Wow. Almost two months since I’ve written in here?
We painted. A month or so ago. Hubby was in London and I talked my sister into coming down to help me paint, and Mom and Dad took the girls for the night. It was originally just going to be Friday night, and I’d go get the girls Saturday, but when we got the purple on the walls in the girl’s room the ceiling, which we hadn’t planned on painting, looked so dirty it was obvious we had to paint it. Kristin said it looked like there had been a fire and there was smoke damage all over the ceiling. So we had to take all the stuff down off the ceiling, and go get white paint, and paint the ceiling. That took much longer into Saturday than I’d thought.
Saturday afternoon I got a call from the Primary president and in talking to her came up with the plan of keeping Kristin another day if she could, and seeing if Mom and Dad could keep the girls, and trying to just keep going and paint the master bedroom too. That’s what we did. So in a wild weekend Kristin and I painted the girl’s room and our room.
We did a good job, actually, and it looks much better. I put the master bed on an angle and I like it except that the nightstands are kind of deep and it sort of closes off Hubby’s side of the bed, making it hard for him to get in and out. I’d move the whole bed but there is a vent right in the wrong place on the floor.
Thanksgiving was really nice. We went to Logan and the girls had a great time, I made the sweet potato casserole and brought pumpkin pie from Costco. I didn’t do the early morning shopping thing on Friday with Glade like I have done the past couple of years, and it was nice to sleep in.
We spent a week in Orlando, Hubby was there for a conference and really wanted us to come out and meet some of his friends. Ironically, we only met one, his friend Naresh from India. We had a five day pass to Disney World, and really had a great time. We went to the Animal Adventure the first day (Friday), the Epcot, then because the girls were getting so anxious to ride some rides we went to Magic Kingdom. The original plan was to go to Magic Kingdom three days in a row, and blow off MGM, but Thing 1 made a comment that she was getting tired of Magic Kingdom so we went to MGM. Of course there weren’t as many rides, but we found all the rides we could, and there were other interesting things and it was fun for me and Hubby too.
Thing 1 and 2 and I had first class seats on both of the legs of the trip home, Hubby was with us for one, the girls and I did the other. It was a bit of a juggling act keeping them happy from across the aisle, but we managed. We flew back on the 12th of December, and for my birthday Huby bought a glass cube that had images of the girls inside. It wasn’t a surprise because they did it at Epcot and it took 45 minutes, and I got involved trying to help get the girls to hold still for five seconds.
The rest of the week I have been trying to catch up. The house is still kind of a mess upstairs from the painting, I’ve only got one of the toddler beds out of the way, the other one is still leaning against the wall. Oh, did I mention that we bought an IKEA bunkbed that is short enough to put right against the wall. Kristin slept in the bottom bunk one of the nights she was here, and said it was much more comfortable than the futon downstairs. I had to paint it white to make it go in their room, and I took one of the two toddler beds to Kid 2 Kid in the back of Kristin’s car, but I haven’t had the girls out of my hair long enough to get the other bed to Kid 2 Kid, since I have to fold the seats down to get it in the trunk.
Thing 2 had a bad morning this morning.
She was playing with Thing 1 and when I told them it was time to go downstairs and have breakfast because we needed to get going to not be late for church, she wigged out. She attacked the Megablock tower Thing 1 had built, demolishing it. It was kind of like she burst into the Tasmanian Devil or something. Then of course Thing 1 launched herself and Thing 2 in retaliation for destroying the tower, and when I tried to intervene, Thing 2 just started screaming and yelling.
