As We Like It

Summertime! Tomorrow is the 4th of July, which may end up being Graham's favorite holiday after Christmas. He is quite adept at spotting American flags, telling us he sees them, and that they are there "Because our country is America!!" Yes, I used two exclamation points on purpose. He's really into it. In our neighborhood there is a July 4th bike parade, which Finn had a blast at last year, so we'll doing that again.

In other news, while Katie was in Anaheim at a library conference, I potty trained Graham in 2 days. Yes, I'm that good! OK, in reality Graham just finally decided that he wanted to wear underwear, and that was that. It's been 10 days now, with very few accidents, and even nice work in the #2 department. It's really quite amazing compared to his brother, who wasn't quite doing this well at age three, as you might recall. Graham, at various times this week after doing his business: "Are you so proud daddy?" "FANNN-TASTIC" "Do I get a fruit snack?" "Are you so happy?" Then later: "What does proud mean?" This no diapers thing is all I hoped for and more.

Graham is also growing out of being a fantastic sleeper. (Not as we like it.) Usually both boys go to bed at 7:30 pm, and wake up at 6:15, which has worked fine because Finn doesn't take a nap but Graham still does. He's of course always needed more sleep since he's younger. Finn is still on this schedule, but as Graham gets older, he apparently is needing less sleep. He hasn't been falling asleep until probably 8:30 pm lately which has necessitated moving him and his bed into the playroom. There he can kick around and play after Finn has gone to sleep. This really isn't ideal for anyone, but as long as he keeps napping, I don't see any way around it. Sigh... It was such a perfect system, people! I don't have any pictures to correspond to these stories, so here are some other photos:

Dressing up "like daddy"

Finn IS growing up, isn't he!!!

Superheroes enjoy watermelon

Thanks daddy for finding my fishing pole, buying some worms, and taking us down to Westlake Park (down the street)... Finn hasn't asked to go since, so it may not have been all that he'd hoped for.

Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da

I recently came out of my teaching cocoon after 6 months within it. Now my life is much more flexible until September. It hard to teach a class and keep up with everything else in life. Other things obviously slip---my contribution to the blog being one of them! I do enjoy teaching and I get a lot of personal satisfaction from reading my evaluations, which generally show that the students think that I know what I'm doing! Or at least that I'm enthusiastic as we stumble along together.

The boys are growing up. Graham is 2 1/2 today! Graham has started to pee in his little potty from time to time, so we'll see where that goes. The swag (stickers, fruit snacks) are far more important to him than any sense that this is what one is "supposed to do." With Finn, it was a long process, and I don't expect anything different with Graham. Only my brother Justin's kids potty train themselves in a week. (Grumble, grumble.) Graham is now in his terrible twos, as he complains about what we're having for dinner and often will lay face first on the ground when he doesn't get his way. But he is still effortlessly cute and snuggly.

Finn is nearing 4 1/2, and about 2 moths ago he told us that he wanted to learn how to read. Katie has been doing nearly daily lessons on reading and writing with him, and he's getting really quite good. Here he is on a "sick day" (he got better fast!) on campus with me. He got to see the room and I teach in and he played with the chalk for about 45 minutes. And he wrote my name pretty well, I must say! Organized soccer practice (Soccersaurus!) just started, and swimming lessons, after a 2-year layoff, in May as well.

My mom came out for a few days earlier in the month, and everyone had a great time. I occasionally daydream just how nice it would be to have more of the family close-by, and then I think about how the life of an academic scientist rarely allows for you to work where you grew up, which is at least possible (if not the norm) for most other jobs that exist. So there is that. Santa Cruz of course has a number of other wonderful attributes!

The boys play together a lot these days. Finn told Katie yesterday that Graham is his favorite person to play with! Graham, being Graham, is usually up for anything that involves Finn, even when it is getting mauled a bit. They had several cute moments on the couch this morning. I promise that Graham was having a good time.

And speaking of bribery...

