An Update About School

So...when we ask Sophie what she did at school, she almost always answers, "I makey sad." Which means that she made a sad face. Heartbreaking, isn't it? But here's the deal...she really DID make a sad face (on a paper plate). She also made a happy face (on a paper plate that is hanging on our fridge). Is that one activity sticking out in her mind? Did she get such a great reaction the first time she said that (hugs and kisses and cupcakes) that she's just repeating the phrase every day?

I don't think she's sad at school When I drop her off, she doesn't cry anymore (although she sometimes wants to be held when we walk in the door) -- once she's on the ground, she marches to the fridge to put away her milk while I put Cowmoo in her cubby, and then she grabs my hand to walk outside to find her friends. When we pick her up, she's always laughing and playing and having a great time. The daily reports have the happy box checked every single day. (We had a couple of sad boxes at the beginning. We've not yet had fussy, but I think that is code for naughty or annoying.) All signs point to her being HAPPY at school, but still -- every day -- "What did you do at school today?" "I makey saaaaad."

Yesterday I asked her who she played with, and she quickly answered "Donavan." There's no Donavan in her class. Is this an older boy? An imaginary friend? I asked her if Miss Heather is nice, and she said, "Meees Hedda pretty." Well, that's something.

Miss Bossy

Sophie is learning about her world every day. Lately, she's learning about the caste system in the Webster household, and attempting to change her rank.

Last week, I grabbed a wipe and scrubbed off her knee (ahem...while I was driving, because she had just drawn hundreds of spiraling red circles on her leg with a ballpoint pen and we were on our way to someplace where I suppose I thought she should look clean...can't remember now). But she told me, "No, Momma. No touch wipes. Time out!" And then she pointed to the car door. There have been times, driving with a whining or screaming version of Sophie, when I contemplated ejecting myself. Luckily this was not one of them. (And...I later learned that there is a kid at pre-school who likes to pull hundreds of wipes out of the container and he got a time-out. I was guilty by association.)

Last night, when I was putting Sophie down to bed, Callie-dog was rummaging around the room looking for dropped crumbs or tasty wooden toys to destroy and Sophie pointed to the door and said, "Get out here, Callie. Go your room! Too loud!"

But she is not above reproach. Yesterday afternoon, she lifted the dogbowl up and then poured it out right in front of Frank and me. We all just stood there silently, staring at each other for a second, listening to the kibble skitter across the tile. Without saying a word, I pointed to the room where Sophie's "time out spot" is located. She turned and trotted off without saying a word. A couple of minutes later she said, "Solly, Momma," and we swept up the dogfood with Callie's help.

And all is right with the world.

P.S. All is NOT right with our camera, so the blog updates may be word-heavy and picture-shy for a while!

Yeah...she's a nut.

Ditchdirt Daughters

This video is a Frank Webster short (a DubSTAR production), created to introduce our Dive-In Movie Experience (watching Jaws while floating in Emily and Debbie's pool). It features the "ditchdirt" daughters (Lucy, Laney, Sophie, and Josie -- from oldest to youngest) in various waters. Yeah...they're going to give us a run for our money when they're all teenagers. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-875271861996358499&hl=en

Can we rent your grandma?

And on the first day of school...God created vomit.

So, it's the first day of school and I've just finished teaching second period when my cell phone rings. (Whoops -- gotta remember to turn that off during classtime.) It's Sophie's school. She has vomited four times in the two hours that she has been there this morning and they're really sorry because they know it's the first day of school for us, but the three things that'll get a kid booted from pre-school are fever, vomit, and a bounced tuition check.

I called Frank in a panic and it just happened to be his conference period (they're on block schedule, so he has an hour and a half block of time off), so he raced over to Sophie's school to pick her up and then...we didn't have that part figured out yet. I started calling all the people we know who happen to work out of their houses or stay at home with kids. (Of course, people with kids would rather invite a rabid dog inside than a vomiter.) No luck there.

Then I had a brainstorm -- one of my fellow teachers lives right down the street and his wife Jan retired last year and she looooves Sophie, so I ran upstairs and got her number from Sean. By the time Frank got to our house with Sophie, Jan was there, ready to be Grandma-for-the-Day. She grabbed Sophie from Frank, sat down in the rocking chair and held Sophie's forehead and pronounced her fever-free. Frank went back to work and Sophie didn't vomit again for the rest of the day and she was back to her old self by the time I got home from work.

