to believe we only paid for things we actually put in the cart, but it's hard to be certain.

9. I did puzzles with Kate. She's getting better at them; it used to be just me doing them, essentially, but now it's her.

10. Sung both of them to sleep last night, Kate with Itsy Bitsy Spider (she sings along, "Pie....der..."), Jack with Swing on a Star. Kate woke up and babbled away for a while, but it still felt like a job well done.

Evening

Emily had to go into the city the other day, and got home late, so I got both kids, gave them dinner, and put them both to bed. Here's a quick recap of how it went.

5:15 p.m. Jack's class is in the tumble room, basically a gym at daycare where they run around, climb on things, and ride little cars or push big bouncy balls around. I wave to him and head off to get Kate, since he has fun in the tumble room and dragging him around for everything makes it all go slower.

I go to Kate's room. She sees me, yells "Daddy!" and runs over with her arms out. It's always nice. I gather her lunch and jacket and hat and sleeping toy. She always wants to carry her lunch and sleeping toy, which I extricate from her just to get her jacket and hat on. Sometimes the hat stays on, sometimes she pulls it off. Sometimes it ends up over her eyes. "I can't SEE," she laments. I fix it.

We go upstairs to Jack's room and collect his lunch, jacket, and hat. Exchange pleasantries with other parents. I know some names, others I know merely as "Olivia's Daddy."

We collect Jack. It's a chaos of sheets to sign, jackets and hats to get on, lunches and sleeping toys to keep track of. And that's just Jack and Kate; other parents show up too with similar baggage. I ask if Jack napped, always important because it makes a difference of about an hour in his bedtime.

We walk to the car, both of us holding Kate's hands. Clamber in. "Can we hear Poker Face?" asks Jack. The Lady Gaga CD is a little too omnipresent in our lives these days.

At home, the kids run wildly around the house while I assemble dinner. This is sometimes fine (they play with toys that are out) and sometimes not (they dig out new toys and create a huge mess, often resulting in lost pieces, instructions, that kind of thing). Every few minutes it's guaranteed that one of them comes in wanting water (OK), goldfish (No.), dinner (Soon.), or help finding a lost piece or instructions.

6 p.m. Dinner. Jack normally eats well, Kate, eh, sometimes yes and sometimes no. I bribe them to eat more with the promise of gummi bears. Hate to resort to this, but sometimes I do; kids gotta eat.

6:30 p.m. Bathtime. Kate tends to complain too much. I put shampoo on her head. "OWWWW!" she says. I wash her face. "OWWWWWWW, DAddy!!!!" Good grief, Kate. I do the shampoos early, then let them play after that. Then wash the rest of them (down as far as possible, up as far as possible, then wash their possible, thanks Mom).

I get both out and wrap them in towels. I dry Jack and send him off to his room to get into his pajamas. Sometimes he's quick about this, sometimes I'll find him sitting naked on his floor 10 minutes later playing with some random toy. Jack, it's freezing, get dressed. I bring Kate into her room to get her lotioned up and dressed. She insists on putting on her own pajama pants, which basically means I get her the rest of the way dressed, go check on Jack, and come back and put her pants on 5 minutes later, collecting them from where she's tossed them after giving up and going to play with some random toy.

I brush both's teeth. Kate occasionally resists. "My turn...ME do it....MY turn.!!!!"

I put Kate to bed. Stories, songs, bed.

Jack napped today, so we head downstairs. We play Toy Story Yahtzee Jr., his current favorite (it's pretty cool, a birthday present), then a little bit with his monster truck set. This is a pretty cool thing where the goal is to vault each little truck into a plastic flame in the middle of a cage. The goal is to hit the fire! Kind of funny.

Jack and I go upstairs to read books. Sometimes these are good, sometimes not; I let him pick the books, unless they're all really horrible choices and I have to sub one out. (I need to draw the line about how often I read "Shark in the Park.") Then it's lights out, at which point he decides he wants some water, naturally. Emily gets home in time to kiss him good night. Good night, Jack.

Outside

Weather has been cold and gray on most recent weekends, or we had plans (holidays, birthdays, etc). But today was relatively balmy; 40s or maybe even 50. Emily was home and Kate was napping, so Jack and I went outside.

In the backyard, we ran around with the football. Jack was Brett Favre, I was Percy Harvin. (These are the two Vikings names Jack knows.) I tossed it to him, sometimes he came close to catching it. He tossed it to me, it crashed into my ankles. We both wore winter hats and jackets. The ground was cold and a little wet, but not bad.

After a little bit of tossing the football, we tossed a little plastic parachutist into the air. It worked better than inside, but the guy wasn't heavy enough to throw it that high. Or I'm getting old, one of the two.

We played tag, kind of, running circles around and around.

We walked to the office park to feed ducks. There were lots of them; the pond was mostly frozen over except for the fountains in the center. The ducks congregated near us as we approached, hopefully. We had a little bread, which was quickly distributed, before the ducks got too aggressive. They seemed hungry; winter. May need to go back soon.

