Happy Lunar Love Day

Before I get to the pictures, two noteworthy things from church this morning. They had a trumpeter today (for whatever reason), and during the offertory, which as Jim pointed out is where they often throw in some not-too-accessible jazz or modern pieces, the trumpeter played loudly into the open grand piano, then paused so we could hear the strings resonating. Magical! Also, every week they read the names of the men and women killed in action in the past week. This Sunday, only two! It really stood out- usually there are more (and when we started at this church, sometimes the list went on for a really long time).

Anyway- here's the photo roundup for Chinese New Year and Valentine's Day. What a fun weekend!


Dim sum, Seattle style.


Lion dance in front of the Wing Luke Asian Museum


Dragon dancers coming up the block.


It was a typical Seattle day. Drip Drip Drip.


Jim decorated the kitchen with lanterns, and also brought home tulips and roses. Here he is, researching power washers online. Now that's romance!


OK, here are the teeny valentines that Naomi made. She hung Luna's over her bed.


Here's the lineup on our door. These Valentines are about an inch tall.


Finally, my little Valentines with the kooky dolls I made them for their V-day present this year. Love Love LOVE! I almost can't take it sometimes. Happy New Year, Happy Valentine's Day, Happy President's Day, Happy Week to you!

Everything Eve

Tomorrow, as you know, is Valentine's Day, but it's also Chinese New Year (OK, lunar new year). Today we went to Seattle's International District to see what was going on. Dim sum was going on, lucky us! So we tried a different restaurant from the place we normally go on the eastside, then headed out into the rain to enjoy the festivities.

It didn't take long for us to find something- a lion dance in front of the Wing Luke Asian Museum. We were still a few blocks away when the firecrackers went off, which is good, becasuse both of the girls are loud noise-averse. But the drumming and the dancing were right up their alley. We also caught the tail end (har) of the dragon dance, and got to see the performers, including another group of lion dancers, coming up the street.

We didn't stay long, and it rained the whole time, but it was a fun way to mark the start of the year of the tiger. If I were at home, I would be posting photos to back up my story, but instead I am babysitting for some Valentine revellers and trying to write a shopping list for tomorrow's (not well-planned) Valentine's breakfast. Tomorrow will be the photo catch-up. Till then, Sun Leen Fai Lok!

Why, yes, I AM watching the Olympics

I am listening to what seems like a Christmas album version of the Canadian national anthem, and wondering exactly why this opening ceremony had to start so darn late. We kept the kids up for a while to watch the start of the Olympics, but all they got to see was a lot of quick-cutting sports footage (and some beautiful landscape shots in high def). It was fun to watch Muriel pretend to be snowboarding, to be sure. And they were predictably impressed by the ski jumping and the figure skating. But our kids love their sleep, and they keep to a schedule pretty rigorously, so it was hard not to feel a little bad when it was an hour past bedtime and their eyelids got all doubled and droopy. No opening ceremony after all.

Now they are fast asleep, and so is Jim, naturally, so it's just me and Bob Costas. Tonight, Jim hung the kitchen with paper lanterns for Chinese New Year, and also brought home a really amazing amount of flowers, so the kitchen is the perfect storm of February holiday decorations. I'll get some pictures of that tomorrow. I have a little more sewing to do on the girls' wacky little Valentine's presents, and then it's off to bed.

Wow, Macedonia's "real" name is the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. So educational, this parade of nations!

Book Report

So, time for a book report, isn't it? I just finished a book called Old Filth, by Jane Gardam. The story is about an elderly man, a retired lawyer and judge, who had worked both in Hong Kong (Filth is a slang acronym- "Failed In London, Try Hong Kong") and in England. He retires to a small town in England, and the book follows his moves through the last years of his life, and in and out of his memories.

The childhood of this successful, accomplished, well-off (seemingly dull) man is heartbreaking, and the scope and the context of the heartbreak is revealed through his memories. He is a "Raj orphan," a term for children sent by their parents living in the far flung colonies back "home" to England for education and civilization. I just googled the phrase, and nearly all of the hits on the first few pages are related to this book, so who knows how widely this term is actually known.

In any case, the contrast between his relentlessly composed presentation and the hardship and sorrow-laden past he endured reminded me of two things: first, you just never know the whole story about someone, and it's a good thing to keep that in mind, and second, that it is lucky for me that I wasn't around in WWII Britain, because no way would I manage the brave stoicism the whole country seemed to own so relentlessly.

I liked the writing, and that is nearly the only thing that really keeps me at a book. Beyond that, though, and beyond even the introduction of this interesting minor historical and cultural archetype, I felt like the agedness of the protagonist helped me to know more about how growing old must be. You don't always get a main character in his late seventies. And at that age, age seems to matter significantly in the way that you feel, the way that you depend on others, the way others treat you, and the way you experience your days.

Next up: The Happiness Project. I'll get back to you.

Not Again!

OK, I waited too long again, and have no time for a real post. Tonight I spent rather too much time uploading a photo and "designing" Naomi's fifth birthday party invitation. Her party is going to be at a play gym kind of place, but before we arrived at that decision, when there was still a possibility of having it at home, we asked her what kind of party she wanted, and she said "astronaut." RAD! So here's the photo I used for her invitation.



How's that for a cute astronaut? I can't believe she's going to be five. And sometimes, of course, I can't believe she's only five.

Call Me!

I don't have much to write about this evening; it's late and I want to go to bed. But I already blew the easy photo-only post last night, and I didn't make anything unusual or interesting for dinner, so that's out too. So here's the thing that made me laugh out loud (inside) today: one of Naomi's classmates gave her his digits. She came home with a little square of paper with the boy's name and his phone number.

What are we supposed to do with this, I wonder? The image of Naomi having a chat on the phone with Timothy is cracking me up not a little bit. She has had a few presents from boys before, a little necklace charm, a picture. This is definitely the first time she's gotten a phone number.

If I were a little more awake, I'd muster up a book report- I finished that book from my friend, and it is great. So maybe that will be tomorrow's post, and I'll start it before 10:15. Night!

Playing Dress Up: A How To

Fake Valentine's

Allow me to open with the quote of the day, from Naomi, uttered as I was fetching various craft related items for her during her latest round of valentine crafting: "It's like you're my waitress!" Nice.

Tonight we went to our friends' house to celebrate Valentines Day a bit early, seeing as they will be out of town for the actual day. It was my job to bring dessert, so I pulled out all the stops (ha) and created a white trash masterpiece known as "dirt cake." This is a dessert made of pudding and cream cheese and cool whip and a bunch of Oreos food-processed until they look like dirt. The trick is to disguise the dessert as actual dirt, which of course works better when the tricked party consists of four-and-unders.

