Rachel the storyteller

Here's the story of how Rachel got here, as she narrated it to me this morning at breakfast:

""Before I was a human baby, I was a mermaid baby, and then I grew up to be a little bit older and I was 4. Then the fairy turned me back into a human."

My friend Amy's response: "That's awesome. I like that way better than Jake's version: 'I was dead and then some guys builded me.'"

***

Rachel also told us this morning: "A long time ago, before you were born, I goed to the sea park and all the sea creatures loved me so much because they rubbed against me and I rubbed against them and they played with the toys I gave them at the sea park. And then BunBun fell into the tank and I lifted her back up and she went into the sea tank with me. It's down in the sea basement of an old castle."

BunBun is the bunny in Rachel's preschool class. We think the references to the sea park are from a book she likes us to read about Little Critter's visit to the local sea park. Little Critter is an ongoing character in a series of books Rachel has.

See why she's so entertaining to be around? Some days I think Rachel makes more sense than all the adults around her....

***

We are leaving tomorrow morning to spend the New Year's Eve weekend with Uncle David, Auntie Anne and Grandma Jean in Seattle. I'll try to post while I'm there, but in case I don't -- Happy  New Year to everyone who reads this blog and enjoys following the adventures of The Little Girl. One of my New Year's resolutions is to post more often and get a new computer so I can add pictures. A great 2012 to all!!

Rachel the sensitive one

This morning I attempted to go swim at the local community center, but the pool was too crowded and I went at night. Pool was still crowded, but it cleared out at 7 p.m. leaving me exactly 15 minutes to swim. (We tried to turn that into a math lesson for Rachel at dinner, but failed).

As I left this morning, Rachel stood by the window next to Drew and said:

"Goodbye, Mommy! Be careful! You don't want to be dead!"

And as my car pulled away from the driveway she said, "...And there she goes!"

***

Rachel is fascinated with the song "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" and is constantly asking us to sing variations of it. Today she noted, "The other reindeer were being like the stepsisters. But they weren't as bad because they gave Rudolph things. Each reindeer did. The stepsisters were mean for the whole time."

(The stepsisters, of course, being the ones from "Cinderella.'").

***

Devin, Rachel's little friend from preschool, apparently said something mean to Rachel today -- something along the lines of calling her "stinky" because she hadn't taken a bath.

Rachel told us she yelled at Devin and then she walked away. I suggested that next time she tell her, "I'm not going to listen to you. You can't play with me," and walk away.

***

Rachel's a girl, all right: We now have quite the collection of princess and cupcake Band-Aids; now add Hello Kitty to the mix. I have no idea where this comes from (probably from her friend Tessa at preschool, who is very into Hello Kitty), but Rachel is now a big Hello Kitty fan. She has offered me numerous Hello Kitty Band-Aids to cover the owies from my bike accident. I think that's her way of telling me she loves me and is worried about my health.

Last night of Hanukkah

I was actually somewhat sad to bid farewell tonight to Hanukkah, even though I've had way too many latkes (6 out of 8 nights) and making sufganyiot is time-consuming and I feel that all I've been doing the last few days is eating food I shouldn't (although this was slightly mitigated by skipping breakfast this morning because I wasn't hungry and am coming down with a cold, I think, and I had a dentist's appointment anyway...plus I swam tonight so that gives me an excuse to eat well).

Anyway....

Tonight after swimming I got home and was pleasantly surprised to see that Drew had set the table, peeled the potatoes and gotten out the brisket that had been left over from my catering gig last month (which now seems like a million years ago), so all I had to do was chop an onion, cut the potatoes (with Rachel's help; she plopped them into the blender), and blend everything together. Rachel is still a little afraid of the blender's loud noise, so Drew gave her a set of headphones and she looked like a little sound engineer. I fried up the latkes and when I was done Rachel hugged my legs and said, "Thank you for making latkees, Mommy!" I hugged her back and we had a nice dinner, with Rachel whining a little about how she was worried we wouldn't have time to open presents because it was taking so long for us to eat (she refused to try the brisket, which was GREAT, and ate a couple of bites of a latke and LOTS of applesauce). I feel compelled to say here that the container of applesauce Drew bought for Hanukkah lasted exactly eight nights. Call that our little 21st Century version of a Hanukkah miracle.

Rachel impressed us with her near-perfect rendition of the prayer over the Hanukkah candles. Really, in a few months, she'll be able to say the Sabbath prayer all by herself!

She also asked me, "What did you do at work today, Mommy? I really want to know."

We finished opening presents -- thank you Tia Daniella and Valerie and JoJo for the tea set, which Rachel instantly adored, and the Frances book, which she made both of us read twice. She also got some old cake pans from my friend Miriam, whose daughter played with them she was little (that daughter is now studying for a master's in social work). Rachel's gift to us was a little Christmas tree she made at school, which we placed on the living-room mantel (Drew noted with pride that the kids at preschool also made mini-menorahs; he was grateful that both Jews and Christians have a place at St. James). We also thank Amanda and Jenn for the artists' brushes and paper for Rachel's multi-tasking easel, and Richard for the Twin Peaks anniversary set, and Mom and Dad for the truffles and Hanukkah Haiku book, and Jack and Kay for the beautiful vase...happy Hanukkah, everyone!

Cute Rachel saying today: As we were cuddling in bed this morning, I remarked that she had beautiful blue eyes.

"Your eyes are the color of the earth!" she said. Looks like we may have a budding poet in our house..

Hanukkah party!

We had a great time this afternoon/evening at a Hanukkah party at the house of Rachel's friend Lila Anne. One of these days I'll get around to posting pictures. I brought homemade sufganyiot and, boy, were they a big hit! I had to cut some corners on timing of the dough to rise, but I actually followed directions and pinched the edges of the dough together, so the jelly stayed inside. People were anticipating them and when they tasted them they kept asking me questions about if I REALLY made them from scratch, how I did it, how much better homemade donuts are than real ones (I have to disagree on that last point, though). The sufganyiot I make taste like beignets, especially since I douse them in enough powdered sugar to provide snow for an entire showing of "Nutcracker."

It was a fun time, even if one of the little girls at the party asked me if I was Rachel's grandma. OUCH!

Anyway...the girls had fun running around and shrieking. There were some boys there, too, but they were a little older and clearly outnumbered. At one point Drew emerged from Lila's bedroom to announce that the room was dark, Lila and Rachel were in Lila's old crib, and they were heading to China. To do what? Who knows??

When we got home Rachel opened her present from PopPop -- the movie "Beauty and the Beast." She was so excited that she insisted on racing upstairs, where I was working, to show me. "WOW!" she said. "I can take it to school for MOVIE DAY!" I told her it was a great movie; Drew and I had seen it years ago before we even thought of having kids.

And PopPop, you will appreciate this: As she was getting ready to go to bed, Rachel walked over to your picture on the bookcase and said, "Thank you for the movie, PopPop!" and gave you a little kiss.

Quiet day

I woke up this morning completely wacked out and groggy from the pain meds I took last night. I slept until 9:30 (Rachel woke us up at 8:30 but Drew told her to be quiet so Mommy could sleep) and when I staggered into the kitchen at 10, I still didn't feel completely awake. Drew left for a weekend shift in Seattle at 11:30, so I had just enough time to shower before he took off.

Rachel helped me make a pie crust for a chocolate silk pie I was making for my friend, Anne, who came over to dinner tonight. Anne's husband died in August 2010 and I like to invite her over every few weeks so she knows her friends won't forget her. I had wanted to make a beef tenderloin from a NY Times recipe, but when I got to New Seasons I was appalled at the price ($46 for 2 pounds!! Are you KIDDING ME?!?!?) and I settled for a rack of lamb instead.

So, after Rachel poured in all the ingredients for the pie crust, I let her pulse the food processor for a while -- she got a total kick out of it. Then all of a sudden I was exhausted, and I need sleep RIGHT NOW, so I grabbed one of Rachel's bigger blankets and lay down on the loveseat in the living room. She joined me after saying, "I'm VERY TIRED," and we both curled up and fell asleep in each others' arms, just like two little kitties. When I woke up it was 3:45 and I still had to roll out the crust, chill it, bake it, prepare the lamb, wrap Anne's Christmas gift (some soaps), set the table, etc. Luckily Rachel was happy to color in the kitchen while I got everything prepared. And -- surely a Hanukkah miracle! -- dinner was served at 7 p.m.: lamb (perfect ruby red), latkes (still hot), baked cherry tomatoes (part of the lamb dish) and chocolate silk pie with fresh whipped cream. Rachel liked the lamb (I called it "lamb steak") and Anne took a second helping of chocolate pie. There's enough left for Drew to sample it when he returns tomorrow afternoon.

After dinner Rachel got extremely whiny for my attention; at one point she kept yelling, "Mommy! Mommy!" and I went over to her, leaned into her face and said, "STOP IT. Just STOP IT." So she was sobbing loudly when Anne left. I'm sure Anne, who has no children, was extremely glad to be childless at that particular moment.

Then I hurried Rachel to wash, brush and get into her jammies, all the while being short and uncommunicative. She kept crying until she got into her jammies and climbed into my lap in the glider.

"Why are you crying, sweetie?" I asked.
"Because I wanted to cuddle with you more" (in the kitchen before Anne left).
"Why is it so important for you to cuddle with me?" I asked.
"Because it keeps me warm," she sniffled. "And it reminds me that I love you."

Well, what could I say? We read a book, and I lay down next to her in bed -- only to have her start whining that her foot was outside her blanket. "Well, just tuck it back in," I said, crossly, and then asked her if she wanted me to stay.

"Yes or no?" I asked.
She made a noise that I couldn't understand; it sounded like a teenage grunt.
"Yes or no?" I demanded.
Same noise.

"OK, I'm leaving," I announced, swinging my still-sore knee over her bed and leaving. She started crying, loudly, but I ignored it and soon she was asleep.

Chavurah Christmas Eve

We belong to a chavurah (a smaller group within the synagogue) that meets once a month at someone's house. The members are similar to Drew and me: They're around our age and have kids (although older, in grade school) and they're really nice folks to get together with. One of the members, Mark Carver, had the brilliant idea of hosting a Chinese dinner/5th night of Hanukkah celebration, with a gift exchange. The catch: None of the gifts could cost more than $1 (which is how Rachel and I discovered the treasure trove that is the Dollar Tree store).

