Vacation pics, Part III

Post-Pocono activities include the amusement park and Bug-Fest (yes, that is Dave working as a beekeeper...)

Vacation pics, Part II

Various Pocono water activities begin with fishing off the dock.

...And the first fish is a real thrill.

Summer Vacation, Pt. 1

The excitement of arrival, plus blackberry picking at a farm in Riverside.

Fresh picked

I suggested that we all go blueberry picking this morning, but of course it was a whim and I had no idea what we were getting ourselves in to. Turns out it was a great call, and we have 13 pounds (yes, pounds) of delicious blueberries to show for it.

None of us had been to the farm before, and we had some vague directions from the web, and when we tried to call no one was picking up the phone, so it's a miracle that we found our way there. The farm was in the boonies, and it took us at least three wrong turns before we found our way to the right place (including driving up a very long driveway next to the farm - so close but not the right one).

When we got there we were all a little hot and irritated, but the proprietor, Farmer Fred, was such a charming old guy (age 87) that we were immediately smitten. He showed us how to tie the big metal buckets around our waist, and then he told us all to hop in the back of his pickup truck and he'd haul us over to the fields. And this is where I am just dying without the ability to post the pictures from my camera. Picture this: Mom and Dad sitting in the very back of the pickup truck, legs swinging off the edge, as the truck bounced along a dirt path. The rest of us sat in the wagon part, trying to avoid injury from the pile of very sharp tools and cans of gasoline rattling around next to us.

And then we got to the fields. There in front of us were rows and rows of the biggest, juiciest, bluest blueberries you've ever seen. Someone was describing them as the size of nickels, but that doesn't even quite do them justice because they were just so darned round and plump and beautiful. We all went to work right away, everyone picking and putting them in their cans; Zach picking and eating as much as he could fit in his mouth.

Farmer Fred had sized up Mom and Dad and declared, "She'll be finished in fifteen minutes. He'll be finished in two hours." And sure enough, within about 15 minutes, Mom had filled up the whole three-pound can, and Dad was still picking through individual bunches looking for only the most perfect berries.

Too bad it was one of the hottest days of the year, because I would have stayed out there for hours, but it was scorching out there in the fields with 90-degree heat and humidity. After about a half-hour of sheer blueberry heaven, Mom summoned Farmer Fred to come and bring us back, and he dutifully drove the truck back and bounced and bumped us all the way back to our cars.

Total take: 13 pounds. Yield thus far: One blueberry pie, five jars of blueberry jam, and two enormous buckets of blueberries (still warm from the sun) just waiting to be eaten.

Please Direct Complaints to the Cookie House

We're back from the Poconos, and how weird it was to spend a week essentially off-line. But even I made out better than Luke, who was going nuts without a computer to do his Lego searches on. This was definitely a do-nothing vacation, for me at least, since I wasn't fishing like everyone else. I generally like a vacation that's a little more retail-intensive, but hey - I managed just fine with a good book, Sudoku, a few boats, and non-stop kid entertainment.

Thanks to Joe, the expert fisherman, just about everyone got a chance to get out there and do some fishing. Luke caught quite a few fish, mostly pumpkinseed fish, for which Joe used a teeny-tiny knife to make a teeny-tiny fillet and fry it in a teeny-tiny pan. Luke's fishing enthusiasm only waned after Joe declared that he wasn't going to let any more fish die unless the boys were going to eat them. Gulp.


I also had a great time hanging out with my getting-bigger-every-minute nephew and niece. Lily is just as sweet as can be, and was a delight to hang out with, especially with Zach, who had his own special bond with her. When he woke up from his nap after they all left, one of his first questions was, "Where's Lily?"

Plus I had a few great rounds of foosball with Sam, who is really an incredible competitor. Even though I was playing hard and not letting him win, he was completely undeterred and wanted to just keep coming back for more. Oh, and he and Luke had a great time hanging out and Lego-ing together. When it was time for Sam to leave, he said to Luke, "Goodbye, brother-I-never-knew-I-had!"

Today was leaving day, and it was one of the few days this week with no rain, so Dave and I decided to take the boys to a local amusement park/waterpark before we headed back. Luke was not the least bit interested in the amusement park rides, and instead headed straight for the mining operation, where you sift dirt through a stream and find colored rocks and crystals. Zach, on the other hand, couldn't wait to get on the roller coaster ("I want to ride the bumpy train!") and cried and cried when the ride was over. On the water park side, Zach and Dave went on a very large chute-like slide that started out several stories high and zig-zagged across the park. Luke didn't care much for the mega-slide, but he loved the different water-squirting operations and he rounded all of us up to go on the "lazy river" water tube experience together. Zach was so wiped out at this point that he barely had the energy to protest that the ride wasn't quite fast or dangerous enough for his tastes.

One of the bizarre little things about the park was a sign at just about every ride, which said something to the effect of, if you get hurt on this ride, please report the incident at the Cookie House. Dave pointed out that they really had you with that strategy - what kind of injury couldn't be cured by a nice chocolate chip cookie? Or maybe two to keep you quiet? They also strategically set up the exit so you had to leave the park through the Cookie House - great deal for kids, right? But luckily both boys were so tired we whisked them right through before they could even ask, "Could I have one of those..." Zach fell asleep in the car before we even left the parking lot. A good day indeed.

