Eating Pie in Copenhagen

The other day, Michael said, "Dad, what's lemon meringue pie?"  My husband answered, incredulous, "Lemon meringue pie? Have you never had lemon meringue pie?"  Michael shook his head, and my husband said, "Well, we'll just have to rectify that." Michael's eyes widened with alarm.  My husband took one look, and knew exactly what was going through his head. He reassured him, "I know what you're thinking, and that's a good guess, but rectify means to make something right, or to correct a situation."  Michael cautiously said, "So, then, it doesn't mean..."  Daddy shook his head, "No, it doesn't have anything to do with the rectum."  Or pie-hole, for that matter. Michael was visibly relieved.

From foodnetwork.com

Because he reads a lot, discussions about various words often come up.  Either he is pronouncing a word incorrectly because he has read it but never heard it spoken, like Poseidon (POSS ee dun) or he infers definitions from words he already knows.  Which generally is a good strategy, unless you're talking about pie.

Poseidon in Copenhagen Port,
probably preparing to rectify something.

Michael was reading something not too long ago when he mused, "Copenhagen is a funny word.  It sounds like it should mean 'diarrhea.'" The thing is, when he puts it like that, and you say it over and over in your head, he's sort of got a point. Like if you have some questionable dairy product, you might have to Copenhagen a little later. Or maybe someone must have been having some problems in the public bathroom, because it was a little Copenhagen in there.  I don't really know how the Danish would feel about my son's bastardization of their town.  I'm sure they much prefer Wikipedia's version of  "copenhagenization," which involves bicycle-friendly urban planning.  I just know that if I ever hear someone talk about copenhagenizing my town, I will probably chuckle heartily.

Bicyclists in Copenhagen, in a hurry for some reason...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copenhagenization

Date Night Sexy Talk

Hey, baby, you recycle here often?

My husband said to me not too long ago, "I've heard that marriage is supposed to be hard work.  I feel like I'm just calling it in these days.  Should I be working harder?"  I didn't have much of an answer for him, and wasn't able to really define what type of "work" we were supposed to be doing.  I am lucky and grateful that after nearly 17 years together, we are stable enough to be able to take each other for granted at times when things are crazy, but I also am well aware that people grow apart and marriages tend to fail when that pattern continues indefinitely.  So one of the things that we vaguely resolved to do is to have semi-regular date nights.  It seems like it should be easy, right? Get a sitter, go out for dinner, see a movie-- how hard can that be?  We are also lucky to live in a city where not only is the food great, but you don't ever have to dress up.  You just have to decide which dress fleece is the most flattering, and out the door you go.  (I usually try to pick the one with the least amount of dried snot and food residue on it.)

Honey, let's go vegan, all the way.

The thing is, Date Night is supposed to be a time for reconnecting, for rekindling that spark, and for eating dinner without constantly moving things toward the center of the table and repeatedly picking up things that have been flung onto the floor.  When you've been wrangling kids all day, or if you're tired from work, it can be hard to get into the right mind set.  For instance, our date nights, once we do manage to get out the door and out of the neighborhood, tend to start with sexy talk like,

        "My mom called today."

or

        "Julia didn't poop today."
        No, she actually pooped this morning. 
        "Oh, she did? How was it?"
        Rabbit pellets.  
        "Yeah, that's not surprising."

At least 50% of the time, we don't have a concrete plan for where we're going, and one time we hit an all-time low by having dinner at a local grocery store.  The sexy talk that night started with, "We're out of milk."  Granted, New Seasons has great ready-to-eat food, but it really doesn't provide the right Date Night atmosphere.  That night, we resolved that one of the requirements of date night was to eat somewhere with table service.  Period.

Since then, we've expanded our repertoire. We went to a comedy club. We went on a short kayaking trip. We tried a ballroom dance lesson. We've met up with another couple. We're getting a lot better. It's still difficult to get out the door, but we're getting the hang of all this hard work. Hopefully we'll still be dating another 17 years from now.