So, after I got home from the clinic today we piled into the car and drove to Mark's house on the edge of Lake Oswego. Rachel, as usual, dove right in to the activities; she doesn't seem to care that everyone is older because she thinks she's a lot older than she is and the other kids are friendly. She got compliments from one of the adults on the outfit she picked out all by herself -- pink striped leggings, a pink shirt with cupcakes at the bottom and a blue denim skirt with while eyelet trim. This is why Drew thinks she'll end up at NYU -- she has a pronounced artsy side.

I was feeling pretty mellow because of the pain meds and the adults got to spend long stretches of the evening talking about politics, birth experiences, Portland public schools, mortgage rates. (At one point, Anna, one of the adults, turned to me and said, "Can you BELIEVE we are talking about mortgages??" to which I replied, "Yeah, we are SO BORING. We all used to lead really interesting lives."). The Chinese food was pretty good, Rachel even ate some Chinese noodles and chicken, and we had lots of desserts to choose from -- including chocolate cake from Costco, homemade sugar cookies and fruit. Afterward we posed for a photo for one of the families who was in Arizona and couldn't make it, then the kids chose gifts and opened them.

And then, at Mark's insistence, we all caravaned over to a street near his house with the most awesome Christmas lights imaginable. It was like all of Peacock Lane compressed into one house. Ligths, lights lights everywhere, a snowman, a train, reindeer. Rachel, of course, was delighted. We closed the evening singing "Silent Night." The folks who slowed down their cars to take a look were no doubt Jewish, commenting on the crazy Christian carolers on Christmas EVE, for godsakes...

Peace, everyone.

Owies, owies everywhere

Hi folks, your faithful poster on All Things Rachel took a break yesterday because of a nasty bike accident I got into late in the afternoon. In its zeal to add streetcar tracks everywhere, the city of Portland seems to forget that a light rail lane in the absence of a bike lane is NOT a safe location for bikers. To wit: I was biking down Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd. on a quick, 45-minute afternoon ride yesterday when I suddenly found myself in a regular car lane. To get out of the way of the car behind me, I veered off to the right, got my front wheel entangled in a streetcar track, and fell, hard, on my right side (bike fell on top of me. Yes, I was wearnig a helmet but my head hit the pavement and I felt the reverberations anyway). I dragged myself to the sidewalk in front of a furniture store, rested for about 10 minutes and debated whether to call Drew or not - he was finishing up his workday before we all headed to the synagogue's Hanukkah celebration -- then decided to let him know. As soon as he got on the phone, I started sobbing. I believe I was in shock.

Bottom line: Drew came to get me (my bike's gears are useless; need to go to the bike store to figure out what's up) and he went to synagogue with Rachel while I stayed home and parked myself in front of the TV, icing my hand for about three hours.

Drew called me every hour from synagogue just to make sure I hadn't lapsed into a coma, or something. Turns out they ran out of latkes and the brisket was inedible -- next year we will go only to the service and the music & sufganyiot afterward. Everyone was concerned about me, and Rachel told Drew she wanted to give me a big hug and kiss when she got home. She impressed the heck out of the rabbi when he taught her the word sufganyiot and she responded by singing the Hanukkah song. "In Yiddish, yet!" he said in wonder. She really will be the top student in her Hebrew school class someday...

This morning I was extremely stiff and sore and could barely move my neck, so I took Drew's advice for a change and went to urgent care while he and Rachel did the grocery shopping. No broken bones or sprains, just bad internal bruising. The doc gave me Vicodin and Flexeril, and I am so grateful (although I've been nauseous for the past day or so). I've been taking Vicodin every two hours, and it does seem to dull the pain and is making me sleepy.

One nice thing about all of this is that the doc who was on call today was...Ellen Singer, my primary care physician! (readers may remember that she dropped by for Rachel's baby-naming ceremony). She asked all about Rachel, and as long as I was there, she gave me a Pap smear, checked my ears for excessive earwax, took a bunch of X-rays of my bruises, and we caught up on all the family news. As I left, I told her that the nicest thing about all of this drama was being able to see her after a long absence. And yes, she's Jewish -- of COURSE she was on call on Christmas Eve!

Rachel's movie date

Today was special day at preschool: The kids watched Christmas-themed movies (including Polar Express, which apparently has enough of a moral theme that the kids spent the past couple of days talking about the lessons it imparts; I've never seen the movie) and were told to come IN THEIR JAMMIES. Late in the day one of the preschool teachers posted a photo of Rachel watching "The Grinch Who Stole Christmas" with a little boy who, she later told me, was Andrew. One of the teachers had put Rachel's hair in little pigtails, and Rachel -- my 3 1/3 year old girl, who claims she doesn't like boys -- was HOLDING ANDREW'S HAND WHILE THEY WATCHED THE MOVIE.

The photo was from the back and they looked so adorable (and alarmingly grown-up), I could barely stand it.

***

Speaking of looking grown-up...Rachel has been complaining nearly every morning that she's cold, and she wraps a baby blanket around herself and insists Drew feed her cereal. So tonight after school they stopped at Fred Meyer and bought the most adorable kid-sized bathrobe imaginable. (I was swimming at the local community center since Willamette's pool is closed until mid-January. LOVE to be able to swim in such a warm pool near home!!). When I got home, Rachel greeted me in her new bathrobe, which is covered in pink, purple, green and blue hearts. It's so cool-looking that I immediately asked Rachel, "Can I borrow your bathrobe, please?"

"You can try it on tomorrow," she said reassuringly. I laughed and told her I was just kidding, but I really do need a bathrobe and it would be way cool to have the same one in an adult size...

***

As Drew was putting Rachel to bed tonight, he sang her an impromptu new version of "The Dreidel Song":

Rachel, Rachel, Rachel
I made her out of clay
and though she's very silly
I love her anyway!

And quick as a flash, she sang her own version back to him:

Daddy, Daddy, Daddy
He's a very silly guy
I tell him that I love him
and then I say goodbye

Perhaps there's a future songwriter in the house??

Hanukkah celebration

Tonight I stayed late at work; the higher-ups were drinking wine and invited me to join them, and I was racing to finish as much as possible before vacation starts (Friday, technically, although the dean graciously urged me to work from home tomorrow because as a fellow commuter he knows how much time two hours tears out of my life every day). Anyway....I met Drew and Rachel at the Mittleman Jewish Community Center for a Hanukkah celebration they were having. The "J," as it is affectionately known, is in Southwest Portland, where Portland's Jewish community got its start. Several of my friends from the suburbs do activities there because it's easily accessible from the city and from the 'burbs. (I also went to a lovely dinner there last week sponsored by the Oregon Area Jewish Committee, where I am a board member).

Drew said I missed the worst part of the evening -- a woman who couldn't sing was attempting to lead a sing-along of Hanukkah songs nobody knew. Ugh. But by the time I arrived, Drew was trying to make Rachel eat some of the quesadillas he'd ordered for her. Luckily they were serving latkes which weren't half-bad (although Drew insisted mine were much better) and I ordered a salmon burger (dreadful) and Drew had hummus and falafel (decent, he said).

A band played klezmer music while Rachel colored out of a Hanukkah coloring book. She insisted on wearing a beautiful lacy dress that Anne gave her -- it's the dress in Rachel's preschool photo -- and she looked so beautiful half-sitting, half-lying on the floor, the skirt of the dress spread all around her, as she drew and Drew and I tried to talk over the music. I suddenly got a flash of -- Belgium? Poland? Did Mom do that when she was little, before her parents were lost to her?

Later, as the band played hora music, Rachel and I joined a hora line that danced around the room, Rachel laughing and enjoying the music. I love klezmer music, it speaks to me of family history and a connection to the past -- a connection I'm trying to pass on to Rachel, hoping she'll associate laughter and dancing and good food and rituals with beauty and peace so she will always know she can return to a place of comfort.

She threw a little fit when Drew told her she couldn't go into the pool at the J, so he scooped her up and we left. Too bad -- I had wanted to talk more to Max, a former colleague at the Oregonian who was part of the klezmer band, playing the flute. I had no idea she had that kind of talent.

On the way home Rachel sniffled and asked Drew if he still loved her. (He got very cranky at her little tantrum and her reluctance to eat a good dinner. Can't blame him).

"Of course, sweetie," he answered. "Mad is just temporary. Love is forever."

"Like friends!" she said, brightening. "And chairs!"

***

Tonight she pulled out the book of fairy tales and insisted on "reading" Cinderella to Drew. It is so wonderful to hear her little voice "read" a story, uninterrupted. When I came in her hair was damp from the bath and she was wearing pajamas covered with blue trucks.

"Even though I'm a girl, I can wear truck jammies," she announced. Then she followed it with, "Only girls can wear headbands."

HanukkahMom has landed!

Well, the presentation at Rachel's preschool this morning went much better than I'd anticipated. For one thing, the pastor wasn't there; just the teachers and A LOT of kids. I brought in freshly baked sufganiyot (which I'd spent until 2 a.m. making, and they turned out pretty well except I didn't pinch the edges of the dough together so most of the jelly fell into the oil, and, really, they're best eaten hot), the construction-paper menorah I'd made that looked kind of like a cross but had the transliteration of the Chanukah prayer on it, our actual menorah that Mom and Dad gave us years ago, and a bunch of dreidels and chocolate gelt for the kids.

I introduced myself as "Mrs. DeSilver," -- first time I've EVER done that -- and told the kids the very basic story of Hanukkah, then read from a book about one family celebrating the holiday -- inviting cousins over, having Grandma light the menorah, putting change into the tzedakah box, etc. Then I sang the Hanukkah song that we sing in Yiddish, ended with "Hip hip hooray for the MACCABEES!" and then it was time to leave.

Teacher Tracy told Drew that this was much better than other ones had gone, and Teacher Erin said she'd always wanted to have a parent come into her class and talk about Hanukkah and she was so glad I'd come. I also found out that one of Rachel's little friends, Tassanee, is Jewish too! (At least, her parents have a menorah). On the way out, Rhonda the recpetionist told us that the sufganiyot she'd tasted reminded her of a pastry her Polish grandmother had made but she could never find a recipe for it anywhere. I'm determined to locate one for her!