Up in the mountains

Lots going on, little time to write, and even less access to a live Web connection, so briefly:
We made it on a not-so-horrible flight to a steamy and humid Northeast.
We had a great swim at the pool.
We went out to our favorite ice cream place.
We picked fresh produce at our favorite little farm - I have great pictures but forgot the camera cord - and Zach ate as many blackberries as he picked, which was quite a few.
On our last morning in NJ I got stung on the toe by a bee and YOWCH! - I forgot how much that hurt.
We're here in the Poconos, in a lake house well-stocked with toys and activities.
We've tried out the rowboat, the pedal-boat, and the kayak, and the pedal-boat seems to be most popular.
It rained all day today but a quick trip to Wal-Mart (I know, yechh, what a way to spend a vacation) cured that - Zach has a new train, Luke has a new Lego set, and Dave and I have magazines and newspapers.
Luke and Dad finished his gigantic Lego set in record time while Mom and I went outlet shopping this afternoon.
Zach is entertaining us all with his funny turns of phrase. When we asked him, "Zach, are you two?" he responded, "No - I'm five and a half!"
Tomorrow: Joe comes with the kids; Luke tries out the fishing pole, and (we hope) the sky finally clears).

Did It!

Tired, tired, tired is the theme of the day, so I'm just going to get this down as fast as possible. I did it, swam the race, made it to the finish line, and lived to tell... I know it feels good to have set this goal and to have accomplished it, but I'm a little sore right now so it hasn't quite sunk in yet.

This first pic is of the race start. We had to sign in at 7:45 but the race didn't start until 9:00, so I had more than an hour to pace and fidget at the starting line. They announced that the women would be starting five minutes after the men, which was great news because the men are notoriously rough (swimming on top of one another, clawing to the front) at the start. I was most nervous about the start of the race, but once I was in the water it wasn't too bad.

Everyone was saying that this was the toughest year in terms of surf conditions that they could recall. People's times were off by 15 to 20 minutes from last year. I felt pretty good throughout much of the race, but I was definitely zig-zagging quite a bit. The worst point was at about the 1 1/4 mile mark, where I looked up and saw a very distinctive blue house on the Strand. "Oh, good, there's the blue house," I thought. So I kept swimming, swimming, swimming, and then I looked up again and I was STILL in front of the blue house. So I kept swimming, swimming, swimming, and then looked up again and I was a little bit BEHIND the blue house. It was like one of those nightmares where you're trying to move but you're completely stuck. Obviously I was stuck in some kind of current (and I learned later that at least one other person had the same problem at that point) but that threw off my mental game quite a bit. From there on in I felt like I was really fighting against the water.


At the finish line there was a woman who was there at the exact same time as me so we sprinted to the end together. Final time - about 1 hour 30 minutes (for 2.2 miles). I had expected to finish in about 1 hour 10 minutes or 1 hour 15, so I was surprised to see that it had actually taken that long.

But the absolute best part was having Dave and Luke and Zach (and Elizabeth) waiting for me at the finish line. Dave got me a beautiful lei of fresh orchids, which was so amazing that I thought things couldn't get any better than that. Then he told me we were going to eat lunch downtown because I had an "appointment" at 1:00. Turns out he booked me for a massage at my favorite spa, where there's a big balcony you can relax on afterwards with fresh fruit, water, and plenty of magazines. Ah, heaven. Now about next year's race...

Vegetable Alien

You know, I was all set to write a monologue on spoons this evening, only to find out that - d'oh! - it's been done. So, it looks like it's gonna be vegetables instead.

This morning Juana and the boys and I went on a tour of a farm, under the guise of "pick your own" watermelon. But here's the difference between a canned farm tour versus a "real" pick-your-own experience: On today's farm tour, we were allowed to walk up and down the rows of watermelon plants and admire them in a non-touching way; then we were shuffled over to where a little pile of watermelons had already been picked, and we got to "pick" our own watermelon from out of the pile. A little cheesy, no? And for this we paid $13 a head?

But it wasn't all a complete waste of time. While we rode in the tractor up and down the fields, the farmhands kept plying us with large handfuls of fresh-picked produce. Of course I expected Zach to partake, but it was a complete - and I mean complete - surprise to see Luke gamely sampling radishes, cilantro, tomatoes, carrots, cucumbers, and green onions when they were passed around. We went to the little farm stand after the tour and Luke insisted that we buy some more green onions. Did you think I would have said no? The funny thing was that I asked him whether he wanted to eat them plain again, or whether I should chop them up and put them on something, and his response was, "Why not both?" It was weird, almost as if a little vegetable alien had done a mind-control job on our five-year-old. Possibly they put something in the soil.

Zach was, surprisingly, a little harder to please. This particular farm tour involved a lot of sitting on the tractor and listening (as opposed to running wild up and down the rows of plantings) and after a certain point, he began announcing repeatedly, "I'm all done with the tractor! I'm all done with the tractor!" while trying to climb off. Of course he was fully enthused with the watermelon sampling, and by the end his pure white t-shirt was a more or less even shade of pink, with dirt streaks up the sides. While Luke and I shopped at the farm stand, Zach ran around a little maze of strawberry plants, and even though I'm almost sure they were not there for the eating, Zach consumed quite his fair share... I'm even thinking it might have been as much as $13 worth.

Sunday is race day!

Another Visit to Krakatoa

It's stupid, and true; I am pretty sure I broke a toe - my second toe-break in two years (albeit a different toe). I am so mad at myself for this happening two weeks before the big race. It happened just as I finished a great ocean swim with some buddies. I was coming into the shore, I started to push off from the bottom just as I got knocked by a wave from behind, and somehow I jammed my second toe into the sand at an odd angle.

I went to the doctor today and he checked it out from every angle to make sure no other bones were involved, and he declared that it was probably a hairline fracture. However, he (sensibly) declined to order an x-ray because the treatment would be the same whether it was broken or not and he'd rather not see me waste the money or get the extra radiation. Now I just have to stay off it as much as possible (haha! joke! after I've been up and down the stairs 17 times today already!) and give it some rest before the big race.