We walked around the water on the pathway. I picked up a rock and showed Jack how the ice wasn't safe to walk on for us, since the ice was thin. "How can the ducks walk on it?" he asked. Well, I said, they're a lot lighter than we are.

We walked up a little staircase and sat on benches. Office workers probably had their lunches there, I explained. I told him not to lean back. We sat in the sun on the benches.

We walked around to the other side of the pond. Looked down on the ducks. Tossed a couple of rocks at the ice. Threw a couple of leaves into the water.

Leaving the water behind, we found some snow. I picked up a snowball and gave him a mischievous look. His eyes grew wide but he laughed. "NO, Daddy!" I tossed it into the water.

We made a tiny snowman. We used little sticks for his eyes, another twig for his mouth, leaves for his arms. I said, OK, let's go. Jack went up to it. "I'm going to kick it over!" I said, aw, no...then, well, OK, whatever. Jack stood close to it, then changed his mind.

"Goodbye snowman!" he said as we walked away. Goodbye, snowman. We walked home. In the yard, we made another tiny snowman, ran around a little more, then went inside for some water and a snack.

Birthday Party

Sunday was Jack's birthday party, and although it was his 5th birthday, it was his first party; at least, first that wasn't entirely composed of family or our friends. This year we decided it was time for a party party, so we rented out a place called "My Gym" in Stamford, invited all his school friends and cousins, and got ready.

It's a bigger deal than you might think; at least, it was to me. I haven't really thrown a ton of parties, especially ones where the guest of honor is a 5-year-old whose happiness and excitement means just about everything. So, I went a little overboard. Multiple trips to every party store in the tri-state area (Phineas and Ferb reference, sorry) for gift bag items -- some with Jack, some on my own. Ordering the cake from Stop and Shop, and going with a full sheet because a half sheet didn't look like enough (it would have been). Getting balloons and other decorations. And then more gift bag items.

Jack and I filled the gift bags on Friday. Naturally, he wanted his gift bag right away. He'd picked out a couple of kooky things, like little bendy smiley face action figures. I'd also picked out some goofy things, like little monster finger puppets. (To my happiness, one of the kids greeted us wearing his at school the next morning; that was kind of cool.) We separated out the boy and girl bags -- boys got Spider-man tattoos, girls got Hannah Montana. I hate to stereotype, but there it is. Jack also felt that the girls should get the yellow and purple finger puppets, and the boys the green and red ones. Boys also got Transformer pencils, girls -- well, this caused me much consternation at the party store. I wanted to get Hanna Montana ones, but they didn't have them. Doesn't Hannah Montana use pencils? Then I wanted Hello Kitty, but they didn't have those either. I knew Emily would frown at the Disney Princesses, and I myself frowned at Tinkerbell (who is apparently big now with little girls, who knew? I was told in the store she had a movie out recently). Anyway, half an hour later I settled on sea creatures - fish, seahorses, that kind of thing.

We got lost on the way to the party. See, I'd never actually been there before. We were supposed to be there 15 minutes early, and in fact we arrived 5 minutes late. Last ones there. For Jack's party. It was a little embarrassing. But, Cathy ran out and we got the kids inside and playing, and I struggled in with the cake the size of a bedsheet.

The place was like a big gym (natch) with colorful mats and circles and things to climb on and big vats of plastic balls and the like. The kids loved it. Kate at first clung to Aunt Cathy, or Emily, before finally getting interested in things like the mirrors, and the plastic balls. Jack was running around with two of his best friends -- actually about 6 months older who'd started kindergarten and thus he didn't see them much -- also named Jack. I was apologizing around for being late.

Every once in a while, the madcap was running around was interrupted by structured activity from the friendly ladies who hosted it. It was kind of nice that they went out of their way to make Jack the center of attention. I realize this was obvious, but like I said, my first party. "Can you all say Happy Birthday, Jack?" "Is that the loudest you can do?" So on and so forth. At one point a lady asked Jack who his favorite superhero was. Inexplicably, no doubt because he was nervous, he said, "Superman." I gazed forlornly at the massive Spider-man cake a few feet away.

They played Tag and Musical Chairs and random stretching, dancing, running in place, dodge ball with huge, people-sized balls...it was nuts. I was exhausted watching. Strangely, none of the kids seemed to be. Kate walked up a slide and tried to slide down the carpeted ramp. That was funny. Everyone did this zipline thing --- wheeee! It was pretty cool.

At one point I looked over and Jack was in tears. It's pretty much a given that it will happen at some point at a party or crowded event. I don't know if he'd fallen down, bumped into something, was hungry -- any of those things were possible. So Emily and I tried to talk him down, and managed it more or less, and then I said, Hey, do you want to see your cake? He nodded, and I picked him up and hoisted him onto a shoulder, which never fails to produce peals of laughter. We went to look at the cake, and after that he was all right. It was a nice moment.

After about an hour or so of this insanity, it was time for cake. The woman had the kids make a line (later, she told Emily it was the most impressive, organized line she'd seen -- that's right, our kids get good learnin' at school) and they headed back for cake. I had ordered half white and half chocolate, which turned out to be a waste -- kids who got white and saw other kids with chocolate wanted chocolate too -- fortunately we had plenty. And those kids were right; the chocolate was a lot better. Blowing out the candles was time consuming -- there was a Spider-man candle, Jack letter candles, and "5" candle. Plus both I and the lady were worried she'd drop the cake as she brought it over. But they managed.