I had a wonderfully warm fuzzy feeling on the drive to work. Yes, I wonder if we're doing the right thing raising Rachel so far from the center of all that is Jewish in this country (i.e., New York), but so far she seems to have a very strong Jewish identity -- she's eager to learn the prayers and is open to the happier aspects of being Jewish rather than the suffering. And if I'm called on to be a cultural ambassador more often than I would back East, then fine. There are a bunch of little kids who heard Yiddish spoken for the first time in their lives today. Who knows what that could lead to??

And Rachel loved having me there. She bragged about it to the librarian who came in to tell the kids stories after I left.

***

Unfortunately Rachel woke up really early today. When I came home she told me, "Go away. Please go. I'm serious and I'm tired." She perked up soon enough, though, when I made latkes. "Um, yummy!" she said. I still remember when we knew she was ready for real food -- it was in December, when her little hand shot out to try some sour cream after I had made latkes for Hanukkah!

***

Drew was reading a book called "Ella visits Israel," to Rachel before bed tonight. When they got to the page about the Wailing Wall, and how people write messages on slips of paper and insert them into the cracks, Rachel said, "Yeah, and I would write, 'Happy Hanukkah, everybody!' on mine!"

Mommy and Rachel Day!

Today Drew had to get up really early to leave for a weekend shift in Seattle (the only thing that makes this marginally OK is he's getting about $300 in overtime pay) so Rachel and I arranged a playdate at Portland PDX with Doug, Linda, Jack and Andrew. Rachel and I got there around 11:15, around the same time as the Grayburns.

Rachel barely gave a glance back at me as she raced off to the play area, so I got to have a nice long talk with Linda and Doug. It was almost like having a grownup coffee date, except for the shrieking kids in the background. Once Rachel figured out where we were sitting, she came over once in a while to visit, then raced off again. A couple of times she asked me to come in the play structure with her, and we had a great time sliding down the incredibly steep and fast slides. I now know better than to put her on my lap and slide down together -- something about our body weights made us go extra fast, and I ended up tumbling on top of her. She laughed, but I got scared and suggested we go down together, but on separate slides.

About 1:15, most of the kids cleared out and it suddenly seemed quieter. Rachel ate a good lunch of hot dog, apples and caramel sauce, and lemonade, and toward the end of the day she begged for a cupcake. I shook my head no, she turned up her big blue eyes at me and pouted, and Linda thought she was adorable. Luckily she listened to me when I insisted she finish her hot dog -- and then she ended up wanting graham crackers instead of the cupcake! Linda wondered how I'd gotten her to change her mind; Rachel often whines for dessert and sweets and ends up leaving half of them on the plate. I think she's like me; she really just wants the taste of something sweet rather than the whole thing.

We stopped by the library on the way home to pick up a book for me to read to Rachel's class when I become HanukkahMom on Tuesday, but EVERYTHING was checked out. Either there are a lot of curious Christians in this city or the library just doesn't stock enough Judaica. I finally put one book on hold at the central library downtown, but I'm unsure of whether to get it; it's about Hanukkah in Poland, and what I really want is a preschool explanation of the holiday. Sigh.

After I put Rachel down for a nap, I spent 90 MINUTES trying to make a decent-looking menorah for Rachel's class. I made it out of blue construction paper, pasted it on a black hardboard, and am including yellow cardboard flames so the kids can "light" the menorah every night while saying the prayer I pasted on the front of the whole thing. After all the time I spent, I can only say that only one of the Lednicer sisters got the art talent in the family, and it wasn't me. I envy Valerie; she'll have the cool art mom who does awesome room projects; Rachel gets the mom whom, um, writes.

Tonight when I put her to sleep, Rachel started telling me a whole story of how she is a horse princess. She's white with a pink collar, and Daddy is a gray horse with a blue collar, and I'm a brown horse with a brown collar, and she lives in a big field, and she wears a rainbow dress and a flower dress, and she is the Horse Princess of the Flowers. She told me she'd wake me up tomorrow morning, and I told her no, please, let me wake YOU up, and she said we'd wake each other up, and hopefully I'd have enough time to get to Horse Work on time. And this paragraph doesn't sound nearly as cute as Rachel does when she tells it to me in the dark, snuggled up against me in her afghan.

Cute Rachel-isms today:

"Even when I'm a grown woman, would you and Daddy carry me around when I'm scared?" she asked in the car on the way home. I assure her we would.

***

"We need a bigger house," she said, also on the way home from Playdate PDX.
"Why do we need a bigger house, sweetie?" I asked.
"So we can have more kids," she said.
"You mean more kids in the house, or so Mommy can have more babies?" I asked.
"So Mommy can have more babies," she answered.
I sighed, and she asked me why I was sighing.
"I'd love that, too," Rachel," I said.

***
Speaking of Playdate PDX, Andrew is quite a bit older than Rachel and I've always assumed they don't interact much. He goes to real school, she goes to preschool; she's a girl, he's a boy.

So imagine my surprise that as soon as I buckled her into her carseat after we left Playdate PDX, she started singing: "Jingle bells, jingle bells/Robin laid an egg/Batmobile lost a wheel/and Joker got away."

"Where did you LEARN that?" I gasped.

"Andrew taught it to me," she said.

And here I thought she and the boys never talked...

Peacock Lane

I've had a bad last two days at work -- interpersonal conflict with a colleague -- and so I was determined to do something fun tonight with Rachel.

We ended up visiting Peacock Lane, a street of tricked-out houses for the holidays. Every house on the block has unbelievable Christmas decorations; there's a booth with free hot chocolate and apple cider; and crowds of people walk up and down the sidewalk to admire the decorations.It was one of two nights in December when it was pedestrian-only; the street was closed to traffic and onlookers clumped up in front of houses, madly taking pictures and oohing and aaha-ing.

It was a hassle to find parking and walk in the damp air without a stroller, but it was worth it as soon as we arrived. "Ohhhh!" Rachel said, her whole face aglow. "MOMMY!!!!"

Her eyes remained lit up the entire time, right up until she decided she was hungry and I raced us home for a quick Shabbat dinner. Rachel insisted that I color some pages from her coloring book that I started last night and didn't manage to finish today. I promised I'd finish them after breakfast -- just about the time that I'll need to bake cookies (or maybe a cake) for our friend Deni's Christmas party tomorrow night.

Hanukkah Mom's debut edges closer...

I am officially on the preschool schedule for next week: "Special visit from Rachel DeSilver's mom to learn about Hanukkah!" Last night Rachel and I went to the Dollar Tree store -- everything is $1; I can't believe I've never been there before -- and we picked up a bunch of crafts for the menorah I plan to make this weekend in preparation for the visit to Rachel's class on Tuesday. Apparently the kids will also be making a classroom menorah, eating Hanukkah treats, learning about Hanukkah and working on "Hanukkah coloring sheets" that week.

I can only guess what the plans will be for Diwali. Or Eid-el-Fitr.

Special note to Mom and Dad: Rachel can sing the Hanukkah song! IN YIDDISH. I swear, you can understand every part of the song she sings. Drew was extremely impressed and hoped you would feel equally so that his 3 1/2-year-old daughter can already speak some Yiddish. He thinks that's way cool. So do I.

***

Speaking of languages, on the way to school this morning Rachel asked me to speak some Spanish and French. Then she asked me how to say "I love you" in both languages. That says a lot about the kind of kid she is -- sweet and thoughtful. As I was getting ready to leave the bedroom this morning, she knelt down and slid my slippers onto my feet and pulled down the leg of my pajamas, which had slid upward almost to my knee. Really, it's like having a little chambermaid in my house.

***

"I like waking you up in the morning," Rachel said as we were driving home. "I like to warn you that morning is here." (Later I told her to please, please let Mommy and Daddy sleep late tomorrow).

Rachel loves the rain

It has been raining for the past 24 hours after a two-week reprieve:

"I like the rain," Rachel said. "It helps all the plants to grow."

Later she said: "I have a wonderful surprise, ok? It's a watering can, and I can rummage around the house when it's dry and water the plants, OK?"

I made up a story today, at her request, about Christmas lights. It was about a family with twin girls (also at Rachel's insistence) named Anna and Sarah who had lots of Christmas lights every year, along with every other house in town, but then all the daddies started losing their jobs, and the mommies did, too, and soon none of the houses except Anna's and Sarah's had lights...

"And if I had jobs I would give out lots of jobs to all the daddies," Rachel interrupted.

The story ended with Anna and Sarah and their parents deciding to give some of their lights to every house in town -- but to do it during the day, when the daddies were looking for jobs and the mommies are taking the kids to activities, so no one knew what Anna and Sarah had done until the night, when the lights came on...

"...and then I'd wave a magic wand and all the houses would disappear!" Rachel concluded.

Too close for comfort

Tonight Rachel asked Drew, "Daddy, how old are you?" (I've told her the real number several times but she doesn't appear to remember).

"A million," Drew answered nonchalantly.

"Nooo," Rachel said sweetly. I chimed in that NO ONE can be a million years old!

"How old do you think I am?" Drew asked.

"51!" she exclaimed.

I laughed so hard I pounded the table. Drew joined in.

"The thing is, it's too close!!" Drew yelped. "It's too close for comfort!"

(The real answer, for those of you counting at home, is...46).

ROAR!!!

Rachel's latest way of having fun is pretending she's a lion or tiger and scaring Drew and me. Most of the time, it's true, she enlists my help in scaring Drew when he's downstairs showering or returning from running errands. Then Rachel and I will whisper that it's a good idea to try to frighten Daddy, so she'll say, "I've got a great idea! Let's roar him!"

We were cuddling in the glider last night while Drew was finishing up a high-profile story in the latest of his "Bankers Behaving Badly" beat stories. She whispered to me, "When Daddy comes upstairs, let's roar him."

"Are we tigers or lions?" I asked.

"Lions," she decided.

The great thing is, whenever we both roar at Drew, he really does appear startled. There's nothing like a low Mommy roar accompanied by the tiny roar of a 3 1/2 year old trying to look fierce that is enough to make you collapse with laughter.