After the yelling stopped and she was asking to be forgiven, we came downstairs and started breakfast. Thing 2 noticed there are a bunch of presents under the tree that I put there last night, and started hauling them in to show us in the kitchen. Then it got quiet for a moment and Hubby heard tearing in the front room, only to poke his head in to see Thing 2 had unwrapped one of her presents. She hadn’t opened the box, but she had gotten all the paper off. Telling her it wasn’t Christmas yet, even telling her gently, only resulted in a new episode of screaming and crying. She was hollering that we hate her and she hates us and on and on… trying to reason with her is just a waste of time, I hate being near the screaming anyway so I don’t know why I bother. I went upstairs to comb my hair and she came up begging forgiveness again…
She wigged out one more time when we were putting her coat on, her sleeves were too tight to get her hands down her coat sleeves, and she started doing her fit thing. There are times I want to just toss her under a cold shower…
Otherwise the girls have been being fabulous. They are very ready for Christmas, excited about Santa. Thing 1 has told us she wants a Nintendo DS for Christmas. When I try to put her off with comments about how expensive it is, she came up with a alternate game plan. “I know,” she told me. “I’ll ask Santa for it. Then you won’t have to pay for it!!” Brilliant! Thing 2 also threw a curve ball by asking Santa for a teddy bear. A Teddy Bear? Yes, a teddy bear. Hmmm… hadn’t planned on that one, either. As often happens to me at Christmas, I start looking forward to it being over. Sometimes the extra work it involves just seems like more than I want to do. Right now, I would really like a nap. In fact… I might just be able to finagle one. There were a bunch of absolutely darling things I was going to write about the girls but have of course forgotten them.
Sunday, December 16, 2007
Saturday, November 3, 2007
Halloween
We had a great Halloween.
Carved a bunch of pumpkins. My sister sent a funny email with all sorts of weird pumpkins in it, and some were easy enough that we could do. We've got one pumpkin eating another, and one throwing up. Yep, that's me, I'm a sophisticated erudite person who carves pumpking vomiting out their seeds.
Once we had a cousin of mine answer the door so I could go trick-or-treating with the kids, but she told us later a lot of the kids were dissapointed that they didn't recognize her and we weren't there to show off their costumes to. So Hubby usually takes the kids around the neighborhood, since it seems like there needs to be someone there who recognizes the kids who come by (me,) so I often try and tell him a few streets to hit, but mostly they just wander around until the kids are cold.
Both girls wore costumes Grandma made them. Thing 1 had a fabulous blue and gold dragon costume, thanks to Grandma. Last year she was a purple kitty, thanks to grandma, so that's what Zoe was this year.
Carved a bunch of pumpkins. My sister sent a funny email with all sorts of weird pumpkins in it, and some were easy enough that we could do. We've got one pumpkin eating another, and one throwing up. Yep, that's me, I'm a sophisticated erudite person who carves pumpking vomiting out their seeds.
Once we had a cousin of mine answer the door so I could go trick-or-treating with the kids, but she told us later a lot of the kids were dissapointed that they didn't recognize her and we weren't there to show off their costumes to. So Hubby usually takes the kids around the neighborhood, since it seems like there needs to be someone there who recognizes the kids who come by (me,) so I often try and tell him a few streets to hit, but mostly they just wander around until the kids are cold.
Both girls wore costumes Grandma made them. Thing 1 had a fabulous blue and gold dragon costume, thanks to Grandma. Last year she was a purple kitty, thanks to grandma, so that's what Zoe was this year.
Thursday, October 18, 2007
Raking
Raking leaves is fine, not my favorite chore but it's just fine. The good part is having the girls jump in the piles. I remember being frustrated that the pile wasn't soft when you jumped in it, but they don't seem to mind.
This is one of my favorite pictures of Thing 1.
And since I'm including photos just because they're so darn cute - this is Thing 2 picking her pumpkin at the pre-school pumpkin outing.
This is one of my favorite pictures of Thing 1.
And since I'm including photos just because they're so darn cute - this is Thing 2 picking her pumpkin at the pre-school pumpkin outing.
Thursday, October 4, 2007
Playdates
Zoe’s friend Maxine is here and they are alternately playing together very nicely, and not playing together. Zoe is pretending to be afraid of Maxine, and curling up on the couch in a ball. Maxine gets frustrated with this and comes to me for help. So she and I had a snack together with Thing 2 howling in the background.