Luke is in a new camp this week and I'm thrilled to see him settling right in with new teachers and new surroundings (fortunately a lot of his friends are in this camp too, so he's not alone). When Zach and I picked him up today, we hung around the playground with a new friend of his from class and the two of them got busy almost immediately playing "Star Wars" (which is funny to me, because neither of them appears to have any idea what they're talking about, but they have all the right lingo).

Luke also told me that he tried celery at camp today and he decided that he kind of likes it. My new favorite camp! My tolerance for picky eaters is pretty low, and Luke seems to be among the pickiest. I'm glad he found a new food that he likes because he's eliminated almost all the rest. For meal options we're now down to peanut butter and jelly, plain spaghetti, hot dogs (but only certain kinds of hot dogs), pizza (but only certain kinds of pizza), and Wahoo's chicken and rice and beans (but only chicken and rice and beans from Wahoo's, nowhere else). I try to console myself with the fact that Joe used to be a picky eater, and now he eats everything, including stuff that I won't even sit in the same room with. Apparently Dave used to be super-picky as a kid too, and he's much better now, but his "will-not-eat" list still includes foods that I consider necessities: eggs, tomatoes, mushrooms, broccoli, and shrimp. Mmmmm. Now I'm getting hungry.

Zach is in the refrigerator all the time but I'm not worried about him eating too much; if anything he's on the bodybuilder's diet. His go-to food is hard-boiled eggs, and he only eats the egg whites, so he's kind of like a lean protein machine. In fact, he has the strongest mid-section of any child I've ever seen. It's evident when he goes to the playground and hangs from a bar and just holds his legs straight out in mid-air for minutes at a time. It's also evident when you try to force him to do something he doesn't want to do, like get his hair cut. ("This kid is stronger than a bull," declared our hair-cutter, Linda, which Dave loved to hear because he is convinced that Zach is a classic Taurus.)

One of my favorite Zach-isms is when we're at the beach and he sees one of the advertising planes. He'll point to it and say, "There's a plane...pulling a sign!" The other day he looked up in the sky and saw a small prop plane and said, "There's a plane... pulling a sign... without a sign!" This morning Luke and I decided to help him make a little sign to tie to the back of his toy plane. Luke contributed the artwork: a little drawing of a beer bottle, and the words, "The Good Time Lime." Ah, summertime.

What's Mine is Yours

Here I am, exiting from the ocean after my swim "test" today (I'm in the middle, in case that's not immediately clear). Now that I've passed the test, I'm clear to swim the ocean race in two weeks, providing I don't chicken out or otherwise fail to pull it together that morning. I've heard the adage, "Do something that scares you every day," and I hope that's a good thing because I am definitely challenging my comfort zone on a regular basis. Not in a bad way like I'm doing something stupid, just in the sense that I have a healthy respect for the ocean (and a fear of being the last one to finish). Getting into the water is like a big rush of cold and nerves... and then suddenly it feels good, and when it's all over it's exhilarating. You can't really replicate that in a pool.

There is so much going on with Zach right now I don't really know how to package it all. These days he will climb up just about anything, hang from it, and then jump off whenever possible. He loves getting into the refrigerator, for example, and pulling out any kind of food that might interest him. Yesterday I managed to get there just as he had pulled down a whole carton of eggs (but before they broke). He's also sporting a big scrape down the side of his face, which he got from jumping, or possibly falling, off the top of the couch onto the train table (and before you call Social Services, yes, Dave and I were both home at the time, both trying to stop him from doing it).

He also has this funny thing where he hasn't really figured out "mine" versus "yours." Last night he wanted to put a band-aid on the scrape on his face... and when he woke up this morning, he stumbled out of his room and announced, "I have a band-aid... on... your face." My favorite was the other day when he was playing at the fountain, got completely soaked from head to toe, walked over to me, and announced, "I wanna... take off... your pants."

Luke is continuing his obsession with Legos and his all-encompassing need for more Lego sets. "Mom, look," he explained to me the other day. "It's like this: You like jewelry, and I like Legos." He knows that Dave gets mad when he keeps asking for Legos, so he's started speaking in code around the house. "Can we go buy some Ls?" Yesterday he was feeling particularly magnanimous after beach camp, when he struck up a conversation with Dave: "Dad, I have a really good idea. Should we go and get everyone some suprises? We can get Mommy some jewels or some new clothes, we can get Zach a really cool toy, and you can get something you like. How does that sound, Dad?" Hmmm, and he never mentioned himself. Whatta guy.

Countdown to the East Coast: 16 days.

Loosening Up

"Mom, my tooth hurts," Luke said to me yesterday. My first instinct was to give him the old "Sure honey, whatever" response, but then, remembering the tooth abscess debacle, I thought twice about it and decided to check it out. It was his front bottom tooth, which upon inspection was listing to the right. I touched it, wobbled it, and confirmed that it was... a loose tooth!!!!! Luke and I danced around the room with excitement. Then we went to Google Images to search for pictures of what the Tooth Fairy looks like. (Hey, this is the 21st century, what are you gonna do?). Of course I loved it when Luke thought about the prospect of a new tooth growing in and asked me, "When is my new tooth gonna hatch?" (Related follow-up question: "Mom, is the tooth fairy pretend like Cupid, or real like God?" Ummm....)

This afternoon Luke is off for his first day at beach camp. I'm sitting here silently fretting and hoping that he'll have a good enough time that he'll want to go back. It's kinda hot today, and he already had a long morning at school, and beach camp lasts for three and a half hours, and yadda yadda yadda mom-worry. As I walked him there this afternoon I was trying to explain what it would be like, but I must have overcompensated because he finally said, "Mom. Please. Stop. TALKING!"