Naomi, Muriel, and I made some paper flowers, and I told them we were bringing a decoration for the party. We put the flowers in the bowl of dirt, which had been in the freezer for an hour or so. Here's the "centerpiece," in the foreground.

After a really tasty dinner of lasagna and salad, we told the kids I forgot to bring dessert (there was some dramatic acting with the hostess and myself), so we were going to have to eat the centerpiece. Naomi claims that she knew that it wasn't dirt all along, but the pictures don't lie.

Even Muriel looks, shall we say, skeptical over there.

The girls liked it after all. It's still a little early to say Happy Valentine's Day to you all, but Happy Fake Valentine's Day!

Daily Titling is Harder Than Daily Posting

Ah, Saturday, how can you be over already? It's a race against the clock for today's post, so go ahead and lower your already low expectations.

This morning we went to IKEA for some cheap breakfast and some leisurely shopping. It's been a while, so the kids actually had a pretty good time, though Naomi is close to being too big to really enjoy the kids furniture testing/play area for more than a few minutes. We got a mortar and pestle, the better to make more authentic curry laksa with. We got a moderately crappy piece of kid room storage furniture. We got a frozen yogurt soft serve. Thanks, IKEA!

So, while Muriel napped and the grownups did housework, Naomi started in on the artisanal Valentine crafting. She created a set of Valentines for the members of her household that are so miniscule, you can barely see them. Then she taped them on the door of the recipients room (or in Luna's case, above her dog bed). As she was walking around with the tape in hand, she made the observation that here she is, making Valentines for everyone in her family, and does she see anyone making Valentines for her? So you can see that she has already internalized the message of the holiday...

I actually got to run OUTSIDE today, which was great and a lot more tiring than ye olde treadmill. What a beautiful afternoon. I took the girls to the playground at the health club, then for a swim. And now I will close with a piece of advice that I hope will be valuable enough to justify you reading this otherwise superyawn of a blog post: Never go to one of those conveyor belt sushi restaurants when you are completely famished, especially if they have the speed cranked up to enhance your feeling of panic that the little plate you want might get away. We grabbed a lot of plates, is what I'm saying. Night!

First Friday

OK, to start things off, here's a picture of the muffins Muriel and I made this morning, using a recipe in a cookbook named Brunch that I got from my BFF last year for Mother's Day. The recipe is called "Doughnut Muffins," and I will attest that they are in fact quite doughnutty and junk-foodesque, but also quite tasty, so I am not complaining. I am not going to post the recipe, as it comes from a published cookbook, but I will send it to you if you want it. A lot of butter and some super fine sugar is involved.


And yes, I was a little late to work.

Tonight, it really felt like a Friday around here- the girls ate two pieces of pizza each (leaving their parents impressed, but hungry). We looked through Naomi's school work packet (they work that kid like a slave at her preschool). She is getting so good at writing her name in perfect little letters, which I know is not going to get her a job, but still, it's neat. Muriel put on Naomi's dress up dress, which was comically gigantic. Both girls did a poor job of visiting with my parents on the computer, as they were too busy trying to read stories to them.

Then the real high jinks started. For some reason Muriel decided to help Naomi get her pajamas on, then Naomi decided she was going to change Muriel's diaper and help her get her pajamas on. She managed to do it. There was a high volume of giggling. And that was just the parents. When they get going, those girls are pretty comical.

Anyway, happy weekend, you guys!

Yes, I Do Know That I am Lucky to Have a Job At All

Today someone generously left some books they no longer wanted on the little table in the office kitchen. One of them caught my eye, a slim red paperback volume, because the title of it made me heave that big interior "what am I doing in this job?" sigh: Best Kept Secrets of Peer Code Reviews. Talk about your page turner!

But after a little self-absorbed glumness on that account, I remembered a couple of the other little office oddities of late, and since this is a daily blog, people, this is what you're getting today. First, on that same table, someone left an US Weekly (I think) with pictures of the two Twilight stars on it. And someone else, I guess, thought it would be funny to write in some captions on the cover, what the stars were saying, or thinking. But they weren't funny at all, the captions, not even a little bit. It wasn't even clear that they were meant to be funny, which raises the question: is there any other point to this kind of minor vandalism? Other than satire or whatever? I wish I could remember now what they said. Something like "How does my hair look?"

Next, while the code review book at least makes sense in the context of my workplace, and the US weekly, while less so, is at least a popular publication in some sense, a few weeks ago someone left another piece of reading material in the kitchen, and it was... a catalog, the size of a monthly periodical, of the Christian Louboutin Barbie collection. The who and the what? Still no satirical or other captions added to the cover of the Barbie catalog, though to be fair to the artist, I should probably leaf through and see if anything thought-provoking has been added to the interior.

The oppressive beeping air freshener has returned to the bathroom. Beep! My very presence necessitates freshening. Beep! I am just washing my hands!!

Last, and absolutely least, for a week and a half or so, this spot on the way back from the kitchen, near a couple of lonely cubicles in the hallway, smelled just exactly like the pickly jalapenos you get on nachos at a sports arena. Although, to be fair, I haven't had nachos at a sports arena in a very long time, and my frame of reference is working at a sports arena to raise money for "band tour" in high school. Having had that experience, though, I have smelled many a pickly jalapeno (to say nothing of the joy of cleaning out a metal pot with nacho cheese sauce charred all over the bottom), so I knew what I was smelling. But there was no visible source of jalapeno odor. A little mystery to work on. Or I could just learn the best kept secrets of peer code reviews!

How to Have a Good Weekend

I'm a little late with this, seeing as the weekend was a few days ago, now, but I have to say, it was a pretty good weekend. Friday night I finally made myself start a book I had been given by a friend (along with an exhortation to please read it already!), and it was so great to start one that was so good so fast. Sometimes I have to work my way into a book, and this often has the result of me not reading any books at all, despite wanting to and enjoying it when I do. More on that book when I finish it up, probably in the next few days. I have to add, though, that I love the way a good book stays in your head. The whole next day I was trying to remember what show I had watched on Friday night, but no, it wasn't TV, dummy!

On Saturday morning we made oatmeal cookies together (yum!), then headed to our friends' house for a play date, which means we got to hang out with our nice friends who have two daughters very close in age to our own (while the kids ran around with very little involvement on our parts), talk about Kindergarten choices and what it all means, and then hit the dim sum place. If you ever go to dim sum with us, please, be assertive, because Jim is the bossiest dim sum foreman in town. Not that I don't like everything he picks. I had some quiet drawer tidying time while Muriel napped, and Jim and Naomi hit the Home Depot (we're in the market for a new ceiling fan). Wow, drawer tidying! But really, it was fun.

