conuly

What's that song in the background? I had it running in my mind for AGES a few years back, but of course one can't identify a song easily if one doesn't know the words!

Ana went to this program today. 45 minutes of trampoline and 45 minutes of rock climbing. AWESOME! She loved it, big grin on her face the WHOLE time.

Didn't nab a single picture, I'm sorry to say, but that's okay, I plan to go back.

Here's the thing. The group of 14 kids was divided approximately by age. Ana, of course, was in the younger group.

The older group did rock climbing first. I noticed as they did it that all the kids were up on the rock at once, on the part of the rock face that juts out a little and is somewhat more challenging.

When it was Ana's group's turn for the rock, because they were younger, they went in what I could see is the "easy" spot - straight up and down. Unfortunately, that spot (the corner) was small enough that only one kid could go up at a time (this after 15 minutes talking about safety, which was necessary, no argument). So Ana didn't get much climbing in... and as it was, she was getting up there (15 feet!) pretty fast. It wasn't difficult for her at all. (It never is, no type of climbing.)

I totally intend to go again (and get some pictures next time)! She had so much fun! But if they divide roughly by age again, I want her in the group that does more climbing. Watching her and the other kids I think she's ready for it (with the same level of help that the others had, of course), and I know she'd prefer to do more climbing instead of sitting down.

How does one go about requesting this without coming off like one of those people, though? You know, the ones who think their kids are sooooo special rules just don't apply? I don't think there is a hard-and-fast rule here, but I certainly don't want it to seem like I think my niece is just much too advanced, etc. etc. etc.

1. The other day, I watched Evangeline carefully set out two cups and a bowl, fill the bowl by trekking back and forth to the bathroom with the cups, and then spend a happy half an hour scooping water back into the cups and pouring from one cup to the other.

Now, I know that this is a fine learning activity. It builds fine motor skills (and some life skills as well), it teaches an intuitive grasp of measurement and basic physics, you learn a lot by pouring water back and forth. And so I let her do it. (She cleaned up afterwards, another learning activity.)

But the question is - I know how useful this is for her development, but how the heck does she know it? Who told her? Children the world over enjoy pouring water from one cup to another, but who the heck tells them it's a good idea? HOW DO THEY KNOW THEY SHOULD DO THIS?

2. Evangeline and I talk about nutrition sometimes when we eat our lunch. I've tried to impress upon her the simple rule that we should eat a variety of colors in our daily diet. (Natural colors, thanks!) This is a rule that's easy for even very young children to grasp, and you can express it in a fairly poetic way, too.

I know that a variety of foods is good for my body. Does the same hold true for the compost? Like, if I compost a little bit of mango and a bit of eggshells and a bit of coffee grounds and a bit of wilted lettuce, is it going to make richer dirt (and therefore healthier, more nutritious fruits and vegetables) than if my compost is made primarily of, say, orange and banana peels?

About somebody wanting to replace her clover with grass "for her babies" (we all largely piled on to politely enough say that clover beats grass any day of the week) got me thinking - our huge patch of clover that went from the front to the side of the house is much smaller. The grass is taking over!

So I want to reseed the clover, naturally. And I thought I might put a few patches of other groundcover on the edges here and there, like creeping thyme and whatnot. Can anybody suggest other groundcovers that are attractive (look or smell or feel pretty) *and* that can stand being stepped on often? It's not so much a yard as a creeping path - one day I'll draw a diagram of our house and yard space.

Yeah... I kinda need the script of everything the moles say in Moleville, the optional stuff as well as the unavoidable stuff. Any chance you guys have it, or know where to get it?

Yakko, Wakko, and Dot.
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.
Ed, Edd, and Eddy.
Up, up, and away!
Ego, superego, id.

I could go on like that all day. What is it called when you have three or more names or words in a list, and the first ones all are alike in some way but the last one is different? Like, the newest Sandra Boynton book, 15 animals, has a boy naming every animal in his house. They're all Bob except, naturally, the last one. There has to be a name for this!

The other day, when she met my uncle's girlfriend, she asked me a highly embarrassing question - "Why is her tummy so big?" and I tried to hush her up (while not simultaneously saying it's wrong to be fat, etc. etc. etc.)

Bit silly, the woman works with small children and anyway, I'm sure knows she's not overly skinny, but still, it was the only polite response I have for that sort of situation. (And advice is appreciated.)

At the time, I was thinking "Thank goodness she whispered", but now I wonder if she whispered on purpose (which still wasn't totally polite, since the woman was in the room with us, but at least it's an effort, right?)