Luckily he is with two little friends so he's not completely with a bunch of strangers. But still, I shed a little tear when I dropped him off. I've been sending him to the same school since he was two but this is different. It's really camp! With counselors! And big kids! ("Are there going to be bullies?" Luke wanted to know.)

Now here's the really weird thing: I'm at home while Zach is taking his nap, Luke is off at beach camp, and Dave is at work, and we're all within a seven-block radius of one another. Luke's beach camp is just a block from Dave's office. So when Dave walked back down to his office after lunch, he sneaked onto the sand to peek at the beach camp goings-on, snapped a little picture and reported back to me that Luke seems just fine.

Apropos of nothing, but it's just making me laugh: This morning Luke asked us, "Was anyone killed while they were building our house?" Um...No, not that we know of.

Late afternoon update: I picked Luke up and the first words out of his mouth were, "That was SUPER-FUN!!!" ... and later he added, "It was funner than fun!!!" Turns out he was a little scared to get in the water, so one of the guy counselors named "Brint" (Brent?) went in with him and soon had him cracking up and playing games in the water. Luke also came up with the name for his group (the Water Slides) that the campers voted as their favorite. So there you have it. Best possible first day of camp.

It's weird that I have so much to say about Luke when in fact I spent most of my time with Zach today. Suffice to say that he's become articulate in a very precise way. He'll spend a full minute trying to string together exactly the right sentence. "There's... a ... baby ... bird ... walking ... on ... the ... dirt ... on ... the ... ground." Often we'll be waiting in suspense for the last word. "I want a... a ... one ... I want a ... a one ... I want a ... a egg."

I always think it's funny that the boys (all kids?) get their b's and v's mixed up (Luke still calls our balcony the "valcony."). Zach is obsessed with "ruvver" bands because he thinks they can be turned into balloons. He'll hand me a rubber band and say, "Make a balloon." Then, after I've told him again and again, he'll walk around muttering, "Ruvver band doesn't make... a balloon."

At the moment I have this little landscaping redesign fantasy for our house, and it involves re-doing the front yard with drought-resistant native plants. I'm obsessed with the front lawn of some neighbors of ours who have perfectly tended white-gold beach grass that sways in every breeze. When I look at it, I think of Zach's hair when he's running somewhere or on the swing. His hair is nearly white, and it's super-fine, and it just kind of blows and swooshes in the air in whatever direction he's moving. I know if we had it in our front yard I would think of Zach and it would make me smile every time I saw it.

Summer Games

OK, is everyone ready to talk about something other than nursing? I thought so. The last few weeks or so have been miserable for all of us, but Zach is finally easing back into his normal life as a happy, cuddly kid who sleeps for a somewhat reasonable amount of time every night. Here he is, walking with the flag on the Fourth of July, and clearly reverting to his old self because he's preparing to just walk away without considering whether anyone is going with him or not (a trait of his that's especially unfortunate in large, open public spaces).

The big news for me is that I've gotten more serious about training for an ocean swim race at the beginning of August. I've put in many hours at the pool, but of course that's literally miles away from what it's really like to swim in the ocean. So on Sunday morning I took the plunge and went down for an ocean swim with a triathlete group that trains at the beach every week. The best part was that I met a swimming buddy, a woman named Sarah who is - get this - a NICU nurse and a lactation consultant! My hero! She was a little bit slower than me, but that was totally fine because it gave me a chance to get my bearings and build more confidence in the ocean. I'm going to take a little ocean swim class on Saturday morning, and then go back for another swim with the group on Sunday. "I wish I had more experience swimming in the ocean," I was complaining to Dave the other day. He fixed a glance at me and said, "Well, you have two choices: You can either take one of those 'experience pills' or just go out there and get more experience." Yeah. That's what it's like around here.

I took Luke and Zach over to the school yesterday to ride bikes, primarily because Luke hasn't been on a bike in about eight months and it's pretty embarrassing that I'm not even giving him an opportunity to learn. He had a good time for about, oh, three minutes, until he decided that it was more interesting to get down off the bike and study the machinery involved in the wheels and gears. (Zach, on the other hand, was completely nonplussed by the tricycle, and climbed onto Luke's bike, saying, "I wanna ride a bike! I wanna ride a bike!")

This summer, Luke is busy reading up a storm. Having finished the Captain Underpants and Ricky Ricotta series, he's now working his way through the Franny K. Stein (the mad scientist girl) books, and a book on science experiments. He's also in love with a new TV show called Special Agent Oso - a Disney-fied James Bond knockoff about a bear. We even pulled out the walkie-talkies yesterday to create the right ambience for some important Oso-type missions we needed to carry out (watering the plants, making dinner, etc.). Oh, and Luke is filled with questions as usual ("Mom, is God real or pretend?") and blessed with charm to spare: The other day we were in a shop and Luke started chatting with the young female shopkeeper. "You are so CUTE!" she finally told him. "Yeah, I know," he replied, "but you're a little old for me."

Zach, by the way, completely idolizes Luke. He'll gladly hold his hand wherever they're walking, he wants to wear Luke's shirts and shoes, and he imitates just about everything Luke says. Given that Luke spends a lot of time talking about his alter ego, Robo-Justice, it's not too surprising that Zach talks about him too. "This is... a Robo-Justice... car," Zach will announce, before sending a racecar down the track. I also think Zach might be just about the only two-year-old in town who, just before heading down the slide, shouts, "Jet pack: Activated!"

Oh, and when it comes to giving guilt trips, Zach has apparently learned from the master. Yesterday he saw me on my computer, checking my email, and he gave me what was perhaps my strongest motivation ever to stop what I was doing. "Mommy, you close...the computer...now...please." Gulp. Guess I'd better wrap this up.

Done

Fair warning: If you're uncomfortable discussing breastfeeding, don't read on. Lots of other things to surf on the web.

