Get a tissue!

Nolan: I love Zadie more than you or Dad.
Zadie: Love me, Nolan? (pointing to herself)
Nolan: (nodding, pointing to the heart on her jammies) That's why that heart is there.

Zadie is TWO YEARS OLD!

[Technically, she's two years and four days old. With the whirlwind visit from the Weber family, I am a little behind in my milestone recognition. Anyway - on with the show!]

Oh Zadie!! Your favorite word: "SELFIE" !! It means: I can do it, let me do it, I want to do it (but stick close in case I can't.) You try everything! Rarely are you stymied in your attempts. You see what everyone around you is doing and you MUST try to do it, too. Is this the fate of every second-born?

You already:

~ ~ ~drink out of a glass
~cut up your own food (well, the soft stuff...)
~put on your own shoes (sometimes even on the right feet!)
~choose your clothes for the day
~do the top straps of your car seat
~ride a trike
~go into the bathroom to say potty talk words (!)

When you are aware you know something funny or cute or clever, you get smilingly self-conscious, stick out your tongue and show your dimples.

You are (mostly) sleeping through the night.

You are an early riser.

You love stuffed animals.

Often, when you and Nolan are conspicuously quiet, I find you sitting side by side on the couch flipping though books. Nolan is your big brother and you want to be with him, do whatever he's doing, and play with whatever he has in his hands. Unless you don't. Then, usually, you want Mommy. (Mommy, Mommy, Mommy!!!)

Your sentences are typically two or three words long, but everyonce in a while, they are four or five. You listen to everything (!) being said around you and generally repeat the last two words you hear. It's like a tiny little echo that emphasizes random bits of information.

You like to pretend to serve me and Daddy food. When we pretend to eat it, you graciously ask "moah peese?" (More please) And then run back to your "kitchen" and refill our plates.

Sometimes you eat eggs, sometimes not. You don't like sweets. Not even birthday cupcakes.

You zoom up and down the hallways with your brother. You drive cars with your brother. You play animals (all together now) with your brother.

You say thank you with the tiniest little "tank you" that ever was.

Roly-poly bugs and spiders delight you. You stop to smell the "fah-fahs." You climb on walls whenever the opportunity presents itself.

How can you be two years old?!?

We love you so much, Zadie.

Fun in Minnesota!

From inner-tubing to playing in the backyard, watching the Twins play and watching cousins play, our nearly two-week visit to Saint Paul and nearby environs was a blast. Otto, Nolan and Zadie made ruckus hourly, hardly slept in past 5:30 am (well, that was mostly just Zadie) and read dozens of stories. Cold beers for the grownups and home-made popsicles for the kiddos in the hot, humid weather. A few showers, but no thunder and lightning (darn it!) Nolan caught his first fish and Zadie fed the dogs ("Suki - eat it! Hoo-goo - eat it!") Otto wanted to get knocked of the inner tube, then he didn't, then he did, then...well, you get it (he did finally go for it while riding with Tim.) Everyone took a spin in the inner tube, even Zadie (with Mumsie) and Nolan, having seen Otto go solo, went solo! We also hit the zoo, per usual, and hosted a few "pool parties" in the backyard with the plastic pool filled up with the hose. After usually doing that in San Francisco, it was a much better experience in warm weather, mostly for the adults who keep getting splashed.

Can't wait for next year!

All about Nolan

Where to start? So much to catch you up on! I think I've mentioned this before, but Nolan is quite the conversationalist. He usually kicks off the chit-chat at dinner with:

"What's something you remember from - ?"

And then it's fill in the blank:

the movie Cars
the movie Finding Nemo
the movie The Incredibles
Shallow Seas from Planet Earth
Fresh Water from Planet Earth
Great Plains from Planet Earth

He listens to your comment, often looking into the distance, blinking, remembering it for himself. Sometimes, while you relay a snippet, he will interrupt to finish it, excited to add all the detail he can remember. Recently, he's been adding books to this framework as in "What do you remember from the book we read at Everett's house?" (That's a pal of his from pre-school. He has a little group of kids he talks about a lot. Today, while he was telling me that he thought Theo was the silliest kid he knows, he was just smiling away, as if just the concept of Theo was funny.)




Nolan has also integrated the "drill" about behavior and expectations and how it's usually accompanied by a lot of explanation from me, ahem. For example, the other day, Dadsie got home late form work, just before jammies and bedtime, and Nolan was still going bananas when it was time to settle down (yeah, right!) Anyway, I started the whole "I know it's exciting that Dad is home - " and he totally cut me off and said "Okay, okay!!" and just started putting on jammies. Enough with the verbal emotional feedback and description blah blah blah. He would rather do what he's supposed to be doing than listen to me jibber-jabber. Hey - that's win-win!! (Especially for Dadsie!)



