Why is it so much fun...

...to make a baby laugh and giggle?

Quote that tickled my funny bone

On Sunday, Jonathan was asked to substitute last minute for an age seven primary class. The talk didn't scare them off! Just kidding, he did a fine job. By last minute I mean twenty minutes before the class was to start. He was handed a manual, and being a good sport he agreed.

After church I asked how the class went. He looked bemused and chuckled, "Oh man! Seven is a theological wasteland! They didn't know anything!"

I bet the kids enjoyed his class though. Jon is very good at balancing goofy with serious. He's a natural teacher and kids like him. He and I team taught a class of 11 and 12 year olds in our first ward together. (Good grief they're on missions and in college now! Wow.) It's a good calling.

Swings

Took the kids to the park yesterday. It was pleasant, in the 70s. The one positive side to having few parks here is that they are usually teeming with lots of kids to play with.

Melissa's favorite thing in the park is the swings. I pushed her for a while then told her it was someone else's turn. Besides, she needed to burn off some energy. If I'd let her, she'd stay on the swings indefinitely. Then I took Isaac over to the bucket swings for the first time. He was startled at first but then seemed to enjoy the slow rocking.

While pushing Isaac, Matthew got on a swing, pumped his legs, and got the swing going All By Himself. He didn't even need a get started push. Six is such a capable age. I really like it!

Close, but no cigar

I was talking with some gamers over lunch and heard that the xbox 360 settlers of catan game was out.  Could this be the excuse I needed to get a cheap 360, and maybe even virtually reunite the Grant / Ellis Catan crew?

Nope.

First, Catan/360 has no camera support.  Come on, guys.  Uno gives you webcam support, for crying out loud.  Are you even trying?

Second, it doesn't allow multiple players to share one console, so our wives couldn't join us.  Or to be more egalitarian, we couldn't join them, either.

Boo, whoever-developed-Catan/360-that-I-couldn't-google-in-thirty-seconds.  Boo!

Mekeni

About a week ago, we went to the only Filipino restaurant in San Antonio worth eating at (there are two others that got mediocre reviews), Mekeni.  The name means "Come on over" in Kapampangan.

I was a little disappointed; the food was only okay.  It was a buffet priced slightly on the high end, but nothing was really excellent.  The kaldereta came closest but was not nearly as good as what the Boondocks's chef served in Salt Lake.  In fact my own kaldereta, produced with the help of the chef's secret ("maraming keso" -- lots of cheese) may be better.  My other favorite Filipino foods are pork and chicken adobo, but Mekeni's pork adobo was barely okay and the chicken adobo was of the lazy "let's throw a bunch of drumsticks and thighs in without de-skinning them or cutting them up" variety, which I guess some Filipinos must like but I do not.  The mechado was also disappointing.

One pleasant surprise was the sinigang.  It was quite tasty, with lots of good chunks of beef.  Unfortunately one of Rachel's first bites contained a very spicy pepper, which ruined it for her.

I let Melissa choose her own foods to try, but even so she didn't want to try anything.  We ended up letting her fill up on Tapioca pudding (with cassava and coconut chunks mixed in).

It wasn't a total loss, though.  A 40-ish woman at the next table heard me trying to scrape the rust off my Tagalog, and asked if I'd been to the Philippines.  "Two years in Quezon City," I replied.  "Missionary?"  "Yes."  "Mormon?"  "Yes."  "No wonder you have a large family!"

Turns out she was Mormon too and wanted to chat.  So we did.

One other thing came up: the restaurant had a large TV running Filipino shows.  Turns out that you can get seven Filipino channels on DirecTV.  (I wonder if it's time-shifted, or if you basically need to get a DVR with that?)  They also have Brazilian and Chinese packages, among others, but not French or Japanese.  (Spanish is listed separately next to English; it's not considered International.)

Talk is done

Rachel is still playing Valkyria Chronicles.  I got distracted and spent 40 minutes reading the Savage Peanut archives.  It is past 1:00.  I am going to go to bed.

The best talks I read while preparing mine are Ordinances and Covenants and Children.

Bathroom Tourism

Why, oh why is it that our children feel the need to check out every store or restaurant bathroom? Sometimes they make multiple trips over the course of a hour.

Are our children connoisseurs of bathrooms? Am I missing some sort of thrill here???