The latest Rachel-isms

Here's what The Cute One said today:

We are supposedly on the do-not-call list, but we still get annoying telemarketers calling during dinnertime. I used to jump up and answer the phone, but a couple of months ago I just stopped. When Rachel would tell me to answer it, I started saying, "I'm just going to let it go." She picked that up from me and now SHE says, "Just let it go." (Trying to communicate the importance of the dinner hour being sacred).

Tonight, while we were all eating Drew's spaghetti and meatballs at around 8 p.m., THE PHONE RANG.

"You should let that go, Dad," Rachel said in her most grown-up voice. "I think it's a telemarketer."

***

Rachel was telling us about a boy named Vicente that had pushed and hit her and her friend Devin at school today. We acted shocked and dismayed and told her he had behaved badly.

"I don't push and hit," she said. Then she thought about it for a second and said, "I like pushing buildings."

We told her that was perfectly okay.

***

Rachel also noticed a bow left over from the Hanukkah gifts I mailed to Mom, Dad, Darryl, Daniella and Duckie today.

"Will you buy me a bow at the store for my present?" she asked, a little plaintively.

Drew nodded yes.

"OK," Rachel said. "That's a good idea."

***

I was upstairs sorting through some documents for a story I'm writing when Rachel quietly crept up the stairs (though not so quietly that I couldn't hear her quiet little breaths) and yelled, "ROAR!"

When I drew her onto my lap and hugged and kissed her goodnight, she gave me a little kiss, got up, and said this just before she went back downstairs:

"When it's time for you to go to sleep and you get distracted of work, you gotta go straight to sleep," she ordered. I could only thank her for looking out for me. 

Rachel has a rough night

I got home late from work tonight to find a solemn Rachel in the kitchen. Drew was kind of quiet, too.

"What's the matter?" I asked, immediately sensing the mood.

Drew informed me that Rachel had accidentally dropped her little red plastic chair because she wanted to help Drew make dinner, and she dropped it on her toe. She yelped. Then a little later, she accidentally dropped Drew's salad and started crying. "I'm worried you'll be mad at me," she said.

"Sweetie, I'm not mad at you," Drew said soothingly. "Everybody has accidents. But the important thing is to figure out why you had the accident and to figure out how not to have it in the future. Because anybody can have an accident, but only some people can learn from their accidents. And if you're one of those people, you'll be better off than everyone else. Do you understand?"

She nodded her little head and Drew gave her a kiss.

***

Last night Rachel and I were reading books by the firelight (she brought in two books from her bedroom and said I could read one book and she could "read" the other. I ended up reading her both, of course).

One book was "Ten Little Fingers and Ten Little Toes," a book about all the babies who are born in the world. It used to make me cry while I read it to her as a baby, because there's a part that talks about a baby that was "truly divine, because THIS little baby is mine, all mine," and it captured exactly what I felt about Rachel.

Then I read the first "Knuffle Bunny" book, which made me teary-eyed. I was also completely exhausted from lack of sleep over the past week or so. I drew Rachel in to my lap and whispered, "please don't grow up too fast, OK?"

"Okay," she said cheerfully. "I probably won't grow up because I don't eat my vegetables."

I, of course, cracked up.

***

When Drew picked Rachel up from preschool today, she was playing with a kid in her class named Andrew. He marched right up to Drew and said, "Can I come to your house and play with Rachel? It'll be a playdate!"

Drew said he'd have to arrange it with Andrew's mommy and daddy. If it happens, it will be the first boy playdate we've had (besides Noah, of course; he and Rachel are really fond of each other). Good to see that Rachel doesn't think all boys are "awful," although she does tend to take my side against Drew when he does something, um, boy-like.

Sweet girl

We spent today (the morning part of it, anyway) at my friend Amy's house with her husband Greg and the boys -- Tony, 8, and Jake, almost 5. We brought over some homemade gingerbread and had brunch. The kids played more or less together (Jake sulked when Tony paid attention to Rachel) and then Rachel asked Tony if she could go upstairs and play with his toys. He took her upstairs and then rejoined us downstairs.

After a while we heard a bloodcurdling scream, "DAADDYYY!" Drew went upstairs to investigate, then brought Rachel back down and sat on the living room couch with her, reading books. When I asked him later what had happened, he said that Rachel had accidentally turned on one of the toys and a song started playing. It was loud, and, as she told Drew, "I was worried that I wouldn't be able to stop it and it would keep the boys awake."

I was totally speechless, and Amy was impressed. "She's so empathetic!" she said. "You can't teach that, you know."

Drew told us that he commented to Rachel about how she likes putting stickers on people. (She put three flamingos on Greg and one on me; and after we had moved into the kitchen and she was eating a piece of gingergread, she gave part of the piece to me and part of it to Drew, and then offered the rest to Amy and Greg). "I like giving people stickers because it cheers them up," she explained.

Later she sat on Amy's lap while Amy played the electric piano she and Greg recently bought. It was lovely hearing Christmas carols and then "Go Tell It On The Mountain." The house was filled with Christmas trees and decorations; it was very festive.

On the way home we talked about all the things we had to do with the rest of the day. "I can help you guys!" Rachel exclaimed.

Truly, we are lucky to have such a kind, compassionate daughter!

Cookie party!

Today was the first of...let's see...two cookie exchanges, one brunch, two holiday parties, two Hanukkah parties, one Hanukkah celebration at synagogue, one dinner for a friend, one New Year's Eve celebration in Seattle. I'm probably forgetting something. Most of this hasn't even happened yet and I'm already pooped.

Anyway....today was a cookie exchange at the holiday party for the NU Club of Portland (I interview prospective NU students as part of the NU Alumni Association). It was at a lavish house 11 blocks from ours; gorgeous kitchen, great kids' play area in the basement, lovely old woodwork, a comfortable porch -- just what you'd expect from 1911 construction. Rachel spent most of the time playing downstairs and watching the Christmas version of the movie "Shrek." I left a little early because I had work to do at home, and as I walked through our neighborhood I was struck by how beautiful it looks this time of year, with Christmas trees in the living room and lights outside. I was especially touched by the Jewish house I saw with a menorah in every window, a treehouse decorated in blue and white lights, and dreidel stickers on the front door. Almost went up and knocked and said how nice it was to know that my neighborhood isn't totally Christian.

Rachel got some nasty cuts on her face today; while she was with Drew at the farmer's market, they went inside Portland State University to warm up, and she ran to him and crashed into the edge of a very sharp table. We put princess Band-Aids on the cuts under and above her eye; poor little thing looks like a prizefighter. I told her that because she's so little and growing so fast, the cuts should heal fast, too. I hope I'm right; I hate to have to explain what happened to the preschool teachers.

I was a bit blue today and Rachel picked up on it. While I was upstairs sorting through papers for the story I'm working on, she came up to me and put a heart sticker on my chest. "This is to cheer you up," she said. I told her she was such a wonderful little girl to think of me.

She's also developing a taste for old-timey music. "Paper Moon" played on the CD today, part of  "Big Band" series of CDs I like to play, and as soon as it came on she told me, "I like this song because it cheers me up." Love that she's developing an appreciation for the classics!

Rachel invents a word

Tonight Rachel finished a lollipop for dessert (she at a plateful of pasta shells, which is about all she eats for dinner these days except when we have chicken, duck or turkey soup. It's maddening that she won't even TRY vegetables. I can only hope she still develops normally) and she needed to know which place to put it...the paper garbage? Compost? Recycling?

"Is that garbageable?" she asked.

Astonished, I asked, "Did you hear Daddy say that? Or did you make that word up all by yourself?"

She smiled and said she made it up. I said something about her being very imaginative. Really, it's a great word. (And by the way, the lollipop stick went into the paper garbage. Apparently the first episode of "Portlandia," which airs Jan. 6, has a wonderful take on this city's obsession with recycling).

***

The stakes are getting higher for Hanukkah Mom: Rachel (and presumably her entire class) now knows the dreidel song: "Oh, dreidel dreidel dreidel, I made it out of clay, and when it's dry and ready, my dreidel I shall play." And today, Teacher Erin informed me that the pastor of St. James wants to sit it on my talk. Great, now I'll actually have to be thorough and accurate. Perhaps I should just drop of the sufganyot and let them figure things out for themselves....

Hanukkah Mom

And so my life as a cultural ambassador begins: I was asked (actually, Drew was asked) to invite me to give a talk about HANUKKAH to the kids at St. James. Yes, it's a Lutheran church but a lot of non-observant Christians go there and I was very surprised to hear that Rachel is the only Jewish kid in her whole preschool. So guess who gets to try to convince all the children that Hanukkah is really a better deal than Christmas because you get EIGHT presents instead of one, and you don't have to listen to Daddy curse as he trips over the Christmas lights, and eating ham is a lot more boring than sufganyot and latkes??

I plan to head to a craft store and make a big menorah out of construction paper, complete with candles that the kids can "light" just before they head home for the night. And you bet I'm going to play up the Maccabees' victory (which all the warrior kids will love) and ply everyone with jelly donuts (homemade, if I can manage it) and teach them the dreidel song, plus the song in Yiddish than Mom and Dad taught us when we were kids...Rachel can almost sing it by herself! A 3 1/2 year old learning Yiddish! In America! Oy vey!

***

Tonight Rachel said that she and Andrew, a kid in her class, were playing "werewolves" in school today, and that they tried to scare all the other kids.

"We were running around and getting lots of exercise," she said. "He was a boy one and I was a girl one."

***

One of the reasons I'm glad to be teaching the kids Hanukkah songs is that Rachel has already started memorizing Christmas songs. Nothing with Little Lord Jesus, thank God, but enough mentioning Christmas that I can't help wincing (in fairness, she asks me to sing her the Yiddish Hanukkah song almost every night).

It's also my fault that I play albums like "A Charlie Brown Christmas" and some other Christmas-themed albums because, let's face it, there aren't any decent Hanukkah albums out there (I'm hoping Paul McCartney's recent marriage to a Jewish socialite will change that; he supposedly is converting to Judaism next year). Anyway, Rachel listened to a verison of "Do you hear what I hear?" and instead of "a child, a child/shivers in the cold/we will bring him silver and gold," she substituted, "the bumblebees, the bumblebees/we will bring them pollen/we will bring them pollen," which I thought was completely adorable.

***

She was so sweet tonight; as we cuddled in her bed together, she reached over to me, just like I do to her, and swiped my nose gently with her index finger, then kissed me softly on my cheek and lips. And just before she fell asleep, she kept patting my cheeks with her little hand.

