Gratuitous Jane photos

Samson is finally on the mend after being sick all week, and he returned to school this morning.

He's not all better, for sure. In fact, he's still coughing like an extra in a production of Oliver Twist, but his fever is gone and his appetite has returned.

Which meant Vicki got to spend some time with just Jane this morning and have a little photo shoot.

Pagan babies (more specifically, mine)

I have a colleague who is quite well meaning and apparently Catholic in a kind of endearing 14th century sort of way.

She always asks how Samson is doing and now asks about Jane as well. One day as we were leaving work she asked when Jane would be baptized. As the godparents (Vicki's brother, Ben, and his wife, Karen) are in Texas and soon to be headed to Colorado, we figured May was probably a good target.

When I mentioned this to my colleague, she asked if Vicki and I had considered having a private baptism in our house. At first, I was totally clueless as to what she was intimating. So I patiently re-explained that Ben and Karen probably wouldn't be back east until late spring.

At which point, again in a very nice way --- sort of like if Mary Kay had worked for Torquemada --- she put forth the private/home baptism option.

Finally I caught on and politely informed her that God forbid anything should happen to Jane, I would expect that her lack of baptism wouldn't consign her to some weird Dantean eternity in the company of Homer and pals.

What I didn't say (again, this person is very nice and I'm sure genuinely concerned about all our souls) was that a heaven that's only for baptized Catholics --- or all Christians for that matter --- seems kind of pointless. No sense in burdening her with my heresy.

Also, I'm totally leaving a ham, bacon, meatloaf, veal, and roast beef sandwich on her desk when Lent starts. I'll tell her it's from Jane...

Sam and Jane: The wonder years

Samson's largesse lasted just long enough for Vicki to get a few good shots of the two of them together. Once again, Jane looks a little nervous to be in such close proximity to her big brother.

Smart kid.

The kid stays in the picture

Samson is still getting used to the idea of sharing the house photographer's time...

Slings, arrows, outrageous fortune cookies

I've often thought that writing fortunes for fortune cookies would be a dream job. In fact, after reading this, I even wrote one company to see if they needed any freelance help.

I never heard from them, so I assume the answer was no.

But I was pretty thorough in my application e-mail and even went so far as to include what I thought fortunes were lacking these days. Namely a sense of fun. And menace.

Like: "Nobody is fooled by that toupee."

Or: "Stop kidding yourself. You didn't almost go to Penn; you got waitlisted. Move on."

Or: "Your goldfish has nothing but contempt for you. Be vigilant."

Or: "Wednesday will bring only sorrow. Remain inside. Under the kitchen table."

I bring this up because in some kind of karmic payback, I opened my fortune cookie on Sunday night and got the following message: "You will soon be crossing the great waters."

Now I'm no expert on world religions, but I'm pretty sure that this is a metaphor for death.

Mind you, it was my second fortune cookie [nobody else in the house eats them], so I'm not sure if it even counts. My first one said "You have many friends" or something completely non-fortuney like that.

Clearly, whatever it was, it made nothing like the impression that the grim reaper of fortunes made.

Still, I can't help thinking that I've got grounds for an intellectual property suit.

Unsettling messages on tiny rectangles of paper was totally my idea.

O Canada?

For a while now, if we've wanted Samson to stop doing something (like crawling along the floor as we're trying to put his clothes on) we've used the old standby: "That's not what big boys do. Babies do that, but you're not a baby. You're a big boy."

However, with the arrival of Jane, I think Samson is starting to rethink the whole "I'm not a baby" stance.

Think about it: She gets held on command, carried everywhere, and never gets in trouble. Ever.

So this morning, as I was trying to get Samson to take his fingers out of his mouth, I said: "Samson, I can't understand what you say when you've got your fingers in your mouth. Big boys don't put their fingers in their mouths. Canadians do that."

He took his fingers right out and asked, with a puzzled look on his face: "Can-ay-dee?"

