Making Way for Hello Dolly

This post is a long distance dedication for my mom, who's bravely offered to make Rosemary's Hello Dolly costume for Halloween. Brave, I say, or maybe more to the point glutton for punishment since there's a high likelihood that whatever gorgeous concoction she makes will be roundly rejected. Rosemary's extra picky about clothing, so much so that (snooze, sorry, I've said this before) she often refuses even her most favorite, most comfy old standards because "it! doesn't! feel! good!!!!" (always yelped with much scrabbling and tugging and ultimate tearing off of whatever she has on). Mom and I rationalize this project by saying that even if it ends up not working this year, we have years more of fancy dress up coming in the near future and a sparkly golden dress will definitely be enjoyed.    

And if it's the journey that matters, well, Rosemary is having a ball working on the costume. We went to the garment district in Manhattan on Saturday to get the goods. I do love that area, with shop after shop of wholesale bead stores, then the trimming shops, and then the fabric stores. First stop, feathers and long, white gloves at a trimming store:

The expression at the end is all for me, as she realized I was shooting the video. The mom-arrazzi is so super annoying. The best part, which I didn't get, was the guy at the newsstand chuckling at the whole number, including the eye-roll finish. 

Having said I love going to the area, I should also say I find it totally overwhelming because there are so many, many options just a few square blocks. Even as I find something perfectly good in the first store, I wonder what might be in the other 25 stores on the block. But it was actually a joy to shop with Rosie because she was very decisive, selective but not picky. Now we bundle all the material off to Mom in Bethesda and start working on the song and dance numbers here. 

Some Days the Light is Just Nice

Fair Days

As you may recall, we have three daughters. There's Maggie, very serious merry-go-round fan:

Rosemary, who self-identifies as "more of games person" although she does like a carousel. (And no other rides.)

 And Sylvia, the Mayor of the Midway. I wish I'd gotten a better picture of her greeting everyone. 

She does also like the games. Or at least the prizes. Rosemary first won a lion for her, which was ok for a few minutes but then she changed her mind and somehow communicated to me that she wanted a giraffe just like the one Rosemary had won for herself. So we had to go all the way back and get her one. I already can't remember how she told me that without using words, but she did, and she was very specific about it.

Back at home in the Berkshires, there was piano playing, pear harvest, sand box time, a slip and slide, a crazy prehistoric looking cricket thing, the book festival, and a snail catch-and-release. While I can't assure you that no snails were harmed, I can verify that the green wiffle-ball bat was not used in any manner.

The Big K

Kindergarten! Because Rosemary's a January kid, and December 31 is the cut off around here for public school grades, she has a bunch of pals who are very close in age and a grade ahead. So somehow kindergarten feels both like a colossal change and like it's been a very long time coming. She hasn't been particularly excited about it, I'd say, but also didn't seem too wound up about it. I guess I fretted more than she did (mom's prerogative) since she has had three years at the same preschool, basically spending all her days there with the same kids, same teachers, in a very sweet, focused, low-key environment.  

Day One arrived, with perfect back to school weather. My mom was in town, so Jason and I were both able to make the trip to school, which started off with a confident, sunny lady.   

Somewhere about half way to school, when all of the sudden a lot of school-bound kids converged, Rosemary's step slowed and she grabbed our hands a little tighter. By the time we got to the actual school - very familiar to her from the outside because we are often there for the farmers market that's right outside or the playground across the street, it was frown city:

She mustered this smile once in class, but she was looking pretty nervous as we left. At the end of the day she said she had two friends and the next day it was "five, maybe six" - not so bad, right?

Change is hard for all our little critters, and I think Rosemary has steeled herself against her new environment and my constant questions, in part because of all of us grown ups constantly asking her with expectation in our eyes, is kindergarten FUN? Are you having fun? Now that I think of it, I guess I look back at kindergarten as being a sweet, cozy time, but that's the end of the year outlook, not the beginning.  

No matter how much she protests that kindergarten is "not as fun as you think...it's more learning than playing," we can still usually glean a silly story or two from of our tight-lipped lady. By Wednesday she was bringing in heart art, glue still wet, for her teacher, and on Friday, she ran into class without so much as a seeyasoon. She seems to be getting the hang of manic cafeteria life and recess on the hot, very urban blacktop playground (would it kill them to have a play structure? Some trees?), where she does get to see some of her old friends. Imagine, there are seven kindergarten classes and six kids from her old school, all in different classes. It's a big place.

Summer's Beginning to Give Up Its Fight

A note to my future self, for when I look back at our photographs from this period and get annoyed at how few high quality photographs we took, let me remind me: there's no safe haven for the camera. There is not enough higher ground in Brooklyn. Sure, our phone cameras document the moment sufficiently, but the days when we took fancy, high res photographs are on hiatus until the twins slow down a bit and can be trusted not to dart out of the playground or pick up an acorn and eat it while you fiddle with putting the camera away or whatever. 

