Nothing's Going to Stop Us Now

We should all be so lucky to have someone who digs us so completely.

Baby Fosse and Inspector Small

Jazz hands AND jazz belly:

Sylvia, slightly bigger:

All That She Wants Is Another Crayon

One of the coolest things about being a parent -- or, for that matter, a constant grownup in any kid's life -- is watching that little person become who he or she is. Or grow into herself, however you want to put it. Passions emerge. In the past week, Maggie's love of drawing has reached a new level: she finally put it together that she can climb in a chair (which she has been doing for awhile, I think?), sit at the art table, and with just a little reeeeach... 

 ...can obtain basically anything she wants from Rosemary's art table. In fact, I think we will just have to start calling it the art table, because it is in no way exclusively Rosemary's any longer. Crayons are great, markers are better, colored pencils are still forbidden and have been moved to what little higher ground we have. Our white Ikea chairs are suffering a bit for the cause, but I guess that's why we only buy Ikea right now. Every morning this week, the second she comes upstairs she runs to the art table and sits and colors, colors, colors. For as long as we'll let her. We've been noticing this obsession with art materials all summer, but now that she can reach the motherlode on her own it's become a constant. She is also surprisingly diligent about trying to put the lids back on the pens. And--I'm not sure this is a plus--she indignantly fishes her finished drawings out of the recycling and gives me the what-for for tossing them out. She sounds a lot like an angry squirrel (still not many words).

(Sylvia, meanwhile, is pretty much indifferent to the stuff.)

This series of pictures, taken at my friend Tiff's house, say so much about Maggie, and her fervent desire to squeeze her seat at the table.

A few other Maggie thoughts and pictures:

She shakes her head no like everyone else does, but instead of nodding her head to say yes, she shakes her entire body to say yes - I guess you could say she "nods" with her torso. 

She loves a good seat, especially a small one just her size.

 Cousin Mimi recently visited and Maggie really enjoyed showing her around our little playground.

And she has new, noisy shoes. This was the first time we put them on her. These are the sweetest shoes, though definitely not the most dignified. It is turning out to be quite handy on the playground though. I am awaiting the moment when Sylvia grows into the squeaker shoes, since she's the cat who really needs a bell around her neck.

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.