New Year's Steps Ahead December 31, 2005 - January 20, 2006 On horrible weather, Lisa's nutritional and Tom's other kind of advances

	The train will come from there

	Hoo hooooo Tommy on a light rail train

Naturally we are not as foolhardy as to make new year's resolutions. In our situation -- i.e. two small children and no grandparents -- every day is a new surprise, and there's no use of planning it. We enjoyed our New Year's Eve quietly, at home. We were up till midnight, but that was in part thanks to Lisa, who insisted on an eleventh hour's toast with mother's milk. We adults had a bottle of sparkling wine open and that was about all there was. Weather around New Near was still the same like on Christmas = awful, and it did not add to our festive spirits. Sid had time off till the second of January, but there was no place to go. A storm raged outside, while museums and other indoor attractions were under siege by half-mad, desperate parents and their underutilized offspring. In the end, we took Tom for a ride on a light rail train. Practically no one here uses the public transportation (since it somewhat impractically goes from one nowhere to another nowhere, and one still needs a car to get to the nearest station), and thus we had it all for ourselves. Tommy checked out the gates, the platform, local pay phone, all storm drains, and eventually very seriously sat on a seat in the train car, and watched the scenery outside the window.

So back to the progress. Tommy announced a wet diaper the other day -- apparently as an excuse to avoid having to go to sleep, but too bad. I dusted the potty, bought him some regular underwear and looked forward to let it "happen quickly". Well, I don't know -- either other mothers exaggerate, or they know some magic to un-stain leak traces on furniture, but a fast method does not work with us. Tom is easily able to pee in his pants -- on the couch, in the midst of his train set, while playing with his toy cars, simply anywhere. I reckoned that we were more likely to experience domestic violence (e.g. ripping a child to five pieces), or a mother gone crazy, than a successful potty habit; subsequently, I purchased pull-up diapers and shrouded myself in patience. Tom gradually comprehended what it is that we want from him, and has been able to stay atop his potty for about ten seconds necessary to pee there. We have minimized attempts resulting in a upturned potty and contaminated floor; our diaper consumption slowly recedes, and we may eventually get to the regular underwear again.

	Tommy finally began to be approachable, and at least try

	Lisa took her feeding right from the start into her own, strong hands

Lizzy has been moving in big strides at the opposite end of the food chain -- i.e. the reception. Lately she became difficult to hold back (literally) when chow is in sight. Her jealous looks following every bite of ours changed into grabs with pesky -- and very strong -- little hands. A few people independently commented on her being skinny -- and so I have decided it was time for substantial nutrition, despite our daughter going to be six months old at the end of January. Upon seeing a spoon, Lisa emitted a war cry, ripped the spoon out of my hand and stuffed its business end quite professionally into her mouth. During her first feeding she grasped the concept that a spoon is no nipple, which would deliver a continuous flow, and eventually allowed me to scoop food for her with this new instrument. She continues to be so excited that she could well use a straight jacket with food -- she kicks her little feet, waves her little hands, through a composition of twists and turns around her long axis she can transport herself over relatively large distances, and begins to cause havoc among Tom's toys (biting his tracks and stealing his toy cars).

The worst part is, Lizzy is incredibly curious. Sometimes she's so involved in watching her surroundings that she finds no time left to eat, and then she roars like an ox, as she remains hungry. Of course, sleep is another expendable item -- seeing my little baby waking up does not invoke in me sentimental tears over a "cutie bundle"; those are tears of desperation. Should she be having a slightly more active day, Lisa can -- as opposed to me -- easily and in good spirit, operate from five a.m. till eleven p.m., with three ten-minute slumbering interludes. Not that there would not be days when she goes to bed by nine thirty, sleeps till six and after nursing extends to nine, while after lunch rests even a whole hour(!), but they are few and far between. Kids who don't sleep are said to be more intelligent -- I don't know -- personally I think that an intelligent child should understand how useless a sleep-deprived mother is, and SLEEP for sixteen hours a day.

	Fremont Peak Tom marched most of the way on his own feet...

	...but we had to keep coming up with entertainment

Our whole family made some progress with our house. I have overcome my aversion to telephoning, an I invited a landscaper to take care of our jungle. He came, saw the horrors, told us what all could be cut and thrown out, and before we returned from an afternoon walk, there was an Everest of branches in the front of our house. It made me worry whether there'd be anything green and alive left in our back yard, but my fears were unfounded. The back yard looks proper again, not like a Maugli's nest; we can even see from our family room all the way to the impressive Mt. Hamilton with an observatory on top. There are many more changes to come; we still miss our step to our master bedroom patio door, and the lawn around it, but perhaps this year we get our act together and survive a few days with contractors in/around the house.