Sunday we got up so early, we somehow found time to make (and eat) pancakes and have a fun, leisurely bath (the girls) before church. Usually baths are in the evening, and rushed, and lately also screamy, due to an impatient mother dousing already tired and whiny children when they are not ready for it, incessant quarreling over bath toys, and a slate of recurring scoldings for this and that. Delightful! But Sunday's was all mellow and playful and cooperative. Church involved no Sunday school teaching, and I remembered to pick up my cake pan (I get a lot of pleasure out of very small accomplishments!). Lunch at the Chinese bakery! Yes, we do eat a lot of Chinese food.

During Muriel's nap, Naomi and I went to the Bellevue Art Museum, which seems to lean toward fantastically artistic handicrafts, rather than straight up art, whatever that means. There were four main exhibits: ceramics, glass, wood block prints, and wood carvings. This was Naomi's first visit to a museum (as a sentient person) outside of the categories of "science" or "children's" (or "flight," since she has been to that one a handful of times with her dad). How did she like it? She loved the revolving door into the museum, going up the long, gentle stairs, giving me the impression she was about to touch something despite my repeated admonishments, rolling the wheel on the kinetic sculpture-benches, and riding down in the gigantic elevator. She recognized a dodo bird on one of the woodblock prints, and informed me that they are extinct. One of the wood carvings included an anatomically correct male torso, and there was some excited discussion and (ahem) pantomiming of how this anatomy differs from her own. Yep!

Oh, and that night, too, Naomi tried her hand at reading, and realized she could figure out some words, especially in books she already knows pretty well. It was funny to hear her brag about how great she is at reading, even though of course I countered her with how cool it's going to be to practice it and get better and better, blah blah focus on the process blah blah.

This is a long lead-in to the thing I wanted to tell you guys about, which is this DIY how-to website I found (www.instructables.com) when, inspired by our visit to the artsy craft museum, I did a search that night on woodblock printing. 'Cause woodblock prints are neat! I will confess I am a lazy internet user, and I don't find myself going down a lot of paths. But this site, I think, could keep me interested, not only because it tells me how to do stuff I will probably never try, but because all these interesting people are out there actually doing these things. And telling me about it! I love it.

Catfish!

More accurately, steamed catfish with ginger and scallions. This is a super yummy dish that is very fast to make. It creates a lot of sauce, so start the rice before you start steaming the fish. We make this in a shallow enamel pan, but you could use any shallow dish that is somewhat heatproof.

Here are the ingredients you'll need:

1-2 pounds of catfish
fresh ginger root, 2 thumb size pieces or so, cut into strips
one bunch of scallions
1-2 teaspoons of sesame oil
soy sauce

Put the fish in the pan or dish, and put the ginger strips on top. Drizzle a little sesame oil on top.

Put the pan on a steamer in a wok or big pan with water in it. Cover and turn up the heat to get the water boiling.

Steam for about five to seven minutes, then pour a splash (1-2 tablespoons) of soy sauce on top. Cover and steam a minute longer.

Chop the scallions (just the green part) and sprinkle them on the fish. (We used to do this when it was finished cooking, but since that E coli scallion scare a few years ago, we always steam them a little.)

Cover and steam another minute or two.

Check for doneness- poke the thickest part of the fish and make sure it's opaque.

It really only takes a few minutes to steam this fish, and if it's overdone, it's not as nice, but it's still pretty good.


Here, with its good friend Napa cabbage. Mmmm.

Part 1 of 28

Last year was the year of monthly resolutions, which for me worked pretty well. It turns out I could do a lot of things daily on a short term basis. I didn't completely build or change all the habits I was after (I still don't exercise every day, and I still don't eat 5 servings of fruit and vegetables every day, I must confess), but I went some distance toward the changes I wanted. This month we repeated last January's theme of no buying anything new (with two exceptions: Jim bought a camera-related app for his iPod touch, and I bought some dinosaur-related presents for a five year old's birthday party). And this February, I'm going to repeat last February's resolution of a post a day. Because it's a short month! And there's a lot going on!

We also have had a habit of eating out too much, which I was going to say was a bad habit, but probably not according to the restaurants who've been getting our money. We cut back on that a lot this month, and I even tried to do a week with no grocery shopping, cooking entirely with what had been lingering around in our pantry and freezer for an indefinite period of time. I didn't make it a full week, though our pantry does have fewer old oddities in it.

It's pretty easy to cook at home regularly once you...start cooking at home regularly. We have a lot of (yawn) standards, and those standards are matched by a lot of frozen meals from Trader Joe's. Jim and I agree it's time to add a couple of dishes to the menu. I got a Jamie Oliver cookbook for my birthday (thanks, J.!), and we have yet to try any recipes from that, and there's also the second Jacques Pepin fast food book, which has gone largely untested so far. Yep, lots of new cooking to do.

So, while I am not saying that my post a day resolution will result in a recipe and/or food report per day, I am hinting that I hope to include a couple of posts about food, including a couple of recipes. See, I have given myself something easy to write about! Now keeping my resolution will be a cinch! In that spirit, look for Jim's famous (and my favorite) catfish recipe tomorrow.

Backwards and Forwards

When we put our dining room table on the free page of craigslist a few months ago, a church's social services person snapped it up, and asked us to please call them if we ever had any other items to donate. So today Jim, after calling them and arranging the pickup, put out on the front patio the crib, the changing table, the toddler bed, and about twenty bags of baby and toddler clothes. So long, babyhood! We didn't think anything of it, but when we were actually moving the things out this morning, we both felt a bit of a pang. There was this cute striped shirt that had been Muriel's, and was so Muriel, right on top of one of the bags. Not to mention the legion of little fuzzy sleepers. (I had kind of been hoarding the old clothes, too lazy for a trip to Goodwill.) Aw!

Through a random turn of fate known as a dead car battery, I had to work from home today, so when the church guy came to pick up the stuff, I was at the kitchen window, listening to my weekly install writers' meeting on the speaker phone. He took a few things down to the van, then I heard him talking on the phone, and the stuff just sat outside the window for the longest time. After a while I looked out, and I could see him crouched in the front yard, pulling tiny baby clothes out of a bag, one at a time, examining each article, and laying it on the ground. He did this for quite a while.

