Salad Spinner

Salad Spinner
(Bill Berkson)
You must grab time by the hair,
couple subconscious helixes
in the space of a secret.
You must tickle the improbable
and believe in the impossibility
of crossroads.
You must learn to suspend
ten grams of white, five grams of black
in hopes of true scarlet.
You must know how to fall from below
to favor the zenith
of mornings to the manner born.
You must love the four mouths
floating around the silky doubt
of dead assumptions.

Tilt-a-whirl

Hannah, one of your favorite games is the laundry tilt-a-whirl. Basically, you get in, hunker down, and Daddy whips you back and forth on the rug, while spinning you around and around at the same time. You seem to love getting your eggs scrambled! You love it so much that you even have a tried and tested method for getting yourself into the laundry basket: you drag it over to your piano, kick aside the piano bench and use the keyboard for leverage/balance as you climb, one leg a time, into your little laundry basket cockpit. Then you look up, smile and plead a high-pitched "DITIWLLL?" until I acquiesce and send you on another living room laundry basket scramble... I sense you shall not be afraid of roller coasters.

Artwork Break

BDD (Best Dressed Dad)

Hannah, "Public-Display-of-Being-Related-to-This," otherwise known as "severe embarrassment by association" is among my arsenal of parental WMD's that can cause permanent social destruction. Yeah - you sure do think this head band and these Sponge Bob pants are AWESOME now, (you love it when I break out this ensemble) but I am can pretty much guarantee this get-up will be your kryptonite by the time you are seventeen. Don't don't think I won't break it out! Love, Dad.

Interesting Parenting Advice

I stumbled upon this 2007 article (which I linked to from the book Mindset's webpage - don't remember why/how I got there) by Po Bronson, a San Francisco-based author of other books about finding work you love, and his latest book NurtureShock. The article is about research on our current society's praise-oriented parenting style, which too many of us falsely believe is best for helping our kids develop self-esteem and high acheivement. Of course the research cited suggests just the opposite, and proposes that praising effort, rather than intelligence, has a far more meaningful impact in building healthy confidence. I am really looking forward to reading these two books as I suspect it may support alot of my very unscientifically-reach conclusions about the growing sense of entitlement/narcissism in kids today (we'll leave grown-ups out of it for now).

Anyway, it struck a chord, and I definitely intend to start applying some of the general advice gleaned form the article on Hannah. We are obviously two parents who are probably too impressed with Hannah's "smarts," and praise her often for it. Her quick vocabulary building skills, her ability to count to ten in English and Spanish (thanks Saira!) - sure, she skips over dos, tres, and siete every time, but it blows my mind. I think she's just really good at retaining patterns (able to sing parts of the ABC song too), and songs and rhymes really help. She's great at finishing off the last word on each page in her rhyming books (like "A Potty for Me"...which has not inspired her to do anything productive in the potty yet, but that's OK). And she's also really got all the people in her life put together and down pat. When she sees slideshows on the computer, she'll squeal with delight when pictures of Ashlynn and Coe (AshlnCoe!) come on, Magnus & Debbie (magnsdebbie!), Kayla, SaraReece, ..... The bottom line is - while we may in fact be impressed and in awe of her burgeoning vocabulary and putting words together ("Daddy's pillow," "Boppa's chair," "Big Thomas," etc.), we should be careful not to over it when it comes to praise. Of course, at only 20+ months, perhaps I am overthinking how praise is affecting her confidence development/self-knowledge. And perhaps this is more of a Kindergarten issue. But considering how much she already rules the roost around here, I'm all for scaling back her expectations going forward. She's become quite demanding in her needs lately (wait, is this new really?), and needs "two" of everything -- "two wipes!" "two hoppy's" -- I guess one for each hand. But there's no question in my mind that the Terrible Two's are definitely upon us. So while it may be too early for her to really understand "discipline," I don't think it's too early to start adjusting expectations.

"Back-up Hop-Hop Plan" backfires -- Hannah with her TWO hoppy's/hop-hops,
and two Thomas trains, Mike & Gordon.

Happy 3rd Birthday Magnus!

