Turning Two

It's nearly the end of the day and I'm thinking about how I now have a two year old. Though I'm still at work, my three kids all asleep upstairs, waiting for their mother to return from a business trip, I was fortunate to spend much of the day with the lady of the hour. When she awoke this morning, bright and chipper despite a ghastly mess in her diaper and bed, there was enough time for a bath and a round of gifts before Rob had to head off to work (a new position at the zoo as an educator; he now gets to travel to schools to show animals). He and I (mostly he) had assembled the wooden kitchen from Kellie last night so that it'd be ready for her to play with today. Inside the oven Rob stashed the gifts from his sister, Schelly, and mother. She carefully unwrapped the handmade sock cat and Frog and Toad book from her aunt, then another stuffed cat and sweet spring outfit from Grandma Cramer. Both cats were instantly adored, willing plush recipients of her hugs, unlike our real cat. She communicated with them in excited mews for quite some time.

Getting a good look at "Boosecat", the name this little brown fellow was almost instantly given.

Olive and I went to Music Together, always a wonderful time, returned home for her to nap and me to paint. Rob came home and we made olive oil granola from a recipe he found on http://www.loveandoliveoil.com/, a great food blog, that we plan on serving as a party snack for Buggy's party on Friday. It's been a while since I've put on a to-do like this, and I'm a little bit nervous about the spacial limitations of our apartment. I'm envisioning guests reclining on our bed when the living room and hallway areas have been filled to capacity. Fortunately many of the guests also have young children and won't be staying too long into the evening.

For dinner tonight, I was working, so the kids and I swung by the house to pick up Rob and Olive, and the six of us crammed into our car, clown-like, and headed to Quiet Storm, a nearby vegetarian eatery. With today being the beginning of the Lenten season and my kids being Antiochian Orthodox, they take things very seriously and abstain from meat during the forty days, making my restaurant choice easier to rope them into. They aren't the most open-minded kids when it comes to clean and wholesome meatless eating, but they went along with it since it was Olive's birthday. What those kids will do in the name of Olive .

And now an amendment since it's days later and I'm finally ready to finish this post, the birthday party didn't happen. On Friday Olive stayed with Kellie since Rob and I were and came down with a low grade fever. Not a huge deal, but I also thought it unwise to bring other kids into our home and risk them falling ill as well, so I called it off. It was actually a big relief. Party planning is not in the realm of things I consider fun. Fun to think about in the weeks beforehand, yes, but fun in the two days preceding, not at all. She, Rob, and I had our own party that evening and, on Monday, we still have a bounty of food in which we're just beginning to make a dent. She's doing much better today (Monday), with only a runny nose to show for it. We're going to make a foray out into the glorious warm sunshine in the jogging stroller. When we do this I let her make the call for the mileage; having never been much of a stroller baby she doesn't have the patience for it.

A few other bright moments in my life:

A splendid dinner party held at the home of my friend, Dylan. Eleven of us were in attendance. Pho was on the menu, with venison, beef, or vegetarian options. Large, plump spring rolls, fresh bread, and raw kale salad rounded out the meal. The company was delightful but I turned in early, tired after a day of work and wanting to spend the remainder of my evening with Rob. He doesn't feel as great a need for social interaction as I do, which is fine, but I sure am happy to have found such a neat group of folks here in this city. It continues to surprise and delight. We will host a game night here at our house in the next week or so with a handful of my buddies who have never had the pleasure of meeting my family.

Rob and I have two concerts to attend in the not-so-near future: Ben Folds in May and Justin Townes Earle (R.E.M. notwithstanding, my most-loved musician) a weeks and a half later.

One month from today Rob and I will be on an airplane bound for San Francisco. I know that the next month will fly quickly so I'm savoring the moments I have with my goon, but I am eager to be on that side of the country again and to see a dear friend who I miss every day.

Buggy has been unfathomably wonderful lately. I've always felt that way about her, but there's something about this two-year mark that brings about truly remarkable qualities in children. She mimics nearly everything we say, displays such real understanding for things that go on around her, and continues to be the sweetest thing imaginable. She surprised me last week: while sitting at the Khorey's kitchen table she turned around the study the jacket hanging on the back of the chair and declared it, "Lisa's coat." Olive rarely sees Lisa, and I don't know that even I have ever seen her in the jacket, but she determined that it most likely didn't belong to anyone else in the home, so it must be Lisa's. To me, this was the coolest thing, this logic and reasoning. When she speaks and I don't understand her, I can say, "What?" and she'll repeat herself. She's honing her taste in music, too, making requests when she wants to hear some of her favorites ("Ben Keller?", she'll ask, when she'd like Rob to play Ben Kweller). When Tom Waits is playing she'll say, "Monster song." A fair assessment, indeed.