Finally, bested by my curiosity, I went out there to ask him if he needed help sorting, if perhaps he had been instructed to make sure he got only clothing for a certain age, something like that. He explained in his eastern European accent that he had been holding the key to the van in his hand, picked up one of the bags, and the key had fallen somewhere, he was pretty sure into the bag, but he had searched through every tiny item in the bag, and still no key. I started looking around with him, had one of those momentary realizations that this is exactly how women get themselves kidnapped- helping a gigantic stranger look for some missing thing right outside the open door of a van... We didn't find the key. He said someone was coming with the backup key, so he would just start loading the other things. I asked him if he needed help with the toddler bed, which was not heavy but a little unwieldy. He laughed. "I am former coal miner," he said. So, no then?

So the part of parenting that involves cribs has officially come to a close. And what lies ahead? Kindergarten. Last night I went to an open house for a Spanish immersion school, where kids learn completely in Spanish for all six years of elementary. I could understand the benefits they presented, enabling your child to be fluent in another language, earning college language credits in high school, experiencing other cultures, it all made sense. But I could tell that if we chose this school, it would mean a lot of challenges, and frankly, inconveniences to our family. And here's where it begins, where we have to start choosing things or not choosing things, knowing it's good or great for our kids, knowing that we might not love it (or we might). I bet for some parents this kind of choice is easy- you always choose what's best for your kid, in the long run. But it didn't seem obvious to me.

We'll be visiting the neighborhood school, too, to see how we feel about that one. I see this kind of thing stretching ahead of us, the stakes of our decisions raised a little more each year. I am not usually nostalgic for the bleary sleepiness of the baby years (though I loved them very much), but the heaviness of parenting older children makes me long for that feeling that I was a superhero just for managing to feed and diaper and soothe to sleep a tiny human just a few weeks old.

Although it didn't make me feel old, exactly, here's something that did: on the way home from the open house, hearing a U2 song... on the OLDIES station. Sigh.

Puppy Love

OK, I admit that is a super corny title, and I'm a little late in posting this, but Luna had her 15th birthday last week. I got Luna from the dog pound in Tucson. It was a depressing place, concrete pens with chain link. The dogs were variously hyper or mopey, but in one pen was the most beautiful dog, red and white and black, with long silky ears, and eyes that matched her red gold hair. And her angle was to sit as close as possible to the chain link and BEG you with her whole self to love her. I gave in without a fight.

She lived with me in Rochester, in my perm-smelling walk-up over the beauty salon. She lived with me in Red Wing, where she jumped into the water and swam for the first time, in the freezing Mississippi on a day that was eighteen below zero. She lived with me in St. Paul. She cried for WEEKS when Naomi came home from the hospital. She moved with us to Washington, and reacted much less dramatically when Muriel was born. Thankfully...

Right, so, fourteen years of Luna, is what I am celebrating this month. She is the best dog ever.


Birthday Popcorn Trail!


The girl in all her glory.

Finally, Trip Photos!

Flower girls in action. Right before the flower girl stop work action.

Can you see by the look on Muriel's face how smitten she is?


Wedding banquet fun!


Naomi and Daddy and the new promotional bear.

Putting out baskets, and cookies and milk for Santa, on Christmas Eve.

The awesome pool at Siloso Beach Resort in Singapore.

Luge, dude!


Singapore Giraffes- good and hungry. For sweet potatoes.

Mostly about Muriel

I know I said there would be pictures... soon! In the meantime...

Things I am finding cute:

Muriel says, when she has a good idea, that she has a goodea. I have a goodea!

Also, she has taken to adding emphasis to things, like if something is huge (say, a monster), it is now really, really, really huge. Only she says "willy" instead of really. A willy, willy, willy huge monster!

Things designed to drive me crazy:

The chanting. I may as well just teach them some football cheers or WTO protest chants. These girls can't stop the repetitive chanting. They have now seen Mary Poppins twice and simply cannot stop singing/chanting about how a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down in the most delightful way. Wait, I don't mean the chanting is delightful.

Things designed to drive me crazy that I also find cute:

Muriel and I, eating a yogurt, looking at the lemon on the container:

Muriel: That's a melon?
Me: No, it's a lemon.
Muriel: A ...lemond.
Me: Right, lemon.
Muriel: A melon.
Me: ...

Naomi and Muriel, playing Queen and Princess or Queen and her cat or Queen of cats and her cat courtier or whatever:

Naomi: Say "Your Highness."
Muriel: My Highness.
Naomi: No, YOUR Highness.
Muriel: MY Highness.
Naomi: Not My Highness, YOUR Highness.
Muriel: MY HIGHNESS!
Naomi: MURIEL!!

Far East Trip, The Final Chapter

I decided to wait until the horror of the plane ride home had a chance to fade a bit before summarizing the last part of our trip, but it turns out that jetlagged preschoolers are also not the greatest side benefit you can get from an international jaunt. Oh well. Things will be normal soon. Things will be normal soon. Things will be normal soon...

Naomi was fine, if a bit sleepy, after her Benadryled Christmas nap. We had our Christmas dinner at one of the local restaurants. Allow me to ramble for a few minutes about two random Malaysia-visit fun facts. One is that the Malaysian language seems to be written out more or less phonetically. So you can read signs out loud and feel like you're kind of speaking Malay, which of course is not true of Chinese signs. Also, though, it seems as though whenever a concept is in need of a word and there isn't an obvious Malay one, they just throw in an English word and Malay it up a little. (I am sure this has something to do with the fact that Malaysia was an English colony for a long while, right?) So, after your stop at the klinik, you may need to head to the farmasi for some medication. Hope you have insurans!

My favorite one of these, restoran, is the segue to my next fun fact: everyone eats out there all the time. It's hot all the time (so who wants to cook?), and restaurants (or restorans) are cheap and ridiculously tasty. All over the place, in every building, the bottom floor has shops and restorans- these restaurants are open air, brightly lit up with flourescents, with cheap plastic chairs and big round tables covered with chintzy cloth. The restaurants have wacky names- I wish I had just written up a list. The ones I remember, though, are Restoran Okay (didn't eat there), Restoran Shanky (did eat there- yum), and one near Jim's parents' house called Restoran Extra Super Tanker. So for Christmas dinner, we ate at the one around the corner, can't remember the name, though I do remember Jim's dad jokingly calling it "Regular Tanker."

So, day after Christmas, back to Singapore. Jim's sister's family has this Honda station wagon with a third row seat which miraculously accommodates ALL of us, even his parents, who came along on this jaunt. The day after we got there, we headed to Sentosa, which is like that Pleasure Island place in the Pinocchio movie, except we didn't see any kids turning into donkeys... it's covered with fun and they continue to develop the heck out of it. We went to a beach resort called Siloso for one night. It took me about half an hour on the beach to get a sunburn, but the kids had a great time. The pool at the hotel was extra super tanker dreamy- huge waterfall thing, water slides, and a long beautiful pool to stroll around in. The girls responded exactly as I remember doing, as a kid, to the combination of vacation and pool: they wanted to be in it every second.