Gates and Locks? (Shrug)

When I used to overhear people talking about childproofing, I generally would fade into the background.  It was a foreign concept to me.  My older boy was always sensible and risk-averse. He never climbed bookshelves, and in fact, lectured me at age 3 about the safety of electric sockets (see http://lomoma.blogspot.com/2009/04/how-electricity-works.html.) My middle daughter had to be tied to her high chair everywhere we went, but even so, we didn't have to really childproof for her either. Instead, we depended on lengthy logic-based lectures to help them learn to avoid danger.  We discussed why it was important to take care of our belongings, not to climb on furniture, and avoid sharp objects.  When things became safe for Michael but were still potentially harmful to Allison, we would throw in, "plus, you don't want to set a bad example for your little sister and have her get hurt!" And it generally worked. Maybe it's because they learned to avoid the long lectures (you should have heard the one I gave my son about interest rates), but they're alive and well as I type.

Safety first! (Max speed 0.5 mph)

So, when the twins came along, we thought we would just play it by ear, with the hubris of parents who have seen it, been there, done it. We'd never had a baby gate, so we didn't go out of our way to become overly, or let's face it, adequately prepared.  We were open to the idea of childproofing, but never really took any proactive steps to prepare for twin toddlerhood.


It turns out that Julia is a climber of couches, chairs, and kitchen tables.  She will climb onto the sofa and lean precariously over to reach the mantle, where she likes to practice chin-ups. It's really amazing how much upper body strength she has. Matthew on the other hand likes to get into things and figure them out with his hands- more of a fine motor gadget guy.  He loves to find bottles of things like shampoo and suck on the caps. I've gotten to the point where I think to myself, "Oh, it's just baby shampoo. That's non-toxic."   Julia could care less about shampoo bottles, but she likes to play in toilets. This is generally heralded by eerie silence and the sudden realization that she is not within visual range.   Even worse, our oldest will generally let it mellow if it's yellow.  And, Julia seems to have impeccable timing, because she always seems to get into the toilet JUST BEFORE we are about to be late getting out the door.

We try to warn our guests to give themselves plenty of time...

So, now we have baby gates. We have toilet locks. We have latches on some drawers and cabinets. (Many of them even work.) I'm 100% sure that the parents out there who are good baby-proofers would still be horrified and panicky if they came to my house, because our bookshelves aren't bolted to the walls, and we have cords laying around everywhere, just for starters. A friend of mine came over with her baby, and pulled out multiple small choking hazards that we had mixed in with the baby toys.  To be fair, sometimes it's hard to keep stuff separated with the two older children.  Legos and Barbie shoes can easily escape their rooms.  But, a couple of Julia's tumbles down the stairs generated visions of permanent neurological injuries flashing through my head.  We now have three baby gates and toilet locks, and we remain humbled at the sheer amount of energy it takes to keep track of twins.

This is what they think of baby gates.

The other day we visited some family friends from my parents' generation, and as soon as I walked in the door, I ran ahead ("Hi, so great to see you!") and shut all the doors in the hallway, moved a bunch of breakables onto their mantle, and scooted the ottoman strategically to minimize climbing. I literally was sweating because I was moving so fast. Or possibly because I still haven't lost all my babyweight and it takes more energy to move at lightening speed. Anyway, all that effort, only to have them give them some "toys" to play with, namely, their choice of squeaky dog chew toys or colorful plastic fish attached to sharp sticks.  Shrug.

These bookshelves used to be filled with books, but Julia would try to climb them. 

A place for everything, and nothing in its place.

As I was walking downstairs the other day, I happened to look up and saw a red foam clown nose in the light fixture in our foyer. Not only do I not have any idea how it got there, but I also am not sure I wanted to visualize the possible sequence of events that led to it being up there.

At this point, I am resigned to finding things in weird places. I had forgotten the toddler tendency to grasp interesting (which is synonymous with "most dangerous") objects in their little fists, wander around, and abandon their object whereever and whenever they find a new, favorite dangerous toy. This could happen anywhere: the bathroom, the shoe rack, any drawer they've managed to pry open.

 This pink box that I picked out of the recycling...

 ....is possibly the best toy ever.

You would think it would end when they get bigger and can understand that we store things in certain areas.  I explain, patiently, that if they don't put the scissors back where they belong, Mommy will probably go ballistic when she needs scissors and they are not there.  Ditto nail clippers.  And DVDs. Actually going ballistic doesn't seem to help things proactively.  It just makes them scramble around, and frankly, I can sense that I approach the limit of ridiculousness freaking out about MY NAIL CLIPPERS WITH THE RED RIBBON THAT I KEEP IN MY BOX OF MYSTERIOUS AND FORBIDDEN THINGS THAT YOU ARE NEVER EVER EVER TO TOUCH!!!

