Jamie Chew's Web Log: Vol. 2 No. 87

2009-05-05 49:08 (Kristen) Once again it was drop Jamie off at school, run to the subway, and drop Liam off at Hakobune. Today, just to jazz it up, I added in running back home, getting some housework done, going to the school to take Jamie to skating, go skating, then ask Michelle Lee to look after the kids for an hour while I get dropped off at the subway to go and get Liam. Get Liam; return home, weed the front lawn while Liam plays. Watch Jake and Jamie for an hour after Michelle drops them off while she takes Charlie swimming. Say goodbye to Jake when his mom comes (with freezies! the ants are enjoying the remants of the blue juice from the freezies that ended up on the front walk), then take kids to library to return overdue books. Walk to Treasure Island, where I buy a little piggy bank for Liam (for the twoonie that Grammie left for him) and Jamie buys the Bionicle that he's been fretting about since Sunday. Decided against going home, as it was already 5, and go to nearby Katsuo Sushi for a light dinner. Children eat gyoza, yakitori, and two orders of california roll. Mother gets 1 gyoza, 1 skewer, and four pieces of california roll. Head to Dairy Queen using public transit (yay day pass), meet Alice, have ice cream. Go home, go to bed. End.

Jamie in particular really liked the meal, although Liam certainly showed appreciation for it as well. He was talking about it for a little while afterwards. However, even after a light meal and a cherry sundae, he still managed to pack away a bowl of meatballs, broccoli, and rice. Liam passed, having finally eaten enough by hoovering 2/3 of the banana split we shared at Dairy QUeen.

2009-05-06 25:08 (Kristen) This morning was a little calmer than yesterday, but not by much. Liam didn't want to leave his beloved television to go to school with Jamie, while Jamie had (unusually) abandoned half of his oatmeal to go and watch television too. Despite repeated notification that countdown was on, Jamie failed to mention this until it was time to go. Tears: he was hungry. I got a banana for him, which seemed to do, and packed two cookies for thie subway trip for Hakobune, anticipating a possible blood sugar meltdown. Liam wanted to go back home, so we puttered until it was time to get Jamie again. We did, and the cookies were a good idea. We left Jamie at Hakobune, which was good, although Liam was put out that he couldn't go too. I took him to Kensington Market, which he enjoyed until he fell asleep. I woke him up at 3, when I went to get Jamie, and we counted animals and birds until we got to the daycare. Jamie asked for bubble tea, so we got some (taro flavour, yum), dropped a book off at the library, and went home. Unfortunately, we had left Jamie's backpack at the bubble tea store, so we had to go all the way back to get it (fortunately, we hadn't left the subway system, although we were at Broadview by this point). Back home we went, where I made dinner, Jamie didn't like the cilantro in it, and Liam just picked. Later in the evening, Jamie went to play with Gary and Ayami for an hour, while I went with Alice and Liam to T&T, the local Chinese supermarket. Liam was delighted to go, picking out this and that. We made it back quite late, and so it was a rush to bathe the boys, wash their hair (it is Wednesday, after all), and get them into bed. Unsurprisingly, they both fell asleep quite quickly. Both boys have been ending up in bed with me with John away, but as he got home late this evening, they'll be delighted to see him again. They've really missed him.

2009-05-07 47:42 (Kristen) The boys were delighted to see their father when they woke up this morning, and that set the theme for the day. John took Jamie to school, and came back to spend a little time with Liam. John went to get Jamie with Liam in tow, and he (as usual) had a blast playing with the big boys. Jamie had the playdate with Sam that he's wanted for ages, which was great, but a little sad as Jamie was talking about what they were going to do together in grade one next year. Sam, seriously, told him that he wasn't going to go to Jackman next year, as he now knows that he's moving to Oakville. This is going to be sad for Jamie, as he and Sam really get along well. In the meantime, he had a great afternoon while Liam had a nap on a walk with Ken. John and I picked him up at the Second Cup, and took him to pick up Jamie. We had a chance to play for a bit, before we all headed home. Jamie did 8 pages of homework with John, and Liam did some sticker books with numbers and 'ABC's. I realized that Liam didn't know his ABCs well anymore recently (he knew them before he was 2, and we got complacent), so thought a sticker book might be fun. He's enjoying the letters, but numbers are where it's at right now. He's getting very good at recognizing numbers and extrapolating values of numbers: he knows that 5 means five objects, which can be different types of object. Not bad. Dinner was consumed, and playing was done, and bedtime was had.

2009-05-08 23:54 (Kristen)( Jamie was up early, and I recall (groggily) John saying to him that he had to wait until 7:30 to get up. By 8, there was yelling up the stairs that he was *really* hungry, Papa! I hauled myself out of bed later, in time to see Jamie out the door with John. I got ready and took Liam to Hakobune, which was the usual joyful event. I picked him up at a little after 1, got him to go to the bathroom, and popped him in the stroller. He refused to sleep, despite some impressive displays of toddler temper and tears, indicating fatigue, and that was that, in the end. We went to Starbucks, where we found John and his green tea frappuchino, which cured all ills. I later checked his lunchbox, and he had not eaten much of his lunch. This would explain it. It would also explain the depths of his collapse around dinnertime, despite my shoving food at thim. It just wasn't *right*, somehow, but he finally did eat dinner when John showed up, sitting with his father out on the back porch in the sunshine as he ate. Jamie roared around doing this and that, wanting to build Lego levels in his games and doing this and that. We went home late, around 9:30, and so the boys were late to bed. Both fell asleep quickly, however, so that was good.