And we had just enough goodie bags.

Driving home, I finally relaxed from the whole thing. It's crazy, I was really stressing out about it. I realize he's 5 and will probably have forgotten this particular party in a few days (if not already), but I wanted it to be awesome for him, and fortunately it was. For one day it was his world, he was the center of attention, and the smiles were all worth it.

"Ladybug RAAAHHHH!" and Jack's birthday

Emily got Kate some ladybug pajamas. Somewhere along the line, Kate got the idea that Ladybugs say "RAAAHHHHH!" like a dinosaur or something. So the other morning, she looks down at her pajamas, and says, "I'm ladybug --- RAAHHHHHH!" Cracked us all up.

Tonight, Jack puts on his Spider-man pajamas. "I'm Spider-man!" And he poses and jumps and pretends to shoot webs. Kate: "I'm ladybug -- Rahhhhhhhh!"

Today was Jack's birthday. He had honey nut cheerios for breakfast, plus raspberries on the side. Arguably his two favorite breakfast things. Went to school, and I spent some time out buying balloons and the like. He came back to decorations, which he immediately wanted to walk around holding. He cut the string on a balloon I'd tied to a chair, then couldn't reach it anymore. I helped.

Hot dogs and fritos for dinner. Cake for dessert. We'll have more cake the next few days.

He made me laugh when I was putting him to bed. We were reading the shark book, which has big pictures of shark, and he'd taken the top of his "gel cling" Christmas tree off his wall. It was a little green triangle with a red circle in the middle (ornament). I said, what are you doing with that? He said, "I want to give the sharks scary eyes. See?" And he placed the triangle over the Great White Shark's eye, giving him a red eye. "Scary eye." And I laughed, and said, you're right, that's pretty scary. He put it over the Hammerhead Shark. "It's scaarrrrryyyyy," he said, dragging it out for effect. I laughed more.

Then he turned the triangle upside down. "Now it's SAD eye," he said. "See? The pointy part is like a tear coming down. Saddddd eye." It was pretty funny.

Chatterbox

Kate, like her Daddy, sometimes wakes up slowly, and is grouchy and uncommunicative for a few minutes or more. As she did this morning. But when she's awake, sometimes, she can't stop talking....

"Happ Bir-day, Jack."
"I want waffle. Do YOU want waffle?"
"I have green apple. You have red apple. I have green apple ....all time!"
"Hi Daddy. Daddy. I have tell you something. Daddy. I have.... tell you something?"
"Sleeper, off? Sleeper off."
"I can't DO this!"
"I have cantaloupe. YOU have cantaloupe? Jack have cantaloupe. Pease?"
"Watch ABCs? I watch ABCs?"

Bedtime for Kate

One of the few times Kate takes an interest in the toys in her room is right before bedtime. It's time to get washed up, or brush her teeth, and suddenly she's fascinated by some toy she's walked right by for weeks.

I separate her from the toy of interest and we head to the bathroom. I get a washcloth wet to wash her face. As I reach it toward her, she says, "Ow! Ow, Daddy! Ow." It's awesome, especially when I haven't come within a foot of her.

I manage to wash her face, and we go back into her room. As I change her diaper, she says, "Elmo? Elmo?" She is referring not to her stuffed Elmo, but rather the kind of diaper she wants. With Elmo's picture on it, rather than Big Bird or Grover. So I find the diaper, and get her dressed in her onesie and pajama tap. But, she wants to put on her own pajama bottoms. "I do! I do it!"

So I sit her down on the floor and she happily busies about putting on her pajama bottoms. I wander off, because this is a 5-minute exercise. Sometimes she puts them on backwards. Sometimes she gets them halfway up, and walks out all proud: "I DID it! I DID it!" And they're still below her butt. Sometimes she turns them inside out and returns to the toy she was interested in earlier. Sometimes I'll hear her: "I can't DO this! I can't DO this!" Eventually, we manage it.

I brush her teeth. This is also a back and forth ("I do it! I do it" and "My turn! My turn"), which gradually gets done. Then it's time to say goodnight to Mommy and Jack, which we do. Sometimes she gives big hugs, kisses, nose rubs. Sometimes she's all coy and runs away. Then changes her mind and runs up and hugs them.

We read stories. Maisy, Goodnight Moon, Backyardigans books, etc. "One more book," she says. Sometimes I relent, sometimes it's too late.

I turn out the light and rock slowly. I begin with Take me out to the ballgame. As I finish, she says, "Sun." So I sing Mister Sun, sometimes she joins in. As I finish, she says, "Moon." I sing Mister Moon. Then: "Edelweiss." I sing that, and we conclude with Eensy Weensy Spider. She says, "Itsee Py-der" with a smile. I sing that, complete with hand gestures, and she chips in a few of her own, raising her fingers up in the air for "up the water spout."

Then I put her in her crib, tell her I love her, and close the door, goodnight.