Now we have ordered remodeling of windows on our house. It had single pane horrors from 1964 that don't insulate neither heat nor sound. Sometimes I had the impression that bead curtains would do the same service. We hope that with new windows, we improve our electrical bills as well as kids' sleeping -- now we must survive the installation in good health.

Our January weather is like an video background to a working-class demagogue's dream about controlling wind and rain -- weekdays are beautiful (to ensure high worktime yields), followed by weekend storms, to keep the workers glued to the propaganda channels. Such a winter storm in California version feels as if someone up there opened all the spigots on full and added a nasty, strong wind. We feel much limited in such weather as far as trips are concerned. Having spotted one sunny window for a hike to Fremont Peak. Tommy surprised us, for he trotted up all the way to the top. It had cost me all my strength, as I had to keep on inventing new games -- let's climb up that rock, jump down, there is a squirrel, humph humph into a big curve, jump over a twig, wave at daddy, there's an airplane flying up there... Tommy even walked down from the very top back to the road. Then I had to carry him -- he asked to be put into the backpack carrier, and also a huge dark cloud has rolled onto us, so the whole world had disappeared in a cold creepy fog. Before we reached the parking lot, temperature dropped so low that we had to scrounge for another and another layer of clothes; in the end, we gladly drove back to our sun-filled Valley.

	We had plenty of space and time to enjoy watching fishes at the Santa Cruz Aquarium

	Tommy had a chance to touch and probe

We spent one stormy Saturday at the Santa Cruz Aquarium. It's actually only a byproduct of a local research institute, affiliated with UCSC. It makes a portion of their research projects accessible to the public. A large whale skeleton can be seen in front of the building, but due to the weather we had to skip all outdoor displays. The indoor section is tiny, but quite sufficient for Tom. Unlike the large and famous Monterey Aquarium, altogether ten people shared the Seymour Marine Discovery Center with us, and we had time to explore everything at a leisure pace; Tom could pet various durable sea creatures and play with puzzles. We even walked out on a cliff trail for a moment -- simply wonderful. As we came quite late, we missed a tour through their dolphinarium, which we must certainly correct next time.

We planned to use the following rainy day to take our car to Costco for wheel balancing. Alas, the same idea had dawned on several tens, perhaps hundred people, and we spent the morning by waiting in various lines, just to be told after an hour that the service cannot be performed, as since last year (when it was possible) they have decided to offer it only to customers who have bought tires there. Sid made a scene (an angry hippo is one of the most dangerous animals on Earth), and they accepted the car. Still it was so late that we had to skip visiting an airport, which we had promised Tom. Our son meekly allowed us to drag him to lunch, then made no problems crawling into his bed at home, but when he woke, he cutely asked about those promised airplanes. We could not bring ourselves to deny him his favorite attraction, and so Sid drove out with both kids and AFTER DARK (it was past five p.m.) dithered around the Palo Alto runway. This must have made, in the end, a much stronger impression on Tommy than if they went there during the day, for he then urgently reported to me that planes go blink blink, and spent the rest of the evening directing air traffic of his toy planes in our family room.

	This, too, is a starfish -- albeit not a typical one, for it's frisky like an octopus

	Traveling show with Barbara - a sight very pleasant to my eye

Tom's memory keeps surprising us. The old "ATTENTION, ENEMY IS LISTENING" is valid as ever, and we must be very careful, how and when we formulate our thoughts. Sid the other day mentioned by the way that we were going to fly to visit granny on a big plane, and Tommy immediately ran to the door to our garage and demanded to travel right away. Of course it resulted in much disappointment and crying, and we had to at least telephone granny. In the midst of the call Tom rushed away and brought back his twin engine plane he received from granny when they went to the airport as she flew back to Europe. After four months he remembers his grandmother, airplanes and many other details. When I give him cornflakes with yogurt for breakfast, he announces that "baba" (granny) ate those, and walks over to point at her empty chair. Thus we must keep our upcoming trip to Czech Republic secret, as he has not developed concept of time yet, and the few days remaining represent a horribly long time for him. It seems that Tom recalls his grandfather (we show him pictures sometimes). Still I wonder what he is going to say to having even TWO grandmothers. If only someone could finally invent so more humane way of travel, better than flying a jet. I admit that I keep having nightmares since Christmas (we shall be on our way for almost 24 hours).

I wrote a larger portion of this journal while Barbara took both kids out for a walk. I was ready by the phone to immediately run out to rescue my poor Lizzy, who was never out so long with a "stranger". This poor child slept through most of the two-hour round, and was relatively content during the rest of it. Yet as soon as she saw her mother again, she released a penalizing scream. It's obvious -- her attachment to mama has been only a refined method of controlling her parent, and in no way should be confused with separation anxiety.

Copyright © 2006 by Carol & Sid Paral. All rights reserved.