The resort was on a beachy area with other tourist attractions. We decided to do the "luge" ride, which meant putting on a semi-smelly borrowed helmet, riding up a ski lift thing, and zipping down a hill in a go-cart. The luge part was over so fast, it was a little stunning. Hence the slogan of the ride- "Once is never enough!" Ha. We ate our meals at the hotel restaurant, which was not that great, but maybe it's because I'm spoiled by all the Malaysian joints. It was good enough, and convenient, and had Naomi's new favorite restaurant meal (besides rice with soy sauce, which she ate about ten pounds of on this trip): Fish and Chips!

It was hard to leave the pool, but we headed back to the apartment on Monday. Tuesday was the Singapore Zoo, which is so lush and gorgeous, you almost forget how hot it is. It was a better view of many animals than I have had before, but in a few instances I think that was because it wasn't so great for the animals. A cheetah let me know exactly what it thought of me. And Naomi and Rachel got to feed a giraffe!

One more night out, to eat Shanghai style dumplings (I think), which are like the Freshen-Up Gum of the Chinese dumpling world (but you know, not minty). On Wednesday, we had to be at the airport at 5:30 a.m., and our gracious host and tireless driver, Jim's brother-in-law, got us there in plenty of time. They fixed our seats so we were all together, the first flight was not too bad, the flight from Tokyo to Vancouver was pretty terrible for the first four hours, but OK for the last four. In Vancouver, the nearly endless security screening was a bit loopy, especially when I had to coax Muriel into letting the nice CATSA lady give her a full body pat down. Oh well.

Short plane ride from Vancouver, short town car ride from the airport, freezing cold home sweet home. I am glad to be back, even though our house seems so dark and cold compared with the warm, bright homes we left behind. Soon, Muriel will stop behaving like a deranged maniac, Naomi will go back to sleeping all night, and we will re-acclimate to this cold damp place. Next post will be pictures!

Feliz Navidad, Again!

Christmas is here at last- hope you all have a wonderful day. Yesterday, on Christmas Eve, we had our third delightful visit to the golf club pool, followed by a pretty extravagant and wonderful sushi dinner courtesy of Jim's dad. We also concocted a Santa tradition for these parts where instead of stockings (which people don't really wear here) hung by the chimney (which we don't have at this house), we left wicker baskets out on the patio. Naomi wanted to make sure they were outside of the locked part, but Jim convinced her that if Santa can get down chimneys, he can fit fit toys through an iron gate.

The girls woke up, opened gifts, and were generally quite pleased. It turns out I didn't need to panic and buy one more toy for each like I thought I did- all the little minor toys I got as stocking presents seemed to be more than enough for them. Later in the morning we went to church, which I especially liked because I cannot get enough singing of Christmas carols. Also, hilariously, in this Methodist church nearly entirely made up of Chinese people in Malaysia, we ended the services with "Feliz Navidad." Hee.

After church we went to an open house for an old school friend of Jim's. It was great for Jim and him to catch up, for me to meet his lovely wife and get an Indian buffet lunch, and for Muriel to have the run of the place and eat a big plate of unbelievable Indian mango. For Naomi, it was not so great. She kept complaining that he stomach was hurting, and because she had eaten some cake before any other food, I thought she might just be tired and over sweetied. So she lolled about, with her mother meanly nagging her to please try and sit up a little, until she finally remembered our new holiday tradition for 2009, which is that on every major holiday, you must throw up on your mother.

Thanksgiving, you may recall, ended with Muriel vomiting on my head on my parent's sunny back porch. For Christmas, Naomi did her part by puking all over my lap. I had a dress on, and we were sitting on a chair over a beautiful Persian rug, so I (heroically, if I may say so) did whatever I could to make sure the spit up stayed in my lap. Fun! Credit to Jim, too, who grabbed a couple of plates when it all went down. What a mess. Naomi and I spent twenty minutes in the bathroom with a box of tissues (because paper towels are not widely used here), and then made a long awkward exit waiting for Jim's parents to come get us.

We came home and showered off- sure enough, Naomi has hives all over. She is allergic to some tree nuts, and must have had one in the piece of fruitcake she tried. I gave her a Benadryl and put her to bed. Poor baby. She seems to be feeling a lot better, I am happy to report, though I will also admit that I am checking on her a bit obsessively.

So, Naomi is sleeping, Jim and Muriel are out meeting up with a bunch of his old school chums, and I am eating some of the (insanely huge bag of) chocolate the kids scored at the open house. Tomorrow we had back to Singapore...leaving behind my new favorite place, the pool at the golf club. But the girls will be happy to be back with their cousin, and we with their parents.

Peace on Earth, good will to all!

What Day Is It?

When I was sixteen, I went to Germany for a month, along with one student from every other state. It was a fantastic trip, but I will never forget hearing from two of my friends when I got back that I was different, not as much fun, something like that. This came to mind when I was thinking about what to post, because on a trip like this, out of my routine and away from home, my everyday self feels far away and quiet. No chattering inner monologue to tap. Lucky you guys. It means I should focus on the photos more, but I left the camera in the room with a napping tot, and I will not wake her for anything.

So, for the roundup- Sunday morning was the wedding of Jim's cousin. We had to be there at 8:30...early, right? It was a bit of a dash. The girls wore beautiful dresses Jim's mom had bought for them, along with some wreaths of baby's breath on their heads. Attaching those wreaths was no easy feat, I'm just saying. The flower girl part went reasonably well, if you don't mind your flower girls looking spacy or sullen or fraught with concentration. There was a little jam up in the middle, but they got moving again and everyone made it to the front. The bride was beautiful and kind, the groom was handsome and magnanimous. It didn't rain on the outdoor event. There was a little buffet after that included some tasty tuna salad croissants. All in all, a lovely morning.

The girls got quite sweaty and undone, of course- it's hot here, if I haven't mentioned it. We went home to change before the tea ceremony for the groom's side. When we came here for our wedding celebration, we had a tea ceremony too. The tradition is that the bride and groom serve tea to all their older relatives, starting with the parents and then the oldest on down to whoever is just above them. The groom serves, the bride serves, and then the relatives hand over a gift. When we had ours, it seemed like everyone was giving us (me!) jewelry. So we thought we had it all figured out, and went out the day before to buy a gold bracelet for the bride. At the ceremony for his cousin, though, everyone just kept handing over the red packets (Hong Bao), and we started to feel like we had really missed the boat. Jim's mom explained later that since gold prices were so high, most people were just opting for cash. Oops.