2009-05-09 24:13 (Kristen) Today was the Jackman Spring Fair, which is an event that the children look forward to with great anticipation. Jamie got to leave Japanese school early today to attend, despite the fact that thunderstorms kept moving though the area, causing the school to have to move the fair indoors. None of the children seemed to care, as they roamed through the school, eating cupcakes and hot dogs, and taking turn after turn on the large bouncy rides indoors. Liam, personally, went down the large obstacle course slide seven times or more. Jamie was no slouch, either. They (and we) were exhausted by 3:30, and so we went home between storms and flopped in front of the television, exhausted. I made dinner, and the boys inhaled it. I got to go to see the new Star Trek movie with the mother of one of Jamie's friends after dinner, and John put the boys to bed. Needless to say, I was in favour of this. John says that they ate strawberries and ice cream, had a long bath, watched two episodes of Anpanman, and both boys were asleep by 9:40. Jamie fell asleep easily enough, but LIam put up a fuss, and cried himself to sleep. I felt badly for him, but it is a Good Thing for him to let his father put him to bed too.

2009-05-10 46:55 (Kristen) I remember being covered in small boys at some points in the night, but was honestly surprised to see that it was 9:11 when I woke up this morning. Liam was with me, and we went downstairs to find that John had made a lovely breakfast of sausages, eggs, and strawberries, along with bagels and cream cheese, for a Mother's Day breakfast. Wow! I was pretty happy. I also got a lovely card that Jamie had made, and two little plant holders (in the shape of a rabbit and a cat) that Jamie and Liam had made at Hakobune. We had a leisurely morning, then headed off to J-Town to do some Japanese food shopping and to run around looking at what was there. Liam and Jamie both picked out new snacks that were somehow not right when removed from their packaging, but ate well of a lunch of Japanese curry, chicken katsu, and potato korokke*. Then it was off to Humber Nurseries, where we bought our new plants for the year (the other part of my Mother's Day present). The boys enjoyed looking at the large goldfish for sale, and Jamie in particular was interested in the plants we were picking out. John and Jamie picked out some watermelon plants, and some broccoli plants, and I'm really looking forward to how they turn out.

Afterwards, we went downtown to pick up our takeout dinner from Babur, as we were expected for dinner at John's parents' house. The dinner took a little longer to prepare than expected, so the boys and I went to the playground in the park behind the AGO for a while to play. The boys had a hilarious time going down a big, curvy, covered slide. Liam wouldn't go down without someone at first, and Jamie cooperated. By the time we left, they were doing down the slide, arms wrapped around each other, either head first or one after another, like a train, and shrieking with laughter. We met up, purely by chance, with one of Liam's Hakobune friends (Hiro-kun), and that was fun as well. It was a joy to watch Liam and Jamie play together. John picked us up, we stopped off to let Liam have a pee break, and we made it to John's parents' house. Dinner was eaten and enjoyed, and the boys had fun playing with John's mother. Then it was time to go home, with two tired and happy boys, and time for bed.

2009-05-11 23:07 (Kristen) This morning John took Jamie to school while I took Liam to Hakobune. While there, he arranged for Jamie to have his friends over afterwards, including Harry, Sam's little brother. John took Jamie to his soccer class afterwards, where it was decided that Declan, a very popular boy at soccer, would come over too. When I got home with a sleeping Liam, around 2, the house was in full uproar. As John was going to go to the doctor with his mom, I was in charge, which meant that all children were kicked outside for an hour so that the house would have a chance of still standing by the time John got home. The kids were completely overwound, and the hour outside was spent playing soccer, arguing about the rules, and by playing freeze tag and arguing about the rules. I let them back in at 3, after two skinned knees (healed up by the magic of SpongeBob Squarepants bandages). Liam, in the meantime, had woken up around the 2:40 mark, which was a 45-minute nap but a good length, ensuring that he'd not be crazy tired but still go to sleep at night. The boys continued to play flat out until their mothers came for them, and then it was a quiet time. I asked Jamie to pick out a book to read to me and he chose a Maisy book with flaps, but I think that it was a success to get him to read even that, given how wound up he was. Dinner was at Browning, where John looked after the boys while I went to play Trivia. He reports that they played well, then came home around 8:40. They were in bed by 9:45, and Jamie fell asleep in 10 minutes or so. Liam took about 20, protesting as he fell asleep that I wasn't there, but still falling asleep for his dad. Twice in three days! I'm almost giddy.

* For the benefit of Scrabble players, words that are not in the Scrabble dictionary are marked with an asterisk.

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