what's in a name?

not only did we return home from our thanksgiving in charlotte with stuffed bellies, but susanna also acquired a new favorite toy: a pink baby doll with a change of clothes, bottle, and hat. the baby has not left her side since thursday, and we've all been subjected to her motherly high-pitched singsong voice as she talks to, and feeds, and soothes her new charge. for the first day or so that the doll was in susanna's arms, she was just known as The Doll. but on friday susanna began referring to her as Baby China. this perplexed us, since she typically calls her toys and imaginary friends and dollhouse figurines by names of people she knows -- classmates, relatives, students in her ballet group, etc. i asked her how she had come up with China. "liam told me that was her name," she responded, as she maneuvered the doll across the floor to her makeshift crib. i pondered that for a moment. he has a huge world map on his wall and is pretty adept at naming the countries and continents, but even keeping that into consideration, it still didn't make sense as to why he'd suggest an asian nation as a moniker for the baby. i told her that that was a very "interesting choice," and planned to leave it at that. "oh, liam showed it to me," she explained, and carried the doll to me. "see? here it is." she turned over the doll and pointed. and sure enough, there, etched into the bottom of her bald plastic head, were the words "©2008 CHINA".

wordless wednesday

from our little pilgrim (and all of his preschool pilgrim friends), we wish you a very happy thanksgiving!

thanks a latte

at one of my most recent 617 trips to target, i received a coupon on my receipt for a "buy one latte, get one free" at the starbucks in the store. now, i'm a coupon queen, spending a half-hour each sunday poring over the circulars, organizing them into my coupon file, and creating menus around them. quite the experienced coupon user, i am. but this one perplexed me a bit. get a free hot coffee? what am i supposed to do with that? chug the first one, and quickly move on to the next before it's too cold? take the second one home and re-heat it for breakfast the next morning? invite a friend to join me in shopping for household cleaners so she can take part in the offer? still, i tucked it into my "restaurants" section of my trusty coupon holder and figured it probably would sit there until it expired. wednesday was a cold, rainy, nasty day. i walked into target, smelled the starbucks brewing, and figured i could drop $4.05 on coffee as a rare treat to myself. there was a young girl ahead of me (amazing how relative age gets as you grow older -- by young, i mean around twenty) and as she approached the counter to place her order, i remembered my coupon. i tapped her on the shoulder and asked her if she by any chance was planning on getting a latte. she said she was. "well, i've got this coupon here, for buy one get one free. i'm going to get one, so if you want, you can have the free one," i told her. i figured she'd smile, thank me, and we'd go our separate ways. but what happened next surprised me. yes, she smiled, and yes, she thanked me. but then she thanked me again. and again. and then her eyes actually began to well up with tears. she touched my hands and whispered, "you have no idea what kind of a day i've had so far." and then, when the cashier handed her that steaming red cup, she looked at me one last time and said, "this is honestly the nicest thing that has happened to me in a long time." it stuck with me the rest of the day. and let's be honest -- this was no sacrifice on my part. i had a free coupon and was going to spend my four bucks anyway. but it reminded me of how much you get back by doing something completely unexpected for someone else ... kind of like that "pay it forward" commercial by an insurance company that airs on television. what had begun for me as a dreary november day when i had trouble getting out of bed had suddenly become a happy one. and all because this stranger next to me in line at target was so grateful. it resonated with me, especially during this week of thanksgiving. i need to be more thankful for the little things. for our neighbors, who picked up the ten huge bags of leaves chris had raked and moved them to the curb just to be nice. for one of my 17-year old pre-algebra students, who was expelled from his base school for gang-related activity, telling me "mrs. mann, that lesson we did today was awesome." for the small acts of kindness performed by my family and friends and acquaintances that make my life a little easier and a little brighter. and for this stranger, so touched just because she walked out of target on a cold and wet morning with a cup of free coffee.

wordless wednesday

liam has struggled somewhat with fine motor skills, to the point that he even saw an occupational therapist for a few months last year to work on things like pencil grips and threading beads. even as recently as this past summer, he wasn't interested in the least in any kind of art activity, and i knew it was because he hated having to hold a crayon or marker for an extended period of time. but something has apparently clicked recently (yet more confirmation that we made the right decision in waiting to start kindergarten) and his current favorite center at preschool is the writing center. he jumped into the car at pick-up yesterday, bursting at the seams to pull his artwork out of his bag to give to me. more than any fancy activity he's done, i'll cherish this one, because he made it with no guidance or suggestions -- he just did it "because i wanted to." (and in case you were wondering, that's the two of us in a rocket ship among three circular clouds.)