So Zach is now officially weaned. The whole process was painful, and Zach was pretty despondent for a few weeks, but it was time for both of us to move on. I realized that I've spent nearly 4 1/2 out of the last 5 1/2 years nursing, and although it's been the sweetest thing I can imagine, I've done my time.

The last few months have been strange for me because I've been assigned to write about breastfeeding issues at the same time I'm going through them. At times it's been hard to sort the universal issues from the personal ones. For instance, last month I was asked to write about the "breastfeeding backlash" - which, in a nutshell, is a backlash against the holier-than-thou breast-is-best preach-ifying that goes on among moms. But, as I told my editor, I really struggled with it, because I don't want to speak for anyone else about what is right for them, but for me it really was the very best thing.

With Luke, the first week was probably one of the most difficult of my life, and the first three months were unbelievably grueling. But we were lucky enough to have good resources and encouragement to keep us going. Once we eased into a routine, it got kind of nice, and once we got past the first year it was too sweet and comforting to stop.

If I hadn't had such a good experience with Luke, I probably wouldn't have tried so hard with Zach. But from the very beginning I was doggedly determined to make it work, even though I knew that when he was born he was heading straight to the NICU and would be bottle-fed. After I came home from the hospital I dragged myself out of bed twice a night to pump and get a good round-the-clock supply going. Once again, I was lucky to have great assistance and encouragement. By the time Zach came home, he decided that he preferred me to a bottle, and he never looked back.

In our neck of the woods, it is definitely de rigueur to nurse for a full year, as the AAP recommends. Quit before the first year without a valid excuse (I'm being sarcastic here, of course), and you might get the old judgmental eye-roll from other moms. But on the flip side, hardly anyone continues nursing beyond a year. I'm one of the very few among people I know in the area who has gone past age two. (Paradoxically, all of my closest friends from college breast-fed their little ones past age two and beyond - whatta bunch of hippies!)

When it was time to wean Luke, I bribed him for the first two days with cake, then with banana bread, and then after a few days it was a non-issue. With Zach, it dragged out a lot longer and he took it much harder. (He was completely unimpressed with the cupcake I offered him.) For the last few weeks he's had an obsession with round comfort objects: Our house is filled with balloons and he's been eating hard-boiled eggs all day long. He's also been wandering the halls in the wee morning hours looking for me. It's only been in the last four days or so that he's kind of eased up and stopped mentioning it. I think he's almost finished with his grieving process, but he still seems to need lots of physical comfort.

Balloons, eggs....Why am I even writing about this at all, you might ask? I think I just want to have this down on record for when I look back on it some day, and to validate how important it was for me and the boys at this very early stage of their lives. There are times (specifically 1 am, 2 am, 3 am, 4 am, and 5 am) when it was a huge pain and I swore I would quit right then. But in the end, the sweetness won out, and I'm glad that is the part that I will remember: snuggling close with a little baby; big eyes looking up at me; my body flooded with feel-good hormones. All in all, I'm glad that we had the time we did together -- and it's hard to imagine a better start for a great relationship.

Buzz

After our super-big party last night, Dave kept saying to me, "You still have your glow...Keep enjoying your glow!" I know there is a post-party glow that happens, especially after an enormously successful beach party, but I also just learned that there's a new Jennifer Lopez perfume out called "Glow." So now I'm starting to think that I'd like to refer to it as more of a "buzz." (Until Lindsay Lohan or Courtney Love comes out with a perfume by that name.)

Two other moms and I organized this beach party for all of the families and teachers in Luke's graduating class, and we were thrilled to have more than 100 people show up, including at least 10 teachers. We also lucked out with weather - sunny and warm - and with hermit crab season offering plentiful little beach crabs for the kids to collect and admire. We went through 17 pizzas and who knows how many bowls of fruit, drinks, cookies, and cupcakes. By the end of the party I knew it was a success because someone (Luke) threw up. (In fairness, it was after dinner, dessert, hours of running around, and one of his friends had tossed a shovel-ful of sand that landed right in his mouth, so it had to come back up.)

Luckily Dave kept an eye on Zach (who made at least 30 trips to the dessert table, but what are you gonna do?) so that I could spend time chatting with other grownups. It was so much fun that I felt a little sad that we hadn't spent more time together during all of these years of preschool... Often we're just ships passing during pickup and dropoff times. But we've got lots of playdates and special trips planned for summer vacation, so we're just going to try to maintain these friendships while we can, until kindergarten starts and we all go in our different directions. Tonight, for example, we met three of the other families for a concert in the park, and while the kids ran around playing detective, we drank wine, did the chicken dance, and enjoyed the buzz while it lasted.

Pomp and Circumstance

It's official: Luke is now a pre-K graduate. We had all of the festivities last night, and what a trip it was. Uncle Bill was the event photographer, and we are eagerly awaiting his photos from the evening, but until then, you just have to deal with my amateurish snapshots and read a bunch of words.

The ceremony started with each of the kids marching up to the stage slowly (to "Pomp and Circumstance"); then they sang a few songs - one in Spanish, one with the sign language alphabet; and then they each came down from the rafters for a diploma. When the director handed out the diplomas, each kid had to say his or her name loudly into the microphone. It was kind of a blur to me, but this is how several people described it: Five or so kids went and spoke in a someone restrained manner, to polite applause; then Luke got up, and said his name so exuberantly that a cheer sort of rose up in the audience; and following that the kids and the families were much more animated and enthusiastic. (I know what you're thinking: Leave it to the kid's mom to somehow imagine that the graduation ceremony was all about her child.) After that we had a nice dinner with Suzi and Bill and friends, and everyone had a great time except for poor Zach who is having a rough week for a couple of different reasons including sickness and overtiredness.

