mathmom's blog

The other day after gymnastics, Amanda announces from the back seat of the car, "I want a sprout!" I think to myself, "OK, she's interested in gardening now? Or maybe bean sprouts?" (Actually, my first thought was What!!??? Those were my second thoughts.) We get to the Wendy's where we eat after gymnastics (otherwise Luke falls asleep without having lunch, a bad thing). I order the usual hamburger with only pickles and no bun for Amanda, with a side of mandarin oranges and a Sprite to drink (preferable to the Hawaiian punch or the sugar free lemonade). We pull away from the window and she asks, "Can I have my sprout now?" I finally understand that I had been talking about going to Wendy's, and she knows that they don't have juice so she gets a sprite. Except that she can't remember the name. At least she knows what she wants. Addendum: After Amanda said that she wanted a sprout, I told her that she could have one when we got hom...

Eleanor has a loose tooth: "The first one on the right," as the Jack Pearson song goes. She let me wiggle it yesterday. It has certainly been a long time since I experienced that feeling. Of course, now she is saying that she can't eat anything because her tooth is loose. I won't give her carrots for snack, but surely she can manage a sandwich. In other news, McCain's choice of Sarah Palin for vice president has transformed at least one Clinton supporter to McCain. In fact, as soon as I told Eleanor about Palin, the very first thing she said was "If something really bad happens to John McCain, then she would be president!" She has apparently learned some civics somewhere.

Well, we made it through tropical storm Hanna (it wasn't a hurricane by the time it got to us) . I don't even think the power went out. There were 10-20 knot winds this morning, along with driving heavy rain, but it wasn't dangerous so we went out onto the porch to eat breakfast. Amanda wasn't sure about being out there in the storm (she also thought it was a bit cold) but she eventually agreed to stay out there. She needed some comfort hugs every once in a while. Every time Luke heard the wind roar he would yell loudly, imitating the wind, we think. He liked it pretty well. I think Eleanor was convinced it would be much much worse, and she had trouble getting hold of the idea that it wasn't so bad. She said that she had watched "a tree branch swinging in the wind like a chandelier." She thought she had stayed up all night...I think she was probably asleep. It does not compare to Hurricane Fran, which drove right up the highway to the triangle in 1...

Mama: "There's a saying, Eleanor, silence is golden." Eleanor: "What's silence?"

On getting into the hot car: "Mama, could you turn on the warm conditioner?" When it starts raining as we're driving: "We need the wind whiskers!" When I offer her a t-shirt to wear for her first day of school: "Well, it might not be pretty enough..." While getting ready for gymnastics: "I need to wear my leotart." There was one more I meant to tell you all, but I forgot! I should have blogged it right away, I suppose. We're all waiting for Hannah to come, we've taken the porch furniture off the porch, moved the garbage can inside the garage, found all the toys that were outside and brought them in... Eleanor is convinced she will be terrified, but I suspect she won't even wake up. We'll let you know how it goes.

I would like to register a complaint. I am trying my best to put things away, keep things in their proper places, be organized, so that when I need something I know where to find it. My son thinks it is his job (perhaps his calling) to take things out of their proper places and scatter them throughout the house. Today I needed the lime squeezer (I made chicken chili). As I looked in the utensil drawer, I had a vague visual memory of Luke carrying the squeezer around, gleefully opening and closing it. I have no idea where it is. A few days ago I got out Luke's monitor (we haven't had it on for a few weeks now) so that the babysitter could sit in the basement and watch TV while still listening for Luke. I kept careful track of it for most of the day, until it was time to put lotion on Amanda. As I did that, I heard Luke laughing and running around. When I was done with Amanda, the monitor was gone. I still can't find it. Luke loves playing with the ladle. Usually I l...

We have quite a few buttons on appliances that Luke can reach. Most of these have "control locks" which adults can push in order to keep young ones from starting the appliances. They have varying degrees of success. The oven control lock does not apparently work. The first time Luke found out about the oven buttons was when he pushed the stool up to the oven/microwave wall stack to see what I was doing with the microwave. He leaned against the oven light button, which obligingly beeped and turned on the light, a very gratifying response. He stayed there for the next few minutes happily beeping as I tried in vain to lock the controls. If all else fails, I suppose I could read the manual... The dryer works slightly better. If you hold down the control lock button for 3 seconds, the controls are indeed locked---except for the "cancel" button. Thus Luke can turn the dryer off, but in order to turn it back on again, I need to hold down the control lock button aga...