We're with alacrity!

One of the ways Sarah and I spend a lot of our time is in "encouraging" the boys to do things they don't want to do: getting out of the door, getting into the car, getting into their car seats, going to the bathroom, washing their hands, getting their pajamas on, getting into bed...You get the idea. Pretty much anything we want them to do they drag their feet as much as possible.

You can well imagine that after pleading, begging, cajoling and bribing them to get a move on in a variety of ways we get a little punchy and begin seeking new ways of saying the same things. Now Sarah usually likes to needle me, not without good reason, for the way my sometimes esoteric word usage and over-elaborate sentence structure finds its way into the boys developing speech. In this case, however, it was all her. One day, exasperated while trying to get the boys out the door to school, she said, "Come ON boys! Let's move with alacrity!" She didn't think too much of it until the next day. As she again exhorted the boys to get moving Connor started off cheerfully and looked back and asked, "Am-am-am- I wiff....a-la-cri-teeee?!!!" Sarah almost fell over. Since then he continues to use his new word, when it suits him, to highlight his compliance, always pronouncing it carefully: "Look mommy! I-I-I'm doing a-la-cri-teee!"

Let's play chest!

Jamie's latest obsession is chess. He's actually doing great with it. For once I am forcing him to play by the actual rules as opposed to the Jamie-always-wins rules Risk and Candyland we usually play, so I wasn't sure how he would react the very rigid rules about piece movement. As soon as we started playing, however, it was clear it would go well because he said, "Dad, is this like war?" Then before I could nuance a reply he said "I think it is, so I like it." He's actually picking up the rules pretty quickly, too. The only piece he really can't figure out is the knight. But he has some of the lingo down after watching the chess scene is Harry Potter, so he likes to refer to his "queen-side castle" whenever possible. This makes up for the fact that he is still working the name of the game out and often calls it "Chest."

It's funny watching him learn strategy. He's been very into Tic-Tac-Toe lately, but he is still totally unable to think in terms of defense. He plays straight ahead to win and doesn't try to block the other player. On the other hand, he's very into rock-paper-scissors and shows a sometimes spooky ability to guess what you are thinking and react accordingly. Of course sometimes he still waits to see what you play and assure himself victory.

Little drummer boy?

So we are moving Jamie to a new school next year. This has been the subject of much hand-wringing over the past couple of years but we are really settled and comfortable. The school is right in the neighborhood and is great. The only issue is that it has a special music curriculum. We like this of course, but Jamie "doesn't care about that stuff." Really he couldn't be less interested in music, even Johnny Cash these days. I thought we might have had a little breakthrough recently, and maybe it will prove to be so. The boys and I were at home playing in the living room and listening to the Master and Commander soundtrack. There are are a number of pieces featuring big booming drums and Jamie perked up immediately and asked "Is this war music? I like those drums." I told it was indeed war music and now he officially likes it.

So later that day I told Sarah about this and we thought, aha! here's our chance to break the news to him about not going back to his current school, and to maybe get him enthused about the new place. So we told him he was going there and could perhaps learn to play the drums like that. He paused and said, "So I'm not going back to my school?!" "No?" we said hopefully. He immediately burst into very genuine tears and sobbed for about 5 minutes.

Of course at this point we both wanted to just say OK, never mind you can go back, but we managed to stifle the impulse and interestingly, he got over it fairly quickly and hasn't said a whole lot else about it since, except for the occasional negative comments about not liking music. We haven't even yet been able to tell him that his best buddy won't be there either so I think it may get easier in time. We've also been trying to play the "you'll get recess now" card, which is making some headway I think.

Drivin' and eatin'

As you all know, anything related to food with Jamie can be a challenge. Occasionally, very occasionally, he can get an eating on him and just go crazy. Other times, if he's somehow distracted in a way that doesn't make him want to leave the table he can very easily polish off a meal before he's even aware that he's done it. I think it must be that he gets enough nutrition at these times to cover himself because the rest of the time he sure doesn't eat much. We've been working out for a while why this is because it's clear that all things being equal he doesn't actually dislike food, and I think a couple of things are in play. The main thing is that he simply doesn't want to sit there, when he could be doing something else more fun. Whatever hunger he has just generally isn't enough to overrule this impulse, at least for very long. He would be perfectly happy eating if we would let him bring the food to where ever he's playing, or even if it could stay at the table and he could come back and take a handful when he wanted. But no, we're mean parents, so we don't let him do that.