[Sidenote: I have family in Canada and can report with near certainty that they don't talk with their fingers in their mouths. But since we don't have any Canadians in the house, and since we do have a baby, I figure our neighbors to the north will forgive this slight bending of the truth.]

Of course this could all backfire, and we'll have a toddler walking around our house singing the theme song to Sesame Park and demanding Kraft dinner.

St. Francis, the early years?

In December, when Samson and I were stringing up Christmas lights on the tree in our front yard, he sneezed and had a giant snot hanging from his nose.

Because I'm not 73, I don't carry a handkerchief in my pocket. So I deftly removed it from his nose with my hands and wiped it on the bark of the tree. Vicki thought this was gross. Samson thought it was about the coolest thing I'd ever done.

Fast forward two months. Of late, Samson has had a stuffy nose. And while we try to keep him supplied with tissues, occasionally he takes matters into his own hands. Literally.

Unfortunately, he feels the need to give me all items removed from his nose. What's even funnier is that he does it in this very offhand way, sometimes coming from another room with outstretched hand and a casual "hereyougo."

Anyway, yesterday morning, as I was getting him out of his car seat in the parking lot of his school, I heard "Daddy?" and looked down and got the "hereyougo."

There on the tip of his index finger was a tiny green asteroid, which I grabbed and flicked to the ground with all the speed and grace of an Ang Lee hero. What follows is a rough transcription of our conversation:

Samson: Where'd my boogie go?

Me: I flicked it on the ground.

Samson: Outside?

Me: Yep, outside on the ground.

Samson: So the birds can eat it?

Me: Sure, if they want to.

Samson: If they want to. The birds will eat my boogie. (Nodding) They will. They want to.

[Of course this makes me wonder what exactly he thought we were offering the birds last week when we hung up a peanut butter pine cone bird feeder. ]

One month later

Sweet Jane is one month old today. It feels both way longer and much shorter than just one month. So what have I learned since her arrival?

1. King Kong is a terrible movie. Why do I know this? Because Jane tends to be wide awake between 11 or 12 and 2 or 3 each morning. Since we pay for HBO, and I was sitting in the basement rocking her anyway, I figured I'd give the movie a shot. You know a movie is bad when Naomi Watts and a giant computer-generated ape can't save it. Just really, really bad. At one point Jane fell asleep and I woke her back up just so I didn't have to hear the ridiculous dialogue. OK, not really, but you get my point.

2. Being a good daytime sleeper is sort of overrated. Actually, it's way overrated. Like best football team in Alaska overrated. My earlier proclamations about Jane's sleeping prowess were, like that Chicago Daily Tribune headline, perhaps a little premature. As I write this, Jane has been up for three hours, been rocked, swaddled, and even lain on the dryer with it going in the hopes the motion would be soothing. Nothing doing. Of course, she's not crying, so that's a plus.

3. Newborns poop with surprising force. I don't remember this from Samson, but apparently it was the case then too. Which leads me to number 4:

4. My memory is gone. Seriously. The amount of stuff I don't remember from just two years ago is frightening. I wonder if there's some kind of program that converts years of parenthood and the resultant short-term memory loss to years spent touring with the Grateful Dead. Unfortunately, the only people who'd have any interest in creating such a program are either asleep right now, busy cleaning up toys, busy changing a fussy newborn, or having an incredibly animated (and totally earnest) conversation about the relevance of "The Hobbit" to the situation in Iraq. Over a big bowl of mac and cheese.

5. That thesis I was supposed to defend in May? I was probably a little optimistic about how much time I'd have to work on it. Not wildly optimistic in a "they'll welcome us as liberators" kind of way, but probably slightly more optimistic (and unrealistic) than the folks who thought that what we really needed to fill the void in our lives was a fourth hour of the Today show.

Sam fights the law; the law wins

Samson got his first time-out at school yesterday. Which is sort of funny, because Vicki and I were just talking about this the other night, saying how he gets them all the time at home but doesn't seem to ever get in trouble at school.

Not that I was worried, but it's good to know he's comfortable enough now at school to misbehave. [I should be careful what I wish for, but I'd rather him get in trouble occasionally because he feels at home than be scared silly and silent every day at school.]