Later that week, she asked me why the water here tastes "different". And I said that our water in NYC is some of the best in the world, and Bonne-maman isn't that lucky.

"Connie! That's not a polite way to say that, because you could hurt Bonne-maman's feelings! You should say "Sometimes things are different, and that's okay", because that's nice!"

Well. What do I say to that? (I said sorry, if you're curious.)

Which is apparently yogurt made from buttermilk. Not buttermilk, the cultured stuff you buy at the store which you can mock up with milk and vinegar; but buttermilk, the stuff that's left over after you make butter.

Which raises an interesting question in my mind. See, the nieces can't have dairy. They can, it seems, have goat milk. I've been experimenting with goat yogurt (they liked) and plain goat milk (they didn't like so much), and smoothies (mmmmm), and now I'm wondering... can I make butter from homogenized milk if I have no access to either unhomogenized goat milk or goat cream?

The intrepid hero(es) wander off and do something that gets them "out of phase" with the rest of the universe. They can see and hear everybody, but nobody else can see or hear them. Maybe they're totally incorporeal, and maybe they can move things around.

But why doesn't it ever work the other way? Everybody else can see and hear them, but they're wandering around in a fog, only able to see the other things and/or people out of phase?

( Read more... )

Incidentally, on a different episode - here's the thing. We, unlike the characters, can't have our ( Read more... ). We already know you're creepy! There's no need to stand still and make frowny faces at the cameras every five minutes! Just once would be more than enough. Really.

Okay. So, let's say you're looking at your average pea plant. And, following the rules of genetics as set out by Mendel, we know that if it's got one recessive gene for a trait, and one dominant gene for that same trait, the dominant one is the one we'll see.

Now, I'll interrupt a second and say that bio was never my subject. Chem was easy, and physics was a blast, but I only got through bio (the third time. Time one was a flop, and time two... well, I passed the tests, but I still wasn't able to really do the work) by memorizing a bunch of facts that didn't make much sense to me. (They made more sense once I took chem, and more again when I took physics. We teach high school science backwards.) So you'll correct me if I say anything devastatingly wrong.

Now, as I understand it, your chromosomes themselves just consist of a small number of nucleotides. So what makes a specific combination of nucleotides say "make this pea green" or "this one's gonna be a yellow pea" or even (in the case of extreme manipulation or random mutation) "purple all the way"?

For that matter, how does a pretty small difference in DNA make me a human, and outside we've got daisies? Or even a huge difference, every little detail different, how does it work to make things? How does it make sense?

I never understood that point. I just threw it back up on the tests, whatever I needed to know (the second and third years. The first year was a loss completely), and I've forgotten a lot of it, since I didn't really learn it properly the first (three) time(s) around.

I couldn't find the boughten play-doh, so we made our own. Scented it with a little bit of rose water. There's something viscerally good about seeing children playing with undyed play dough, and knowing that you did that yourself. It smells so... wholesome, it really does. Like the store bought kind, but moreso.

Play dough is really easy - just about two parts flour to one part water, and as much salt as you think it needs. I always have it too sticky like that, so I keep adding flour until it's right. Takes about five minutes of my life - less if I make the kids do it, and they think it's fun.

It's like cakes all over again. So many things we buy as a matter of course, we assume make our lives easier. And I guess they do, sorta - but it turns out that the homemade replacements aren't actually that difficult to make, or even that time-consuming.

I was reading a review on Amazon.com about a cookbook, and somebody commented that parts of it were "too time-consuming" because she's a mother of a pre-schooler, so she substitutes (this is her example) canned beans for dried. I didn't get it. From where I'm sitting, soaking the beans is the easiest part of cooking! Sure, it takes several hours, but you don't need to be there. You don't even need to be awake. Just put some water over the beans and go to bed, and by tomorrow they'll be ready to cook. They're healthier that way, and cheaper, too, and it's so easy. I suppose if you start cooking every day by looking in the fridge and seeing what you haven't run out of yet, it makes sense, but that costs more money and time to do, and stress as well.

I was inspired, after the play dough, to look up some recipes for glue, for paint. Why, it's easy to make glue, and not that hard to make paint that'll stand up to the needs of a very young child. (It's not like your very young child is Picasso and needs good quality art supplies just to make a mess on the table, right?)

I read just the other day an excerpt from an old cookbook, preaching frugality. It is the height of waste, I was told, to buy vinegar. One should buy some vinegar once, and then just keep topping it off with this and that - old cider, sour beer, whatever. It sounds so simple, but who makes their own vinegar now? Or stock - why do we buy stocks? What could be easier than dumping your vegetable garbage and bones in a pot and watching TV for a few hours?

