week ending oct 26, 2008:

Week ending October 26, 2008: The picture is of the kids at their final day at soccer clinic in costume, of course.

This week Alex has been having nightmares. I’m sure every kid has a nightmare now and again, but 3 days in a row was troubling to me. I asked a host of questions about school and worries and came up answers like: the thing Alex likes least about school is cleaning up the toys (fair enough), the thing Alex is worrying about is his Daddy’s shoulder (Daddy is going to have shoulder surgery Nov 7). All told Alex seems to be an extremely happy kid. He smiles almost whenever I catch his eye and he has plenty of energy and enthusiasm. Fortunately later in the week the nightmares seemed to disappear as quickly as they appeared.

Chloe was sick on Wed with a sore throat and a fever and then on Thursday she was all better and asked to go ice skating. Alex says he’s never skating again, so he stayed with Grammy Carole while Chloe and I headed to the rink. Chloe was pretty nervous when she got on the ice and she started panting every time I let go of her hand. I’d remind her to take a deep breath to calm down. After a few reminders, she’d stop what she was doing and take her own deep breath every time she started to get wound up. Apparently I was doing some kind of hand gesture raising my hands up and down with the breaths in and out because every time Chloe would stop, she’d do an exaggerated hand gesture as she took her deep breath. She had a good time skating and did a lot of grinning as she got better and better. Shortly afterward we were in the Target parking lot and I gasped as another driver nearly rammed a parked car at high speed. Chloe asked why I’d made that noise and when I explained it she said “you should take a deep breath and calm down Mommy”. I said “thank you Chloe” and she said “you’re welcome!”.

Alex and I started reading some of the books that he got for his birthday that were quite technical descriptions of the science behind various aircraft, especially spacecraft. Alex was riveted. When I came up to turn his light off in his bedroom at night he said “Mom, I’m reading my favorite book. Look at this…” he could barely contain himself enough to get to sleep. That’s my boy! I can’t wait to take him to the air and space museum as soon as we get some free time.

Week ending oct 19, 2008:

Week ending Oct 19, 2008: This week I had multiple conversations with Chloe about why we cannot have a pet dolphin. She has decided that she wants to be a dolphin trainer and I explained that a good way to become a dolphin trainer is to volunteer at the Aquarium like Aunt Tricia did so she could practice and learn about dolphins. Chloe wanted to get started with the practicing right away. Since I wouldn’t consent to a pet dolphin she took to giving commands to her stuffed dolphin and throwing it in the air as though it were doing tricks.

Also this week we saw a butterfly on our zinnia. I called the kids over to the window to see it and they both “oohed” and “aahed” and said it was beautiful. Then Alex looked at Chloe and said “it is almost as beautiful as you are”. Even Chloe was taken aback and asked him if that is really what he had said. He really did!

I’ve explained before how the kids tend to reenact recent events in their imaginary play to try to get a handle on what has happened. Many months ago when one of them threw up, they spent a week pretending to throw up and pretending their toys were throwing up. In the last few months I’ve been noticing them doing a lot of pretending about packing for a pretend trip. Since we went on 4 week long vacations this year and several shorter trips, we do seem to be constantly packing. In their play, the packing is real. They have a whole draw full of back packs and duffle bags and they will pull all of them out and fill all of them to capacity. This week the pretend destination was the Russian Ballet. The real destination was my bedroom in which they emptied the contents of all the bags.

Also this week we went to a corn maze at Greenstreet Growers in Lothian with 8 other kids from our neighborhood: http://picasaweb.google.com/constance.phelps/Greenstreet#

And we went to a birthday party with TWO ponies at which Chloe got no less than 6 pony rides: http://picasaweb.google.com/constance.phelps/NatalieDixonS5thBday#

Week ending oct 12, 2008:

Week ending Oct 12, 2008: This week the twins had their annual “well-visit” with the doctor. Chloe was worried that she’d have to get vaccinations, especially since she had 5 shots last year. It turns out that the only vaccination the kids needed was a flu booster and this year they could have the flu-mist nose spray instead of a shot. Instead of being relieved that they wouldn’t have to have shots, both kids were worried about the nose spray. They’ve each used saline nose spray, so I still don’t understand their trepidation. In the end Alex was dead set against the spray, asked if he could have a shot instead. I decided that he’d prefer the nose spray in the long run if he just tried it, but I had to hold him down and the nurse gave it to him while he was kicking and screaming. The doctor is very personable and asked each twin what they wanted to be when they grow up. They were feeling too shy to answer for themselves so I asked Alex if he hadn’t said that wanted to be an astronaut. He said that he’d changed his mind about that because Chloe had told him that if he forgot his helmet, he wouldn’t be able to breathe. I guess we’ll have to talk some more about the training and planning that goes into a space mission.
Chloe asked how we know that the earth is round. I told her about the pictures that have been taken from space, and explained that we first learned that the earth was round when sailors sailed around the world. She asked if they sailed upside down when they were on the other side of the earth. I thought this was a clever conclusion to be able to visualize a sail around the earth like a loop on a roller coaster.
This week the kids heard the song “You really got me now” by the Kinks on the radio and both really liked it. They asked me to play it again. I find that they like a lot of the most popular songs which makes me wonder about the unlearned part of humans that makes so many of us like the same songs.
This week we got a 2nd guinea pig from the rescue to keep the 1st one company. We’ve read that guinea pigs, especially females do better in pairs. Chloe decided to name the new pig Princess Dandelion. PD looks very similar to Princess Smiley.

week ending oct 5, 2008:

Week ending Oct 5, 2008: This week the twins turned 5. On their actual birthday, a Friday, I let them eat doughnuts for breakfast, took them to Chuck-E-Cheese for lunch, brought ice cream cups and pudding cups into school (no cupcakes allowed), then Daddy came home an hour early for work and they opened the presents from us. I wrapped the presents the night before their birthday and left them in the dining room for them to find, but I had explained the night before that we weren’t opening presents until Daddy came home. In the morning Alex lay down next to the pile of presents and just stared at them. When I walked over, Alex said “Mom, I can’t help loving my presents” and he gave the wrapped boxes a hug. Chuck-E-Cheese is quite manageable at lunch time on a school day and the kids really love it. When I paid for the pizza and tokens I mentioned that it was the twins’ birthday and the employee gave each twin a gold medal and a balloon. A little while later Chuck-E-Cheese himself came out they BOTH ran right over. I think this is the first time that Alex has ever volunteered to get his picture taken with a character (he wouldn’t even stand next to Buzz Lightyear at Disney). At school the teacher gave the kids each a birthday crown that they were still wearing when I picked them up. We got the twins a special birthday present this year, a battery powered ATV. It took no time at all for the twins to figure out how to operate it since it steers like a bicycle.
Between running around at Chuck-E-Cheese and an evening of excitement and presents the kids were so exhausted that they didn’t have any trouble getting a good night’s sleep before the party on Saturday. We ended up with 10 kids and 21 adults of the possible 52 people we had invited. Everything went very smoothly and the kids all seemed to have a great time bouncing on the trampoline, riding the ATV, doing a craft project, playing a game, opening a piñata, and eating cake. I can’t think of a single thing that went wrong. Every time I started doing one of my “hostess chores” (handing out cake, etc) 4 or 5 people jumped in to help. After the twins unwrapped all the presents Alex started right into getting the toys out of the packaging and Chloe ignored all the toys and went back to playing with her friends. Very typical. Alex loves tinkering with toys and Chloe loves spending time with people.
I can’t believe how much they’ve grown up this year. They are getting more independent all the time. Except at bed time when Chloe was exhausted from a day of partying hard she started asking a lot of questions about what life will be like for her next year when she goes to kindergarten in a new school and I get a job. She’s worried about who’ll watch her, and as I hugged her she clung to me and said “I don’t want you to go to work!” I hate to see her worry, and I reassured her that she’ll be ready for the changes and that I’d do my best to make sure she was happy next year, but part of me is touched that she still wants me around.