Wytie’s grandma will be bringing Thing 1 home any minute. I asked her to pick Thing 1 up because I was waiting for a UPS package for Hubby that had to be signed for. The package came, but when it was time to go to school it turns out Thing 2 was embroiled in her unhappiness.
Hubby is in India. He left on Monday morning, and between the time changes and the expense and spotty internet connections, he hasn’t been able to call but for two minutes (yes, two minutes) last night. He used the new iPhone, and the call probably cost $5.00, but I was glad to hear he was okay. We texted quite a bit the day after he left, so I knew he was alive.
I am feeling a little… frustrated. There are so many things to do… and while I’m knocking off the little ones from my list, there are some pretty big remodeling projects that need to be done. The office needs to be emptied, painted, and new shelves and apparently a new desk needs to be bought. I need to move my stuff out, and make more room for his stuff. My frustration with this, aside from the fact that I will probably be doing most of it myself, is that while he certainly needs more room for his professional library, giving him more shelf space might mean more room for papers and stuff like that which I don’t quite know how to go through, no really more book shelf space. Another problem is I don’t really have shelves in the breakfast nook, where my stuff is supposed to go to, to hold my stuff. Of course there will be some shelves freed up when we get some new shelves for him, but it needs some serious reorganization in there too. Luckily I’m not hoping to get it painted before the reorganization is done.
Then there’s the girls bedroom. Thing 1 has pretty much grown out of her toddler bed, and needs a twin bed. We found a bunk bed at IKEA that is quite short and I think will be fine, but again, I want to paint. I don’t like the white-favoring-gray walls up there, and there’s no reason they should stay that way for another five years. Except that the carpet is gray. That’s my one limiting factor.
Wytie’s grandma will be bringing Thing 1 home any minute. I asked her to pick Thing 1 up because I was waiting for a UPS package for Hubby that had to be signed for. The package came, but when it was time to go to school it turns out Thing 2 was embroiled in her unhappiness.
Hubby is in India. He left on Monday morning, and between the time changes and the expense and spotty internet connections, he hasn’t been able to call but for two minutes (yes, two minutes) last night. He used the new iPhone, and the call probably cost $5.00, but I was glad to hear he was okay. We texted quite a bit the day after he left, so I knew he was alive.
I am feeling a little… frustrated. There are so many things to do… and while I’m knocking off the little ones from my list, there are some pretty big remodeling projects that need to be done. The office needs to be emptied, painted, and new shelves and apparently a new desk needs to be bought. I need to move my stuff out, and make more room for his stuff. My frustration with this, aside from the fact that I will probably be doing most of it myself, is that while he certainly needs more room for his professional library, giving him more shelf space might mean more room for papers and stuff like that which I don’t quite know how to go through, no really more book shelf space. Another problem is I don’t really have shelves in the breakfast nook, where my stuff is supposed to go to, to hold my stuff. Of course there will be some shelves freed up when we get some new shelves for him, but it needs some serious reorganization in there too. Luckily I’m not hoping to get it painted before the reorganization is done.
Then there’s the girls bedroom. Thing 1 has pretty much grown out of her toddler bed, and needs a twin bed. We found a bunk bed at IKEA that is quite short and I think will be fine, but again, I want to paint. I don’t like the white-favoring-gray walls up there, and there’s no reason they should stay that way for another five years. Except that the carpet is gray. That’s my one limiting factor.
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
Thing 1 turns 6
Since we have a family celebration for the girls for their birthdays, I've limited the girl's friend parties to every other year. This was Thing 1's 2nd friend party. We just had it at home, with several games and things we've seen from pre-school and other parties. One of my favorite things was filling squirt guns with colored water and letting the party guests paint something painted on fabric on the clothesline. Thing 1 had a "pony" themed party, so Hubby painted horses and the kids got to squirt them.
We also did a pinata, we've done one for nearly each birthday party and the trouble is getting the darned thing open. We usually let the kids whack until they're tired, then just rip the thing open.