Hannah's pal Magnus, the hardest working kid in showbusiness (and you can see why!), turned the big Three in August! I got to meet up with him and his mom Debbie at the Toy Boat, and snap a few pics. Hannah wasn't with us, but Magnus was so well behaved and mellow, it was awesome. Sounds like 3 is the magic year! Happy birthday, Magnus!

New pet for Hannah...??

I was out watering the plants yesterday during Hannah's naptime when I stumbled up this bright green, 3+ inch-long Stagmomantis carolina or Carolina Mantid -- aka Praying Mantis -- crawling up the side of our calla lily! So i shot a few pics to email to my mom to find out if this guy, or as it turns out female, was a friend or foe. Turns out praying mantids are in fact very good garden pets. To quote from the web, "Being a carnivorous insect, the mantis feeds primarily on other insects. However, it is not uncommon for larger mantis to consume small reptiles and even small mammals or birds. To capture their prey, mantids use their camouflage to blend in with the surroundings and wait for the prey to be within striking distance. They then use their raptorial front legs to quickly snatch the victim and devour it alive. The primary predators of the praying mantis are frogs, monkeys, larger birds, spiders and snakes. Praying mantis will also prey on each other, usually during the nymph stage and during mating."

Good stuff. When i clicked on the link to find out more information, I was treated to a wonderful video of a mantis devouring a mouse. Hannah actually loves watching it - "More?" - and when the mantis gets the mouse, she calmly says "oops," and then starts smacking her lips to emulate the sounds made by the hungry insect.

So Jon, I think we may have our cure for the critters that appear to be nesting down in our wall again... I wonder where I can get more of these bugs??

Welcome home...so where's Boppa?

Well, it probably goes without saying that Hannah not only survived our 9 day absence while we were Honeymooning in Spain, but she thoroughly enjoyed it! So much so, that when her dad went to greet her in her crib the morning after we returned, she looked at him cockeyed, pointed to the bedroom and said, "Boppa?" Apparently her nighttime cries for Momma quickly morphed into asking for Boppa, then Memaw. As for Daddy, well, she tried to call him a bunch of times, I'm sure figuring he must've just been at Work.

Anyway, it was a great trip for us, all the more so knowing she was in good hands here with her beloved Memaw and Boppa, who brought her love/obsession with creating artwork to a new level with the purchase of some sidewalk chalk. I don't think a day has passed since our return when she hasn't mentioned (demanded) sidewalk chalk, with a sense of real urgency of course. She really loved Boppa's new game of drawing faces so she could then draw on the hair. She now asks me to draw faces of various friends - sometimes I have to clarify if she's really asking about that person, not realizing she actually remembers their name/association/etc. Like when she asks for "Sawa" - and I inquire, you mean Sara? She nods furiously and confirms with a loud Yeah! And then as if to prove she knows who she's talking about, she'll follow up with a request that I then draw Reece (her daughter). It's pretty darn cute, I gotta say. Of course the last time they had a playdate, Hannah did give Reece many kisses, so I guess I have just been underestimating her fondness for her girlfriend.

In addition to her increased fervor for sidewalk art, Hannah has been putting together words on her own. We think her first independent phrase was "Big Pillow" - something she loves to throw off the sofa, bed, etc... That was before our trip. Now it is Daddy's pillow or Momma's pillow, Boppa's chair, Memaw's glass, My cup (I can see this last one becoming more problematic in the near future..).. Other words have gotten more clear - instead of Ava for Avocado, she actually sounds out the 4 syllables, and gets shockingly close. One of her new favorite phrases? "No way!" And I'll find her talking to herself sometimes, saying "no? okay. cool" - little mini sentences that's she's probably heard alot around here. But when we were having breakfast this weekend and she started yelling "Tom! Tom!" I knew exactly where that came from. My mom yelling for my dad, as is pretty common around their house. Too funny... It's only a matter of time before she starts reminding us of all the words we SHOULDN'T be saying around the house!

There are too may other developments to discuss here - I'll let Daddy detail the rest in another post. The bottom line is, we had a great time, but by the end could not wait to get back to see our little Rivercat! Every little kid in Spain made us think of her, and order another pitcher of sangria to quell our aching, but well rested, hearts... :)