a lovely warm day + a lovely dinner out

the girls are so good at restaurants these days. boy is that nice! ok, nina's been good for a while, it's maggie who's really gotten better. it's such a pleasure to know she'll sit happily through the meal, color while she waits for her food, and then chow down on her french fries and lemonade while the rest of us eat a leisurely meal. it's been 2.5 years since i've enjoyed a meal out so much!

of course, maggie went to dinner (we were at mr. c's with mom and dad and anne) in her new pink footie pajamas, since that's still all she'll wear. ("why are you wearing your pajamas to the restaurant?" nina asked maggie. "because i'm 2," maggie replied.) at one point, after the other table handed the waitress their payment, she asked them "do you need any change?" and maggie responded, loudly, "yeah i want some change!" the people the other table had a good laugh, and i heard one woman, who we know from church, tell the others that she knows maggie from church, and she's quite a sharp little girl. aww, it's true of course!

nina was far too tired to muster up some dinner conversation. the poor girl was half-asleep in her chair. we'd had a big day outside since it was so, so warm (the clock in town said 66). we played in the huge leaf pile we made for hours, played on the swingset, worked in the garden, and even did a late afternoon fire pit (because once the sun dipped below the trees it started to get chilly. you know, at like 3:00). all that before going out to dinner was a lot for one little kid.

and ahhh, the garden! nick and i have dug 2 new beds for next year, and today we mixed in some mulched leaves and grass (dad mowed up his lawn with the leaves, so it made a great leaf/grass mix). the difference in the soil between the "old" garden and the new spot is remarkable. the new space is mostly sandy dirt with some clayish spots. the old spot is darker, crumblier, and full of worms. much higher quality! it made me feel good, like i've really made some progress improving the soil. i'd really, really like to get some manure in the ground before it freezes, but we'll see. it's so stinky to transport. yup, for the first time since the growing season ended, i actually missed my gardening a bit! just a bit mind you. but i'm sure by the end of winter next year i'll be anxious to get my seedlings going.

oma is here!

the girls were so excited to see her. they waited up on tuesday night, and nina ended up staying home on wednesday because she was too excited to hang out with oma. today was no school on account of veterans' day, so that worked out. i think she'll be ready to go back tomorrow, just for a day.

the girls have been especially adorable lately. maggie keeps telling me that she loves me, which is just music to a mom's ears! she also loves her whole family, for the record. maybe chester most of all. she talks about that dog every day!

and tonight, as nina lay in bed, falling asleep, she said to nick, "sigh, i can't fall asleep. i need lunesta!"

haha!

nick and i got to go out

we saw rustic overtones at the opera house. it was so fun! mom and dad watched the girls, and they did great. nina was especially excited to have a night alone with them, she even kicked us out of their house before we needed to go.

we happened to see mike and karen there, and they invited the 4 of us over for dinner on sunday, so we ended up having a very social weekend. which was nice, because it's started to get cold! sunday was cold and windy, and sunday night we ended up having a much stronger storm than we were expecting. i read online that portland jetport recorded a max wind gust of 63 mph! the wind was coming from the north east (did that make it a nor'easter, or is snow a requirement for that?), and since my bedroom is in the north east corner of the house, it was pretty loud. the girls room stayed nice and quiet though, and at least nina slept well. wow, as i type this, the weather channel is reporting on the storm! maine made the big time news! the woman says wind and rain are expected to continue through tomorrow. well today was mild, we even got a bit of sun, so maybe not for us.

not much else going on. maggie tried 2 times to poop this morning but it was just gas. the second time she didn't poop after thinking she might have to, she ran into the kitchen where nick was standing and yelled "nothing!! came out of my butt!!!" haha, it was funny. oh, and nick came home from basketball while she was in the tub, and she was so excited to see him that she stood up and did a wiggle dance. too cute!

you've all heard of hannah montanna, right?

she's like a kiddy pop star. i think she sings. one of nina's friends had her poster in her room, and after playing there the girls have talked about her occasionally. only maggie calls her "hannah futannah," which is so cute. reminds me of rosanna danna danna!

margarete, the difficult child: addendum

nick reminded me of this one.

during one of her wailing on the floor tantrums, i remarked, "it's difficult being two."

"NO!" she yelled. "it's NOT difficult being two!"

see? no matter what i say i'm wrong. there's just no reasoning with a two-year-old.

finally over this bug

wow, that was a difficult week! first maggie throwing up, then nina. at least nina could tell us when it was coming and make it to the bathroom (except for the first time. maggie now calls the blue blanket that caught the bulk of it "the throw up blanket.") still, i was doing 2 or 3 loads of laundry a day for a while. speaking of which, i forgot to throw the sheets in today, and margarete peed on them last night. my sheets of course. and what wasn't on the bed? the waterproof mattress pad! it's always on the bed, but i had to wash it this week (guess why? vomit, in case you were thinking pee), and because it's plastic-backed, i can't put it in the dryer. so i remade the bed without it, and didn't want to bother to strip the bed to put it back on, and lo and behold... kids!

where was i going with all this? oh, they're better. maggie got diarrhea after the vomiting, but it was mild. nick felt nauseous for a few days and didn't eat like his usual self, but i didn't get anything. i may have a terrible immune system when it comes to fighting off a head cold, but nothing disturbs my stomach.

so, to wrap up on last week:
1) my job. it's not a big job, just a little one. i'm going to teach an SAT class at the high school. just one day a week for an hour and a half, but it'll be fun. i like working with the kids, and it keeps my brain sharp. i'll start in january.