Apparently he was talking at nap time and then stood up on his cot. Clearly against the rules, and clearly stuff he knows he should not do. [By the way, his cot is about three inches off the ground. Still a bad choice, but not a dangerous one. Like when he tried to stand on the windowsill in his room, using his headboard as a stepping stone. I digress.]

For punishment, he had to sit in the "little chair." According to Samson, one of the other kids in his class had a time-out in the "big chair," so I'm thinking there's a sliding scale for infractions, with Samson's registering on the lower end of things.

When I asked him about it last night, he seemed suitably chastened by the whole experience. We'll see...

Living After Midnight

For some reason, Jane can't seem to settle down in the wee small hours of the morning. I still stand by my claim that she's a better sleeper than her brother was. She sleeps through most of the day with no problem (and is apparently unmoved by drums, trucks, Samson's cries of "Strike up the band!" and other household noises).

And even when she's awake in the middle of the night, she doesn't make a whole lot of noise about it. This is not to say she's demure when she's hungry or has gas, but by and large she's just not a noisy baby. Which is good, because we definitely don't need both kids up at 4 in the morning.

At the same time, there's something a little unsettling about looking down at this peaceful little bundle and seeing those blue eyes staring intently back at me. This morning, as I walked around the house with her, rocking and shushing and talking to her, I'd catch her eyes closing every once in a while. But just when I thought it was safe to sit down with her, they'd snap back open as if to say: "I'm watching you. Back to work..."

This is a terrible analogy, but I can't think of a better one. So here goes: You know how in horror movies, there's always a scene where the star/hero thinks he has defeated the bad guy/monster? And then there are those few seconds of cautious joy mixed with sheer exhaustion. But then you get the close-up of a hand or an eye or something, and it moves, and you know it's starting up again.

It's kind of like that. Without the hockey mask, of course.

The one thing, apparently, that helps Sweet Jane get to sleep when she just can't settle is the sound of the hairdryer.

I've heard of this type of thing before, but running anything louder than a toaster for baby Samson sent him into fits of terror, so I was pretty surprised to see Jane's eyelids get droopy once that high-pitched whine started.

Makes me wonder if we shouldn't have gotten this instead of the rocking chair for her room.

The People's Game

Is there a more fun sport for two year olds than duckpin bowling? We went on Sunday, and I can honestly tell you there is not.

Seriously, where else can you combine the sheer thrill of rolling a heavy, potentially toe-crushing sphere with the excitement of knocking things down and the high drama (and possible finger loss) of the ball return mechanism?

In short, it's a perfect day out. Especially when the day is really cold.

Samson and Oliver did a terrific job taking turns and sharing the balls. It got a little dicey when the lane next to us was occupied by some kind of Golden Girls meets Gray Panthers bowling club, but even their reproachful looks at Samson as he reached for their reset button didn't diminish the fun.

You should know that Oliver is an excellent bowler. He's actually more of a thrower, but he sends the ball speeding (sort of) on its way to its destiny with those little duckpins.

Samson, on the other hand, is more of a slow roller. Watching his ball meander down the lane and meet the pins feels almost like a Beckett play. Long periods of waiting for something to happen. Occasionally something does. Or not.

Even so, it was great. And Samson woke up Monday thinking we were going again. It's kind of hard to sell school as an exciting option when you've spent the previous day being encouraged to throw things and knock other things down.

In borrowed shoes, no less.

The Kids are All Right

Freezing temperatures outside + Samson, Jane, and Mommy stuck inside = photo shoot.

Jane actually doesn't look so sure about this, but Sam looks like he's having fun. Man, I wish it was Saturday...

Code talker

When Samson was a newborn and having trouble falling asleep, we explored a number of theories to help get him settled. Swaddling seemed to work best. At least most of the time.

Unfortunately, it worked so well that we had to keep doing it to get him to sleep until he was about 8 months old. Which is a very long time, even if it doesn't sound like it [swaddle-months are like dog-years.] Indeed, we were worried we'd need to give his college roommate instructions on how to swaddle him.