I would be remiss if I didn't mention at this time that Muriel has fallen in love for the first time, madly, deeply, with the brother of the groom. She referred to him as "the Big Guy" the whole time, and waved and flirted and was just generally obsessed with him the entire day and evening. When I get my act together with the pictures, I will post the evidence.

The best news of the day was that the girls took about a five hour nap. They got up in time to get dressed for the reception, which began at what is normally their bed time. Fortified by the nap, however, they were ready to party. The reception was quite grand and enormous, with a seven (roughly?) course meal, a giant curtain with the names of the bride and groom in sparkly gold letters, a slide show of photos of them looking like Hong Kong movie stars, and a visiting corporate logo bear who handed out stuffed toys and candy to the kids. That last part kind of put it over the top, but really, it was a good party. The kids went to sleep near midnight- a clear record.

Yesterday we visited Jim's grandfather at his house. The cool, clean terrazzo floors and relative lack of impediments in his house were irresistible to the girls and their cousin; there was a surplus of dashing around and chasing and screaming. And ineffectual shushing and scolding.

This morning we went for a swim at the golf club Jim's parents belong to. It's really a lovely place, and they had a kiddie pool, which meant I got to just wade around a bit and not really commit (I enjoy a swim but I sort of have to be in the right mood). Jim ran into a high school friend and her husband and children, visiting from Sydney. It was fun to chat with them by the pool. Afterward, we had lunch on the veranda of the golf club- alfredo noodles for the kids and curry laksa for the parents. I think this brings us entirely up to date.

I have a few things to figure out and accomplish before Christmas...which is in a few days. There will be more visiting, more eating out (always more eating out!), more shopping, and if I get my act together, some photos posted in the near future. Ho Ho Ho!

Malaysia Day Two

Today: Wedding rehearsal at a lovely resort, dim sum, shopping mall, big giant rehearsal dinner type thing at the groom's parents home. The kids stayed up hours past their bedtimes and basically had candy for dinner, so wish us luck tomorrow as they participate (and play minor supporting characters) in an 8:45 a.m. wedding. Yee-ikes.

Who says a family of four can't fit in the back seat?


Sweaty children at a wedding rehearsal.


Sweet nourishing bao!

One delight of foreign lands is the sometimes wacky signage and marketing concepts. At the mall by Jim's parents' house, against the backdrop of "Sparkling Christmas," one sees the "Call of Duty" tournament. Merry Christmas- get ready to shoot!

(Full disclosure: actually posted on Malaysia day three...more on that day soon, I hope!)

Singapore!

So much for my post-a-day ambitions. It's day two of our trip, and I'm writing this from the 24th floor of an apartment building in Singapore. There's a view of downtown from the living room window (when it's not too rainy to see that far), and an even better view inside, of two little girls playing with their super cute three-year-old cousin whom they met for the first time yesterday. It has been so good to stay with Jim's sister and brother-in-law (and their daughter), though I am afraid we are kind of awful guests, voracious and noisy and sleeping at all the wrong times.

The flights were...OK. I will summarize with bullet points:
- The international terminal at Vancouver, oh all ye Olympics-bound travelers, is pretty swank. Enjoy.
- Japan Airlines, please, please give your passengers on ten hour flights more food. We waited so long for that second meal to arrive, and when it became clear that all you were giving us was a half sandwich and two teensy cornichons, well, let me just say that it was a bit of a disappointment.
- All Nippon Airlines, while I am at it, if you are going to try to fix a seating issue, only to divide up a family with tiny children into one pair of seats and two singles (?), please, when you finally get the situation sort of resolved, be judicious about asking the tired, worried family to hurry into their seats. Good food, though.
- General advice for long trips with small children: you need WAY more snack food than you think. Go overboard packing snacks. At the Tokyo airport, in a sleepless haze, I ended up buying a can of Pringles to avoid that panicky feeling I was getting near the end of the last leg. They were the only food I could recognize that wasn't a cookie, or a distressingly named mystery food (like "Corn Chocolate").
- Obvious advice for international trips: you are supposed to know the address of the place you are staying. You can save yourself (and the poor relative who is picking you up in the middle of the night) a good twenty to thirty minutes of customs line time.

One more short flight this afternoon- to Kuala Lumpur. We are sad to leave our hosts behind, but happy to see Jim's parents and other relatives, and get ready for his cousin's wedding on Sunday. Plus, his sister and brother-in-law are coming for the wedding, so we will see them again tomorrow.

Hopefully the next post will include some pictures. Keep on keeping on!

Watch This Space

In a couple of days we will climb on board what I truly hope is a luxurious jet plane and wing our way to the East. Except that of course we will be flying westward to get there... whatever. The point is, we're spending Christmas in Singapore and Malaysia. This is very exciting because we get to spend time with Jim's family, in particular his sister, brother-in-law, and niece (who is three and whom we have never met), and of course his lovely parents, who hopefully have forgiven me for being such a grump near the end of their last visit here. We will also get to see his extended family, because his cousin is getting married. Which reminds me that we are supposed to have bought some presents for some of the little relatives, and I don't know if we have yet... yikes.

The part I am not looking forward to of course is the plane ride. We keep pitching it to the kids as a super fun adventure, but I am not quite in that frame of mind yet. Better start working on that frame of mind... we have drawing pads and sticker books and unusual snack food and a new little computer that will play movies (and a headphone splitter for the girls). It's really only a ten hour flight followed by a seven hour flight- I can't really count the hour long flight to Vancouver.

We are going to have a computer along, though, so I am going to make an effort to post often. In the meantime- Happy Holidays, you guys!

Tonsillitis!

As gleeful as it makes me to get a real diagnosis from a doctor, you would think I would choose to actually go to one more often. Today's appraisal of my wretched horror movie throat has me dancing to the pharmacy counter, because the charming Aussie-accented doctor I saw assured me that tonsillitis (what I got) is not only treatable with the awe-inspiring Z-Pack (or in my case, its generic cousin), but is also NOT THAT CONTAGIOUS! As he said, it's between me and the bacteria. All weekend I have been agonizing over giving this illness (that I thought was maybe strep throat) to my kids right before we start our 23 hour plane journey to the other side of the world. It has been yucky- I feel sick in all the traditional ways, but my throat hurts so badly that every time I swallow there is pathetic whimpering. I picture that times two on a full day plane ride, and it quite literally gives me heart palpitations.

But no longer! I have started my generic pack, and feel the full confidence of the pharmaceutical industry coursing through my veins. Both girls have finished off their own virus-induced maladies, enough said about that. We will be healthy and happy and bursting with love or whatever when the plane takes off. Whew!