Our garden last year was so simple, we didn't touch it, and we had fresh veggies all summer and into fall.

What else is there that's really just so easy to do, that people generally don't do? And why don't we? I appreciate that people don't know how, but why don't people know how, or think of it?

Edit: To be clear, since I don't think I was, I don't mean "This way is better than that way" except for tangible things - these things are easier than they're portrayed (even if they're not totally easy), and they do save money.

I mean, more along the lines of "Why don't people see these as options? Why don't they know these options exist?" It's one thing to know your choices and make an informed choice to do this or that because it's easier for you. It's totally different to make your choice because you think something is impossible for you when it's not, or to not even make your choice because you don't realize you have one.

So like, to be specific, planning meals in advance *is* cheaper. But if it can't work for you, or if it's not a priority, that's your business. This is me, totally not caring (except if you're my mom, in which case, I really wish you'd stop buying food that looks good now, but that never gets made and goes bad in the fridge or freezer) because it's not my concern at all.

*deep breath*

I'm running off now.

I've asked over in parenting101 and I've asked over in TBW and the answers that I've gotten have mostly been... less than helpful*.

Angelique has been asking (again!) about how the baby is made. She still thinks that we're cooked to become alive, and she presumably still thinks we're eaten, too. Which makes a certain kind of sense, and is why I no longer say that a baby is in a tummy. It's always "womb", and often even "womb, which is near the tummy, but not, because the tummy is for food, right?"

Last time she asked, I told Jenn, and we agreed on getting a book, and... nothing ever came of that.

So today, I want book recommendations. Books that treat the subject simply and plainly and honestly, and that will make sense to a fairly bright four year old, or even a not so bright four year old who thinks, or wants to think, that we're baked like cookies.

And please - unless you have a copy in English that I can buy, no links to scans of that German book that actually shows what goes on prior to conception and says that people have sex because it feels nice. While that's the sort of attitude I appreciate (though I'd of course run it by Jenn and 'dul first!), I don't want it in German. This child is still learning to read, after all!

*_{How do you politely clarify your request without also telling the person who gave you totally the wrong type of advice that their advice is the prime example of the sort of stuff you don't want to say? Somehow, this nice woman managed to hit all three points of things that I did not want! And she meant well, and it would be good advice if I was coming at it from the same direction she is. I felt bad.}

Edit: I've now gotten better advice elsewhere, so with that advice and your advice here, I should be set. I hope.

Where can one buy a large container of unflavored soy yogurt?

Because, while eating my pumpkin tomato soup today (with sour cream on top for me, but not the kiddos, I'm afraid), I had the best idea ever!

I need to get some yogurt at once and proceed to make raita. Not Indian raita, but Tex-Mex raita, to take the place of sour cream. Take a minute to think how wonderful that would be. Mmmmmm....

But since the baby (this is her official name now - "I not Eva - I THE BABY!") can't have dairy and Angelique can't have dairy and Jenn can't have dairy and Elise and I probably shouldn't have all that cow's milk either, it's either soy yogurt or goat yogurt, and I suspect soy is going to be easier to find around here.

Any ideas?

And this close to Halloween, there's not much point, but next year I'll know about it in advance and I'll be able to do something at the start of the month, instead of the very end.

This reminds me. I haven't given out candy since 2001. I mean, it was 2001, and it rained that year anyway, and nobody came to our door. So now, I not only have way too much candy (no idea how many people stop by - this year, I'll make a list, and next year I'll have the right amount of candy for the little ones and costumed people, as well as the right amount of raisins and toothbrushes for the older kids who don't dress up because it's for their "baby sister"), but I'm not sure if I got the right variety here.

So, you tell me - what is *your* favorite type of candy (either very specific or very vague, whatever) that I might buy for Halloween? What about least favorite? If you're an adult, and you have kids, ask them, post their replies.

When you are on your period (or when somebody you know has her period, and you actually know this), how many pads do you use every day? Because my getting paid and my getting ready for that time of month happened to coincide, happily, but buying enough for a full week is going to cost a lot more than I want, so I figured that for one month I could just wash laundry more often, and add more next month, and so on, until I have as many as I want - right?

But, for the life of me, I can't remember how many pads I go through daily. Well, it's not like I can't just buy pads if I get too few to start, so... how many?

