Christmas Singing 2007

Props to the Preschooler

Fiona gets a magazine called Ladybug (thanks Grandma!) which features various stories, poems and songs each month. There are some stories that run to several pages, some poems that only run to a few lines, and each month there are a few recurring features in comic strip form following the adventures, variously, of a boy and girl in preschool who are best friends, a pair of twins and their dog, and a girl and her cat (called "Molly and Emmett," and it appears on the back page of each issue).

Whenever Ladybug arrives in the mail and Fiona sees it she acts more or less the same way I acted when I discovered I got into my first choice college--she jumps up and down and can barely contain her excitement. Such are the pleasures of getting mail when you're not even four years old, I suppose.

Anyway, this month Ladybug was, not surprisingly, built around a holiday theme. When we reached the last page, we read about Molly and Emmett going to a Christmas carnival and finding the names of boys and girls who needed presents that year. Molly and Emmett each take a name (Emmett's a talking cat who walks on his hind legs, by the way) and find a gift and then wrap it and take it to the charity while talking about how nice it is to help Santa.

After we read the story for the first time, we had a talk with Fiona about what was going on in the story. We explained that some children didn't have as many toys as she did, and that what Molly and Emmett were doing was a nice way of making sure that no child had to go without a present at Christmastime.

We quickly realized that this was, as the parlance goes, a teaching moment, combined with an opportunity for us to do explicitly what we've been doing surreptitiously for years, which is to periodically clean out toys that Fiona isn't playing with any more.

We knew that if we asked Fiona to pick toys out of the blue to give to charity she'd either pick random items that would have no use out of context (the middle car of a three car train, for example), or else she wouldn't think quite straight and would suggest getting rid of a stuffed animal that was so beloved she wouldn't be able to sleep at night (yes, I know, the truest expression of the holiday spirit would be to give away the thing you love the most, but we're talking about a 3 1/2 year old here).

So instead, the night before we asked Fiona to make her choices, we laid out 12 toys and asked her to pick six that she would be willing to give to children who didn't have anything. She started by picking toys she absolutely wanted to keep, one or two of which suprised us. And, inevitably, some toys wound up in the "keep" pile, and then the "give away" pile, and then the "keep" pile. Halfway through I realized I'd better explain to Fiona that Mommy and Daddy were going to be giving things away during Christmastime as well, although I'm not sure that I did a very good job of explaining charitable donations to a kid who thinks you buy money at a bank. Still, I didn't want her to think we were just asking her to give away her stuff while we partied it up.

I'm not going to list what she gave away and what she kept since I'm sure one or two of her toys were former gifts from people who read this blog (on the other hand, if you still think a four year old should be playing with the same exact toys she played with when she turned two you might have expectations in need of adjustment). But Fiona did select six toys and even when she noticed that the toys were still sitting in our front room in a box waiting to head out for donation she didn't show any regrets.

So score one for the holiday spirit... and one for parents in a New York apartment managing to get rid of a little clutter. Analogies to scooping water out of a leaky canoe with a dixie cup might be appropriate, giving the impending arrival of Santa followed two weeks later by birthday presents, but at least we're still out there trying. And way to go, Fiona.

Big Girls Get Big Car Seats

A little early Christmas present, as much for us as her: Fiona's grown into a booster seat for the car now. Here she is trying it out after I took it out of the box but before I had a chance to install it in the car. Glad to see she's treating this big moment with the reverence it deserves.

The boots are another new acquisition (and not one we held out on for the 25th--the kid needs something to wade through the snow and ice). For about the first 48 hours after she got them they were permanently attached to her feet. Pink and hearts--can't beat that!

Christmas Concerns

We're hosting Christmas this year, which means for the first time Fiona is going to wake up Christmas morning in her own bed and will get to see what Santa Claus brought for her in her own living room. She's very excited, and has even started talking about how she's going to wake up in the middle of the night so she can sneak out to see Santa.