Which leaves me plenty of time to brag about the kind of spectacular Holiday Open House. What a turnout! Dearest oldest friends, check. Neighbors, check. Friends acquired through kids' school, check. Church friends, check. Coworkers, Jim's and mine! Check! All total we had thirteen kids, and they ran around and begged for cookies and played with each other and made foam sticker ornaments and begged for punch and ate cheese and cucumbers and chocolate. Mostly it was my kids begging for treats and punch, actually. Two of the kids (7 and 5?) from across the street came, and stayed when their mom left, and at one point they announced to me that Muriel was their particular friend. Lest anyone think I am exaggerating her party girl affect.

And now, in the week remaining of home for the holidays, I have a fairly clean house full of flowers and pointsettias and snack food. Hooray! The only down side of the party is that I also now have FOUR half-finished bottles of wine in my fridge, and in my tonsillitised state, I am completely unable to do anything about them. I am working my way through the cookies and cake leftovers, thank you very much.

Sophie's Choice

Naomi is home from school with the stomach virus thing. I will keep my feelings on the stomach virus to myself... She has kept herself mostly busy watching "Super Why" and drinking soup from a straw and dozing. Our extra time together has afforded her extra time to pursue her new hobby- giving me completely random choices.

The choices do NOT go together. It is frequently difficult to make any kind of connection between them. They are presented at unpredictable intervals throughout the day.

Real examples:

Do you like ice cream or cats?

Do you like oranges or stars?

Do you like number one or number 4?

Do you like water or broccoli?

Do you like chairs or markers?

The reassuring upshot is that I have figured out there isn't a penalty for liking one thing over another. But can't I like both water and broccoli?

Thankful Itinerants

You know who has really spectacular weather of a Thanksgiving week? The Arizonans, those lucky lucksters. I enjoyed seeing everyone bundled up in sweaters and fleeces during the shivery 70 degree days. Brr!

I'm lazily relying on pictures, as is my habit of late. There are a few bits I don't have any good pictures of, though, like the night my parents and I drove the girls out of town in an attempt to get a better look at the stars. It was moderately successful- we saw Mars and Saturn in addition to the Pleiades, though neither my parents nor I could pin down the Big Dipper. During the singalong on the way back, my dad indulged in one of his endless novelty songs, "Found a Peanut." About six verses in, Naomi whispered to me, "Mommy, is he just making this up?" Hee.

In addition, I had a fun night with some high school chums at a local sports bar, dinner out with my sisters, and a trip to the zoo with my brother's family and my parents. Thanksgiving dinner was remarkably early, it seemed to me (12:01 p.m., approximately), but the turkey was delicious and we had a good time. I was toying with making the weird cranberry relish they are forever flogging on NPR, but I didn't. Anyone ever made that?

And now, the pictures...

I have already mentioned that my mom buys the best toys. Good job, Gramma!








On Tuesday morning, I took the girls to Hole in the Rock at Papago Park. They loved climbing around on the rocks, especially Naomi, who pretended to be a bear the entire time.




The Zoo! Remember when Muriel was all terrified of the livestock? No longer! She loved this goat with her whole heart.


I made up a name for the goat, Buttercup, before I realized that the nice Zoo people had put the name of each goat on their collar. (Its real name was CJ.) Muriel really believed Buttercup was hers, and kept objecting if any other child attempted to make contact with the creature.


Meanwhile, I was mildly obsessed with this giant bird, the Kori Bustard, an animal I had never heard of before. 42 pounds! Heaviest flight-capable bird!

Thanksgiving!


I got this idea from my friend, A.- the kids had a good time assembling assemblies from mini-marshmallows and uncooked spaghetti. Muriel just ate a couple of marshmallows.

Beautiful Thanksgiving afternoon- sunny, warm, and so delightful. Except that about ten minutes after this photo was taken, as I was sitting on the floor of the porch playing with the kids, Muriel decided to throw up down my back. Whee!

Muriel had been a sick little insomniac for the first three nights, had about two decent nights' sleep, and then in honor of Thanksgiving, picked up a nice stomach virus, probably from Buttercup. She was already in a lightweight phase, but three days of being sick and not eating followed by two days of throwing up and not eating has resulted in our little skinny thing being an even littler, skinnier thing. I'm trying not to worry. More vitamins and jello for her, maybe.

Here are the pictures I didn't post, because I can't get Lightroom to work in a recognizable way right now- one of Jim and Naomi in the plane on the way home- hooray for having another parent along! And one of our friends' new baby, D., who joined us (along with her parents! yea!) for a terrific former band nerd brunch the day after Thanksgiving. So wonderful to see old friends, and new little ones.

That's the trip roundup. The holiday open house is this weekend- Will I distribute the invitations to the neighbors on time? Will the power go out? Will anyone show up? Stay tuned...

Thankful

Yesterday Muriel and her classmates made big paper turkeys, decorating the big fan feathers in the back, which their teachers then assembled. On the right-most feather, the teacher wrote the child's name and what they are thankful for, as dictated by the child. Charlie is thankful for strawberries. Ella is thankful for her Mommy. Muriel is thankful for... Vitamins and Jello.

Aren't we all? Tomorrow morning is the kickoff of a crazy travel season- we're off to Arizona to blink in the sunshine for a week, and try to remember how to play outdoors. And then of course there is the thankful feasting. Have I told you lately, friends, how thankful I am for you? You and vitamins and Jello.

Girls' Weekend Mashup. Or Sample.

Imagine if you will that your girlfriend won a weekend stay at a geodesic dome on Washington's Pacific shore, and that she was kind enough to invite you along, buy you some cocktail makings, snack box, red-velvet petit fours, and for heaven's sake, a camel colored Snuggie to wear while you kick off the holiday season a little early by watching White Christmas on DVD and listening to the November beach wind howling outside.


Of course, I don't have to imagine it, only acknowledge my good fortune at hitting the weekend jackpot yet again. After the snack, cocktail, and Bing Crosby combo and a luxurious night's sleep in the geodesic loft, I had a long walk on the windy gray beach and time to catch up on back issues of the New Yorker. Liver, down, erudition, up slightly. In the afternoon we explored the nearest tourist/beach town, a place almost entirely devoid of village-type charm, with weird little strip malls bunched up along a rigorously divided highway-type road. We hit a souvenir shop enticingly named "Eye Candy," which was positively chockablock with seashell-themed merchandise. The homemade ice cream and fudge shop next door was also kind enough to stay open in the off season, and while we enjoyed a cone apiece, Ice Cream Shop Radio played a current song that uses the refrain from a vintage Hall and Oates hit. You know the one. Thus began the debate on what constitutes a mashup vs. a sample. I read (OK, skimmed) the Wikipedia articles on both mashups and sampling, and I still don't think I can answer the question with any authority.