Yes, it's true: I'm in love.

We have reading!!

Drew, who is by far the better parent than I (me?), always is searching for teachable moments with Rachel. For instance, she knows the basics of very simple subtraction because while she was working away at her Halloween gummy bears, he'd say, "OK, you have 6 bears on your plate. What's six takeaway one?"

It took her a couple of tries, but now she knows to say, "Five!"

When she gets down to one, and Drew says, "What's one takeaway one?"
"Zero!" she shouts.
Drew apparently doesn't intend to introduce her to negative numbers. Yet.

***

OK, so tonight I was mixing up some chocolate quick bread as part of a fundraiser for our synagogue (the auction winner gets one quick bread per month from me, for six months; we're starting with chocolate peppermint bread and moving on to gingerbread, pumpkin bread, cinnamon streusel bread, banana chocolate chip bread and finishing up with orange tea bread) when Drew came in and announced flatly, "Rachel can read."

"What?!?" I gasped. "You really need to let me turn off the mixer before you drop a bombshell like that."

Turns out there was a reason she didn't get to bed tonight until after 10 -- they were reading "Snow White" for the millionth time, and Rachel asked, as usual, what certain words meant, and then Rachel started sounding them out, like Drew told her to, and after a couple of tries she can now read "the" wherever it appears in the story. And "snow." and "white."

She may, in fact, be reading even before she's 4! War and Peace, anyone??




***

Cute Rachel sayings today:

At breakfast this morning, she asked me, "Is today a school day?"
"No, sweetie!" I answered cheerfully.
"Yay!" she said. Then added in a singsongy voice, "I can fool around!!"

***

Drew and I were up quite late last night -- me watching an escapist movie because I really needed to; Drew finishing up the latest book he's reviewing for the Seattle Times. Result: We slept quite late this morning -- until 9ish -- and Rachel, bless her little heart, was so quiet! She never even knocked on our door.


Finally I heard her breathing outside, got up, pulled on some clothes and took her into the kitchen.

"I was windering, 'when are they ever gonna wake up?' she said. "I was worried!"

***

Drew made cinnamon French toast for breakfast out of the challah he bought yesterday. It was delicious. Rachel noticed our 90-year-old neighbor, Fay, through the kitchen window.

"I'm having cinnamon French toast, neighbor Fay!" she said (Rachel apparently believes "Neighbor Fay" is her name). "Do you want one? Is it yummy?"

Rachel speaks Spanish?!?!?

Last night at dinner Rachel astonished me by counting almost perfectly to 10 in Spanish! Turns out they are teaching her some words and numbers in Spanish in preschool.

The other night when Drew made some comment or other about speaking Spanish, the conversation went like this:

Rachel: Corduroy speaks Spanish! (Corduroy is the stuffed bear in the beloved kids' series in the 1970s that I remember reading as a kid. One of the best things about being a parent is you have a perfect excuse to re-read all those great books you read as a child!)

Drew: I think he speaks English, doesn't he?

Rachel: Well, Lisa (Corduroy's pre-teen owner) speaks English and Spanish.

Drew: That's right, she does!

Rachel: What do YOU speak?

Drew: I speak English, and and some Spanish, and a little bit of French.

Rachel: Say something in French!

Drew: Ou est la salle de bain?

Rachel: What does THAT mean?

Drew: It means, "Where is the bathroom?"

Rachel: Oh. (Pause). Can you say it in Hebrew?

As Drew says: She keeps us on our toes, that one.

Rachel's a Crimson fan!

Tonight I was reading Rachel "Knuffle Bunny Free," and I started crying (as I usually do) at the part when Trixie gives her Knuffle Bunny to a wailing baby on the plane, then gets a thank-you note from the baby's parents, and then her daddy writes her a letter to be opened in the future, about how he hopes he lives long enough to see her get married, start her own family...and then one day get a package (Knuffle Bunny) from an "old friend." I'm tearing up as I write this.

Anyway, while I was reading and crying, Rachel said, "does this book make you sad?"
"Yes, Rachel," I sniffled.
"It makes me sad, too," she said, getting visibly distressed.

I explained to her that most parents are sad when their kids grow up.

"You can come to college with me!" she said cheerfully.
"Where are you going to go?" I asked.
"Harvard College!" she answered, and I burst out laughing.
"What are you going to study?" I asked.
"Chocolate!" she said, grinning.

***

Perhaps she really will go Ivy League: While I was cleaning up from dinner and making my salad for lunch this week, I heard a strange little noise from her room. In the course of trying to open her door to investigate it, I bumped up against her body. I assumed she was trying to open the door to the bathroom.

Imagine my surprise when I saw the pages of her Fairy Tales book open next to her night light! "Are you trying to read by the night light?" I said. "Yes," she answered meekly.

At first I told her she really couldn't read this late at night and asked her if she wanted to take the book to bed. "It's too heavy," she sniffled, and got into bed and started crying. Of course, I gave in right there.

"It's OK, sweetie," I said. "You can read a little while. But don't stay up all night, OK?"

"OK, she said cheerfully through her little tear-stained face. The last thing I said before shutting the door? "I'm so proud to have a little girl who likes to read!"

Drew has competition

In case you couldn't tell from the last post...Rachel has totally fallen for "Uncle David." That's because he patiently showed her endless pictures on his iPhone, introduced her to a cool airplane flying game, and pulled up old You Tube videos of Tweety Bird cartoons.

Yesterday after breakfast, all the girls in the house -- Anne, Jean, me and Rachel -- trooped to the soaking pool near our house while David did work and Drew got gas for his car, recycled a bunch of cans and read the book he's reviewing for the Seattle Times. "No stinky boys ALLOWED!" we all said as we left the house, and the excursion turned out to be a great one for the females. I thought Rachel would be freaked out by going in the water in the cold and rain outside (especially when the raindrops kept plopping on our heads) but she was fine. She loved the pool, and I hooked her arms onto my shoulders and we swam slowly from one end to the other, and we hung by the bubbler, and sat on the steps going in to the pool and watched some kids around her age swim to their parents.

"This is so nice and relaxing," Rachel said at one point.
"Yes it is, Rachel," I agreed. "I like to come here when I'm stressed-out and tense."
"Me too!" she agreed.

When we got back, Drew built us a fire(the fourth one of the weekend; thank you Anne and Dave for bringing the extra cord of wood! We really needed it!) -- and Rachel and I snuggled on pillows on the floor, turned out the living room lights and watched the fire. Anne was on the loveseat working on her computer; Jean was sitting on the big couch and David was sitting next to her. Drew left to get groceries; Rachel, discovering he was gone, started crying because he'd promised to take her with him.

"Come here, sweetie," David beckoned, and Rachel climbed into his lap. Within minutes, she was asleep.

"Anne, could you put another log on the fire?" he asked after a while.

"That's your job," she replied.

"Uh, I can't," he said. "I have a little girl on my lap."

Then David added, "My life is now complete. This is WONDERFUL."

Thanksgiving weekend

Sneaking away from everyone upstairs around the fire to write this. It has been a fantastic holiday weekend so far. Some highlights:

--Thank you to Anne, David and Grandma Jean for being so flexible on Wednesday and coming at 8 p.m. instead of 1:30 p.m. The extra time allowed me to finish cleaning the house, pay some bills and further de-clutter my mail. So I was completely ready for our guests.

--Thanksgiving Day was great. David and Grandma Jean took turns reading to and playing with Rachel while Drew and I busied ourselves with the turkey, the pumpkin cocoa cake (which I really should have made Wednesday night; I'll know better next year!) and the side dishes. We sat down to dinner at 5:30 and by 9 or so, had ripped through the lemon roasted turkey, bourbon spiked yams, stuffing, green bean casserole (Anne's specialty), cranberry relish (Amanda and Jenn, who arrived around 1:30 by train) and pumpkin pie (Jenn), plus the cake. I hereby give up any attempt to make pumpkin pie ever in my whole entire life because Jenn's is cleary so superior I will never be able to touch it. I did, however, make whipped cream with powdered sugar. Color me intimidated.

--On Friday Anne, Jean and David and Jenn & Amanda and I had a lazy breakfast of nut bread and cinnamon rolls (Grandma Jean -- thanks!), cereal and bacon. Then Jean, David and Anne went to visit Doug, Linda and the kids and Amanda, Jenn, Drew, Rachel and I took a walk in Tryon Creek State Park. Rachel stole Jenn's hat and had a great time clowning around in it. We ordered in pizza when we got back and I promised everyone popcorn and homemade hot chocolate. We ate and drank while watching Toy Story 2 (which Rachel stayed awake for about half before her lids grew heavy and it was really time to put her down to sleep) and then the grownups watched "The American" with George Clooney (terrible; don't rent it). Anne, David and Jean got back about 1/4 of the way through the movie.

--Today was great, too; we all went to Kenny & Zuke's, Portland's approximation of a NYC deli, for brunch. Rachel was wonderful and so well-behaved; she impressed everyone by artfully drinking from a full-to-the-brim glass of orange juice; half a bagel; most of Drew's challah French toast and a fruit cup. Halfway through the meal she wandered over to my end of the table and asked, "what did YOU order, Mommy?" much to the delight of another mommy waiting for a table nearby. Anne, David and Jean went to visit Doug and Linda again while Drew, Amanda, Jenn, Rachel and I went to the farmer's market. We took them to the train station, Rachel and I went down for naps, and then Anne, David and Jean came back. We lit a fire and sat in front of it with Rachel, savoring the darkness, until Drew picked up our Thai takeout. Rachel snuggled in my lap in front of the fire, then brought her soccer ball-shaped pillow from her bed and insisted I cover her with her argyle blanket. When it came time for bed, she insisted, "Uncle David books!" probably because David had been reading to her all day and showing her pictures on his iPhone. (He also was impressed with her grasp of an airplaine game on his iPod; she had a great time "flying" it while she snuggled on his lap on the couch. "See, this is what having a kid is like!" I said; he sighed and Drew piped up, "She's available for long-term rental!" Anne chimed in, "When she's old enough to come visit..." and I can see long weekends she'll spend up at the San Juans, sans Mommy and Daddy, hanging out with her cool aunt and uncle).

