"Boo" to you, blog

Oh, blog. You poor, sad, untouched thing. All the happiness (and otherwise!) of the happy blue house which you will never know about, weeks and weeks of it. That, and the Pesach cleaning. A few nuggets, maybe, I can throw at you, and then it's dinnertime with Daddy.

Naomi: Mom, isn't Saul cuter than Yash?

Mom: ummmmmm......

Naomi (explaining): 'Cause he's not as serious?

More Naomi, speaking of daily life in her pre-K class: 

In circle time, before we daven, we always say "How are you?" to each other. And I always say "tired"... (thinking)... I say, 'Tired, Baruch Hashem!'" 

This is why, with apologies to certain grumpy rabbinical types, I think I have my kids in the Chabad school. Because it cracks me up to hear them say this, and Toy-rah, and Koy-desh, and mezoynoys.... the leavened kind! Yum!  

Ezra (looking at microwave): For some reason, it's 8:23.

And since, for some reason, it's 8:36, I gotta go eat.

Sunday afternoon in the park

D.'s been in Israel since Wednesday, so yesterday Kiki came to play with the babies, and the two big kids and I got hot dogs and went to our favorite playground, the "boat" playground. It isn't a very fancy playground,  but it does have a nice, moody feel to it, what with a colorful boat-thing with slides and ladders on it, and an amazing view out onto the water (appropriately enough) and a slightly spooky grove which Naomi likes to visit... It always brings out the mama wanderlust, and we play games involving departing ships and long sea journeys to far-flung lands with interesting animals not found in suburbs. I flatter myself,  but I think the reason the kids like this playground so much, and not better ones I can think of, is because it makes me play. We always end up going there in the late afternoon or early evening, and there is no better place to be in the whole world than a westward-facing Mercer Island playground at dusk. 

On the way home, Ezra suddenly insisted that he had gone on a field trip this year (apropos of nothing, as if speaking to an imaginary doubter), and described it, in his funny, preachy way: How we got to Bowling was, we went on some real bumpy roads, and then made some turns, and got to some smooth roads, and then we got there. (Mapquest that, baby.) And I used real heavy bowling balls, not kid ones. And the things, the things you were supposed to hit, they all went down into this tunnel that went under the ground. And then I went again. (Mom: were you good at it?) I was pretty good. (Mom: Were you the best? - nevermind that mom should definitely shut up.) No, Shem Tov was. 

What's so funny is, I distinctly remember Ezra coming home from the field trip grumpy and withdrawn, and it took all of 3 seconds for me to figure out it was because he hadn't been as competent as he's used to being, or as some other kid was. Already, life is hard... I almost always forget how hard it was for me to be five and six (possibly because I was thrust into 1st grade straight from nursery school). Just thinking about it now makes me feel utterly helpless and at the mercy of pitiless forces outside of me. However, when it was good, it was very, very good... to be young.

MAMA!

It is hard to believe that this squishy mass of baby can do it. But he did it. Saulchik wins the prize. Saulchik can have my heart. He had me at "Mama." Saulchik, I'm all yours. (Yasha, this should be incentive for you to shape up!) Saulchik said it, and he said it again, and he said it again. It wasn't a fluke. Saulchik, I love you, even though you did say "Dada" first, and still say "Dada" more often. I know you don't mean anything by it... it's just that... it's easier on the palate, or something. Saulie, thank you for saying "Mama." You're a beautiful bouncy baby, and Yasha Kasha is too (okay?), and Mama loves you both the same.

I needoo dzheck my emoo!

A time to embrace

Okay, so-like, my dh left for Israel, just as my bff and her dh arrived to explore the Pacific NW in the hopes of - hooray! - possibly moving here. And just look at the smooching that went on in my kitchen! This bff, however, has every right to smooch her husband anywhere and anytime she pleases, for she has battled an intense form of  !@%&#$@&!? (can't bring myself to write the c-word) and come out the victor. I have known her since first grade, and I love the way her seriousness, her maturity (I was always the baby, she the elder sister-figure, in our relationship) are suddenly wiped away by the most genuine smile in the world--a soft, warm, playful, childishly vulnerable smile--just when you're least expecting it. Hats off to you, Anna.