Today [actually a few weeks ago now that I'm actually finishing up this post] we went to the twins picnic (finally! it happened!) and I was chatting with a woman who was there with her 21 month year olds, who basically stuck beside her the entire time. After the fact I wondered, is that just who those kids are or can I expect that kind of behavior from Maggie and Sylvie in a few months? I doubt it, but it would be nice. As it was, Sylvie was trying to dart off to the zoo and Maggie to the carousel. Rosemary hung out with the clown, who had a nice thick Brooklyn accent. They had an amazing psychic connection, as evidenced in this picture:

The twins are in their leprechaun phase right now. This is the one where you are CERTAIN they are beside you only to look up and see them 30 feet away on top of the play structure. If it's Maggie, she's probably carefully going down the twisty slide. If it's Sylvia, she is probably standing in the gap waggling her foot over the edge grinning at you in a taunting kind of way.

Actually, if I had a quarter for every time some one looked at her and made the observation, "This one looks mischievous, we'd have our groceries all paid for. But Sylvie does have her quieter moments, and has been giving some amazing hugs lately. Tiny arms give you a good tight squeeze. She also has developed a serious stuffed animal addiction, and insists on going to bed each night with a whole host of friends in her crib. We often come by to remove a few after the fact.  

It being summer, and Jason working from home, we have spent a lot of time at playgrounds. I choose them carefully right now, aiming for ones with few exits and good sight lines, that are close enough to home that the girls don't fall asleep in the stroller. There are a couple I'm avoiding until future notice, until they have their quest for independence a bit more in balance with their street smarts. (By which I mean their not-going-out-into-the-street smarts.) It's a bit limiting, on the one hand, but the good thing is that we usually run into a friend or two wherever we go.

We've hit the age where you need two of everything.

Parallel Strolling

But more useful would be magical powers to clone the desired, fought-over item so that both girls think they've won the tug of war. Because supplying a second, equivalent item does not solve much, really, in that particular instant. Maggie is almost always the toy-taker, and Sylvia the toy-loser. This is notable because Maggie is, in all other ways, so unbelievably, uncharacteristically (for a toddler) charitable and thoughtful most other times. When I pour them sippy cups of milk, she will often wait until I have both, nestle them both against her chest, and go bring one to Sylvia (who is usually not hovering about waiting for hers). Yesterday Sylvia was upset about one thing or another, and Maggie went over to Sylvia's crib and pulled out a stuffed animal that Sylvia particularly likes, and then went and handed it to her.

Maggie, Ms. Fix It, also takes time out to take care of any thing she sees needs to be done. Shut an open door, get your shoes at first mention of leaving the house, close a drawer, smooth a wrinkled area rug, put a sippy of milk in the refrigerator (albeit the fake kids' kitchen refrigerator, not truly helpful). And beware standing in the real refrigerator trying to get something out, as she will probably try to shut you inside.

Sylvia, a cat-like little person, tends to follow her own whims a bit more. Fortunately, her own whims include dancing to anything even remotely musical, smiling broadly at strangers in a way that makes them think she has only EVER smiled for them, and singing along to the ice cream truck whenever it goes by. On the less adorable side, she will try to dart out of a playground if you give her half a chance.

Fancy Pantsless

Double decker chalk drawing

Hugs

I hear something.

Jason recently gave Sylvia the nickname the Littlest Big Shot, because she will give you every sign she is excited about doing something - say, going on a carousel. But when the carousel ride is imminent, she is suddenly really, really not into it.

Meantime Maggie, who appears the more circumspect of the two, appears to be a bit of a daredevil. She loves a carousel:

When we went to the Columbia County Fair, Maggie was torn at the end of the ride between gripping on too tightly to be removed from the horse and signing for more. She also got really mad that she wasn't tall enough to go on the roller coaster. Maggie mad, by the way, or excited, makes an imitable, throaty, squawky sound I hope I never forget. She also understands everything (but says little), even relatively complicated things. She's been trying to go down the stairs facing forward rather than backward, and has been so frustrated I keep telling her to go down the safe way. So when I proposed a compromise yesterday -- that she go down the first half of our very steep staircase the safe way and then the second half the other way, she understood immediately what I meant.

This is such a Maggie stance. She walks around like this all the time:

Over the summer, Rosemary has been studiously avoiding reading, which she can totally do (each word still takes a bit of work, though she sometimes surprises me by reading something in her head), and has making more elaborate drawings, including my personal favorite, the cartoon "Hello Dolly and the Monsters":

And braids / hair accessories:

Gratuitous mustache section:

Fairy foliage hair:

Just yellow:

In August, Rosemary stayed in the Berkshires for 1 1/2 weeks, while Jason and I and the babies came back to the city. While we missed Rosemary dreadfully, we took advantage of slightly greater flexibility to visit the Bronx Zoo, go strollerless to Governors Island, and swim in the pop up pool along the waterfront. (While Rosemary is getting better and better at swimming, we're not quite ready to do a full family swim.)  

It was great to get her back home a few days later. It felt like a long time apart.

And I'm so glad we didn't miss this momentous occasion, which happened just a couple weeks later. 

More and more the three girls are playing together, for little stretches here and there. I love it when the three little independent spirits converge. Mostly it's tickling and rough housing, but also reading books and chalk drawing, chalk drawing, chalk drawing!