We also did a pinata, we've done one for nearly each birthday party and the trouble is getting the darned thing open. We usually let the kids whack until they're tired, then just rip the thing open.
Thursday, August 23, 2007
Noise Levels
I have a screamer. If Thing 2 doesn’t get her way, she screams. I do not know how to deal with it and it’s starting to cause problems.
When she started, my response was “That’s an outside voice so you get to go outside.” I would pick her up and plop her outside the back door. She got a blanket to wrap up in (she started when it was cold) and her binky if she wanted it at the time, though sometimes it took me a minute to go find it…
It got to be kind of amusing. She’d just sit out there in the cold on a little kid lawn chair. She’d usually immediately stop crying and screaming the minute I put her out there, sometimes she’d holler but not usually for very long. I’d give her a couple of minutes I’d pop my head out the back door and ask if she was ready to come in. most of the time the initial response was to bellow at me. I’d do this a time or two. Eventually, I’d poke my head out and she’d be waiting for me, all smiles, and say “yes, mommy, I’m ready to come in now.”
So it seemed to work for a while.
Then it seemed I was hardly ever putting her out there anymore, and when she did scream and I’d turn to her and say outside she’d turn on her heel and sprint off in the other direction screaming “I don’t want to go out side!” If I did chase her down and catch her, she wouldn’t just sit and scream or sit quietly like before, she’d open the door and come in. So I started locking the door. She’d then throw herself at the door and scream “Let me IN!”
Okay, so that wasn’t working anymore. But I’ve kind of been left with no options. She can let herself out of whatever confinement I’ve given her. We haven’t tried to time her out with no real boundaries, the uncooperative chair or whatever, maybe that’s the next step… but it’s just such a punishing scream. She’ll either let loose with this oncoming train blast, or sometimes she’ll just start screaming and crying and she kind of gets hysterical and can’t seem to stop herself.
There was one night in the bathtub she slipped into that mode, for whatever reason she wasn’t getting what she wanted and started screaming and wouldn’t stop. I pulled her out of the bathtub and quickly dried her off (still screaming) and popped her outside the bathroom door. And locked it. She continued her hysterics, kicking the door and screaming. She’s screaming she’s naked and cold. I got her into her pajamas, and I get fuzzy on this point, but the screaming didn’t stop and she ended up outside the bathroom door again screaming. You can come in if you stop screaming. She didn’t. Then she starts screaming “I’m done!” I open the door and say “Well stop it, then!” and she pushes herself into the door and into the bathroom where she continues crying and screaming with me saying “Stop it.” Finally. I turned on the shower (separate shower and tub in our upstairs bath) and plopped her into a cold shower. She really started screaming for a minute, she was very upset that her pajamas were wet, but she did stop after a couple of seconds under the cold water. So I got her out and she whined that the ONLY pajamas she wanted to wear were the wet ones, no others would do.
So, short of plopping her in a cold shower, I don’t know what to do with her. And I’m kind of saving that for those “I’ve gone hysterical and I can’t stop” moments.
She started on it today. She was eating lunch with Thing 1 and my niece who we had over. I was in the other room going through some mail, and next thing I know Thing 2 is in the kitchen screaming. I come into the kitchen to see what’s going on and she runs out the other door. Thing 1 and Niece are sitting at the table looking stunned (Thing 2 has one hell of a scream.) Long story short when she did come back to the table I told her she needed to apologize to Thing 1 and Niece for screaming at them. “I wasn’t screaming at them.” You weren’t? who were you screaming at? “I was screaming at you.” Me? Why were you screaming at me? __Insert wild contrived fantasy here about I was at the bottom and she was at the top and on and on about something that sounded vaguely like something that had happened a couple of hours ago on the stairs. Whatever.
About once, maybe twice a week, she does this. Her temper has always been on the explosive side, and in less time than I could say “Thing 2…” she’s gone from calm to hysterically screaming.
