The school year at Casa Ninos is done, and the classes all put on a huge celebration show. It was adorable, of course. Here’s a sampling. Jonah’s first:
And here’s Danny’s musical number:
Now we’re off to camp for a few weeks -3 weeks for Danny, and 5 for Jonah - then back to school. Danny will be back at CNSM, and Jonah will be starting Kindergarten at Greenfields! Kindergarten?! Sheesh…
Nothing much to report, but I do have to blog a few funny things before I forget them.
Me: “Jonah, we need to cut your hair.”
Jonah: “No we don’t.”
Me: “Yes, we do. It is too long and you have wild sideburns.”
Jonah: (looking alarmed…) “What are sideworms???”
Needless to say, I won and we cut his hair. Sideworms are terrible….don’t let them get you.
Another conversation with Danny recently after he was telling me about his day at school.
Danny: “I ate lunch at the table with Valerie.”
Me: “That’s nice. Were there other kids at the table or just the two of you?”
Danny: “Just the two of me.”
Ha! Maybe Danny should be the one in photos for psychiatric services! (see last blog post if you have no idea what I am talking about)
My friend Christine was in the waiting room at her local hospital in Vermont, when she glanced at the literature rack and saw a familiar face glancing back:
Christine thoughtfully grabbed a copy for us and mailed it right away. I’ve read through the brochure a dozen times, but it doesn’t indicate whether Susannah is meant to be the giver or the recipient of psychiatric services.
Just thought I’d share a few recent tough questions from Jonah. Sorry we don’t update this blog enough - we are usually too busy running around after these kids!
Ethan and I were telling Jonah about how we didn’t always live in this house - we used to live in an apartment. Here is an excerpt from the conversation:
Jonah: “Where was my room - did it have the same stuff in it?”
Ethan: “Oh, you weren’t born yet, Buddy.”
Jonah: “You mean I was in mommy’s tummy?”
Me: “No, you weren’t even in my tummy yet.”
Jonah thinking….me hoping the next question wasn’t coming…
Jonah: “How did I get in mommy’s tummy?”
Me: “I don’t know….you just got in there one day. Let’s go have a snack.” FYI for those of you reading this, you can pretty much always deflect tough questions from Jonah with the talk of a snack….
Another interesting recent conversation has involved evolution. I guess at school they have been talking about evolution and Jonah has heard that people are descendants of apes (and I’m sure that is helped by the BNL song we listen to on their album Snacktime, in which they sing “raisins come grapes, people from apes, I come from Canada”). Anyway, he is not clear on the concept and here was our conversation.
Jonah: “When was I an ape?”
Me: “You were never an ape Bud, just our relatives a long time ago were apes. You and I were always people…but before us, there were apes.”
Jonah: “Whoa, Granny used to be an ape!?!?!?”
So then I drew a lineage diagram….Jonah - Mommy - Granny - Josie - then millions of years - Ape. He seemed satisfied by my explanation, but I’m still not sure he gets it. In fact, I think he was a little disappointed to learn that Granny was not actually an ape. Sorry Mom.
Well, our grueling kindergarten search is over! I feel like we just prepped for the college admission process - which, for Jonah, we may be doing in 6 years so I guess this was good practice. Anyway, we visited private schools, public schools, charter schools, you name it. We’ve settled on Green Fields Country Day School, which is an independent (read: no religious affiliation) private school. Jonah passed his interview and “readiness test” with flying colors and is excited to start there next year. We are very excited too! For those of you who want to learn more about the school you can go to www.greenfields.org
In other news, Danny is talking up a storm these days. And you can even understand almost all of what he says. One of his favorite things to do is to copy people, especially Jonah. So Jonah will be talking and Danny will copy whatever Jonah says. So Jonah asks Danny, “are you copying me”? Danny replies “yes”. Then Jonah says “stop copying me!” And Danny mimics “stop copying me!” It is a riot! Ah, pesky younger siblings. Thankfully I never had one! 