Another scheme we tried was something Vicki read about where you create an association with a word or phrase and falling asleep. The trick, allegedly, is to catch the baby just as they are falling asleep and to say the word so as to build the connection. Once such a connection is built, the word or phrase can then be used to help settle the child down and ready them for sleep. Sort of like Pavlov, without all the salivating.

It seemed reasonable (or not any less reasonable than being up all night), and as I recall, the conversation went something like this:

Vicki: "I was reading about this technique where you create a code word to help the baby fall asleep."

Me: "Yeah. How does it work?"

Vicki: "Basically, you pick a word or a phrase and try to link it, in the baby's mind, with the act of falling asleep."

Me: "What kind of word do you use?"

Vicki: "I guess it could be anything."

Me: "Like 'poop'?"

Vicki: "We probably don't want to say 'poop' to get Sam to sleep. But it could be a phrase like 'lights out' or 'sleep tight' or something. Basically, it can be anything as long as you're consistent."

Me: "How about 'Unicorn Karate'?"

Vicki: [sighs]

Anyway, I won out, and we tried "Unicorn Karate." [She did say it could be anything.]

But we never had much success. Perhaps something about mythical one-horned beasts engaged in martial arts struck Samson as decidedly not sleep-inducing. Or maybe he was familiar with the little known Bruce Lee film. Or maybe it was that neither of us could say it without laughing and waking him back up.

Whatever, it still takes him more than an hour to fall asleep every night.

But now that Jane is here and is exhibiting some of the same night/day confusion symptoms her brother had (although on a far smaller scale), I think it might be time to give Unicorn Karate another chance. She's sleeping now, but I expect she'll be up sometime around midnight.
I'll keep you posted...

Il Postino

Jane, you've no doubt noticed, has a good, thick head of black hair. So did her mother. And apparently her grandmother as well.

Is Jane the Esau to Sam's Jacob? Probably not. She's got blonde eyebrows, and so I expect, just like later pictures of her mom evidence, a little towhead to emerge from under that Sid Vicious hairdo. And to be honest, I'm just glad she's got hair. From what I can tell from the pictures, I had the G. Gordon Liddy look for almost a year and a half. Not such a big deal for a little boy, but I can picture Vicki taping barrettes to poor Jane's melon. So we dodged that bullet.

Anyway, yesterday a colleague joked that Jane must be the mailman's child because of the dark hair.

Hilarious.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy a cuckold joke as much as the next guy with a two-week-old baby.

What made the joke funny to me is that our "mailman" is a 225-lb black lady with cornrows.

Samson's protestations to the contrary, I'm pretty sure she didn't have anything to do with it.

People are strange (still)

I meant to write about this the other day and totally forgot. On Sunday, in a minor miracle (not quite on the level of the loaves and fishes at Cana or Lazarus coming out of the tomb, but slightly more miraculous than the immaculate reception) we made it to church. On time.

OK, Vicki and Jane made it on time. Samson and I were parking the car and so arrived after the opening procession. But we were still there in time for the first reading. In any event, we went to Mass and then met up with friends for some coffee afterwards.

We had just about finished when an elderly woman (sort of a well-coiffed combination of Cruella De Ville, the old woman from Titanic, and the middle Stygian witch) walked past the table, stopped to look at Samson, and proclaimed: "He's too pretty to be a boy. He should have been a girl."

I'm sure somewhere in the archives of Emily Post there's an appropriate response to this kind of gender-defiant compliment, but I was, uncharacteristically, at a loss for words. I thanked her with a puzzled look and pointed to Jane, lamely offering "well, his sister is right there." To which she said, "Oh, she's sweet. You should let me have her."

Again, I had no response at the ready. Which didn't matter, as it turned out, because she then let us all know the following: "I like them at this age. Up until three. Then you can have 'em back." And with that, she was gone.