We had to keep her home for 24 hours, so I took her to the doctor the next morning. Here's how that conversation went:

Me: She's had a cough and then she vomited at school (probably drainage) and her lungs sound raspy. She just started pre-school so we think it's the kennel cough.
Doc: Yep...she's sick. Probably a virus. Say "Ahhhhh" Sophie.
Sophie: No.
Doc: Okay. It's a virus. That'll be $20 please.

She got to spend Tuesday with her Daddy (he hired a sub, but went to school to meet each class, and then took Sophie outside to play, then to lunch with the Kealing crowd, then home to nap). She's almost cured now (and she's back at school), but the cough lingers.

Now I've got to work on my plan to:
1) get my dad to retire so he can pick Sophie up from school when she's sick
2) convince Granddad and Mamaw (Frank's folks) to move to Texas, or
3) figure out how to RENT a grandparent when we need one.
Think Craigslist will work?
Here's Sophie rejecting her new vitamin regimen. She guzzles down Tylenol, Triaminic, and cough syrup, but thinks cute animal-shaped, candy-tasting vitamins are YUCKY:

Lordy, lordy, look who's...two.

What with moving classrooms and the first day of school and Sophie-school starting and the recent outbreak of kennel cough at the Webster household, I finally got some of the birthday pics posted to the main picture pages website. Click here to check them out: BIRTHDAY GIRL.

Next on my list: thank you cards mailed! (tune in to a mailbox near you.)

Some new TWO things:

She "checks for understanding" (teacherspeak) by adding "kay?" to the end of many of her sentences. "Sophie have popcorn, kay?" "Brush teeth now, kay?"

She loves watercolor, but she has a very, let's call it muted, style. She dips into color first, then into water, then onto the paper. I've showed her my way many, many times. She prefers the highway.

She requests songs each night (ABC? Bah, bah black sheep? Pig?) That last one refers to Old MacDonald, and she usually requests the animals in this order: pig, chicken, dog, cow, pig again (for sure) and then sometimes back to chicken.

For the first time ever, she looked up at me during the whole bedtime routine and said, "I go to bed now, kay?" OKAY, Sophie Grace!

She tells Callie-dog, "Go 'way, Callie" and "Knock off, Callie!" (Poor, poor dog. But don't feel too bad for her -- she's gained a lot of weight from all of Sophie's scraps.)

Food has suddenly become yucky. She used to eat sweet potatoes and peas and broccoli. Her new thing is: "Yucky. Sophie no yike it." I would blame school, but it started right before then. I can, however, blame her school for our nasty cough. Stay tuned for more gory details.

Happy Birthday, Snowpea.

You're sleeping now. You had an amazing weekend galavanting around town with Uncle Jordan and Ashley, then you romped and played at your party this afternoon under the trees at Freddie's Place. Birthday Girl, you looked soooo sweet in your green party dress with the cute white pockets and your hot pink cowboy boots that are two sizes too big (but you refused to wear any other shoes). These past two years have been the most wonderful of my life. Even when I stop to consider my mother's diagnosis and sickness and passing -- you brought her such joy in the time that she knew you. And as for me, I didn't know I could love so much. Nana Jane wanted to give you a dollar for every year of your age, so I'm about to sneak into your room and put $2 in your piggy bank. Apparently you'll have quite a nice gifty when you turn 18 and break open the bank. We all love you so very, very much. Thanks for coming into the world!

Hey, is that a knife in your heart?

Momma, driving Sophie home from her third day at pre-school: "What did you do at school today, Sophie?"

Sophie, drawing a tear down her face with her finger: "I sad. I cry."

First Day of Preschool

We experienced another "first" today: the first day of preschool. And it seems that we have all survived quite nicely. Don't get me wrong -- Sophie cried when we left and I cried on the way home -- I mean, we barely know these people and we just drove away! But when I returned, they hadn't sold her to the gypsies or made her sew tennis shoes together. Instead, they learned about monkeys, and that is a subject that Sophie loves to discuss. Apparently she took a nap today (I have no actual proof that she slept on a little blue mat on the floor, but that's what the people are trying to tell me), and while she had some sad moments, she also had some moments when she was interacting with all her new friends. And that's the whole point.