A while back Finn somewhat suddenly stopped being a kid who always sleeps through the night. It generally wasn't anything he really needed us for - fixing his blankets, getting him a drink of water (there's a water bottle by his bed), or just saying hi. We were not pleased, as you can imagine. So when we were in Pismo Beach recently, we got ourselves a small and affordable seashell collection. Now, when the boys (i.e., Finn) make it through the whole night without waking up Mommy and Daddy, they get "seashell time" in the morning. Making it through the night is defined as from when we close the door at bedtime until the light-on-a-timer turns on at 6:10 am. Here are the boys during a recent seashell time.


Yes, that's a shell on Finn's head. It's not junk food like the cookies, extra trash like stickers, or expensive like the bike, but it works. This was the carrot; there was also a stick, which I could explain to interested parents, but it wasn't nearly as effective.
For those of you looking for a status update on the poop bribes, the bike chart is nearly full, and the bike is ready for weekend pickup. When we ran out of girl scout cookies we somehow got conned into single bites of ice cream. Sigh.

Chicken, it's the new gum

Tonight when I gave Graham his toothbrush he stuck it in his mouth, then took it back out and spit out a wad of chewed up chicken. From dinner. Which had ended over half an hour earlier. Apparently when you don't have all your molars, you can just work on a few bites of chicken all through tummies time, bath time, pajamafication and the like, without ever swallowing or giving up. He's a persistent kid.

Graham's a big chicken fan now, as Jonathan discovered while I was gone. I think the boys had a pretty good time without me, although I was told (and could tell) that I had been missed. Finn says I was gone for "soooo many days, Mama" but politely asked me "how was your day in Philadelphia, Mama?" He's so polite sometimes, I hardly recognize him.

Less than 3 days after I got back, Jonathan left again. The boys seem to be taking it all in stride, although Graham did look around for Jonathan to get his good night kiss after bedtime stories tonight. Here's a picture we took on one of the days we were actually all here, and a couple I took before my trip in case I got homesick.


Meanwhile, back at the ranch, the potty training bribes have gotten a bit out of hand. The peeing has long been easy, but like many kids, Finn's had intermittent struggles with #2. We started out with 1 M&M rewards, which quickly increased to 2 M&Ms, swappable for 2 chocolate chips, which were somehow more exciting. Somewhere in there things got crazy, and now he's getting daily girl scout cookies and has a chart that, when filled (4 weeks total, 12 days to go), is redeemable for a bike. I mean, we were going to get him a new bike this summer anyway, and the cookies will stop when the boxes are empty, but... geez. The way Finn usually works is that he responds really well to incentives (okay, bribes), and then once he does something long enough, he eventually forgets to ask for his reward. Toothbrushing, peeing on the potty, and I forget what else have all gone that route. I just hope we make as graceful an escape from this one, because it is a *big* one. Wish us luck.

Big boy bed and random videos

Milestone #1 for this month - Finn slept in his big boy bed for the first time Saturday night, and then did it again on Sunday. Then the past few nights he's decided it's more important to sleep on Paula, his hippopotamus (which is another story for another post), and has been in his crib instead. The important thing is, he's in favor of the idea generally, and we think we'll have him more or less settled in by the time we travel back to the midwest in August, which is good since he's probably too big for the pack and play now. Here's a picture we snuck in and took while he was sleeping on the first night.

Milestone #2 - we have had pee in the potty! It wasn't exactly intentional - we make him sit on his potty while he brushes his teeth after bathtime (so he doesn't pee on the floor), and the other night he made a deposit. He does like to sit on the potty (usually fully clothed) and say "Pee! Pee!" so that's fun. (We'll spare you the photo of that.)

Random movie #1 - Finn at the fountains downtown on Sunday. Hard to believe it was just about 8 months ago he could barely stumble around in them. The best part is right at the beginning.

In the fountains again from Katie on Vimeo.

Random movie #2 - Finn likes to ask if he can watch Sesame Street, and he does it by asking about various Muppets. Usually he'll go through a stream of 5 or 6, but when I tried to take a movie he decided it'd be more fun to jump on my stomach and get a close up look at the camera.

Asking about Sesame Street from Katie on Vimeo.

And here's me in San Francisco last Sunday, getting a couple things signed by Neil Gaiman, one of my favorite authors.

Jonathan gets back from Pasadena in less than 48 hours. Think I can make it?