We have a non-working fireplace in our living room, so we've talked about how Santa's going to slide down the chimney and leave her presents (but first we'll have to clear her toys out of the fireplace--this being a New York apartment, we find storage wherever we can). A few days ago, Fiona was playing near the fireplace when she suddenly noticed that the flue was closed. I don't think she'd ever noticed the flue's existence before, but the consequences were immediately clear:

"Daddy!" she shouted. "We have to open that for Santa!"

I have no idea what's in our chimney after decades of a closed off fireplace, and I'm not about to find out. I explained that the flue opens from the inside as well and that Santa was going to open it on Christmas Eve when he lands on our roof. Fiona seemed okay with that.

We tried to take her to see Santa two years ago (when she wasn't quite two years old) and she was so terrified we couldn't even get close enough for a photo. Last year our schedules didn't work out and before we knew it we'd missed Santa for the season. We're planning on taking her on Friday afternoon this year; I'm sure an update will follow.

New Additions

Because it can't all be about the kid.

We adopted a pair of cats yesterday. It was time.

We're not totally sure on names yet, so we're sticking with the ones they had from their last owner who had to get rid of them for allergy reasons. This one is Snowy (or Miss Snowy, or Snowball III for you Simpsons fans):

And this one is Risky (or Mister Risky):

They're siblings. And they've been hiding an awful lot the last 24 hours, but they'll get used to us. After all, we have their food.

Henry's Birthday

Fiona attended her first big invite-the-whole-preschool-class birthday party over the weekend, although since the party was held in Brooklyn and you needed to drive only about 5 kids from the preschool were able to attend (the place was still packed, since the family also invited various friends, and every kid had 1-2 parents chaperoning).

Classic New York moment: the first big birthday party my daughter attended was held in a bar. In Greenpoint, for those who know NYC. The birthday boy's dad owns the place, and I guess he decided to keep the hipsters, drunks, and hipster drunks out until 4pm or so for the day (although anybody could have wandered in, I doubt they would have wanted to stick around once they saw the scene, unless they were really overdoing it on the ironic hipster act).

And from the preschoolers-can-get-away-with-this-kind-of-stuff file, my favorite moments from the party:

• A friend of the family who must be a dog trainer brought in 4-5 dogs to do some tricks for the kids and then invited all the children up to pet the dogs. Fiona ran to the stage with everybody else (as I've noted before, you can suddenly tell how tall she is when you see her towering over all the other children at the party; part of that is because she'll be four next month and the birthday boy was just turning three this weekend).
  
  One of the boys from her class, David, suddenly noticed at that very moment that Fiona was at the party. And so he started shouting "Fiona's here! Hi Fiona! Everybody, Fiona's here!" at the top of his lungs, making it impossible for the dog trainer to say much of anything. Except wait for Fiona to eventually notice that somebody was shouting her name at the top of his lungs (she was happy to see David once she stopped paying attention to the dogs).
  
  
• At birthday cake time, everybody (naturally) wanted to sit next to the birthday boy. Once we got Fiona her cake and headed over to the table with the kids, Henry (the birthday boy) was already sitting on a bench next to another boy from class, Jules. So Fiona crawled underneath the table and forced herself between Henry and Jules. Neither of whom seemed to mind, or even notice.
  
  
• I think the parents wanted Henry to open his presents after the party, which I'm sure was fine with the various adult friends in attendance, but not so kosher with the preschool crowd. Before we left, Fiona picked her present out of the pile and brought it to Henry (she wasn't the first kid to do this, nor was she the last). Eventually, his parents decided to let Henry open the presents that were brought to him. But as he pulled at the bow and had trouble opening the gift, Fiona leaned over and told him what was in the present. Again, he didn't seem to mind.

Now I guess we have to find a good local dive to have a bash in for Fiona's fourth...

We Know Which Grandparent This Comes From

Two moments from the weekend:

1. Clearing the breakfast table, Fiona reaches for the orange juice container. I ask her if she wants me to take it since it's heavy. Her response: "I'll get it. I'm strong, like a wookiee."
   
   
2. Driving in the car to the grocery store, I search for a radio station to get us through the three minute drive. I happen across some bagpipes playing and surf on. Fiona shouts from the back seat: "don't change that, I like that!"