A typical excursion begins with me telling the kids that they need to use the bathroom before we go. OK mom! Done? Great. Fine and dandy, we leave. As soon as we get to an establishment a small voice will pipe up, "Mom I need to go potty!" Matthew is big enough to go by himself, but Melissa I have to help. So we make the first trip. Depending upon the condition of the facilities I may remonstrate Melissa to "not touch anything!" Yuck.

We leave the "rest" room (now there's a good euphemism). Perhaps 15 minutes will pass and I'll hear, "I need to go potty!" And she'll go. Again. This time the other half of her business, which she takes her sweet time doing. Ugh. Then I wipe since her job is "not good enough even for government" as Jonathan has stated.

Just to make things interesting, Matthew may have to go again and sometimes he can't reach the sink to wash so Jonathan or I will have to assist him as well.

Not to be outdone by his older siblings, Isaac will more times than not fill his drawers, necessitating yet another trip to the ladies room. Which may or may not have a changing table...

If we're at a restaurant there's the obligatory post-meal hand and face washing. With the three of them I get to know the area bathrooms much more intimately than I really care to.

Sometimes it seems I spend more time in the ladies room than sitting down in the restaurant. Sigh.

Speaking tomorrow in church

I was asked to give a talk in sacrament meeting on perfecting the saints.  This is going to be hard.

I'm used to public speaking.  That part doesn't bother me.  In fact, it's kind of a rush.  But I've always tried to make my presentations involve audience participation -- asking questions with a small audience, getting a show of hands with a large one, that sort of thing.  Sacrament meeting talks, though, are monologues.  That's just how they are.  It's more solemn that way. So I keep thinking of ways to drive participation for this talk, but I can't use them.  It's driving me crazy.

Also I like to be very informal when I present.  And controversial.  Both of these help when your primary purpose is to entertain.  (And even in technical talks, that's your primary purpose, or you're doing it wrong.)  I can't get up tomorrow and say, "The two-Cumorah theory is bulls***."  (Rachel caught me laughing to myself earlier.  I was thinking of things I could say that would ensure I'd never be asked to speak again.  That's one.)

I guess the fundamental problem is that speaking in church, at least in sacrament meeting, is not primarily to entertain.  It's a completely different game than you practice for any other public speaking.  No wonder almost nobody is good at it!

Back to the grindstone.

Peanuts

• Matthew showed me a video of Melissa jumping on the couch.  "See?  See?"  Tele-tattling.  That's an application of his new camera that hadn't occurred to me.
• Matthew has become very good at trying new food, perhaps partly in an effort to differentiate himself from his sister's pickiness.  Sometimes Melissa will follow his lead if he gives it the Matthew stamp of approval, like tonight when he pronounced the noodle-wrapped shrimp Good.  He doesn't hesitate to stop after one bite if he doesn't like it, which may be why his opinion carries more weight with his sister than Mom's.
• "Melissa," Matthew began from the back of the minivan, "remember when Raven was babysitting the three kids?"  "She fell asleep, Matthew," I interrupted.  Matthew was undaunted.  "Oh.  Dad, remember when Raven was babysitting the kids ..." and we embarked on a dissection of a particularly humorous Teen Titans episode.  I should have kept my mouth shut.
• A motorcycle pulled up next to us today while our windows were down in the 80 degree weather.  "Hear that, Matthew?" I asked.  "That motorcycle is a Harley.  They are the only ones whose engines sound like that."  "Why do they make them like that?"  "Because it sounds manly."  He is now identifying Harleys like a pro.

Some Christmas thoughts

Dazzled by his presents, Matthew exclaimed, "This is the best Christmas ever!"  A few hours later, he was sourly complaining, "I never get to do what I want.  Santa didn't get me a computer or a phone that plays music, even though I wrote him a letter!"  Somebody's trying to grow up a little too fast.  And just when I was feeling pretty good about how much six-year-old toys cost, too.

Matthew was on his best behavior for the rest of the day, though.  He told us that that was his Christmas present to us: being a good boy all day.  And he was.

The kids got up at 5, but Rachel was ready for them: "Santa" left their stockings by their beds.  So when they woke us up we told them to go play with their stockings and come back at 6.  Then at 6 we told them to go downstairs and see what else Santa got them.  "Santa" had left several presents unwrapped for each of them.  "How did you know the doll was not for you and the magic set for Melissa?" we teased Matthew later.  "The doll was pink, Dad," Matthew replied.