The most poignant thing so far: David saying to me, as he went into Rachel's room to read to her at bedtime, "remember your father took a liking to me because he never had a son; that's how I feel with Rachel because I don't have a kid." Part, if not all, of the reason that Thanksgiving with family is so important to me is because I want to build memories for Rachel so she'll always know that she's surrounded by people who love her, who will read to her and play with her and tuck her under a blanket in front of a roaring fire and give her three cookies for dessert when she really should have had only one. That's why she's such a happy kid.

Out of the mouths of....

This morning for breakfast, Drew was having a bowl of Crispix and Rachel wanted to see the back of the box. She read out the letters "O," "W," and "N."

"What does that mean?" Rachel asked.

Drew explained what own means, and said we own a car and own a house.

Then Rachel began reading what OWN stood for on the box -- Oprah Winfrey Network.

"What does that mean?" she asked.

"Oprah Winfrey Network!" Drew said. "Oprah Winfrey is a very rich lady who owns her own TV network. She used to have her own TV show, and then she decided she wanted her own TV network."

Rachel thought about that for a couple of seconds, and then she said:

"She should have been happy with what she had."

Catching up after a few days away

I went to synagogue on Friday night (my new resolve is to try to go at least twice a month) and ran into Melissa, our fellow NU grad, and her two kids Jeremy and Natalie. They invited me to eat dinner with them, and when I called home to invite Drew and Rachel, Rachel said, "Mommy, I want to do something with Daddy." Which meant that she wanted to play with Drew for a while, so I took that as a sign that going to dinner with Melissa and the kids was OK.

We went to a so-so restaurant in Northwest Portland, with Melissa talking a mile a minute and me missing my family. I treated her kids to chocolate at Moonstruck Chocolates (they were very polite and said thank you), and when I got home Drew was telling Rachel a story in the glider, about to put her to bed. She looked so happy to see me and immediately reached out to give me a hug and kiss without being prompted.

Later, Drew told me that while I was gone, Rachel was making little sad bunny whimpering noises, and Drew said, "are you a sad bunny?"

Rachel answered, "that means I'm missing Mommy."

I refrained from waking her up and covering her little face with kisses.

***

Today Rachel had her dance recital, and she did a great job of following directions. She seems to have mastered all the arcane-sounding ballet positions -- releve, sute, chasse, etc. -- positions I once knew but have since forgotten -- and when she was done she ran straight to me yelling, "Mommy!" I swung her off the ground and hugged her tight. "I can't believe I wanted a boy!" I told Drew.

Her ballet teacher, Sandy, said Rachel is ready for the Nutracker, but suggested we find a shorter version than the elaborate one put on by Oregon Ballet Theatre. There are a million dance studios and small theater companies that do this, so I'm going to try to find a 45-minute version that we can all go to. I also noticed a free show for kids her age about a little boy who turns into Frankenstein; it's called "Holiday Hullaballo" and I took Rachel last year with Doug and Linda and the kids, whom I met at a Thai restaurant after the show. Hopefully we can all go again this year.

Our adorable kid

Last night I went back to chorus for my first rehearsal in, oh, more than a year. The members all cheered and clapped when Ryan, our director, announced I was on the risers. It was a welcome antidote to the bad news about the job I'd wanted.

Drew had told Rachel that morning that Mommy would be going to chorus and they'd be on their own for dinner. So on the way home from preschool, Rachel said:

"Is Mommy at chorus?"
"Yes, sweetie," Drew replied.
"Are we on our own for dinner tonight?"
"Yes," Drew replied.
"Is chorus at the synagogue?" Rachel asked.
"No, sweetie, it's at a church," Drew said.
Pause.
"Does the chorus have a rabbi?" Rachel asked.
"No," Drew said. "But it has a funny little man called the director." And anyone who knows Ryan, the director of my chorus, knows how apt a description that is!

***

Drew and I were deep into a discussion of today's board meeting of the Oregon Area Jewish Committee, which I attended during a lunchtime break from working at home. Rachel said she wanted to say something, and Drew told her to wait until Mommy was finished.

Without a word, Rachel slid off her chair and started walking sadly away (at least, it seemed sad to me; now I think she was just tired).

"Want to cuddle against Mommy?" I asked. She didn't say anything but just went into her room. We finished our conversation, then Drew went in to her bedroom to do Daddy Books -- and found her on her chair reading out of the fairy tale book! (the one Richard gave her earlier this year when he came to visit us while Drew was at Columbia).

She also plays a lot with words these days; she invents rhyming games and invites us to join her, which we always do because it's fun, and a challenge. Drew told me tonight that when kids get to that level of sophisticated thinking about language, they're just about ready to read. I told him I wouldn't be surprised if Rachel can read by age 4. "I hope so!" he replied.

***

Speaking of cuddling....I slept late this morning while Drew was showering. Since I was working from home I could take my time getting dressed.

While my eyes were closed, I heard Rachel pad into the bedroom, hoist herself onto the bed and give me a wet kiss on the lips. "I want to cuddle with you while Daddy finishes his cereal," she said, and I gladly pulled her next to me under the covers, tucked her head under my chin, and kept giving her little kisses on her forehead and hair. She was almost asleep when Drew came in and told her she needed to get up for breakfast. She whined and kicked and said, "I wanna cuddle with MOMMY!" but Drew was firm. She needed to be at school by 9 to go on a field trip to see a play called "Pinkalicious," about a girl who wears so much pink that her daddy tells her she needs to eat brussels sprouts to even out her coloring.

Later, as she was pulling on her boots, she told me, "I wanted to cuddle with you a lot longer." I promised her she could do that when the weekend comes.

De-cluttering time!

Yesterday I found out that a really cool magazine editing/publishing job I'd applied for went to someone else. It was a blow that I'm still recovering from, and because I'd put so much off -- it would have involved a move to another city, so I didn't feel I could commit to anything more than a week or two in the future -- I suddenly felt the urge to start de-cluttering our house (also because we have a lot of people staying with us next week and I can't stand the thought of them having to weave their way through piles of junk).

Anyway...I enlisted Rachel's help tonight in cleaning out her bin of toys, the one that used to be in the living room and that we now keep in her bedroom closet. She was more helpful than I thought she'd be; I had assumed she'd kick up a huge fuss about having to get rid of her stuff but she matter-of-factly started tossing old toys into bankers' boxes. When I held up a stuffed animal or two, she'd say, "Well, that's really a baby toy," and watch it with cold, unsentimental eyes as I packed it up. It was kind of unnerving, actually -- she was wearing a cute corduroy dress with a kitty on the pocket and a pair of stockings, but her hair was pulled back by a tiny hairclip and she suddenly looked very, very grown-up to me. Enough to take my breath away, which is a usual occurrence these days.

We filled up five boxes with toys and books, and then Rachel busied herself with the playing cards covered with princesses that she discovered and told me she wanted to keep. She also said the most beautiful thing -- when I held up one of her stuffed giraffes, the one I use as a pillow when I'm cuddling with her at night, she said, "No, I want to keep it because you need it as a pillow when you lie down next to me." I was astonished at her thoughtfulness and maturity.

I thanked her profusely for working so hard, and treated her to pizza for dinner. We had a hilarious time when she asked me to sing, "She'll be coming round the mountain," and she started adding her own words -- "she'll be coming on a hot rod when she comes, vroom vroom!" which she learned at school -- and then she'd say, "and we'll all have chocolate pizza when she comes, yum! yum!" and I'd substitute, "yuck yuck!" and "no, no!" and "no way!" and "you've gotta be kidding!" and she cracked up as if I'd said the funniest thing in the world. That is the best thing about having kids -- they are so easy to entertain that I ended up thinking I'm not a total loser after all.

Catering gig

As part of a fundraiser for Congregation Beth Israel, I donated a home-cooked meal for 8, using recipes from the cookbook I wrote a few years back. Someone actually bid on it, and this past Sunday was the day the bidder and I agreed on for the meal.

That meant that I had to get up early on Saturday morning to head to a restaurant supply house and buy aluminum hotel pans and some other essentials, and pick up a brisket my co-author had helpfully ordered for me. I raced home to put the rub on by 10, because the brisket had to absorb the rub for at least 6 hours before I smoked it in my smoker for 5 hours, and then kept it in the oven at 200 degrees for 17 hours.

When I got back from the supply house, who greeted me but Rachel? She came to the garage door in her pajamas and said, "how can I help?" I promptly gave her some of the hotel pans (they were very light) and she carried them into the house, along with some of the lighter stuff I'd bought.

Then she wanted to help me pat the rub onto the brisket. At first she was hesitant because of the heavy spice smell (this rub was made of cumin, garlic, salt, pepper, ground Nicaraguan coffee and hot pepper, among other things) but then she dove right in, asking Drew to help put on her apron and dragging her little chair from the bedroom and standing next to me as I handed her the rub to pat on the meat. She did a great job.

The meal, by the way, was a wild success -- I made pumpkin soup, a pear/bleu cheese/spinach salad, brisket, a cheesy potato casserole (recipe from the book) and pumkin cocoa cake with a semisweet chocolate glaze, covered with crushed peanuts. Everyone gave a toast to me at the end; one of the couples came up to me and said, "this is some of the best food I've ever tasted!" and the hosts said over and over again how nice it was to be able to actually visit with their friends instead of trying to talk to them while preparing and serving a meal.

And they all asked if I was available for future gigs. Of course, I said, passing around the cards I'd just ordered the day before. So maybe someone will call "The Smokin' Gal: BBQ, baked goods, and other culinary delights" over the holidays and I will earn some extra money, which we really need.

Rachel's bravery

Impulsively took Rachel in to the clinic this morning to get her a flu shot. I've been meaning to get us both flu shots but haven't had the time, so today I decided we needed to because the last thing I want is for all of us to get sick next week when I have a household of people here for Thanksgiving.

We got to the clinic later than I wanted to, but we got in fairly quickly and I noted to Rachel that we would be able to sit together on a wide enough seat to get our shots. I also didn't give her the option of an inhaled flu shot -- I figure that she'll have to get lots of shots in her life so why soften her up too early? When the nurse asked who should go first, Rachel was no dummy -- she said, "Mommy first."

The nurse swabbed my left shoulder with alcohol, unwrapped the needle and gave me a shot. I winced; it hurt.