Last Saturday as we were getting ready to go to breakfast and then the zoo it started up again. It’s kind of amusing to me to watch Jeff try to handle it. A long time ago he chastised me for raising my voice to her when she started getting hysterical. I agreed it was ineffective and worked around to find other ways to deal with her (I think that’s what started the thing about putting her in the back yard.) And last weekend I got to watch him get increasingly frustrated with her and start to raise his voice. And yup, it was just as ineffective when he did it as when I did it. A couple of weeks before this he’d watched me lock her in the back yard and seen how ineffective that’s gotten, and pointed that out to me, so we’ve stopped doing that and now we’re kind of left with no real response. He was trying to get her attention to even begin to make her stop… My response was to say Daddy and Thing 1 are going to breakfast and the zoo. When you stop, we’ll go too. Then I tried to get him to go.
He didn’t want to go. He got as far as the garage, then came back and tried to reason with her some more. He’s home for 22 hours and he doesn’t want to spend it with just Thing 1 and leave me and Thing 2 home screaming. So he comes back in and tries to reason with her.
I don’t remember how it finally ended… I thought I had been doing pretty well, she’d stopped screaming and moved to begging that she wanted to go when he came in, and she’d immediately escalated it up a notch and started screaming again.
It’s just hard to watch her not seeming to make the connection between her screaming and her getting into trouble. You scream and the world stops being nice for everyone. What about this don’t you get?
She did it to me again today. I bought them a computer game when Thing 2 was with me at Costco. It’s really for Thing 1, it’s a little advanced for Thing 2, but she sure as heck wants to do it. She griped at me while I was installing and registering it to hurry up and get out of the way. Then it stalled several times, and when I’d try and intervene she’d gripe at me to get out of the way and let her play. We did get it to move forward some, but it doesn’t seem to be working quite right, and she was having trouble with the mouse moving off the edge of the table. I’d try and show her she just needs to pick up the mouse and move it to the middle of the mouse moving space, and you’d have thought I spit on her or something, she was so angry at me for interfering.
My patience is just about at its end with her. I told her I wasn’t helping her anymore because I don’t like being screamed at. Her response? A very confident “you’ll forget.”
When she started, my response was “That’s an outside voice so you get to go outside.” I would pick her up and plop her outside the back door. She got a blanket to wrap up in (she started when it was cold) and her binky if she wanted it at the time, though sometimes it took me a minute to go find it…
It got to be kind of amusing. She’d just sit out there in the cold on a little kid lawn chair. She’d usually immediately stop crying and screaming the minute I put her out there, sometimes she’d holler but not usually for very long. I’d give her a couple of minutes I’d pop my head out the back door and ask if she was ready to come in. most of the time the initial response was to bellow at me. I’d do this a time or two. Eventually, I’d poke my head out and she’d be waiting for me, all smiles, and say “yes, mommy, I’m ready to come in now.”
So it seemed to work for a while.
Then it seemed I was hardly ever putting her out there anymore, and when she did scream and I’d turn to her and say outside she’d turn on her heel and sprint off in the other direction screaming “I don’t want to go out side!” If I did chase her down and catch her, she wouldn’t just sit and scream or sit quietly like before, she’d open the door and come in. So I started locking the door. She’d then throw herself at the door and scream “Let me IN!”
Okay, so that wasn’t working anymore. But I’ve kind of been left with no options. She can let herself out of whatever confinement I’ve given her. We haven’t tried to time her out with no real boundaries, the uncooperative chair or whatever, maybe that’s the next step… but it’s just such a punishing scream. She’ll either let loose with this oncoming train blast, or sometimes she’ll just start screaming and crying and she kind of gets hysterical and can’t seem to stop herself.