The doll had been securely fastened in the most diabolical fashion with many wire twisties to a cardboard box.  Melissa's solution was simple: obliterate the box.  Dozens of two-inch scraps of cardboard greeted us when we finally groaned out of bed.  That must have been a lot of work; it was a sturdy box.

Two new games: Andrea got us Killer Bunnies and Ellis got us Take Off.  I'm impressed with Andrea's game sense; for a non-gamer (or perhaps we should update that to "new gamer"), Killer Bunnies was a very astute choice.  It looks very Munchkin-esque, which means I'd better wait until I have some non-family members to play with.  Take Off is suggested for players 6 and up, and hopefully I'll get to try it tomorrow with the kids.  I am also impressed by this choice since it looks like a fun game that I have never heard of.  This is tough to pull off once your gift subject discovers Board Game Geek.

Take Off will probably precipitate another lesson in sportsmanship for Matthew; wish me luck.  (We tried to play Parcheesi a few nights ago; the game ended when I captured one of Matthew's pawns and he stormed off to his room in a temper.)

The extended family is getting large.  I lost track of who we'd gotten what for, to the point that when I opened a copy of Ticket to Ride: the card game addressed to me this morning, to find no note included, I asked several people on the phone if they had sent it before I realized that it was the present I'd ordered for Brian, on a mission in Brazil.

Rachel found a copy of Mark Twain on Writing for me.  It's been on my Amazon wish list for years and out of print -- and impossible to find, which is unusual with Amazon and alibris -- for even longer.  That's love!  She also got me a high-end set of cooking knives, after she caught me drooling over Greg's.

Rachel got each of the kids a bilibo -- pink and blue, of course.  Matthew loved his; his favorite thing to do is spin in it like a top on the tile floor.  He really gets going!  Melissa was more interested in the beads from Grandma and the princess accessories from Andrea.

Matthew's favorite toy was his new camera.  I considered getting him a new one, but the cameras marketed towards kids take terrible stills and no movies at all, and I didn't see the point in adding another 5MP-ish point-and-shoot to the family collection, so we gave him our old one.  I admit it's a gamble, and he might prove me wrong by breaking it.  But I think my odds are good.  I was right, too: the movie mode is his favorite part.  He's already chastised me for speaking during his movie.

I was jealous of the family together in New Jersey when I called and everyone was at my parents'.  It almost makes me want to give up and move back.  But that's just not going to happen; it's way too expensive to live there with three kids.  Everyone still there is either childless (David, Christine, Frank) or has a low head count (Grant: one girl).  Grant's expecting to add a boy very soon and maybe more after that so I wonder what he will do.

One step forward, two back

The good news is, flying to Newark is now a 3.5 hour flight instead of 4.5, and costs $220 instead of $350.  (Or $150 to Philadelphia!)

The bad news is, flying to Seattle is now 6+ hours instead of 2, with no direct flights.  I think I need to get more activities for the kids when we fly out to Andrea's wedding.

Christmas Eve

Filed under things I never did before children: sweeping the table. No, not washing the table, sweeping the table. Today we made sugar cookies (for Saint Nick, of course!). I mixed the dough ahead of time. Matthew and Melissa rolled it out, cut Christmas shapes, and placed them on the cookie sheet. In the process they made approximately 1,000,000 pieces of cookie dough crumbs. These crumbs managed to migrate through much of the dining room leaving only 500,000 still on the table.

Reminds me of play-doh days.

Then I added frosting to the mess. Oh yeah. Such fun!

Matthew, the traditionalist, opted for green and white frosting. Melissa, our "pink" girl, naturally wanted pink frosting only for her cookies. She made a pink tree, snowmen, candycane, and bell.

Uncle Chris called from Korea tonight. It's Christmas day over there. The kids were thrilled to talk to him. Uncles are so much fun! It's hard to believe it's him! My baby brother Chris is sounding so much older and more mature now. I miss him. It appears that he is working hard and really loves the Korean people.

I mentioned to him that Matthew is reading pretty well, and he asked me if I remembered teaching him to read. Of course I remember that summer! Chris's teacher during the school year didn't know how to teach kids how to read. They were using "whole word recognition," which turned out to be disastrous.* Chris didn't think he was smart enough to read and was determined to be proved right. Mom and I took turns with him going over sounds using hooked on phonics. It was a slow and frustrating process. This was not because Chris was slow, quite the reverse. He'd just had such a bad experience that he didn't want to try. Gradually he started having some success and now he loves to read. Growing up, I'd often find him squirreled in some odd nook with a book in hand. Anyways, tonight Chris thanked me for teaching him. Aww shucks, of course!