Then it was Rachel's turn. And...nothing! No crying! No whimpering! Not even a wince?

I was astonished. "You didn't even make a peep!!" I exclaimed. "You were SO BRAVE!" (It's true; I had a bunch of treats in my purse just in case she got upset, but she never needed them).

She caught on to the "you didn't even make a peep!" and on the way to the car and all the way to preschool she kept saying, "I didn't even make a PEEP!" We also decided that since we'd gotten OUR shots, it was time to nag Daddy to get HIS shot. "Time to get your flu shot, Daddy!" Rachel practiced saying.

I reminded Rachel that when she was a baby, she hated shots. She cried and cried..."WAAH!" I said, imitating her.

"Yeah, I was so startled!" she said, and again I was reminded of her amazing vocabulary.

When she got to preschool, I told Rhonda, the receptionist, that we had gotten our flu shots that morning.

"I didn't make a PEEP!" Rachel told her. "I was braver than Mommy!"

Yeah, kid, you were.

More cute sayings from Rachel

Tonight at dinner (a pasta, sausage and tomato soup that I introduced to Drew, who quite liked it; Rachel loved the macaroni but tried the soup and said she didn't like it) Rachel suddenly said, apropos of nothing:

"Sometimes Mommy cooks, and sometimes Daddy cooks!"

"Yes, Rachel," I said approvingly. "In this house, both Mommy and Daddy cook!"

***

Sometimes she sounds like a college professor.

"How was your day?" I asked when I got home.

She was drawing a rainbow on her easel upstairs.

"Well, I didn't have quite a good day," she said, then went on to say nobody wanted to play with her. Need to talk to her teachers about that.

***

Rachel ate a whole plate of macaroni, probably because she knew if she did, she'd get to have a piece of Halloween candy (we are doling it out, one at a time, only IF she has a good dinner. Now she goes around saying that Drew, I and other people can only have a treat if they have a GOOD DINNER). She said:

"I'm so proud of myself for eating my macaroni!"

Drew and I cracked up.

Occupy Portland

My last digital editing class was last night, and the instructor let us out about a half-hour early. Instead of going straight home, I impulsively made a stop at Occupy Portland, our version of the Occupy Wall Street movement (yes, I think we can call it a movement now), sweeping the country.

I've lived in two developing nations and all over the United States, and I've never seen anything like this.

There was a mass meeting that started at 7. (Every day the participants hold mass, general meetings to form consensus on the most mundane to the most important things. If you agree on a point, they call for "twinkles!" and you're supposed to hold your hands up in the air and wiggle your fingers to signal you like the idea). I got there around 9:10, and they were talking about how to prepare for when the Portland Police evict everyone at 12:01 a.m. Sunday. (I should say that the encampment encompasses two parks, Chapman and Lonsdale, across the street from City Hall).

The people who spoke sounded really quite sensible. They all stressed the importance of nonviolence and brainstormed ways to to keep the movement going -- hold a mass rally, occupy another park in Northwest Portland, make signs and ride the transit system, and encourage people to ask about their signs -- there was none of the "police/politicians are evil" talk. Just the practicalities of taking down the camp -- arranging for nonviolent opposition, sitting down when police try to drag them away -- and regrouping somewhere else.

I noticed a lot of middle-aged, well-dressed people in the audience. Some wore trench coats and ID badges. Some wore comfy down jackets. Not everyone was the Portland caricature of long skirts, backpacks and dinky little caps. And everyone was respectful of the speakers, who were reading their suggestions from sheets of lined notebook paper at a microphone, while behind them, someone on a laptop projected their ideas on a giant outdoor movie screen. High tech meets low tech.

After a while my butt got cold sitting on the brick steps (I was freezing, in fact), and I decided to take a stroll around the camp. The smell hit me as soon as I crossed the street -- the smell of raw sewage, of garbage and probably human waste (although I didn't see any). But then I walked further and saw the most amazing sights: people gathered around a drummer, all chanting softly (Native American chants, perhaps?), a food kitchen doling out salad and lentils even at 9:30 p.m.; a medical tent (closed); a lending library (no one there at that hour), two guys playing chess in a tent labeled "AFCSME Local 88," with one guy wearing earbuds; tents upon tents upon tents upon tents. I passed a pregnant woman in a heavy sweater with a girl about Rachel's age on her lap, wearing a warm coat and clutching the same stuffed Curious George monkey that Rachel has.

I could have stayed there all night, observing and talking to people, but I'd promised Drew I would get home so he could go to the gym. But as I got into the car, the following thoughts tumbled through my mind:

--My daughter really, really needs to see this. (When I got home I begged Drew to take himself and her there, but I don't think he will)

--What purpose am I accomplishing in my life? What am I DOING?

--I could feel a palpable longing of everyone I saw -- a longing to belong to a cause bigger than themselves

--Americans will have no trouble surviving a terrorist attack or nuclear war. Mini-societies like the one I saw at Occupy Portland will flourish as soon as everyone realizes what's happened and that their former lives are torn to shreds, never to be mended

---I used to secretly chide my parents for not doing more during Vietnam or the Civil Rights movement (a former boyfriend of mine told me this great story once: His girlfriend asked her parents what they were doing during the Civil Rights era and they answered, "raising YOU."). But they were raising kids and doing all the normal things people do in the midst of great social change. Now I'M in that position, raising a kid and worrying about money and wanting a bigger kitchen and wondering if I'll ever get a raise -- and I'm not doing a bloody thing to make the world any better.

I've gotta work on that.

Late dinner tonight

Got home late tonight -- very late -- because I had to make up emergency business cards for a charity event I'm catering this weekend. It's a fundraiser for our synagogue; a couple bid on my offer of a homemade meal featuring recipes from my cookbook. So I'm preparing them smoked brisket and a bunch of side dishes. Drew suggested I get business cards made up just in case someone loves the meal so much that they want to hire me for a real gig.

Anyway, I got home to find that Rachel had made a cute necklace at preschool, featuring an acorn with a smiley face on it and fuzzy orange hair. It was adorable!

At dinner I was expressing my fury over the scandal at Penn State (assistant football coach raped young boys over a 15-year period; head coach, athletic director and president responded completely ineptly. As of this writing, the legendary head coach Joe Paterno is OUT, as is the university president and others directly involved in keeping quiet. This is especially interesting to me now because I work for a university) and Drew was talking...and then Rachel said sternly, "Less talking, more eating!" We laughed, stopped talking, and finished eating.

Then Rachel wanted me to read to her. She has a new trick at night: She begs and pleads and teases, "ONE more book. No. ONE more book. ONE more book!" So, of course, I always give in, even when she started the conversation saying, "I wanna read TEN books!" We worked our way down to two, and I let her get away with a third, albeit short, book.

Sickness in my house

First I got it, then Drew, now Rachel. Altogether we've all been sick since Halloween. Got a call from preschool yesterday to come pick Rachel up; her little forehead was burning up and her voice sounded like a little frog's. She perked up just a bit when we got home, but then said she wanted to cuddle after I took off her dress and told her she could eat dinner in her pajamas (only because she was sick). She fell asleep, completely asleep, leaning against my soft black turtleneck sweater. I fell asleep, too!

Today she was well enough to go back to preschool, but I worked from home just in case her temperature spiked again. She was fine when I picked her up, although she started crying after a friend of hers named Tessa told her not to jump, or yell, I don't remember what it was.

When we got home she wanted to play upstairs, and we decided to build a tower and a prince and princess out of Duplo blocks. When I made my prince say hello to her princess, Rachel burst into tears again and stunned me with what came next: "Your prince is better than my princess!"

What are you supposed to DO at these moments?? I took her in my lap and told her that different people are good at different things, and that she'd discover that she did things better than other people, and that she hadn't even finished building her princess yet, for heaven's sake! We finished both, and they got married and lived happily ever after -- and then we knocked the tower down.

***

Over dinner Rachel got weepy again when I told her she needed to eat big sips of her chicken soup before she was able to get dessert. I took her in my lap again and she explained that Sadie, one of her friends at school, never wants to play with her. "She says, 'I don't want to play with you. I want to play with DEVIN!'" Rachel said sadly.

"Why not ask other kids if they want to play with you?" I replied.

"They all play with each other," she said. "No one wants to play with me."

"How about reading a book?" I said.

"There's nowhere to read," she replied.

We left the issue unresolved, but I had a heavy heart as I tried to soothe her. I thought we were years away from the exclusionary nature of cliques. I had a nightmare of a childhood trying to fit in, and I hope so much that Rachel doesn't experience that.

Dinner with friends

This morning I had to attend a new members' orientation meeting for the Oregon Area Jewish Committee that lasted until 1:30, and I had a bunch of errands to run before we headed out to our friends Melissa and Steve's house. They live in Lake Oswego, so it was a bit of a drive to get there but totally worth it (even if I was hung over from the nice evening out Drew had treated me to on Saturday night).

Rachel was a total champ, as usual. She hung out at the kitchen table with the big kids, eating a little of the lasagna and being a friendly little person, while Drew and I talked with Melissa, Steve, and their high-powered guests, one of whom is a classics professor at Reed College and one of the world's experts on the Sparta monarchy and met her husband at Oxford. I brought a homemade fig cake with buttermilk glaze that the classic professor adored and immediately demanded the recipe for.

After a while I went into the kitchen to check on Rachel, and all the kids (there were three other pre-teen girls and one pre-teen boy who wandered in and out of the festivities) had left the table. Guess what they were watching? The Sound of Music, my favorite movie in the whole world (which I of course told Rachel), and her legs were tucked under a big blanket just like the other kids and she looked so adorable I wanted to cover her little face with kisses. One of the dads had come in and told his 13-year-old it was time to go home, and she pleaded with him to stay, and then Drew and I joined him, and Rachel looked up and said, "Go away, Mommy and Daddy! Go join the other grownups." Really, it's hard not to laugh at her sometimes.

Playdate PDX

Well, the day didn't begin very promisingly. Somehow I lost the earpiece to my Smartphone, the one I use to talk to all of you when I'm driving (about the only free time I have these days) as I drove from work to synagogue. Checked the car, my coat pocket, my pants pockets, the street, the sanctuary, the room where the Oneg Shabbat was -- nothing. Very frustrating, because I'm extremely careful about knowing where my Smartphone and earpiece are at all times.