People have been asking me, "Did it make you cry?" Well, I felt all melt-y and goosh-y inside but I didn't really cry - I was too entertained by the whole spectacle. But I'll tell you something much more real that almost made me cry today:

Zach loves trains, right? A few weeks ago I took Zach to the little mini-train ride in the mall near us, thinking he'd have a blast. As it turned out he was a little scared and didn't want to ride it without me (no parents allowed on the train). So today, Luke and Zach had off from school and (given that I had a bunch of unused tickets from a few weeks ago) I decided to bring them both to the train ride. Luke held Zach's hand, they walked in there together, and Luke sat next to Zach right up in front at the engine. As the train started up, Luke put his arm around Zach's shoulders and kept it there, protectively, while they went around the tracks. A minute or so into the ride, I saw Luke showing Zach how to push the red button to make the whistle blow; then they sat back again, with Luke's arm draped over his brother's shoulders. I would have given anything to have a camera, but then again, maybe I wouldn't have enjoyed the moment so much. I just loved seeing Luke, with his baseball cap on at a jaunty angle, looking like such a great big brother; and Zach, with his saucer-wide eyes, finally feeling safe enough to enjoy the ride. Now there's a tear-jerker for you.

Hamburger Rock

I'm extremely pleased to report that Dave declared yesterday as "The Best Father's Day Ever." And it was pretty darned good for me too. Dave took up the invitation of his good friend Paul (known to Luke as Friend Paul) to take the boys over to Dodger Stadium for a special Father's Day ball-playing opportunity down on the field. Dads were invited with their kids to toss a ball around on the grass, after which they all got free Dodger Dogs and ice cream. Good deal, right?

The best part was that the boys had a great time -- at one point sharing a feel-good moment of brotherly love -- and Dave came home calling it "even bigger and better than expected." Oh, and I got four hours of "free" time while they were gone. How do you like that?

After that we had a fun cookout/celebration with Dave's side of the family (including Uncle Jerry) in Long Beach. Zach kept himself busy shooting baskets, while Luke spent most of his time poring over the Lego catalog and deciding what to get next.

At one point Dave took Zach out in front and Zach stopped to admire a nice flat, round rock. Turns out that it was a rock that Dave spotted in a park when he was 10 or 11 at a camping/cookout adventure, and he was thoroughly amused that it looked like a hamburger, so he brought it home. "That's a...nice...rock," said Zach. "You're right!" said Dave, "That's the same thing I said when I first saw it 30 years ago!" So he promptly picked it up and packed it in the car to bring to our house. As Dave explained to me later, "For the past 30 years, every time I walk into my parent's house, I pass that rock and I think, 'Hey, there's my hamburger rock.' So I thought it would be a nice Father's Day thing to bring it to my house and share it with my own son." So if you walk into our front door and see a round rock, now you'll know why.

Final thought - Chances are Luke has been watching too much TV lately. This afternoon in the car he said to me (out of the blue), "You know Mom, if you or Dad have a heart attack, you should probably take some Lipitor."

Huh?

Next up on the docket: Pre-K graduation!

Party of One

That's me, in my usual position on my "perch," playing Scramble, as it turns out. When I expressed surprise to Dave that he had managed to snap a picture of me in this position, he said, "Well, I've only seen you like this about a thousand times." So there you have it, me in all of my glory.

For the past five years we've hosted joint half-birthday parties for Luke and his buddy Hatcher at the end of June. This year the invitation list was getting just too complicated, so Hatcher's mom Julie and I decided to put most of our energy into a graduation party for their pre-K class, and a very small amount of energy into a very small half-birthday party for the boys. So last night, Luke and Hatcher had four of their closest friends over for a special evening at their favorite ice cream parlor.

Anyone who has hung around with Luke knows which ice cream parlor I'm talking about, and you know that he's not really all that interested in the ice cream - he's there for the books. This picture of him is actually a shot from the middle of the party, when everyone else happened to be up from the chairs, and he was so engrossed in his book he sort of forgot that he was at a party.

Nevertheless, the whole thing was extremely cool. They gave us a "tour," which essentially had us walking into the back room to see the ice cream machine and they let the boys add the sprinkles to the Birthday Cake flavor ice cream (Luke's favorite, and perhaps not coincidentally, their most popular flavor). After that everyone got a little sample of the freshly made Birthday Cake (which I like better fresh, especially when made by a bunch of five- and six-year-olds).

Then - and this is the kicker - they brought out these giant bowls and everyone got to have any flavor ice cream they wanted, along with their choice of toppings and whipped cream. It was supposed to be all-you-can-eat but one bowl was literally all most of us could eat. Actually, I think Hatcher's dad Stu managed to have a second bowl, right after declaring that this was where he wanted to have his own birthday party.

For Father's Day, Luke and Zach and I sent Dave off to get a massage, and while he was gone, the three of us drove down to Carson to the meat market that has Dave's favorite carne asada. Somehow when Dave has adventures with the two boys he always comes home enthusing about what a great time they had and how good the boys were; and yet when I attempt to have an adventure with the boys, it always turns into a comical disaster. So picture us at this meat market (where we are the only people speaking English), jostling for position within a huge crowd at the meat counter. Zach spots a precarious pyramid of apples and wrestles his way out of my arms to grab one, which is annoying, but I figure if I give him one it'll keep him occupied. So I get him an apple, and he starts eating it, and then he starts doing this thing where he chews off a little piece of skin and then spits it out as far as he can. Picking up pieces of apple-skin from the ground, and trying to listen for our number to be called (in Spanish), I am mortified. In the meantime, Luke sees all of the deer heads mounted on the wall, and then notices one that is smaller and has no antlers. "Mom? Is that a fawn? Why did someone kill a baby fawn? Isn't that mean? Why would someone kill a fawn? Did they shoot it? Why would they shoot a baby?" and on and on. We finally get the meat and make it to the check-out counter, and I have no cash so I attempt to use my Visa. They must be using one of the old dial-phone systems because it takes another 10 minutes before the machine can process it. I start getting the eye-roll from the regulars. And just before we finally are finished, Zach decides it's time for a loud chorus of the one part of the Handy Manny song that he remembers: "Muy rapido! Muy rapido!"

