Jamie Chew's Web Log: Vol. 3 No. 13

2009-11-03 24:15 (Kristen) The end of daylight savings strikes again, as I was woken up by both boys being loud as crows in the morning, happy to be awake, and notifying me in their own ways that it was daytime, Mummy. It was also about 45 minutes earlier than I'm used to, and as I'd been up quite late the night before, I was no entirely happy about it. And yet, we soldier on. Jamie got to school on time and with a little to spare, and Liam was at Hakobune on time too. Wow! Liam greeted me with an enormous running, "leap-into-Mummy's-arms" hug, and I whisked him off home. I should mention that, instead of playing DS the entire ride there and back, we read Rhyming Dust Bunnies, which is Liam's favourite book right now. He also pounced on me to read Blueberries for Sal, which delighted me. Maybe the end of the DS obsession is in sight? There might be room for other pursuits? I live in hope! We went to pick up Jamie, played a little, and then Jamie went home with Gary (who happened by at the wrong time) while I went to get a few groceries at the Big Carrot with Liam. He fell asleep just as we approached our house, despite his protestations when prevented earlier that he wasn't sleepy and he wouldn't fall asleep, and was made to walk the last few metres home. Protest. However, it was close to 5:00, and a nap at that time would have been more than disasterous. The kids played, ate dinner here and there (it was far from an organized family meal night), and stayed home with John after I went a few houses over to go to my book club. John informs me that the new rule for nights when I'm out is that they only speak in Japanese when I'm not there. They forget every few minutes, of course, but then they remember and start again. I'm all in favour of this, and may use it was an excuse to go out. "Oh, don't you want a Japanese boys' night again? Don't the kids need some language practice?" We'll see. I came home to put the boys to bed with John, and they were bouncing off the walls. As I came upstairs, John was pretending to call me on my cell, saying to come home right NOW, and Liam delightedly pounced on me, saying that he *knew* I was coming home to put *him* to bed. The boys were asleep in less than ten minutes, which was a clear indication that it had been a long and satisfying day.

2009-11-04 21:52 (Kristen) In keeping with my new theory, I have started Liam's days with a rundown of what we're going to do. It seems to be working, and some of the transitioning problems we'd had have not been present. Yay! Got Jamie off to school in the morning, and Liam had a quiet morning playing DS and other things before Jamie came home for lunch with John. After lunch, Jamie went back to school and I took Liam to skating. He had another good class, but he was just wiped after 20 minutes on the ice, and had to come off. I could see him taking longer and longer to get off the ice each time he fell, so wasn't surprised when he skated to the gate and cried to come off. We went over to Jack's house, after Jack and Tom chorused that they wanted Liam to come over for a playdate. I went to find their brother Charlie and Jamie too and brought them back for a spell too. Jack, Charlie, and Tom all had H1N1, and are all well now, but are just starting to get back into their usual round of playdates. They're about crazy for company, so it was a raucous time, as the siblings have seen as much of each other as they can stand and were more than pleased to have someone else over to play with. We ran home to do homework with John, then had dinner. We did more homework after dinner, and Jamie was very tickled to see that a book he'd thought too hard a month ago was now very easy (Danny and the Dinosaur). Liam didn't get much attention, unfortunately, as he'd wanted it, but we all watched Robot Repairman (Backyardigans) together before a short play with Gary and bathtime/bed.

I forgot to mention that Jamie forgot his coat yesterday in the school. We found it in the lost and found after school, but later, when I was talking with another parent, I pointed him out. "Oh, THAT's Jamie!" she exclaimed, and said, "He's very silly, isn't he?" After confessing that yes, he was, she said that she'd seen him at lunch (on a cold day) without his coat and asked him where it was. He looked up and said, "Umm...I forgot it? Umm...I ate it?" and ran off. That would be my son.

2009-11-05 23:07 (Kristen) Tonight, when I brought a complaining Liam up to the bath, he protested to his dad that he wanted to play his DS. John explained that I hadn't allowed the DS into the bathroom in case it got wet and was broken. Wouldn't that make Liam sad? "My already sad," Liam replied. The pits of three-year-old despair.

It was a quiet day, all things considered. Jamie did manage to finish off the rest of his Japanese homework for the week, and Liam is showing signs of emerging from his Kirby obsession. They're both starting to get me to read to them more, which is fine by me.

2009-11-06 23:42 (Kristen) Jamie had a big day, with a trip to see the play Alice in Wonderland in the morning, with his class and a big playdate at his friend Sam's (referred to in the family as a "big fat playdate" since it's gonna be big with lots of kids). He tells me that he ate pizza and had ice cream for dessert, and it sounds like it was a total blast. He was exhausted when he was dropped off at Browning at 7:30. Liam had a great time at Hakobune, and put up with me dragging him to the library, toy store, book store, and grocery store. He loves the library and makes sure that we go home with a stack of books for him, and always expects a book will be bought for him when we go to the bookstore. He made sure that we bought the raisin bread by holding onto it and refusing to put it back. He certainly ate two pieces when we got home as snack, so it was the right thing to do. By the time we got home, he was tired but still in a good mood. Both kids were more than ready for bed when we got home, and fell asleep in about five minutes flat.