Here's Sophie on her first day of school, with her backpack, lunchbox, and new converse tennis shoes: (Oh...and clean face and cute piggies so they will love her, of course.)


When I picked her up from school, she told all of her new friends, "Bye! See morrow!" Then we went to order her birthday cake for this weekend and she got to have a special cupcake treat to celebrate school. Yes, yes, I know. I shouldn't comfort her with food. But she's too young for a margarita!

The Truth About the Egg

Who needs school? Sophie has considered the chicken AND the egg, and drawn her own conclusions. Tonight at dinner she was snacking on a hard boiled egg and, completely unprompted, held it out to us and asked, "Baby Chicken?" And then answered herself: "yeah." So then I ran and got the camera to see if she would tell us more. She launched into this high-pitched, hilarious Sophie voice that is most often used to mock her mother (or when she is pretending to be a parent and tells her doll, "Come onnnnnnn!" or "Oh, man!") See (and hear) for yourself:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kn8Y5DH-v-k

Then Frank "interviewed" her to find out more about her egg theory:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFp0rkAdttc

Sorry for so many videos in one post, but THEN she picked up the phone and started having a conversation with Mommy and Daddy (not the ones sitting in front of her, but the "others") so Frank decided to call her using his cell phone. She was pretty shocked to hear a voice coming from the phone when she thought she was just pretending. Hilarious:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mo3cirhRUeA

Sorry they're not embedded. I used to know how to do that but I keep getting error messages about tags. Blogger pals, any ideas how to fix that?

Blue Girl Group

Sophie's a very serious (er...contemplative) artist:

She's getting quite good at declaring (accurately) her brush strokes: "Painting circles." or "I painting rainbows" (when making arcs). She's not so keen with colors yet. The entire time she was painting this masterpiece she was muttering, "pink, pink, pink."

And I call this one: Why We Don't Paint More Often.
Subtitle: Don't Touch ANYTHING, Sophie!

Happy Birthday, Laney!

Sophie has been practicing the Happy Birthday song for months, now. She finally got to perform it in public, at a real birthday party (instead of a Target aisle or a restaurant). Happy Birthday, Laney friend!

This was her cake CHOMP when she thought no one was looking:

What?! Of course I'm using my fork!

BOUNCY CASTLE FUN!!

Sophie loved playing with Laney's art easel, and that made us very, very happy because that's exactly what the birthday fairy stashed under our guest bed, waiting for Sophie's birthday next week! Dr. T, maybe you should get one for Jack, too!

Bouncy Movies

Laney had a bouncy, bouncy birthday party! Click on the links below to see some videos:

http://www.youtube.com/v/Q6JWhDoyG00

http://www.youtube.com/v/QI4heGrMSIk

Ditchdirt becoms Surfsand

A decade (or more?) ago, the Ditchdirt group of friends hit the beach. We were single then -- we stacked pyramids of beer cans and got sunburned and laughed at Matthew picking up girls with his "sin o con ropa!" invite back to the hot tub.

Last weekend, Ditchdirt returned to the beach. The group has morphed somewhat (with new faces and slightly older looking faces). Many of us are married with kids, now. Instead of beer cans we stacked dominos so the kids could watch them fall. No one really got too badly burned because we're all packin' 50 spf sunblock these days. We still laughed at Matthew, but he's not into picking up girls these days. And you know what? I had a TON of fun.

And this marks the end of our summer posts, I guess. Next Wednesday, Sophie starts school (GASP). The following Monday, Frank and I head back to school, too. Summer, we hardly knowed ya. Come again soon...

Click HERE to see more pics from our beach trip: DITCHDIRTBEACHTRIP

Chinese Torture

They don't use water anymore, they use lead. On Elmo. Sacrilege. And the Fisher Price website doesn't tell you how to explain recalls to a toddler. Elmo's going inside an envelope! Elmo's going on vacation! Elmo won't be coming back because Elmo was trying to kill you... (this is where my speech needs tweaking).

So...if you haven't heard yet, there are 80 or so Fisher Price product lines, which translates to millions of toys, that have been recalled. You may want to check the site if you've got little ones (or a Dora collection -- weirdo). Personally, I think Dora got what was coming to her. She's always yelling, that one.