There was one night in the bathtub she slipped into that mode, for whatever reason she wasn’t getting what she wanted and started screaming and wouldn’t stop. I pulled her out of the bathtub and quickly dried her off (still screaming) and popped her outside the bathroom door. And locked it. She continued her hysterics, kicking the door and screaming. She’s screaming she’s naked and cold. I got her into her pajamas, and I get fuzzy on this point, but the screaming didn’t stop and she ended up outside the bathroom door again screaming. You can come in if you stop screaming. She didn’t. Then she starts screaming “I’m done!” I open the door and say “Well stop it, then!” and she pushes herself into the door and into the bathroom where she continues crying and screaming with me saying “Stop it.” Finally. I turned on the shower (separate shower and tub in our upstairs bath) and plopped her into a cold shower. She really started screaming for a minute, she was very upset that her pajamas were wet, but she did stop after a couple of seconds under the cold water. So I got her out and she whined that the ONLY pajamas she wanted to wear were the wet ones, no others would do.
So, short of plopping her in a cold shower, I don’t know what to do with her. And I’m kind of saving that for those “I’ve gone hysterical and I can’t stop” moments.
She started on it today. She was eating lunch with Thing 1 and my niece who we had over. I was in the other room going through some mail, and next thing I know Thing 2 is in the kitchen screaming. I come into the kitchen to see what’s going on and she runs out the other door. Thing 1 and Niece are sitting at the table looking stunned (Thing 2 has one hell of a scream.) Long story short when she did come back to the table I told her she needed to apologize to Thing 1 and Niece for screaming at them. “I wasn’t screaming at them.” You weren’t? who were you screaming at? “I was screaming at you.” Me? Why were you screaming at me? __Insert wild contrived fantasy here about I was at the bottom and she was at the top and on and on about something that sounded vaguely like something that had happened a couple of hours ago on the stairs. Whatever.
About once, maybe twice a week, she does this. Her temper has always been on the explosive side, and in less time than I could say “Thing 2…” she’s gone from calm to hysterically screaming.
Last Saturday as we were getting ready to go to breakfast and then the zoo it started up again. It’s kind of amusing to me to watch Jeff try to handle it. A long time ago he chastised me for raising my voice to her when she started getting hysterical. I agreed it was ineffective and worked around to find other ways to deal with her (I think that’s what started the thing about putting her in the back yard.) And last weekend I got to watch him get increasingly frustrated with her and start to raise his voice. And yup, it was just as ineffective when he did it as when I did it. A couple of weeks before this he’d watched me lock her in the back yard and seen how ineffective that’s gotten, and pointed that out to me, so we’ve stopped doing that and now we’re kind of left with no real response. He was trying to get her attention to even begin to make her stop… My response was to say Daddy and Thing 1 are going to breakfast and the zoo. When you stop, we’ll go too. Then I tried to get him to go.
He didn’t want to go. He got as far as the garage, then came back and tried to reason with her some more. He’s home for 22 hours and he doesn’t want to spend it with just Thing 1 and leave me and Thing 2 home screaming. So he comes back in and tries to reason with her.
I don’t remember how it finally ended… I thought I had been doing pretty well, she’d stopped screaming and moved to begging that she wanted to go when he came in, and she’d immediately escalated it up a notch and started screaming again.
It’s just hard to watch her not seeming to make the connection between her screaming and her getting into trouble. You scream and the world stops being nice for everyone. What about this don’t you get?
She did it to me again today. I bought them a computer game when Thing 2 was with me at Costco. It’s really for Thing 1, it’s a little advanced for Thing 2, but she sure as heck wants to do it. She griped at me while I was installing and registering it to hurry up and get out of the way. Then it stalled several times, and when I’d try and intervene she’d gripe at me to get out of the way and let her play. We did get it to move forward some, but it doesn’t seem to be working quite right, and she was having trouble with the mouse moving off the edge of the table. I’d try and show her she just needs to pick up the mouse and move it to the middle of the mouse moving space, and you’d have thought I spit on her or something, she was so angry at me for interfering.
My patience is just about at its end with her. I told her I wasn’t helping her anymore because I don’t like being screamed at. Her response? A very confident “you’ll forget.”
