Grandpa is visiting us now. He is so, so sweet--the sweetest, loveliest old man. D. helped him wash his hands for challah with a basin at the table, and dried his hands for him, and I saw the girls and Ez smiling at him with eyes shining with... love, I think. He's impossible not to love. We watched him eat his eggs, not seeing them, today, and I kept watching him trying to pick up pieces of egg with his fork, not realize he hadn't, bring an empty fork to his lips, then calmly try again. I was soooo rooting for him...and holding myself back from helping him. He's adorable.
Anyhow, last night, at our most solemn Shabbos table, Saulie said (with rest of family quietly awaiting their slice of bread): Balance. Get Balance!! (referring to "Smart Balance," the margarine-esque spread). We all snorted in spite of ourselves. And he was right, and I got it.
The first thing he said, before he got practical, was, "See moon in-a window!" I guess he had seen it earlier that night...
It's so fun to have the silly twins with us now for Shabbos, now that the sun sets at 4pm. They're so uncivilized, and so delicious. Jakey sits in his booster for a while, then climbs out, comes to me, and says, "More sit on lap!" and no matter how inconvenient, I can't resist him.
Uncle Mikee flew in with Grandpa, and together, we made our first unaided Thanksgiving! We got a turkey from Trader Joe's, he handled the turkey and stuffed it, I made sweet potatoes with sweet crunchy walnut topping, mashed potatoes, the cranberry sauce, the gravy. We did it! I was so, so pleased we weren't, once again, opening foil pans from Nosh Away (though they did provide the pies--c'mon, we have two year olds!) or begging our friends to take us in, orphanlike. Making the cranberry sauce, easy though it was, made me feel like I was finally on the grown-up side of the adult-kid divide. Hooray!
I couldn't help thinking of Ingrid the whole time, and called Julian, for old times' sake.
The twins, the twins. We moved their cribs, and crib tents, downstairs so that Grandpa wouldn't have to climb stairs every day to get to the kitchen, and they are so cozy there. I was hesistant to have them so far away, but we hear their cries through our bathroom vent very well. And the girls are right next door, too.
Saul loves to "read," is almost never without a "twucky book" or some other book, and says, "Dis iz a caww. Dis is a twuck. Ducky eyes. Fishy cwying, Mahmee?" and so on. They like to sit on their boosters with little cars or trains behind their backs, supported by the booster's back (we have a no-toys-during-meals rule), so they say, " Car sit down!" and think of each other, too, as in "Saulie sit down the car," Jakey's way of reminding me to put Saul's car behind his back, too.
Saul asks to go in the (real) car this way: Gunna gunna gunna gunna gunna caww!" Unfortunately, the answer is usually "No car." It's still too hard to go out with the two of them, especially now, in the rainy season, when we can't go to playgrounds. I'm terrified of shopping with them, ever since Yasha took a nosedive out of his cart at Ross, and landed on the cement (?) floor on his head.
Well, this room is tooooo cold to sit and type in. More later, perhaps, now that I've broken the ice again. And you--that is, I--have forgiven the long delay.