So now I'm wondering if this woman lives in a gingerbread house somewhere on the edge of town and has a pen full of kids who she keeps until three and then returns to their rightful guardians.

I'm also wondering if somewhere out there is a two-year-old little girl whose parents are going to be told: "She's too handsome to be a girl. She should have been a boy."

Playing with food

Not exactly haute cuisine, but you really can't go wrong with a project that allows your two-year-old to make his own snacks.


To be honest, I think he's humoring me with the peanut butter and raisins. While I was working away on the masterpiece below, he was munching on a plain piece of celery.

Of course, it's a lot easier to gin up some excitement by calling out, "Who wants to make ants on a log?" than it is by saying, "Who wants to sit in the dining room and eat plain celery?"

First snow

The first snow of winter fell today. We probably didn't pick up more than an inch, so it was as much like digging in the dirt as it was playing in the snow.

Even so, it was a perfect excuse to get out of the house. And the look on Samson's face as he watched the snow falling was like something out of a Rockwell painting.

We weren't out for very long, however, because somebody refused to wear his mittens. Repeatedly. If there's one thing I won't abide, it's a refusal to dress for the weather. [Seriously, ask my sister. I'm very concerned about people being warm enough.]

The enforcer

I'm not sure who Samson has been observing for diapering techniques [should we call his school?], but consider yourself warned: Sam takes no guff.

Especially not from Care Bears.

Say it loud...

Something really strange happened last night while Samson and I were downstairs playing with Play-Doh. By the way, if you haven't played with Play-Doh in a while, there are two things you should know.

1. It still tastes salty. [My curiosity got the better of me, and I took a tiny taste while Samson wasn't looking. I figured it would be the same, but with all the new colors, I wasn't completely sure that they hadn't gone all "new" Coke on us.]

2. According to the warning label on the container, Play-Doh contains wheat. Some of Samson's friends are allergic to wheat, so I know how serious it can be. I also would never in a million years have guessed it contained anything related in any way to food. So now you know.

Anyway, while we were cleaning up and I was trying --- in vain --- to separate out all the squished colors and put them back in their respective little tubs, I asked Samson to hand me the black Play-Doh. [One of the new colors: great for making wheels and snakes and handlebar moustaches, but I digress.]

Amazingly, he went and picked up said doh and brought it over to me, singing "I'm black Play-Doh; I'm black Play-Doh." At which point he dropped the last part and started dancing around our basement singing "I'm bla-aaack; I'm blaa-aack!"

I have no idea what this means or where it's come from. But I think it's hilarious. Maybe it was that James Brown mobile he had as a newborn...


On the Jane front, her umbilical stump fell off today. Which will make changing her diaper a heck of a lot easier. I don't know what your experience has been, but the nurses at our hospital put the fear of God into us about touching the thing. Of course, when we took Sam for his first doctor's appointment, his pediatrician saw that it was hanging on by a thread and simply pulled it off.

Even so, I wasn't touching that thing for love or money, so I'm really glad hers fell off on its own. And Samson was really excited to hear the news because "now she's big."

Life as we know it...

Jane came home last week, and both she and Vicki are doing just fine. Likewise, Samson is doing a pretty good job adjusting to the big change. He's not crazy about me holding her, and the first few times she nursed he was fairly vocal about not wanting Janie to "put her nose on mommy's belly."

Overall though, so far so good. Some random stories from the past week:

Apparently the standard baby/infant seats (those ubiquitous buckets you see people awkwardly lugging all over town) do not fit in captain-style seats. Our minivan has such seats, which means that Vicki's step-dad spent a lot more time with me in the backseat of our van than anyone should ever have to.

After a mighty struggle, we decided quitting was the smartest thing to do and called up to the hospital room to our respective wives (not without some trepidation) seeking advice. Vicki's mom graciously offered to pick us up the kind of seat we knew would fit, and that was that. Still, I felt like an object lesson on the evils of procrastination there in the parking lot of the hospital (yep, I was that guy; what can I say? Jane came a bit earlier than we expected).