( Read more... )

Edit: Seems a lot of people use about 4 a day, and I'd probably want an extra big/thick one for overnight, because I like my sheets. Okay. I can do that. I have great sympathy for those of you who change your pads much more often than most do (and me, to be frank) - you're either very heavy, or much more fastidious than the rest of us.

Why are scarecrows a symbol of fall? I thought you put them up in the spring to keep birds from eating all your seed, yeah? I can understand why they'd be useful to protect your crops until they can be harvested, but why are they solely used to mean late autumn?

Angelique has an acquaintance (not a friend) in her toddler programs.

He's 2 and a half, and every time she sees him she shouts his name really loudly - and proceeds to totally ignore him. Well, he's not on her level at all, and, unlike her sister, he doesn't talk. (This makes it hard to speak to his parents, because all you can really politely talk about in these programs is your kids and theirs, and if I talk about how much she's talking now (which is all she's doing), it sounds like I'm boasting or judging.) He's in speech therapy.

But what I really want to say to his parents (but was not going to) is that I'd be much more concerned about the fact that, at two and a half, he doesn't play with the other kids. At all. I don't mean he doesn't play games with them, I mean he doesn't parallel play. I see this kid every week, several times a week, and he doesn't ever sit with another kid, or copy another child, or take somebody else's toy, or do the motions to any of the songs, nothing like that. He does what his mother tells him to do (come here, give me that, don't!) but he doesn't look to another kid if she goes "Hey, it's so-and-so!" or get a smock if she says "Do you want to paint?" or nod his head and sit down if she goes "Are you hungry? Let's eat". If he and his mom are doing play-dough together, and he decides to do something else, he doesn't look at Mommy before he gets up, he just moves (bolts) towards the other thing. My gut feeling is that all this combined is much more unusual than just not talking - I like kids, I pay attention to them. Evangeline plays with her sister, both in the parallel variety (Angelique is playing "eating dinner", so Evangeline does the same thing) and the social variety (Angelique says "Let's hide!" and Evangeline goes "Where Ana?" and 'finds' her to hide with her), and she's some 8 months younger than this boy, and she's just not that advanced.

Unfortunately, the only time I ever spoke to his mom about this, I was all reassuring "Yeah, it's just because you speak to him in Chinese, and you know boys are slower to talk, he's a bright kid, don't worry too much about it", but now I'm making this list of things and... I don't know.

Now, for those of you who might be new to my journal, I don't think that being unusual in this respect is a bad thing, per se - but his parents... I don't know if they see that he's different like this. I think they're focused on the language, and maybe not seeing the rest of it? Maybe they do, I don't know.

It's just hard to accept your kid if you don't know how they're different from other kids. Or to help him - he should be able to communicate with his parents, and now I'm thinking... well, you know what I'm thinking, I'm always thinking it :) I don't think it's just that he's slow to talk, is all.

Man, how do you say all this to somebody who it isn't their first language and you don't know them that well to begin with because all you do is make nice-talk about each other's kids (or some people gossip about other people's kids who aren't there)? Well, his mom is fluent, anyway, so language barriers should be minimal.

We were at soccer (soccer!) and there were only 10 minutes left, but it was getting dark out. I took out my phone to call my mom to ask what the forecast was for rain. She gets on the phone, I go "Hi, I was just-" and I see the lightning in Jersey, between two buildings. I hate lightning, and right on the water, too! "Nevermindgoinghomebye!"

Grabbed Ana up, assured her that soccer was over for everyone and got approximately 200 feet before the sky opened up.

40 minutes later or so, it finally stopped. I'm actually glad I decided not to wait at the Hunger Memorial - a tiny, cramped spot, open on both ends, with two young children and a whole crowd of people? If the baby, at least, were older it might be kinda fun, but as it was... I prefered getting soaked. Ana got soaked and loved it (mostly). The baby did not get totally soaked, being up on me (we kept each other dry where it touched, and her back stayed mostly dry as well, god knows how), but she alternated between terrified sobbing (aw) and what sounded like genuine laughter. Maybe she was putting on a brave face, I don't know.

Naturally, of course, this all happened only half an hour after I caved and bought a pair of sunglasses for Ana to replace the ones I left at home.

And here's a question. Ana has been complaining a lot lately about the light hurting her eyes. Given that her mom and my mom have a history of migraines and light sensitivity, I naturally take this very seriously, and was careful to tell her parents. But I'm also pretty sure that some of it, she's complaining because she likes the reaction - like when she said the light from the ceiling hurt her eyes, I don't think she was serious. I've instituted a new rule for our trips that on sunny days, she wears her sunglasses and they stay on (or if she takes them off, she brings them directly to me so they can't get lost), but I'm wondering - how sensitive is it possible or probable that her eyes are? It's not anything that ever bothered me, brightness of lights, so I don't know how to gauge this.