So I took Danny and Jonah back to school this week after their 2 week break! Jonah practically knocked me down running past me to get in to school. Danny was a little more cautious, but nonetheless walked right down the hall to the toddler room. We went in the door, and his teacher, Marcus, said “Danny, good news! Now that you are doing so well with potty-training, you are moving to Becca’s room” (the 2 and 3 year old room). First, Danny gave Marcus a look like “come again?!?!?” and proceeded to walk right into the toddler room anyway and begin playing with his girlfriend Kate. I let him be for a few minutes while I chatted with Marcus, but then Marcus said it would probably be best if I just took Danny over to his other room - just start the new year off in his new class, not ease into anything. After attempting to negotiate with Danny to walk to the new class by himself, I eventually had to pick him up and carry him. As I carried him the 10 yards down the hallway to the next class, the poor little guy was crying his heart out, reaching his arms behind me, and screaming “KAAAATTTTE”. I’m telling you, if he had been wearing an undershirt and had a little more finely sculpted physique, he could give Marlon Brando a run for his money!
I said to Jonah the other day, “Hey buddy… you know there’s just one more night of Hanukkah.”
“Awww man!” He was seriously bummed. “Daddy, why is it only eight nights?”
“Well, remember when I told you about the Macabees?”
“The gorillas!”
“Guerillas, yes. Well, after the big fight, they went to their special meeting place and found their holy lamp was almost out of oil! They could only use a very special kind of oil for their lamp, and they found they only had one more tiny bottle of oil. They sent their fastest riders out to go get some more. The tiny bottle they had looked like it would only be enough for one night, but like magic it lasted the whole eight nights that it took for the riders to come back with more oil!”
“Awww man! I wish they’d sent their slowest riders!”
So everyday when we pick up Danny from school we get a little note sent home saying what the kids did that day, what kind of mood Danny was in, whether he peed in the potty at school, took a nap, etc. Pretty useful information to know. Two recent notes that have been sent home are now on our fridge, because Ethan and I got such a kick out of them. We thought we would share them with you loyal readers of this blog.
Note home yesterday - “We are having Danny sit on the toilet 4 times a day. We want to encourage parents to do the same at home and sit as much as possible. Thanks.”
YEAH, THANKS FOR THE SUGGESTION TEACHERS! I’ve gotten pretty good at sitting on the potty, and depending on how much water I drink during the day, it’s at least 4 times a day!
A note from a few days ago - “Danny was frustrated when others tried to work with him. We are working with him to be cooperative and use his words.”
YEAH, IF MY OFFICE SENT NOTES HOME ON ME, THAT’S PRETTY MUCH WHAT IT WOULD SAY MOST DAYS.
Danny peed in the potty twice today - once at school and once at home!
Woohoo!
This means that the end of diapers is just around the corner! Then we enter the realm of looking for potties, potty emergencies, “I-don’t-want-to-wear-pullups-to-bed” arguments, and “I-couldn’t-hold-it-anymore” accidents!
Woohoo.
Feh.
Well, we survived our trip across the county with two kids. And we all had a great time. We visited all 4 Disney parks, the Orlando Science Center and the Kennedy Space Center. Needless to say, Ethan and I felt like we needed a vacation when we came back from this one.
Jonah and Danny are good travelers. Jonah wheels his own little suitcase through the airports and looks like a pro. One lady in the gate area was talking to him and asked “so, are all of your clothes in your bag?”. To which he replied “no, just toys”. Little does she know that the child would have worn the same clothes for 5 days - his suitcase was full of the really important stuff! See attached list that he wrote out the night before we left. He decided it would be a good idea to have an “inventory report” to make sure we came back with everything we went with.
Overall, fun time. Thanks to Jeremy & Noel (and Emma and Shadow….who Danny is still talking about!) for their hospitality. We’ll rest up and be ready for another trip in 2 or 3 years!