Enter husband, sheepish. "I borrowed them and forgot to put them back. Sorry."  Me, sheepish, because after all, they are only nail clippers even if they do have a red ribbon tied to them. "Oh. Thanks."
                                                                

What's that? You want me to sit still for a picture?   

But I thought this entry was "Nothing in its place."

Road Trip!

We wanted to take a trip Spring Break this year. We thought we might visit Grandma and Papa, and then maybe take a surprise side trip to DisneyLand.  We had looked into flights, but the cheapest one we could find was $800 per seat. Even though we could have flown with the twins on our laps, the older kids still needed seats. Plus, we still would have needed a car once we got down there. So, we decided to drive to central coast California, skipping the DisneyLand part, with 15 month old twins, a 4 1/2 year old and an 8 1/2 year old. Not only that, but my husband wanted to stay in crappy motels so that the kids could learn to appreciate the value of a dollar.  He stays in nice hotels for his work travel, and therefore accumulates hotel points, which enable us to stay in pretty nice hotels when we do travel.  The kids are used to having amenities and sleeping in Heavenly Beds, which is a far cry from the bare bones but clean places I stayed when I was a kid.  He did some research and found a Motel 6 for $50 per night about halfway down.  We figured we could make it in 2 days.

I decided to combat my anxiety about the trip by planning to completely overpack. We borrowed one of those Thule overhead cargo containers to free up space in the car. I had Pandora radio on my phone. We packed a DVD player, but my kids are readers, and generally pretty good travellers. I hoped that their example would rub off on the twins, but not wanting to take any chances, I also planned to pack plenty of snacks, spare binkies, sippy cups, diapers, wipes, washcloths, and an assortment of toys.  I also decided to bring our pack and plays, because I was a little nervous about the baby bed/floor situation in the crappy motel.  I know bed bugs aren't supposed to be harmful, and luxury hotels can have them too, but that's mainly the mental image I had burned into my brain.

My husband, whose biggest fear is always that I will overpack, figured we could just all pack one big family duffel bag. and that will be enough. My feeling on that was that he was smoking crack and obviously didn't appreciate the anount of planning (toys, snacks, games, etc) that would need to be done in order for this undertaking to succeed....  In fairness to my husband, at some point during trip preparations, he visibly resigns himself to the inevitability that I will overpack, and does his best to help me get everything in the car. Maybe it's because we've had enough trips where he looks at me, panic-stricken with a blown-out diaper, and asks if we have an extra onesie, and I ask him, "What color?" and pull one out of pocket number 8, bag number 4, followed by a Ziploc baggie for the yucky onesie. 


We managed to get everything packed, and hit the road. We drove over 2000 miles with four children.  It was long, but we stopped every couple of hours to change diapers and stretch our legs.  I had the older kids do jumping jacks, push-ups and sit-ups at our stops.  We visited the Jelly Belly Factory, and after we arrived, we drove some more to visit an ostrich farm, a luffa farm, Costco, and a Dutch village. It was, all things considered, wildly successful.  The olders just read in the back of the car most of the time. When it was too dark to read, we set up the DVD player for them. The twins did really well also, considering their ages.  It's not like they never cried, but no prolonged wailing. We kept them fed and entertained. They napped. Pandora radio was a godsend- we played the Raffi and Sesame Street channel quite a bit, then more adult music once they fell asleep. We would absolutely do it again. Maybe next time we'll drive to Mexico.

Oh, except that it turned out that the crappy motel we had planned to stay at turned out to be sort of a hangout for meth heads and prostitutes according to some online reviews, so we stayed at a Hamptom Inn instead. Free breakfast, wi-fi, and workout room. Not really the life lesson we had hoped to impart, but my son did comment on the lack of room service. 

 Safely arrived at Grandma and Papa's!
(Ok, actually, this is a day or two after we arrived, and the sweat and messy hair is because I just came in from a run. But it's a good visual, no?)

Feeding an ostrich.  Actually a lot scarier than it looks. They really like whatever is in the bowl.







While we were in the Dutch village, Papa pointed out to Michael a windmill.  Michael asked, "Is is moving?" (No.) "Well, then I'm not really interested."