We continue to work on getting the ground rules down with Samson regarding Jane. As in, yes you can touch her arm or kiss her cheek. No, you can not push that train on her sternum. Definitely a work in progress. But he's trying.


It's still early, but Jane is a very different baby from Samson. For one, she sleeps pretty well. She's still figuring out the whole night/day thing, but she doesn't really cry all that much. And she can sleep through just about anything [perhaps she's been hearing the muffled yells and drumming of her brother all this time and so takes it as a matter of course]. But even when she's fussing she never really gets up to Category 5 strength like Sammy Lungs did. This is not to say she's not waking up at night or that we're not tired. She is. And we are. But nothing like the last time around. Sweet Jane.

She does, however, go through an incredible number of diapers in a day. I'm sure I have casually used the term "stinky-poo" at some time in my life. Only now do I truly appreciate the power of that compound noun.

The number of people who ask if we've named our daughter Delilah is surprisingly high. And I can't tell if it's an attempt at humor or if they really think that the pairing (despite the creepy things it would imply) makes sense. Either way, it would be fascinating as a sociological study if it wasn't so annoying.

We have also gotten a lot of "You had a girl? How wonderful. Now you can stop." I get the general idea, namely that people are telling us we have a nice, balanced little family. And I'm ecstatic to have a little girl, just as I was (and remain) ecstatic to have a son.


But to be perfectly honest, having another child is not among the things on my mind not two weeks after the birth of our daughter. I wonder if parents who have a second child that is the same sex as the first get comments like "Too bad you had another girl/boy. Guess you'll have to try again." or "Well, you win some, you lose some."

Perhaps Jim Morrison said it best when he said "people are strange." [Of course, he also said he was the lizard king...]

Gift of the Magi

She came a little early (on the Feast of the Epiphany, no less), but she's here safe and sound.

Welcome to the world, Jane Victoria.

Both she and Vicki are doing well. And big brother Samson is ready to start big brothering. Look out, Janie...

I'll post more later. Lots of photos, lots of stories, just not enough sleep. See you soon.

Letterbox

Wouldn't you know it? Right after Christmas, and just before what will certainly be a time of bunkering down in our house [although it's not exactly cold out right now], the TV in our bedroom is dying.

Mind you, I bought this set --- which weighs about twice what Samson does --- when I was in graduate school 11 years ago. So it really doesn't owe us anything. And it's not that the TV is going that is so annoying. It's how it's going.

I assume, based on my vast knowledge of electrical appliances, that the picture tube is slowly giving up the ghost. I say this, because now when we turn the TV on, there's a better than 50 percent chance that whatever we watch will essentially be in the letterbox format. Which might be cool when you're watching indie and foreign films. But it makes the news hard to watch.

And it makes Curious George almost impossible to find on-screen.

Lately, this is Sam's show. Which, I have to say, is a welcome respite from the Higglytown Heroes.

Aside from the creepy weeble aspect of the show, the cast of 'heroes' seems to waning. I'm sure the idea was sound when it all started: Introduce kids --- via talking nesting dolls --- to the many career opportunities out there.

Fair enough, but the pickings are getting a little slim: They've gone from doctors and teachers and firemen to clerks of court and electrolysis technicians. I imagine we'll see an episode soon where the kids do a ride-along with a bounty hunter or meet the tollbooth guy on the HTPK.

Kitchen confidential

Special thanks to Williams-Sonoma for carrying a Samson-sized apron that was not pink or yellow gingham.

This one even has a train on it. Measured against the toys he got, this was probably the least exciting Christmas gift we gave Samson.

But something tells me he's going to get a lot of use out of it.

Ringing in the new year

With Vicki due in just one week(!), we have been pretty busy getting things ready for the new arrival.

Even so, we did take some time to ring in the new year. Or at least, we made a valiant effort to ring in the new year but ended up calling it a night sometime around 10 pm.

The ball, I presume, dropped in Times Square?

The boys had fun, and I don't think any of us would have wanted to keep them up (or to stay up with them) until midnight.