Final postscript: On the way home, I told Luke that I don't like the idea of killing fawns either; and in fact I don't really like the idea of hunting at all. So he thought about this, and then said, "Mom, when we get home, we should look up "Duck and Deer Hunters" on the computer, and then email them, and tell them that it's not nice." My five-and-a-half-year-old. The crusader.

Happy Father's Day to all of the amazing men in our lives.

Man of the moment

Beneath his shy, I-only-want-mommy facade, Zach is quite the mischievous little imp. But the saving grace to his prankster personality is that he will loudly and gleefully announce whatever he is doing, especially if he knows that it is somehow "wrong." Examples from the last 48 hours include: "I'm taking off my diaper!" "I'm dumping the fish food!" and "I'm opening a lollipop!" to name a few. There are nights that he might balk at getting in the bathtub, but if he has an opportunity to get wet in, say, a fountain, he is first in line. Today after the farmers' market he got so completely soaked playing next to the little dog-statue fountain that I had to bring him home in just a diaper, socks, and shoes - with a huge grin on his face. (I later found out that the shoes and socks were completely soaked through as well). Once he realized he could take his diaper off, he wanted to go over to his little kid-potty. This gave him an opportunity to announce from the bathroom, "I'm sitting in the toilet!" (which sounds more alarming than it turned out to be).

The other day at the park, Zach overheard some older boys saying to their friend, "Go get the ball, dude!" and for some reason (I think it was the "dude") this had him doubled over with laughter. Now if you want to make him laugh, all you have to do is add "dude" to the end of the sentence. It'll just about send him over the edge.

Luke is in a quiet, serious mode these days, probably due in part to 1) his newfound interest in Legos ("Mom, when we went to the snowy mountains - was that before or after I was into Legos?") and 2) reading. Yesterday Luke brought a book over to me and read a passage very authoritatively (without any hesitation between words): "The most poisonous jellyfish is the Australian sea wasp. The largest jellyfish measures almost 7 feet across and has tentacles more than 200 feet long." After I scraped my jaw up off the floor, I was able to manage a "Great job, Luke!" Where did this come from?

Lest anyone think I'm bragging about Luke, I should follow it up by noting that he then went on to forget the book and leave it behind at My Gym, becoming the third item this week that he's left behind somewhere and we had to drive back to pick it up. Super-genius, maybe, but absent-minded professor for sure. Dude.

Hats Off

Today was the last t-ball game, or should I say love-fest in honor of Coach Dave. I guess I can't really say enough how beloved he is by all of the kids on the team (and their parents), although those of us who know him can certainly understand why. Throughout this season he has been totally dedicated, thoughtful, encouraging, lighthearted, fair, and approachable -- all the things you would want in your kid's t-ball coach. The kids are even talking about requesting to be together on Dave's team next year. I'm not surprised, really, but I'm extremely pleased to see him so happy and natural in a role -- and I'm tickled to see so many other people appreciate him for all that he does. One dad asked Dave how much time he spent on coach stuff each week, beyond the one hour practice and the one hour game. Dave thought about it and estimated that it was about another hour, but I know it's more than that. I've seen him poring over batting lineups and practice drills, and doing countless other things to get the kids more playing time and exposure to high-quality baseball. I'm especially glad that Dave's parents were able to be there to watch him in action today and see the team give him a nice thank-you gift after the game.

What's that? You're getting tired of me rattling on and on about Dave? Well here's one funny thing about the end of the season: Dave got an official league baseball for each kid and had them all autograph the balls for one another as an end-of-season present. But unbeknownst to him, the trophies that the boys got from the league turned out to be in the shape of a golden baseball glove - into which the ball fit perfectly. So each boy took home an autographed ball, nested neatly into the glove of the trophy.

What's that again? You're tired of me burying the lead? Oh yeah, Luke got his cast off yesterday. The x-rays show that the bone is still cracked but the doc was satisfied with all of the new bone tissue that had grown around it. Luke is not allowed to bike or skateboard for another week, but otherwise he's good to go. It was a real treat to see him get up to bat and play in the final game -- and even though his arm wasn't quite as strong as it was eight weeks ago, he still did a fine job and everyone in the stands was cheering for him.

Tonight we all (our little family, that is) went into the hot tub together for the first time in two months. We love being in the pool, but I guess it was just a little solidarity thing with Luke while he had his non-waterproof cast on that none of us went in the pool. But tonight we were more than ready to celebrate a cast-free lifestyle. Let the summer begin!

Spoke too soon

Yeah, yeah, we went on vacation, la, la, la. Hope everyone enjoyed the last little installment of what a great time we were having, because things have a way of turning quickly. Zach came down with a fever on Tuesday night, and was completely feverish and basket-case-y all day Wednesday. Add to this the fact that Luke was suffering from over-stimulation and sheer exhaustion. By the time Thursday rolled around, our collective parental nerves were fried (Ed: Where is the collective parental nerve, exactly?) and we were ready to do anything -- anything -- to pass the time until our 3:45 flight. A long aimless drive, a second trip to Target...Let's face it, we were more than ready to go home.

