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G still mostly sleeps in our bedroom.  We’ve been struggling with this one for quite a long time. Every time we seem to get some traction for her sleeping in her own bed, we take a trip or she gets sick or something happens and she’s back in our room.  I think I’m going to have to paint her room full of dinosaurs and dragons and yodas and shit for this to stop

We vowed not to make this mistake with Alana.  And largely it has been working. Put her in her crib, complete silence until dawn. That was going great up until about about…3 days ago.  Now she is keenly aware of where we are and howls until she falls asleep.  The howling is punctuated by new-found usage of shrieking, saturated with “mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmoooooooooooooooooommmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy”, and peppered with a few “daddys!” for good measure.  Eventually she falls asleep.  Then she wakes up and it starts again.

It is awful. I tune it out. Then I feel sad for how little love we’re giving her compared to her sister. Then I’m kinda touched by how aware she has become of everyone in her family and how she wants to be around us all the time.  Then I’m kinda afraid that I will soon be sleeping in G’s room since my bed is full.

We 3 hooligans ducked into the MMR pool today.  G was rowdy and raucous and the life of the party, as usual. Alana started slow, but a change in her demeanor was quickly evident. Last time she was afraid to venture 2 steps from the edge of the baby pool.  This time she waltzed across it, up the stairs, and held out her hand for me to help her jump from the side over and over again.

I’ve realized that its not just the depth, but the scope and the surroundings that make my kids afraid of the water.  G being so much easier to translate and communicate sometimes makes Alana’s progressions fade into the background. Today I told G to go to the big pool herowndamnself and leave me and her little sister alone.  3 minutes later, Alana too was bored of the baby pool.

In the past when I’ve towed her, she’s arched her body into a parachutist’s pose, trying to get every ounce out of the water. Today she relaxed her legs and enjoyed the pull.  In the past when I’ve picked her up she’s clung to me for dear life; today she realized we were taking turns tossing into the air and could not wait for G’s turn to finish.  She stood on the steps with her arms outstretched, clearly verklempt having to wait so long. I threw her far above my head, each beat of the countdown her smile got bigger in that goofy quiet way she has of co-existing in the shadow of her big sister.  Even when I missed her on the catch and she dropped to the bottom, she coughed and smiled and held out her arms to be thrown again.

G crapped out before Alana did.  Alana wanted to play more Toss the Baby.

Gravity

Anti-Gravity

I really missed the girls after they were out of town for a week.  With a day of vacation costing as much as the discount from a complete week out of daycare, spending Friday with them was a no-brainer.  Beckie fluffed for me, and G couldn’t wait for our Special Day.  We started with the Zoo (Alana’s first time as a bipedalist), then to the El Dorado Pool for some new water features, and finally lunch at Lolo’s.  Lolo’s was a heart attack waiting to happen, but other than 16 incredibly sticky greasy fingers and 4 incredibly sticky greasy thungs, we had a great time.

Saturday we had a birthday party at Pump It Up, followed by the pool, then a 2-bike ride.  Sunday was pool and *another* party at Pump It up, on the heels of a 55 mile beatdown on the roadie through Phoenix and Paradise Valley courtesy of Doug. After that I got pretty drunk and passed out with exhaustion, but i think there was more playing and a bbq.

I’ve been religiously trying to get G and Alana to the pool 2x a week after work.   Its only for about an hour since the pool closes at 6, but its the best i can do.  Kids in AZ need to get wet and cool regularly or they go insane, and though its a ton of work going 2:1 with Monsters who are in entirely different places in the water, its vital for me too.

I’ve got our pre-game ritual down: grab em out of class and into the bathroom, make a pile of clothes to swap with a pile of swimwear, slather on sunscreen and surfshirt and shoes, potty and swim diaper, then jet into the car.  They too have figured out the routine, so we can go 25 min from the time i walk in to the time we hit the water.  This is probably the most difficult part, especially when i commute home and continue to slow-roast until we finally get wet.

Each day is a new adventure, some days they get better and some days they get shy and scared.  Some days I deal with tinyMeltdowns.  Most days are very good and very inspiring.  I bought G some brightly-colored rubber squids that sink to the bottom and waggle at her, and within 1 session she mastered kicking her legs to propel herself downward to fetch them.  She can pick up all 4 at once, she keeps going deeper and holding her breath longer, learning to use her arms and legs to swim underwater.  She jumped off the low board and swam to the side. She swam with me 6 feet to the bottom of the lap pool, and let me lifeguard-carry her across the 25 meter length and back.  She taught herself to dive by following up on her natural instincts to throw herself headlong into whatever she is doing. And she’s started recognizing the other little boys and girls and playing with them.

Last time at the pool, Alana waltzed down the zero-depth entry up to her neck, smiling and holding the squids. Only after falling under when the ripples in the water knocked her off-balance did she get scared. Some days she is afraid of the water and of me, other days she can’t wait to get swung around and tossed in the air.  I wish she had the benefit of our old backyard pool to ride in wings and floaties and lose any fear of the water like G did, but romping and stomping 20 yards at a time has its own benefits.  She hangs on the side and pulls herseff up with remarkable motivation, and just started flopping over the  edge and in on her own.  I’m surprised she does not seem to freak when she actually goes under, maybe its ignorance instead of fear, maybe I should give her more credit.

Alana has become extremely loquacious. EXTREMELY. LOQUACIOUS.

it takes a little while to figure out her accent. actually her accent is pretty impossible to figure out. Its like a conference call with an Indian programmer who is mildly deaf, and possibly has Downs Syndrome. There is a lot of mumbling, slurring, shouting, blabbering, blathering, blithering, chitchatting, driveling, gabbling, gibbering, jabbering, prattling, chuckling, clucking, squealing, cackling and some running on at the mouth for good measure. I understand it all perfectly.

She says mommy, daddy, kila, shoes, genevieve, alana, and NO. The NO can be so clear is quite emphatic. Out of this miasma of baby-noise come an extremely willful “NO“. NO fuck NO i do not want to get in the pool. NO fuck you motherfucker there is NO fucking way i am eating this broccoli.

Surprisingly she does not seem to be saying too much more yet. Her use of her small vocabulary is so ritualistic i keep expecting to hear a short Shakespearean sonnet purr naturally forth from her. I guess its cause these few things are most important to her. She is very emotive about lots of other stuff, mostly cheese and her blanky, but does not talk about them. It cant be long.

Alana like shoes. a lot. she’s had this thing about shoes since about 4 months ago, one of her first signs of personality.  she’d crawl into a pile of things and come out with 2 matching shoes.  sometimes hers, sometimes Beckie’s, and i swear when we’re getting ready to leave she ends up with mine.  She gets very proud of herself when she matches shoes, she holds them out for the world’s approval, and gets a big sloppy grin on her sloppy budha body.

G liked shoes too, and enjoyed the empowerment footware provided, but Alana’s relationship to los zapatos is sublime. She understood from the start the advancements of the species shoes represent, even before she could walk.  Once you get shoes on this child, she keeps them on for 14 hrs straight, the occasional baby-shoe-sock-self-entropification notwithstanding.  her shoes make her a bigger more able baby.  A sophistication becomes Alana when she is shodden.

For some reason G only wore these a few times before her feet were too big.  Alana looks spectacular in them and will rock the beach in Rocky Point.

her first pair of brand new shoes.  she wanted these more than her blanket. while i hate the impregnable opinions, i am wary of getting between a girl and her shoes, and appreciate the straightforward manner of communication.