(This enforced sunglasses-wearing is bound to come in handy, anyway. Everybody on Jenn's side of the family (that's my side!) has bad eyes, at least, and that's genetic, isn't it? So if she ends up needing real glasses (and she ought to get her eyes checked sooner than later, Jenn, weren't you on top of that?), she'll be in the practice of wearing them anyway.)

Let's suppose that there are an infinite number of alternate timelines running right now, for every little teeny tiny difference possible in the universe.

Now, we all know about the trousers of time and all, or of flipping a coin - but if you add time travel into the mix, would it make sense that all the futures are still "real" even if they haven't happened yet? So there's an infinite number of worlds that are exactly the same as this one, in every detail but what will happen next? (Or in a million years, or whenever?)

I mean, if this weren't all a house of very flimsy cards, would that make sense?

And on another note, for some reason this is making me think of the exhibits in the Natural History Museum, which we went to today. (See? I'm a good aunt!) In the Hall of Asian Peoples they have a few dioramas of ancient cities, for different time periods. And in one of them, they really have a miniature person on a flying carpet above it :P

No, really. A pair of boys, dressed alike, who looked honest-to-God like Draco must've looked at age five, if he'd happened to wear nice quality Muggle clothing.

And then I saw the third one. Triplets. All dressed alike.

Sunday, I went out with Deniz, Ana, and Su while the respective other adults were busy. (There's another story about that coming, but wait until my thoughts make sense, 'k?) And the whole day was a mess of me yelling one, two, or even three wrong names (Evangeline wasn't even there, but I kept calling her name!) before I hit upon the correct one for the child I was intending to correct.

These kids don't look alike, and they sure weren't dressed alike. And I couldn't get their names right for the life of me.

So here's my question - why do people dress their multiples, especially those identical or very similar in appearance, alike? I'm not judging or criticizing, exactly, they clearly have their reasons - but whatever those reasons are, I simply can't fathom. And I want to know, I really do. All I know is that I don't have the brain power to do it, I'd go absolutely batty and the children in question would grow up insecure and altogether a bit confused about their own names.

So I just don't get it.

Thoughts? Answers? Help?

(I also met another young Topher today. This is me, being startled.)

Not intending any disrespect towards the poor girl or her family, but why is it her we've been hearing about off and on for the past ten years? Why is it her who got to be featured in so many tabloid articles?

Why not any of the other children who have been lost or killed in the past ten years?

Tangentially, I know pictures exist of her *outside* of her pageant pictures. Saw one or two of them tonight. So why were virtually all the pictures we've constantly been inundated with been the ones from the pageants? Was that really the best way to remember this kid?

I made the mistake of explaining to Deniz about the Braille on signs and the bumps in front of subway platforms (and we so need those gate thingies inside the station!) and how they're for people who can't see.

And now she seems to see me as the expert on all things blind. "Connie? How do people who can't see get on the boat? How do they know where to sit?" Well, that's easy - I explain as much as I can about the logistics of using a cane, a dog, advice from others, or your memory to find a seat and leave it at that. "Connie? How do people who don't use their eyes get food? How do they cook?"

What? I don't know how blind people cook! I don't especially care how blind people cook, frankly, seeing as how I'm not blind.

We spend a lot of time with Deniz. I anticipate more questions of this nature in the future - and, heaven forbid, questions about deafness can't be far behind. Does anybody have any good resources so I can make an attempt at answering her questions? I promised her I'd ask around. She's probably forgotten by now, but I did promise.

I'd also like some simple books for five year olds on this sort of subject - she can read, and she's right into asking questions about everything, so it'd be very good for me to be able to toss her a book and say "Here, find out for yourself". Good for her parents, too.

In similar thoughts, it's occured to me lately that if we lived in a world without glasses, I'd be actually pretty disabled for that. My eyesight is perfect with my glasses on (well, pretty much - my glasses are now royally fucked up, with scratches and superglue all on the lenses, so it's perfect if I ignore that!), but without them on, it's pretty bad. I mean, really bad.

Which isn't so bad, I mean - I always wear my glasses, and it's hardly comprable to having eyesight that *isn't* correctable via the use of carefully chosen lenses hooked onto my nose. But... *shrugs* I hadn't thought of that before, even back when I lost my glasses all the time.

I need to get new glasses.

How does one remove dust from fans without removing the grille cover on said fans?