Pretty much every night after dinner we have a Family Dance Party. We play an old ska song by The English Beat that has a part of the song where the singer says "and now STOP!" and the music stops for a beat, we all freeze, then start dancing when the music comes back. Nolan sometimes wakes up in the morning and I know one of two questions will be at the ready:
Can I have a muffin?
Can we have a dance party?

Sometimes we do both!! And, yeah, those are homemade muffins. The house might not be spic and span, but I bake up a mean muffin, and Nolan is my best customer.


A few recent tidbits:

* He wants to move our house to an empty farm. In Africa.
* He doesn't just like peaches, he loves them.
* He doesn't just like dirt, he loves it.
* We don't kill bugs. Except dangerous ones like the brown recluse and the black widow. Oh, and mosquitos are fair game, too.
* Whenever we require him to wash hands, we hear his voice yelling from the bathroom "Soap?" and usually the answer is "Yes, soap!" Sometimes he's in there for a while, making faces at himself in the mirror.
* Can *insert friend's name here* come over and play?
* Can I go over to *insert friend's name here*'s house?
* Mom/Dad, can you play with me?
* Dessert days are Monday and Friday. "What day is today?"



Today he got his haircut across the strret from Mitchell's ice cream parlor. For a treat, we headed over there and he wanted chocolate ice cream, but not in a cone. In the end, he chose to have a milkshake. He offered a sip to Zadie and then some to me, too. Handing that cup back and forth, taking turns sipping, watching each other enjoy the chocolatey goodness. A moment I will remember for a long time.


Zadie's update soon to follow!

Nolan is four years old!

And, unfortunately, he has some kind of stomach bug. He stayed home from school (no pumpkin muffins with cream cheese frosting to share with his little pals) and even threw up. He took a three hour nap, though he claims he never fell asleep. I am planning to post a big birthday message replete with pictures when I am also feeling better (fever, chills, nausea...it's a party around here, people!)

However, I think the Birthday Boy might be on the mend. This just overheard:

Nolan: Dad - get me in a headlock and I'll start punching you, okay?

(Picture from his little party at home last Sunday!)

Nolan is Four Years Old!

It is not to be believed!





That little round-headed baby who turned our lives upside-down, inside-out, and round-and-round is four years old. From the days when pulling himself to standing, spooning oatmeal into his mouth and talking about himself in the third person were the highlights and stepping stones. To today, running down the street, driving his big wheel like Lightning McQueen (that's Mario Andretti for the kiddo set) and holding his own in any conversation (especially about Lightning McQueen. Yes. It's a theme.) as the latest developments.

Nolan *still* makes us smile everyday by saying something simple but profound; true, now that you think about it; familiar, but with his own twist.

We still call him The Rememberer, and it still fits.

He is a wonderful big brother, only occasionally displaying impatience, and usually outright enjoyment. Zadie mimics him incessantly. We can't forget that her first reliably reproduced sound was "rumm-rummmm" like a car. From the beginning, she saw in him what is unmistakeable: a bursting personality that draws you in and makes you want to know "what is going on inside that mind?!?"

Nolan has friends at school, and makes them at every playground we go to. He is curious about other kids (and their toys...especially their cars) and is often on the receiving end of that curiosity.

A bundle of energy, he loves to walk and climb and adventure and hike and jump and swing and wrestle. He plays superheroes versus bad guys with his Dad and sister (Human Torch, The Enforcers, and Daredevil, respectively.) He's a lobster under the sea of Mumsie's comforter.

He also flips through books on his own for long periods of time, studying the pictures and the words he knows. Nolan can read more than a handful of words and knows all about letter sounds. Once, in a story Dad was reading out loud, someone used a "phone" and Nolan interrupted because he couldn't find the word that started with 'f'.

Books with food in them are devoured by us all - grabbing the item and pretending to stuff it in our mouths. We've been doing this with Nolan for years (can you believe that he's old enough that I can say "for years"!!) He loves this book we have about nutrition and what happens to the food when you eat it and which foods do what for your body. How many four-year-old kids know about the esophagus?

Nolan picks out his clothes for the day and dresses himself. He is mostly proud of this accomplishment, but I think it sometimes scares him a bit, too. Being independent is a big step that sometimes feels like it's away from Mom and Dad. But it's accompanied by his drive to be capable of making what he wants to happen come true so instead of away from us, it's parallel to our purpose.

Yes, there are the bumps (oh, the whining! oh, the testing!) and yes, the usual worries (are you sure you don't want an egg/avocado/meat/milk - protein???) What would parenting be like without them? He's a kid, after all!

Nolan, a day has not gone by that I haven't quietly watched you for a moment, trying to drink you in.





Heart of our hearts.