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Waxing poetical
You’d think it would kill me to get to bed before midnight. It helps that my folks let me sleep in in the mornings while they entertain the girls… I just come up here and collapse.
Hubby called from DC where he is attending the Agile Alliance conference to say that he received the very prestigious Gordon Pask award. Yippeeee!!! What it means for us: it looks great on his resume, and on the back of his book, free marketing, and a travel award for him to attend two international conferences at their expense. Since we are now paying for his travel, this is a good thing. At this conference he learned the scuttle butt around ThoughtWorks is that he separated from the company to do his own thing. Most people who have separated from ThoughtWorks have, from what I’ve heard, gone out with more of a bang. He kind of quietly slipped out sometime last March or so, but they’ve just finally noticed that he’s gone and started to make it official.
So as I’m talking to him on the phone, it’s pushing 10:30 and Thing 2, who took a long late nap today, came upstairs again. I hung up to go put her back to bed and as I’m trying to politely convince her of her need of sleep, out of the blue she asks me “Who brings us the night?”
I was speechless for a moment… what poetry! What a beautiful line coming from a four year old! I asked her where she’d heard that… she kind of mumbled and made some reference to hearing it at a friend’s house, but I’m not sure. I’ll have to ask her friend’s mother, but it sure was poetry out of the mouth of a baby to me.
So I wrote a poem around it.
Who brings the night? My daughter said,
As I kissed the top of her small blonde head.
And tucked her, again, into her bed…
Why does it come, to close my day
And bring an end to all my play?
And send the sunlight on its way?
Why is it dark, she asked me, why?
Why are the lights not in the sky?
I’m scared of the dark and want to cry.
I whisper close to her small curled ear
The dark is your friend, my darling, my dear,
Like a big warm blanket, pulling near.
The dark is here so you can rest,
And cuddle the teddy you like best
And dream your dreams curled in your nest.
Tomorrow we have things to do
And you’ll be tired before it’s through
And glad your bed is waiting for you.
So rest your head and snuggle down tight
Let your imagination roam all night
Your dreams can gallop out of sight.
Hubby called from DC where he is attending the Agile Alliance conference to say that he received the very prestigious Gordon Pask award. Yippeeee!!! What it means for us: it looks great on his resume, and on the back of his book, free marketing, and a travel award for him to attend two international conferences at their expense. Since we are now paying for his travel, this is a good thing. At this conference he learned the scuttle butt around ThoughtWorks is that he separated from the company to do his own thing. Most people who have separated from ThoughtWorks have, from what I’ve heard, gone out with more of a bang. He kind of quietly slipped out sometime last March or so, but they’ve just finally noticed that he’s gone and started to make it official.
So as I’m talking to him on the phone, it’s pushing 10:30 and Thing 2, who took a long late nap today, came upstairs again. I hung up to go put her back to bed and as I’m trying to politely convince her of her need of sleep, out of the blue she asks me “Who brings us the night?”
I was speechless for a moment… what poetry! What a beautiful line coming from a four year old! I asked her where she’d heard that… she kind of mumbled and made some reference to hearing it at a friend’s house, but I’m not sure. I’ll have to ask her friend’s mother, but it sure was poetry out of the mouth of a baby to me.
So I wrote a poem around it.
Who brings the night? My daughter said,
As I kissed the top of her small blonde head.
And tucked her, again, into her bed…
Why does it come, to close my day
And bring an end to all my play?
And send the sunlight on its way?
Why is it dark, she asked me, why?
Why are the lights not in the sky?
I’m scared of the dark and want to cry.
I whisper close to her small curled ear
The dark is your friend, my darling, my dear,
Like a big warm blanket, pulling near.
The dark is here so you can rest,
And cuddle the teddy you like best
And dream your dreams curled in your nest.
Tomorrow we have things to do
And you’ll be tired before it’s through
And glad your bed is waiting for you.
So rest your head and snuggle down tight
Let your imagination roam all night
Your dreams can gallop out of sight.
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