This morning I was preparing to head to the Verizon store to replace the earpiece when Rachel said sternly, "you need to have breakfast."

"I can't, Rachel," I said, firmly. "I have to go out."

"Well, you're going to be hungry," she said sadly.

And she was right. By the time I got home at 11, calmer (the earpiece cost less than I had dreaded it would), I was ready for a piece of homemade strawberry bread, bacon and tea. And I took Rachel on my lap as she was changing into her stockings and leotard and said, "thank you for caring that I'd be hungry. That meant a lot to me." She smiled.

***

When she got back from ballet class, I took her to meet my friend Sarah and her 4 1/2 year old son, Noah, at Playdate PDX, a great indoor playpark with an awesome play structure (complete with slides that are scary fast even for grownups) and really good food (my hot chocolate was excellent). Sarah and I were a bit dismayed when we arrived since the place seemed way too crowded and we were annoyed by all the big kids who kept crashing into our kids and the staff's uncaring, unconcerned response.

After 2 or so, things cleared out a bit and Sarah and I got to talk while we sent Noah and Rachel to play. They handled themselves really well, racing back to our table once in a while to check in, but otherwise they were on their own and seemed to like the independence. When it came for lunch, Rachel was a CHAMP. She ate a whole hot dog (minus the bun), apple slices dipped in caramel, and milk, with goldfish crackers for dessert (after I talked her out of a cupcake). I had only ordered hot chocolate because I figured I could eat whatever Rachel didn't want to finish. Result: No lunch for Mommy! Hard to believe I ever worried about Rachel's eating habits. She's still disdainful of vegetables (I made a point of noting that Noah likes peas and carrots) but otherwise she really seems willing to try new things.

Even Noah decided the place was too chaotic -- "this place is too crazy," he told me as he and Sarah prepared to leave. "I'm going to the liberry" -- but Rachel was up for more play, so we said goodbye. Rachel ran off to the play structure, then came back totally unexpectedly to give me a hug. "I'm giving you a hug to thank you for showing me where all the things are," she said, meaning the different entrances to the play structure. She is so considerate, she really bowls me over sometimes.

What Drew and Rachel do when I'm not around

Last night was the next-to-last night of my digital video editing class, and Drew said he and Rachel played baseball upstairs, as well as "chicken."

"Chicken" involved Rachel sitting on one of my old donut-shaped nursing pillows and pretending she was sitting on imaginary eggs. When they hatched, Drew pretended he was a baby chick and said, "peep peep!" Then he held open his mouth to be fed, and Rachel told him he needed to go to sleep. He tucked his head under his arm. Then she woke him up and told him it was time to go to animal school.

Tonight I went to synagogue, and when I called Drew to let him know I was on my way home, he answered sternly, "We're doing a Dr. Seuss puzzle" with that don't-disturb-us tone. I laughed, but when I got home I saw it was true -- Rachel had done most of a Dr. Seuss Happy Birthday puzzle. "Mommy, wanna see the Dr. Seuss puzzle?" she demanded when I walked in the door. "Take off your coat!" she ordered, then dragged me in to the living room. I exclaimed over it and she seemed very happy.

Drew also reports that she ate a grilled cheese sandwich at school today and liked it. "Daddy makes the best grilled-cheese sandwiches in the WHOLE WORLD!" I told her, and Drew promised her he'd make her one for lunch sometime.

Oh, and tonight during her bath, Drew said Rachel pretended she was in the soaking tub at the Kennedy School while it was snowing outside. Evidently she remembered the promise I made to her last week that I'd take her there when it was cold outside and we could soak together. 

Rachel, the schoolkid

This past Saturday, we were watching a movie late at night when Drew heard the little patter of footsteps downstairs. Turns out Rachel was trying to go to the bathroom and needed help unzipping her pajamas.

All was well until Drew discovered the cache of BOOKS next to her bed. She had gotten up out of bed after he'd tucked her in, grabbed a whole bunch of books and was trying to read them by the light of her night light!

I was astonished.

Drew gently chided her for doing that, although secretly we were both extremely pleased. But he told her she needed her sleep and if he caught her doing that again, he'd take away the night light.

***

Tonight was another reminder of how much Rachel wants to read and write. I was bustling around getting dinner ready after taking the day off work because I was sick. All of a sudden I realized Rachel had started writing in a notebook of mine -- the capital letters E, O, and T! I was so proud. "What does that spell??" Rachel said. I told her it wasn't a word, but that if I added "P" at the beginning it would spell "POET." She was very impressed.

Later, I peeked into the living room to the most gorgeous sight -- Rachel, in jeans, a sweatshirt and her flip-flops (she insisted on changing into them when we got home from preschool) lying on her tummy, using one of her colored pencils to trace letters in a workbook Drew bought her a couple of weeks ago. One foot was in the air, another on the ground, as if she was doing...homework!

She stayed like that for 20 minutes. I took pictures.

***

The whole writing thing really makes me thing about letters and how kids process the act of writing. I was watching her trying to write letters and for a moment I was in her shoes, trying to decipher these squiggly lines and make them mean something --- kind of like Man's ancestors. She looks up to Drew and me because we can write, and it's something we totally take for granted, when in fact we went through the same process she did. And if a kid has anything wrong with them -- bad brain chemistry, developmental delays -- the act of writing can be agony. I feel for them and am glad we have a kid who appears to be developing normally.

***

Today's Rachel-speak:

At dinner tonight, she said she had a bad day because Devin and Sadie, her friends at preschool, didn't want to play ball with her. When I asked her if she'd asked other kids to play with her, she said she had and no one wanted to play with her, either. "I was lonely," she said sadly.

Then she added:

"Somethings Devin and Sadie call me baby and I say no pretending and no real. And usually kids don't like to be called babies, you know. Especially me."

On why she doesn't like dogs:

"The problem is, the reason I don't like dogs is I'm worried they're going to eat my food. That's why I'm afraid of dogs."

Apropos of nothing:

"Elephants are so strong. Especially Mommy and Daddy elephants."

Happy Halloween?

Rachel and Drew got into a car accident this morning. Very minor; both Drew and the woman who plowed into him were at an intersection; Drew, having arrived first, began driving through, and the other driver somehow spaced out and blew out his headlight. He's OK, Rachel's OK, and the other driver admitted the accident was totally her fault...but it's still a hassle. Drew's car won't be fixed until Thursday, which means I'll be solely responsible for taking Rachel to and from preschool the next few days. Which is fine except that I'm feeling really crummy and am thinking of staying home tomorrow. Ugh.

The accident happened on the way to preschool, and as soon as Drew and the woman exchanged insurance information and he got back in the car, Rachel told him, "While you were outside talking to that lady, one big tear rolled down my cheek."

"Why, honey?" he asked.

"I was afraid we'd be late for school," she replied.

She was in her fairy costume because the teachers had told her class they'd be going to the baby room to show off their finery, then would change into their pajamas for a pajama party. Rachel indeed missed her Purple class, but the Pink class let her join them. And hopefully that is all the excitement we'll have for today.

***

"Do you love me?" Rachel asked at lunch yesterday.

"Oh, yes I do," I sighed.

"I love cuddling with you," she answered. Then:

 "Even when you're mad or sad or angry, do you still love me?"

"Of course I do!" I exclaimed. "When you're mad or sad or angry, do you still love me?"

"Yes," she said.

"I may get mad or sad or angry at you, but my love for you will never change," I said. "Do you understand that? It's really important."

Comic relief

Years ago before I had children, a good friend of mine, an editor at the Pioneer Press, said to me, "You have children for comic relief."

We had one of those moments tonight. I'd just gotten a call from my friend David Jones telling us about the big snowstorm back East. We talked about it at dinner, which led to a conversation about Rachel learning to ice skate and ski this winter and play in the snow.

"You can ice skate but not ski," she said to Drew.
"Other way around," he said. "I can ski but not ice skate."
"Why?" Rachel asked.
"I'm clumsy," he answered. Then he added, "No, I'm awkward."
Without skipping a beat, Rachel replied, "No, you got it right. You're clumsy."

As we hooted with laughter -- me slapping the table over and over again because I couldn't stop -- she added, "You were right the first time. You're big and clumsy."

***

Drew sang a little of "In the Mood" to Rachel yesterday. She has already decided she doesn't like "Paper Moon," which is a shame, because Drew and I love it. Here's her assessment of both songs:

"I like 'In the Mood' because it's cheerful. I don't like 'Paper Moon' because it's boring, but if I hear 'In the Mood' when I'm sad, it would cheer me up."

***

Comment of the evening:

"We're parking goddesses, right, Mommy?"

You better believe it, kid.

Halloweenie!

"I'm so excited for Halloweenie!" Rachel said tonight, trembling.

(The latest cute thing she does is tremble when she's excited. It's so adorable!)

Drew pretended that she meant we would eat weenies on Halloween instead of duck soup (after she fills up on trick-or-treat candy, of course!). Rachel and I had a good time feigning horror and exclaiming, "No! Noo!" until he finally relented.

Rachel and I also outflanked Drew in the "over/under" argument. As in, should the toilet paper be inserted in the holder so the paper rolls OVER the roll, or UNDER?

I'm an under person; Drew is an over. We've been arguing about this for years. It even continued in Africa, when Drew would sign his letters, "p.s. over." It took so long for me to catch on that he claimed he won the battle. HAHAHA, I said, and continued to insert the toilet paper under.

(Really, people, we do discuss more substantive stuff. Like, if it's ever OK to deny medical care for your kid based on religious beliefs, or if the economy will improve in time for Rachel to find a job and leave our house; and how many men are on a baseball team. I still don't know the answer to that one. Nine? Eleven? Does it really matter?).

Tonight Drew told me that he and Rachel were having the over/under discussion, and before I could prompt her, Rachel -- who was sitting and listening to us -- yelled, "UNDER." I said, "yeah, UNDER!" Drew said "OVER!" but he was no match for the two women at the table. I feel so sorry for him -- this is only the first of many times he's gonna be outvoted on critical issues.

***

Drew pretended he wasn't going to share the pretend candy bars he told Rachel he would eat for dinner one of these days (instead of a nutritious meal).

"There's a rule you need to share your candy with us, Dad!" she admonished him. "Sharing is caring!"