Samson actually closed out the old year by being really cranky --- seriously, he was meaner than I've ever seen him. Not sharing, not smiling, not even really interested in playing music.

Still, all was forgiven by the stroke of 9:30.

And Jacob may have discovered his true calling. So here's to 2007...

A Christmas Miracle

In what was truly a Christmas miracle (or, at the very least, the fruition of a successful whisper campaign leading up to the 25th), I also got a didgeridoo for Christmas.

Yep, that low droning sound you hear is the sound of Samson and me on the stairs scaring the bejesus out of the cat. Good times.

Samson really seems to like his didge, although we've got to figure out a way to keep him from launching it when he's done playing. Beyond the sound of PVC on hardwood (which is way louder than any of his drums), I'm afraid one of us is going to lose some toes.

The night before Christmas

Samson's ear infection notwithstanding, he had a great time at Jacob's house. And when we came home, we were ready with our milk and cookies for Santa.


[Sidenote: Growing up, we always left a mug of beer and some cheese and crackers for Santa. I wish I was kidding about this. It wasn't until I was older (like college-aged) that I learned that this was not what other families did. I'm torn between admiration for my Dad for the sheer audacity of the proposal (which went on for years) and horror at the idea that as kids, my sister and I fought over the honor of who got to pour "Santa's beer" for him. Nothing like giving old St. Nick one for the road...]

Anyway, as you can see, we not only put out milk and cookies for Santa, but we also left him a note and put some food out for his reindeer. In case you're wondering, reindeer food (courtesy of Miss Jacki at Sam's school) is made out of oatmeal and sparkles. It was a cold, clear night when we put it out. Unfortunately, it rained all Christmas day, so we ended up with a nice, sparkly papier-mache on our front steps when we finally changed out of our PJs on the 26th and rejoined the world.

Recap

OK, so I'm a little late on the Christmas posts. Samson came down with an ear infection on the 23rd, and we spent some of Christmas Eve at the pediatrics clinic. Apparently he has some kind of genetic propensity toward ear infections. Thanks a lot, Vicki.

Apparently we also are not doing a good enough job of cleaning out his ears, because his right ear needed to be irrigated. Lets just say it's not something I hope he has to do again anytime soon. Still, this trip was better than the one last time. And it did seem to help. In fact, it produced a piece of ear wax roughly the size of a cuff link. So not only did we get to have a screaming, febrile toddler on our hands, but we also got to feel like neglectful parents. God bless us, everyone!

Anyway, Samson got his antibiotics and is on the mend. He was feeling well enough to go to church [although we didn't make it through the whole Mass] and then rallied again so as not to miss out on Jacob's Christmas Eve-palooza. And by Christmas morning, he was pretty much back to his old self.

I guess we should count ourselves lucky that he's good about taking his medicine. But to be honest, he's a little too excited about taking it for my liking. There's something about the way his face lights up when he sees that little plastic shot glass full of pink medicine that just makes me uneasy.

Gratuitous Samson pics

In case you're wondering, it's always open mic night at our house...


Which is funny, when you consider that the picture below is from his school's Christmas concert last week.

Yikes!

Have you seen this?

Kind of puts the whole Grandma-lets-the-kids-eat-junk-food-before-dinner thing into perspective, no?

Cheap sunglasses

I believe it was the poet Billy Gibbons who exhorted young men to go get themselves some cheap sunglasses.

I have no idea where this pair came from, but lately Samson won't leave the house without them. Yesterday, as we were getting ready for school, he insisted on wearing them with his wool hat. Which made him look like the littlest witness protection program member.

But for the fact that we were running wildly late [not unusual on his schooldays], I would have grabbed the camera. He still had them on at school, and his teacher told me he'd been carrying them around on the playground the day before.

We watched a few minutes of U2's performance at the Live 8 concert the other day, and I'm guessing that it made a bigger impression on him than I realized at the time.