2009-11-07 22:22 (Kristen) Jamie woke up at the usual time, had breakfast, and complained that he didn't want to go to school this morning. I didn't take much notice, but brushed my arm against his forehead as he was going upstairs to brush his teeth. Uh oh. I asked John to confirm, and we agreed that he had a fever and should stay home. So, it was a somewhat irregular Saturday, as both boys were home and John was out at a Scrabble tournament. We managed to stay in without any real meltdowns or trauma, and without too many declarations of "I'm bored!" I pulled out a "excavate your own velociraptor" kit of Jamie's, which kept us busy for a good part of the day pulling plastic dinosaur bones from a block of plaster. Liam played with his DS, helped a little to brush away "dirt" from our dinosaur bones, and watching "Robot Repairman" (Backyardigans) over and over as much as he was allowed. Jamie's fever remained low but present, but he had no other symptoms and was both functional and in a good mood. We had dinner, and watched some "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" before John's return, and bedtime.

2009-11-08 23:42 (Kristen) I fell asleep with Liam last night, but Jamie ended up with John after having a nightmare or two. The boys were up by 7:48 (if I recall Jamie's announcement correctly), and John was off to his Scrabble tournament by 9:30 or so. I was pretty sure that Liam was going to explode spontaneously if we didn't go out, and so we arranged to have our friends Peter, Leslie, and Simon come over for lunch and a playdate. Both Jamie and Liam exploded simultaneously as we were trying to get out the door, and I was both unhappy and unimpressed with this, but we managed to get them out the door and down to the Detroit Eatery for lunch. Jamie managed to keep a rather impressive grump out until we reached Jackman, then more or less gave it up in the face of a beautiful day. Liam's meltdown was largely a reflection of Jamie's, as he was upset that Jamie was upset, and insisted on holding Jamie's hand until Jamie felt better. We stopped off to see an open house for a newly renovated home near Jamie's school, and Jamie and Liam both enjoyed running through a large uncluttered home with lots of doors and closets. Jamie asked it we could buy it, and I told him that we could if Mummy won the lottery last night (which I do doubt). This led to an explaination of what lotteries were until Jamie got bored and we headed out to get our lunch. The boys ate suprisingly little of their food but did hoover back half a strawberry milkshake each and steal some of Simon's onion rings. Then it was off to the playground to burn off more steam, which they did. Jamie did manage to give himself a really impressive lump just above his right temple on a gate lock, which occasioned me running across the street to the Second Cup for a cup of ice to bring down the swelling. It did, but he has a really impressive lump still, with a bit of a contusion. Ouch. We went home after an hour or so, and waved goodbye to Simon and his parents as they went on to their next engagement. Dinner was haphazard as my initial meal didn't work out, and we were all happy to see John when he got home from the tournament. We were all pretty tired by this point, and so it was an early bath and into bed. Both boys were asleep by 9:30, which was very very good for all.

2009-11-09 22:07 (Kristen) We've got Party Week here at our house, with my dad's birthday today, John's mother's tomorrow, and Jamie's on Wednesday. John has his usual Scrabble night on Wednesday, and we usually have a separate party for Jamie and Sai, but there were other people to factor in and it became Complicated. So, at the last minute, we decided to have a party for Jamie over at Browning with the Browning crowd. Liam went with John to soccer, while I took Jamie to Browning for lunch, then Gary dropped Jamie off at school while I took over Liam after he ate lunch at Browning post soccer. The afternoon was spent shopping for presents for this, that, and the other child, and then realizing that I'd forgotten to buy cake and had no more time, so John had to run out and buy some. Jamie had an impromptu playdate with Aidan, so John and I took Liam for a quick checkup (all systems A-OK) after his long cold and then went to Browning to wrap presents and otherwise prep for a usual dinner. I already had plans to go and play pub trivia tonight, so we really had to rush. Jamie was suprised, although he said that the minute the lights went down, he knew that there would be cake (for him). John had found a table top hockey set at the Games Convention on the weekend, for an excellent price, so we gave it to Jamie for his birthday. It certainly wasn't what I would have picked for Jamie to like, but everyone had a fabulous time with it, and it was a real hit. Hooray! I'd gone to trivia by the time they were playing, but heard all about it. The boys were still awake when I got back home at 10:20, but Jamie must have fallen asleep earlier as only Liam was asleep when I got upstairs. He took about ten minutes to calm down enought to sleep, but it still was waaayyyy too late.

I forgot to add that today was a beautiful day, with the temperatures in the high teens (Celsius), and I was thinking all day about how the 9th of November, 2003 was exactly like this. I was out raking leaves, taking a chance to get some work done before the baby was born, and everyone told me "Oh, you'll have the baby soon!" I was "Yeah, right, the baby'd be a week early!" Sure enough, I was in labour the next day, and Jamie was born the day after that. But today was just like that day, and I remember how I felt so very clearly.

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

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