2) nina's checkup went very well. it turned into a sick visit for maggie too, since she'd been throwing up for a while and her tummy really hurt, and she was going to be there anyway. but dr. feder said it was just a stomach virus, and so it was. nina is growing wonderfully. she's still around the 85th to 90th percentile for height, so i guess she's just gonna be tall. which is funny, since nick and i are both perfectly average height. maggie's tall too. well, i guess the tall genes won out.
she also got the last 2 shots for kindergarten. she was so brave, as a treat we had dinner at the ebb tide. no one threw up that night!

3) one funny little anecdote from last week: nina had drawn some pumpkins on the chalkboard one day, and while she was at school maggie had erased them. when nina saw that her pumpkins had been erased, she got annoyed. she put her hands on her hips, looked at maggie and said, "maggie, do you see where my hands are?" haha!

margarete is a difficult child!

nina never experienced the terrible twos. quite the contrary, two was a delight. she was fun, funny, happy, easy-going--in short, a joy to be around. while maggie is also a joy, she can be quite the challenge. lately, she's thrown herself to the ground crying 10 or 20 times a day. there's no warning either; i'll do something as seemingly innocuous as ask her majesty if she'd like a pretzel, and she'll collapse onto the ground in a sobbing heap, "NOOOOO!!" we find ourselves constantly saying something along the lines of "that's fine maggie, but you can just tell us instead of getting all hysterical about it."

and then, there are the issues over which she has dug herself in. first, it was not wearing shoes. "you can carry me," she tells us. it started in the summer, so i said fine, don't wear shoes. she said her shoes were uncomfortable, which is possible, as her toenails have this strange growth pattern of kind of flaring out, and breaking a lot. i get broken big toenails a lot too, so i have empathy. and to be fair, she is beginning to get over this one. she likes her rubber boots, and she usually will wear those.
she also has rejected pants. but fine, she has a thousand dresses, i don't care if that's what she wants. she'll gladly wear tights under them , but not a shirt. she doesn't care for the layered look. i have, however, found out that if i put a shirt inside the dress before i put it on her, she will think it's all one piece and wear it as such. so, not really a huge deal.
but then it was coats. she refuses to wear a coat! for a few days i got her to wear a poncho i'd made from a fleece blanket, but that didn't last. now it's starting to get cold, and she has agreed to put on a jacket when it's been under 50, but not for short trips between buildings. and not in the car. which, again, i let go because they actually say you're not supposed to buckle them in with winter coats on, since the straps can't get tight enough and were there to be an accident, the kids can actually slip out. so the "good parent" thing to do is to buckle them in without coats and then put a coat or blanket on top of them. so how can i push this one knowing her way is the safest way? well, i can pretend that i'm a superior mommy, following safety instructions to the letter because i'm so amazingly wonderful. yeah, that's totally it!
but NEXT came the pajamas obsession. she only wants to wear pajamas! oh how i long for the days of dresses. but, she's 2. does it really matter if she wears pajamas? footies with pink rubber boots over them? and a blanket on top? does anyone notice or care? maybe if nick didn't wear pajamas all day, she wouldn't have gotten the idea in the first place.

well, yesterday i convinced her that an adorable velour track suit was pajamas, and she wore that. and today she dressed up in a tutu, tights, and a "topping" (that's a leotard) for dance class. boy was she adorable!! at home she promptly changed back into PJs for her nap, but she's been changing to nap for a while. ohh the difficult ways of margarete.

and did i remember to write about the swimming pool in arizona? for a few days before we left, we were all talking about how exciting it would be to go swimming outside again. maggie nonchalantly commented that she'd be swimming naked. when i told her that you can't swim naked in hotel pools, she'd immediately throw herself to the ground and cry "yes i can!! yes i can swim naked!!" finally i said, "well, we'll ask at the hotel and see what they say."

sure enough, she didn't forget about swimming naked, and when we got to the hotel started talking about it again. so i took her down to the front desk and told her she could ask. and she did! in her cute little voice, "can i swim naked in the pool?" behind maggie's back, i shook my head no. the woman at the front desk caught right on and said, "oh, no, i'm sorry. it's a public pool so you have to wear a suit." "oh," said maggie. "maybe i can wear just my shirt." "no," said the woman, "you have to wear bottoms. you can wear just bottoms, that would be ok." it worked! maggie was satisfied and happily wore a regular swimsuit. success at last!