When we actually got home, however, everyone miraculously cheered up. A happy little reunion with familiar toys and beds seemed to do the trick. Now, as we get more time and space away from the actual vacation, I'm willing to gloss over the not-so-pretty parts and remember some more of the fun stuff:

-- A pajama-clad Zach, who adorably says, "butt-nin" instead of "button," running down the hall to the ice machine: "Push red butt-nin! Get ice!"

-- Luke, after reading a sign painted on the wall of the crab restaurant that says, "Free Crab Tomorrow" (a rip-off of the old bar joke "Free Beer Tomorrow"), waking up the next morning and saying, "Hey! Today's the free crab day!"

-- Sampling the pushing-the-limit Jelly Belly flavors, including "Toothpaste" and, yes, "Booger."

-- Pretending the big glass hotel elevator was a massive spaceship.

-- Going back for cereal again and again at breakfast just to use the cool cereal dispenser.

-- Chowing down on Chex mix and goldfish every night during the hotel happy hour.

-- Getting the kids all cleaned and polished for a "fancy" dinner at Dave's favorite Italian restaurant.

-- Having two movie nights (Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist and I Love You, Man) with Dave after the kids went to bed.

OK, maybe it wasn't so bad after all...

Lucky

As we soak up every minute of vacation #2 within a week's span, I have to say how lucky I keep feeling. To have vacation time... to have discretionary spending money... to be able to stay in a nice hotel for five straight nights... to "call for" our car whenever we need it... Seems like we are truly living in the lap of luxury, at a time when I know many people are not. Things might be totally different in two months, when our income stream officially runs dry, but for now we're definitely enjoying our time. I had a real moment of reflection today after yet another day of special treats: We stopped off at the Target to get another little plane toy for Zach because he had left his at the minor league baseball game the other night... and suddenly I started thinking about how totally extravagant this vacation must seem to a lot of people. Buying more toys after losing the first toy while at a baseball game? Not to preach-ify, but seriously... I need to recognize that this lifestyle is somewhat extraordinary. (Not that it's stopped the kids from complaining at any given point, but still...).

What is there to do in Sacramento? How 'bout a quick laundry list of what we've done since we jetted in on Saturday? Minor league baseball, steam engine train ride, train museum, Lego store, carousel ride, Fairytale Town park, tour of the Capitol, tour of the Jelly Belly factory... and of course the requisite dining out, ice cream treats, and dips in the pool.

I'll start with Zach because he just continues to amaze me. He was completely transfixed at the train museum by the extensive display of Thomas trains and villages. He stayed there for about 90 minutes before nap, until we had to drag him away, and then another 90 minutes after nap. The funny thing is that even though he's extremely shy around strangers, something about the trains seemed to give him a boost of confidence. Without fail, every time a new person approached the train display, Zach would pick up a train, carry it up to that person, and declare, "Train!" as if to make sure that they knew why we were all there.

Another crazy thing was at Fairytale Town, a park that has sets re-enacting various fairy tales and nursery rhymes. There was a feature called, "The Crooked Mile," a long winding path through the trees that went up and around and twisted and turned every which way. It was not a full mile, obviously, but it was long enough that it took Zach a full 5 minutes to run through the course. So he ran it with Dave once, then again, then again... and then he kept running the course again and again. He ran it a total of 10 times, which was pretty astonishing considering he left Luke in the dust after about round three, and he had Dave pleading for mercy by the end.

Zach has a funny little speech pattern in which each sentence starts out LOUD and then fades to a whisper: "CAN I HAVE (some goldfish)" "HOORAY FOR (hot water pool)" and so on. Whenever we get into the rental car, Zach announces, "I LOVE (very fast car)" which is ironic because the car (a PT Cruiser knockoff made by Chevy) isn't all that fast or lovable.

Luke is suddenly obsessed with Legos, which is funny and sad, because if I'm honest, I can't stand Legos. I'm sure if he were an only child, and we had a big organized area of the house devoted exclusively to Legos, and they never got lost or swallowed or stuck up someone's nostrils (ahem), I'd think they were cool. But those kits with the tiny pieces that are so easily lost and so tempting to toddlers... they just make me crazy. Regardless, we treated Luke to a trip to the Lego store and he was in hog heaven, deciding whether he wanted to choose pirates or Star Wars or some kind of evil robot creature for his next creation.

Also, I am SO glad we took Luke to the Jelly Belly factory tour. When I saw the brochures, I was a little doubtful because I assumed it would be super-touristy and probably a little cheesy. And, sure, it was a little of both of those, but it was also extremely compelling. We had a great view of just about everything that was happening at each stage of the factory and Luke was absolutely enthralled by the robot-creatures that load up and sort all of the trays and beans. When you think about it, machines and candy sounds like just the kind of place that Luke would never want to leave (and he didn't).


Most little kids would probably yawn at the idea of a trip to the Capitol, and Luke probably was bored for the most part, but when we got up to the Senate chambers, I sat down next to him and gave him a little "pep" talk: "This is where you'll sit when you get elected to the California Senate," I told him, "and you'll get to make the rules for everyone in the whole state. And once you are elected governor, you'll sit up there in front of all of the senators. And when you get elected president of the United States, you'll be able to come back here and all of these senators will listen to you and you can tell them what kind of rules you want to make for the whole country." He seemed extremely pleased with this idea, and suddenly the Senate chambers got a whole lot more interesting.


As you can tell, this has been a fairly kid-oriented vacation. But one interesting thing about Dave on this trip is that he has seemed almost proud to show off "his" city. Even though the kids had just about had it by the end of the Capitol visit, he still wanted to show us his meeting spots, his favorite coffee shop, and his favorite diner. And of course he insisted that we pop in to his favorite sandwich place, where you order the sandwich and they make it in some mysterious place on the second floor, and when it's ready it comes sliding down through a special chute. Now who wouldn't love that? Luke sure did. What a lucky, lucky guy.