After Chris's call we read the Christmas story in Luke, and tucked the kids in bed. It's quiet now...have they fallen asleep with sugar plums dancing in their head? I hope so. Santa wants to finish with his work so that he and Mrs. Claus can retire to bed as well.

Oh wait, an Isaac is stirring. Sigh. At least he's pleasant.

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!




*This is part of the reason Jonathan and I are so determined that Matthew have a positive experience in school. We really, really want him to love learning new things and not have it be a drudgery. Kids are born programmed to learn, and are inquisitive from the get go. We'd hate for our kids to lose that!

The dark side of Netflix

Rachel's mom got me a netflix subscription for my birthday.  (Thanks, Mom!)  Netflix lets you create sub-accounts, so we made Rachel one and put her in charge of one of the discs.

All was well until she put High School Musical at the top of her queue.

I will only say that "Never watch a movie that went straight to DVD" is a philosophy that will save you a lot of grief.  Not to mention, "Never watch a movie whose main fans are pre-teen girls."  The one bright spot was the eerie resemblance one of the main characters bears to a family member.  Spooky.

Rachel claims that this was only fair, after I made her watch MST3k, but I think that HSM violated the doctrine of proportional response.

Thanks, Isaac

Yesterday I wore a pair of my pre-pregnancy pants and today some jeans.

Yippee!

A lot of it is due to the Pumpkin's hearty appetite, I think. Right now I'm on the breastfeeding diet: eat what I want and when I want, until I'm full.

Breakfast and a nap

We went out for pancakes and eggs this morning.  Afterwards Isaac and I were tired, so I rocked him to sleep and took a nap myself.  While I dreamed, my friend Ellis magically moved to San Antonio and I had a conversation with him:

Me: "Hey, Ellis.  Does Merri like pancake places?"

Ellis: "Yes.  We especially like [some local place]."  Too bad I don't remember which one it was.  Ellis is usually right about such things.

Me: "Oh, cool.  We just had breakfast at the Magnolia Pancake Haus."

Ellis: "They're okay, but the food is pretty heavy."

It's almost 2 now and I'm still full.  Ellis was right again.

Matthew likes to sleep with the covers over his head

Matthew likes to sleep with the covers over his head
Originally uploaded by jbellis

It makes him sweat. A lot.

-Jonathan

Good thinking!

Both Matthew and Melissa get very concerned when their baby brother cries. As Jonathan has mentioned, it doesn't happen all that often.

Melissa was offering suggestions, "Isaac needs to nurse!" When that didn't work she said, "Isaac wants Daddy!"

Isaac may have wanted Daddy, but he settled for a nap in my arms.

Melissa Singing

Another thing Melissa likes to do is make up songs to sing. Kind of reminds me of the Francis stories. I gave her an egg this morning and she started chirping:

"Eggs, eggs, eggs!
Mmm, mmm, mmm!
I LIKE eggs!
Hmm, hmm, hmm!"

She composed her own tune too, because it wasn't one I recognized.

Actually

Melissa loves to interject to word "actually" into conversation. Here's an example from a few minutes ago...

She was chattering with Isaac, "Hello, baby boy!"

I said to her, "Well, hello big girl!"

She responded, "Mama, I'm a big, BIG girl, AXE you ally (actually)."

Pardon me! But of course!

Isaac Rolls Over

He started rolling over about a week ago, Daddy was the first to see him do it. I didn't see him roll over until yesterday. Jonathan says Isaac appeared quite surprised the first time he ended up on his tummy. Yesterday when Isaac flipped over it was clearly with intent. He curled his legs up, turned to his side, then reached with his hands towards a toy with all his might.

He's getting bigger! Time to start baby proofing.

I thought Melissa rolled over much earlier, but I read back in the archives and she was just shy of four months when she first rolled. Matthew I know rolled over early, he was just three months. He was a wiry, busy baby (and he had roughly 5 pounds less to move than Isaac does).

I'm a little wistful. I'd like him to stay my little baby a while longer, but he seems determined to grow and do. Which is how it's supposed to be... I guess.