sneaky snuggler

the first thing i see every morning these days is susanna, standing at my bedside, flashing me a smile before she climbs into bed with me. and while she's heaving her soft chubby body up to the top of the mattress to curl up beside me, she says, "mommy, will you snuggle with me?" i can't think of a better way to start my day -- cuddling under the comforter as i stroke her hair and we talk about her dreams from the night before, or what she wants to wear to school, or what she requests for breakfast. fortunately for me, she's a gift that keeps on giving, for i hear those same five words repeated multiple times throughout the day. "will you snuggle with me in the family room?" she asks, before we squeeze onto the sofa. "will you snuggle with me on the deck?" before we curl up on one of the cushioned wrought iron chairs. "will you snuggle with me in my car seat?" before we -- well, before i tell her that there are some things that momma just can't do. it really is the sweetest thing. but it wasn't so sweet on friday night at about 3:00 a.m., when i awoke to the patter of her feet and a whimper at our doorway. "i cannot find Baby Bear," she wailed. now, i must admit that the thought of a possible disappearance of Baby Bear did not bother me in the least. it's this ratty teddy bear she got at the state fair a month ago, wearing a pink UNC t-shirt that has already started to pill and eyes that aren't quite level on its face. i shudder to think about where that thing has been and how many random people have held it and how much cigarette smoke it inhaled before my loving husband won it when the "stump the guesser" guy miscalculated his weight by 15 pounds. but i digress. so, i sighed quite loudly just in case chris wasn't aware of the disruption and of my selfless sacrifice, and trudged down the hallway to her room, cursing Baby Bear and its already-coming-apart-at-the-seams self under my breath. and as soon as we got to her bed, there, in the dark, with my eyes still not adjusted, i found the thing lying right next to susanna's dadgum pillow. how had she missed it? i wondered. i tucked her back into bed, secured Baby Bear to her side, and headed to the door. but not before i heard, "hey mommy, while you're here," in her little three-year old voice, "will you snuggle with me?"

wordless wednesday

the highlight of halloween candy is not its yummy goodness, but its ability to transform a treat into a math lesson. liam and susanna already know the drill so well now that i don't even need to ask: one may not consume one's M&Ms until one has separated them by color, declared which is the mode, totaled the contents, and compared one's data to one's sibling's data.

i feel bad for them in a way. they're probably going to grow up to be total math geeks like their mother, but i just can't help myself. and, really, doesn't chocolate taste even better after your brain's done a little work to earn it?

talk about a revolution

"the beatles do NOT have good manners," liam stated from the back seat of the car to chris as he drove the kids home the other night. let me interject something here: it is a small miracle that they were listening to the beatles at all. we have had the same six CDs in our car CD player since last december 26, when i removed the christmas music and replaced it with the same six CDs that had been in my car CD player for most of 2008. care to know what's on our children's playlist? we've got sesame street. veggietales. the wiggles. a vacation bible school soundtrack. a little people compilation. and slot #4 has been permanently out of rotation ever since liam tried to cram in a disc upside down (with peanut butter fingerprints all over it, mind you) back in 2005. thankfully, our sorry musical repertoire was destined to change after we spent a weekend at a friend's house in asheville a few weeks back. saturday morning the kids got to try their hands at the xbox "the beatles: rock band" game, and beatlemania hit the family faster than the H1N1 virus swept through most of our preschool. they laughed at "yellow submarine". they danced to "twist and shout". they quickly mastered the chorus of "ob-la-di, ob-la-da". as soon as we returned home, chris burned a greatest-hits-of-the-beatles-for-the-car CD and we chucked that little people "let's go to the beach" disc out the window. which brings me back to liam. why, chris asked him, do sir paul and his friends come across as impolite? what manners are these four esteemed gentlemen lacking? he replied, "they say 'yeah'. that is very rude!" he then closed his eyes (as, apparently, all good rockers do when belting out their songs) and then sang, "she loves you, YES, YES, YES." chris considered explaining how even the most polite songwriters need to take liberties with their lyrics from time to time. but then he realized that by doing that, he might be undermining 5+ years of manners training. so he smiled, nodded in agreement ... and let it be.

wordless wednesday

we offer you an assortment of pumpkins for your viewing pleasure today! in the foreground are some lovely smaller varieties on display -- although we regret to inform you that their most stunning features (scrawled permanent marker by preschoolers) are rather invisible in the dark. on the left is an homage to our dear son with his missing bottom tooth. and on the right, of course, no halloween would be complete without my infamous math reference that no one ever understands.

sweet talking will get you everywhere

our baseball player and princess-with-a-wand enjoyed every single minute of their halloween. and why wouldn't they? a quick synopsis: a) their costumes were easy and comfortable. b) it was a clear, balmy 80 degrees. c) there was no rush to get home, since we were gaining an hour of sleep that night. and, most importantly, d) they made out like bandits. our far-too-generous neighbors all seemed so happy to hear their doorbells ring -- we're one of only two families with young children on our street -- and they certainly made our stops worthwhile. (truth be told, they were probably more excited to have an opportunity to unload the gobs of candy they'd bought than they were to ooh and aah over the trick-or-treaters on their front step.)

the most memorable stop of the evening occurred on the street behind our house, with an older gentleman who did not at all agree with liam's choice of costume. he opened his door and immediately gave a friendly scowl. "a dodgers player? trying to get my candy?" he harrumphed. "i'm a lifelong yankees fan and i have to say, i'm not crazy about your uniform," he said, before giving liam one nestle crunch.

chris and i exchanged a glance, both curious as to how liam would react. the boy could make friends with a brick wall, so i guess i shouldn't have been surprised at what followed. "oh right, the yankees. from new york! i pull for them sometimes. like, if they play a team from chicago or something -- well, i pull for them then."

and just like that, the man grinned, reached back into his stash, and dropped five more candy bars into liam's bucket.