The most wonderful time of the year

Oliver's mom and dad were nice enough to invite us over for their neighborhood's annual Santa visit the other night. Which was great for the boys and a really nice excuse for us to get together for beer and pizza on a weeknight. Sam and Jacob showed their gratitude by putting their sticky candy cane fingers all over everything and then sitting on some packages under the tree.

Of course, Oliver also sat down on a package, but it is his house...



[Full disclosure: those "gifts" under the tree were decorations, not actual gifts. You'll note I'm using the past tense.]

The visit was really sweet, although both Santa and his helper bore an eerie resemblance to post-Swingers Jon Favreau. I imagine the mall Santas in Vegas are similar.

After spending a few minutes with jolly old St. Nick, who apparently was slow in making the rounds that night due to a bone spur [clearly Santa's elf didn't sign a confidentiality clause], the boys were ready to do some singing. Think last call on New Year's meets the Wiggles and you've got a pretty good idea what it sounded like.

Guess who's discovered YouTube?

Samson's index

Days until Christmas: 7
Number of Wise Men Samson made us take to church yesterday: 2
Number of times we sang "Jingle Bells" before bed tonight: 3.5
Number of times we sang "Frosty": 2
Minutes spent discussing Frosty melting and then being resurrected: 6
Guess-timate number of days after Christmas we'll still be singing "Jingle Bells": 165
Number of times I've almost given him the didgeridoo: 4
Percentage of toys in our house from the Island of Sodor: 35
Percentage after Christmas: 50
Hours Vicki will likely spend in her PJs that day: 16
Hours I hope Samson will nap: 3
Number of candy canes Samson will begin: 11
Number he will finish: .7
Hours Samson probably will nap, in light of all those candy canes: .5

You can build it (in theory). We can help (allegedly).

Don't believe the hype, I've rarely found the guys at Home Depot to be particularly helpful. In fact, it's not easy to find them at all. So it goes.

I hit the Depot the other day to get some PVC pipe to make Samson a didgeridoo for Christmas. This summer at the farmers' market, there was a guy there playing a didgeridoo [or didge, to the cognoscenti], and Sam was absolutely fascinated by it.

Unfortunately, the guy never showed up again, but every time we go to the market poor Samson expects to see him.

In any event, since then he has been making didges out of paper towel rolls. He scrunches up his face and does his best to imitate the rather singular sound of the didgeridoo. You've probably heard one without realizing it, but click here for some samples.

You can imagine, of course, the reaction I got from the guy in the plumbing department when I asked him to cut me 3 feet of PVC for a didgeridoo. He protested he couldn't cut to measure. No problem, I said, just make it approximate.

He protested that he had to sell me all 10 feet. No problem, I said, I'll just stick the shorter piece in the cart and carry the rest to the register.

And then he protested that they sold stand-alone pieces of 2 feet in length, and wouldn't I rather have that instead.

Samson, from the cart ventured his opinion/confusion: "The man is helping us?"

I assured Samson that the man was and hoped the guy would just cut the damn pipe and let us get out of his aisle.

Surly orange-aproned guy aside, we got all our supplies and headed home.

Last night, after sanding and priming the pipe, I painted it. In truth, it looks less like primitive art and more like art therapy for head wound survivors, but I tried.

I have to make the beeswax mouthpiece tonight, and then it's ready to wrap for Christmas. [Yes I took him with me to get the materials, and yes he has some vague sense he's getting a didge, but I'm banking on the intervening weeks and continued train requests to push this gift to the back of his mind.]

Nothing says Christmas morning at our house like the low drone of a stone-age instrument made out of plumbing pipe.

Good Santa

We went to the mall last night to get Sam's picture taken with Santa. What a difference a year makes. Last night, aside from the eight-person entourage in front of us (is the first photo with Santa a rite of passage in their family?) and the kid screaming bloody murder behind us, it was pretty uneventful.

Samson duly walked up to Santa, put his arms up for a little help onto the lap, and said in his politest, most practiced voice, "I want a train for Christmas...Please."

For my money, this guy is a great Santa. His eyes really do twinkle when you talk to him.

Samson even managed a smile. Well, sort of.