Anyway, back to the dome for more snacking and magazines, and in the evening, back to the town to visit the Irish pub, which had advertised live music and implied fish and chips.


The live music was a guy at once loathesome and lovable, playing a truly random assortment of songs (Danny Boy? Yes. Take the Skinheads Bowling? Yes.) on the guitar and sometimes the piano. At one point he started "Blister in the Sun," and somehow the lyrics to "Might Like You Better if We Slept Together" crept in. OK, so, mashup? Sampling? At the last minute it switched to "The End of the World as We Know It," so ultimately we had to conclude it was...a medley? The highlight for me was a singalong to the Pogues' "Fairytale of New York," the lowlights I will refrain from cataloguing.

So, already a Saturday night to remember, right? But while the music played, two couples came in, pointedly dressed in their pajamas. My friend gave them a friendly interrogation on the way back from the Ladies', and that is how we ended up leaving "Galway Bay" and heading to the IGA (the town's grocery store) for Moonlight Madness. The IGA was hopping, the place to be in your pajamas and bathrobes, buying three pounds of Cornish game hen for $4.99, or, like the elderly man we bumped into on the way in the door, a half-priced case of Monster energy drink.


We spun the wheel of cheese (though we did not win the Emmenthaler), we bowled with a frozen turkey and eight two-liters of 7-Up (though I didn't even make contact with the soda, weakling that I am), and we jumped onto orange numbers taped to the floor whenever the lucky number announcement came across the PA.

Thus did I resurrect my streak, winning a ten dollar gift card on lucky number 9. What a weekend!

Back on the Eastside, every weekend is a Girls' Weekend. Muriel got her witch on, and Naomi, who already has considerable practice, was her cat.


Bubble, bubble, toil and trouble. Jim also got to take the girls to a princess party for one of Naomi's school friends. Apparently Snow White, the REAL Snow White, according to Naomi, was there, inexplicably doing magic tricks and painting kids' forearms instead of their cheeks.


Times are hard, even for the princesses.

Continuing Education

This past Saturday was the second and final installment of a brief but interesting continuing education class I enrolled in through the local college. (It's not a community college anymore, yo- they've got bachelor's degrees now!) The class was about online writing, specifically blogging. I know what you are thinking- what more could the creator of this entrancing, engrossing web log possibly need to learn about blogging? Yeah, yeah, very funny.

The class was geared toward people who have a business or some other interest for which social networking (via blogging, tweeting, Facebook and the like) is an as-yet untapped opportunity. The instructor provided lots of ideas for how to make your blog more engaging, including such obvious yet oft-ignored advice as "update often." Apparently I should also be reviewing products, or books, or movies, staging contests with prizes, and conducting polls. (For the first contest, I am thinking about a wagering pool on how long we let our jack-o-lanterns moulder before we transfer their squishy persons into the yardwaste bin...)

The real reason I signed up for the class is that I have been fomenting an online writing project on a topic that interests me. I thought getting a little formal blog training (such as it is) would give me a confidence boost to get going already, since like many projects in my brain, this one has taken out a mortgage and moved into a solid little house in the idea phase. But what I learned, of course, made me not more confident, but markedly less so. Because social networking on the web, and knowledge networking, I guess, provides a staggering array of tools and sites and doodads you can use to make sure that your thoughts or your message or brand or whatever get OUT THERE! in a hundred different places and ways. So you can set up and write your blog, but no one is going to find it if you don't give it the right "Google juice," and get it stumbled upon or dugg or kirtsied or whatever.

OK, maybe these are just ways to encourage visits, not determine the life or death of your ideas. But still, there is a gravitas implied in the level of effort and technology to promote an idea (which ironically I would be perfectly willing to exert if I were helping my classmate get his building supply company's blog off the ground) that feels misplaced on some fun writing project I'm idly mulling over. Crap. Now I have to go back and read the Artist's Way all over again.

Speaking of education, we let the television educate our children a bit over the weekend, and we were all treated to an episode of "Dinosaur Train" that featured great green boulders of Brachiosaurus dung, feces, poop, and one other poop-phemism that escapes me. We were expecting more of a (snickering) reaction from Naomi, who is not immune to the refined toilet humor of the preschool set, but because she is a TV hothouse flower, I am never sure what she is even understanding when the shows are on.

Speaking of jokes, the knock-knock jokes are attempting to gain traction. The joke is a fascinating little neuroscience mini-project- little kids love to laugh, they love jokes, but they don't understand them, and they really don't understand how to tell them. (Of course, neither do I, I am terrible at joke telling.) It's amazing what mental abilities go into this genre of socializing. So Naomi can repeat jokes, but the ones she invents are more Dada than Catskills.

And speaking of more laughs to come, I am happy to discover lately that Muriel possesses the personality trait (which she didn't get from me) of being able to laugh heartily at herself. At dinner the other night she was holding her fork weirdly, upright by the tines on one hand, while doing some other engrossing thing with her other hand. She looked at her food, then said, hey, where's my fork?! When I told her it was in her hand, she looked at it, and back at me, and laughed and laughed.

Above Average Wednesday Evening

Tonight Muriel saw on the foyer table a little box of restaurant crayons I found in the pocket of a coat I haven't worn since last winter, and decided she wanted to color. I found her some paper in the art drawer, and she drew a little shape she referred to as a love, by which she meant a heart, and in fact it was pretty close. Then Naomi got in on the act, and helped Muriel trace her hands. Naomi traced her own hands on a different piece of paper, and decorated them elaborately, as she does. She made two circles which she said were cheeks, and she decorated those too. Then she taped the paper up on the wall over the cardboard box they have been living in, got some chopsticks and the rice server paddle thing, and set up her henna and face painting shop. The chopsticks were the henna, the rice paddle was the hand mirror so you could see your painted face.

They also were playing with this flashlight/radio we have, that you can wind up to charge the battery. Jim did his usual science explanation of how a dynamo works. Do they listen to this stuff? Hard to say. He had to coach Naomi a bit on how to turn the knob just a tiny bit to tune in a station. She wound it and wound it, and found one of those song that starts slow and melodic, but that you know is going to pick up. When the beat started, she stood there holding this flashlight radio, bouncing to the rhythm, with this serious, un-self-conscious look on her face that was indescribably awesome.

Naomi climbed into the chair behind Muriel and played that her arms were Muriel's. Then Muriel decided that meant she was Naomi, so she climbed onto Naomi's chair and ate up her leftover salad. There was some play yoga (Muriel's idea), and a pileup on Jim (in which I took no part), and then off to the bunk bed.