The other piece to the puzzle is that Jamie now proclaims his hunger every time we are about to get in the car. This has been on the increase lately and has really been confounding us. In part we can recognize it as just a time-honored delaying tactic, one also mobilized when it is bedtime of course. But I started to figure it out one night when he was refusing to eat a dinner that consisted of entirely foods that we know he likes. I asked him if we put it in a bowl and gave it to him in the car, if he would eat. Without hesitation he said, "Yes! All of it!" "Why?" I asked. I was impressed that he was then able to pretty much vocalize clearly that it was because when he's in the car he's sitting anyway, so he might as well eat, there be nothing better to do. This explains too, that when he waits until the moment we say it's time for bed to declare that he's STARVING, it's more than just delaying bedtime, it's acknowledging that he really is hungry and just doesn't have a more entertaining option.

Of girls and magma

Perhaps one of our biggest regrets in removing Jamie from his current school is that there is a group of adorable little girls who seem totally smitten with him. We were at a birthday party at one of these bouncy-castle places a couple of weeks ago and one of the girls was there and spent the entire 2 hours chasing him and, when she caught him, tackling him. At first, he was happy to see her and they had a good time. Eventually though I think he began developing some personal space issues and started to run away. Whenever he gave her the slip, amidst the din and rancor of 30 bouncing kids you could hear "Jaaaaamiiiieeeee?!!!!" ringing out and the chase would be on.

Of course we always want him to be nicer to the girls too. Recently Sarah took the boys to a playground not too far from school and yet another adorable, slightly older girl from school was there. She is, in fact, the best friend of Jamie's best friend's older sister. We had always had the sense the they treated the boys with disdain, and probably much of the time they do, but in this case her face absolutely lit up when she saw Jamie. They circled each other for a bit, but when Jamie sat down to do some digging she came over with a big smile and said "Hi Jamie!!!!!" Sarah was fascinated, but Jamie only gruffly responded. She asked what he was doing and he said, without looking up, "Digging for magma." No offer of letting her help was made. Sarah wanted to tell him to stop digging and be nice, but at this point, Connor, perhaps sensing an opportunity, happily marched up and introduced himself. "Are you Jamie's brother?" she asked with another big smile and got a much more enthusiastic response from little C.

A sad state of affairs

Jamie, as many of you know, is very into playing with Star Wars legos. He sets up elaborate battles in which, happily, good seems to triumph inevitably over evil. They are fairly fragile, however, as can be his psyche, so when they break it is a bit traumatic. Some of these are fairly elaborate constructions that are beyond Jamie's ability to put together at this stage. (Honestly, they're almost beyond our ability.) Over time we have built and rebuilt several ships only to see them disintegrate over time. There then ensues a period in which Jamie asks us to rebuild them and we stall. It's a little hard to gear up for this because it's a real undertaking and ultimately a futile one.

Jamie recently had a friend over who is also a big Star Wars legos fan (surprise!). The last time he was over he and Jamie had lamented the breakdown of the Republic Attack Shuttle, and as soon as he arrived he asked where it was. Jamie replied, a little wearily, "It's in my bed room. And I'm sorry to say it's in the same condition as before." They both sighed.

Sick boys!

Once again I must apologize, dear readers, for the delay between posts. Between Easter, allergies and various (minor) sicknesses the expected calm period has yet to be realized. Nonetheless I am in the last week of classes at Rice so I hope to be able to catch up on some of the various happenings.

After a very long healthy period the boys have both been under the weather of late. Poor Connor had a double ear infection a couple of weeks ago and then Jamie got a virus last week. It has been ages since he got sick so I think he was a little taken aback by the experience of feeling poorly and it made us realize how lucky we've been with him. The worst symptom was a very high fever for a couple of nights. I slept next to him on the futon and it was nice to be able to care for him though also made for a long couple of nights. The fever and the semi-sleepy state meant that he produced some rather strange comments as he was clearly hallucinating a little bit. He kept talking about being upside down, which then seemed to disconcert him. Happily, it took one day at home from school with Sarah, some TV and some video games to restore him to health. He refers to this day now as "the best day ever!".

Now Connor seems to have the virus. It's different with him because the main result is that he wakes up and wants to get out of bed and play. Wants us out of bed too. So we had a bit of a time getting him back to sleep at about 4 last night. It gets hard to comfort him too because if he doesn't get what he wants he gets mad at us and turns away when we come near. Finally, we turned a desk light on in their room. Sarah had positioned it on the floor pointed down so it wouldn't be too bright. Apparently that's not a problem because when he finally fell asleep he was lying with his face on the edge of the bed looking directly at the light, about a foot away. Whatever works!