A Pivotal Developmental Milestone

May 1977. I was about a year older then than Fiona is now. George Lucas releases a weird little space movie which goes on to be seen by everybody in the known universe over the next few months.

Except for me. My parents, no doubt cackling over the abuse they were visiting upon me, decided I was too young to see Star Wars. I proceeded to spend the next school year pretending to know what everybody was talking about when it came to Luke, Han, Leia, Vader and Obi-Wan. I experienced the phenomenon second-hand, which you couldn't help but do, what with the action figures, bed sheets, comic books and other assorted tie-ins, not to mention the fact that every single day at recess inevitably involved light saber battles as one scene or another got recreated near the jungle gym.

By the time I finally convinced my grandmother to take me to see the movie two years later, I already knew every beat, but I was still bitter at my parents for what they denied me. I made up for it by turning into a ridiculous film geek for about 15 years, seeing just about everything I could lay my hands on in some desperate effort to make up for that central childhood trauma.

And I swore I would never do the same thing to my kids.

Well, I promised I'd let my kids do a lot of things I never did like eat candy bars for dinner and never have a bedtime, and you know how most of those promises work out. But this afternoon, all I can say to my parents is... this is something we let Fiona do:

The good: she likes what she's seeing. She's actually gotten her hands on a Star Wars book for kids already, so some of this is familiar.

The bad: she keeps asking where Jar Jar Binks is. Sigh.

Each Set of Grandparents Will Say This Sounds Like a Daughter They Remember

This evening at dinner Fiona asked for an apple. We told her she could have it if she was still hungry after she finished the other food on her plate, which she did, so I sliced up half an apple and gave it to her in a little bowl.

After eating a slice, she then proceeded to play with the next slice in all sorts of maddening preschooler ways that had nothing to do whatsoever with how a human being usually eats food. We've been getting frustrated with this behavior, so I picked up the bowl and carried it back to the kitchen, letting her know that if she was just going to play with her food she clearly wasn't hungry so I was going to take the food away.

Well, she turned remorseful, as she always does, and pledged to eat the apple by putting it in her mouth (imagine if you had to make stipulations on the level of "by putting it in your mouth?" with adults?) if I brought it back. I agreed she could have another chance, and went to get the bowl.

"No, I'm going to get the bowl!" Fiona declared.

We were trying to keep Fiona at the table and focused. "I'll get it," I responded.

"No, I get it!" By now she was hot on my heels, but she'd been frustrating us throughout dinner, and for whatever reason I didn't feel like giving in.

"I've got it," I said, scooping it up and carrying it back to the table. "Now come on if you want to eat it."

The results were entirely predictable. Fiona went to her room and screamed and cried and jumped off her bed a few times and then jumped off the top of her bookshelf (OK, I'm not so sure about that last one--but it sure sounded that way from the dinner table). Andrea and I had a grown up conversation about whatever grown ups talk about while pretending there's no screaming three-year old on the other side of the nearest wall.

After a few minutes, Fiona marched back into the dining room.

"Would you like your apple now?" I asked, but Fiona just glared at me. And then she scooped the bowl up off the table, carried it back to the kitchen, set it on the counter, scooped it back up, and returned it to the spot from whence it had just come.

"I get the bowl," she said.

This would be one of those moments where you're working too hard on stifling a laugh to bother holding your ground.

That Preschool Education is Tearing Her Away From Her Mother

Bedtime, and it's my turn tonight. I help Fiona through brushing her teeth and then she's all set.

Daddy: Okay, now say good night to Mommy and give her her kiss.

Fiona: (running across the room to Mommy and starting to hug her) Good night, Mommy! Hey, wait! (stopping and pulling back from the hug before she's even given her mother a kiss; this is more important:) Good night. Guh guh guh... Good night starts with "G"!

Mommy: Yes! And night starts with "N".

Fiona: No, "good night" starts with "G".

Mommy: (deciding it's not the right time to try to explain that it's actually a two word phrase) That's right.

Fiona: (heading toward her room) Guh, guh, guh...

Mommy: Um, Fiona, can I have my kiss?