his first reflexive verb, en espanol

I have to give those "Go Diego! Go!" cartoon people credit.

The other day I was cleaning the fish tank and Andy was playing in the living room. He was trying to get a toy out of his toy box but it was stuck and wasn't budging. Normally at this point he'd throw a hissy fit and slam himself into the floor.

But this time he just yelled, "Ayudame! Ayudame!"

Now that is impressive.

('Ayudame' means 'Help me' in Spanish.)

more 'splainin to do

In addition to confusing muffin and puffin, and blimp and shrimp ("There's a shrimp in the sky, Mommy!"), Andy is confused about other things, apparently.

For example, we're watching an "Andy Movie" right now - a home movie from last winter. Andy loves to watch his home movies. And this particular video has a shot of our resident red-tailed hawk. We hear him often and see him from time to time too in the yard. In this clip the hawk is sitting on a snowy branch outside of our foyer window.

When Andy saw the video of the bird, he said, "There's a ham hock."

We've been making ham and bean soup. It's understandable.

aargh, matey!

Last evening we went to a pirate-themed Halloween party up at Oglebay. Andy went as a skunk. Shawn went as a banana. I did the pirate thing.

The place was decorated in a piratical theme, complete with life-sized skeleton in pirate garb that had a moving jaw and sword. Andy was, in his own words, horrified. We spent the vast majority of the evening outside in the cold so as to avoid the creepy pirate in the corner. Eventually he was able to work up the nerve to approach it, shake it's hand and take a Reeses' cup from it's bowl.

He did dance, or rather took my hand and ran around in circles for long periods of time until I had to stop for fear of losing my hot buttered rum and the other contents of my stomach. They also had a giant pile of pine shavings under which a few pounds of candy were buried; by the time Andy found his way out there the candy was long gone. But Andy was far more interested in the pine shavings and spent 40 minutes standing alone in the pile throwing handfuls about, covering his adorable costume and his father with them.

I have to say, though, the highlight of the evening was when I was introduced to a local pediatrician and was talking to him and his kids about this and that. I believe it was my mother who drew our attention to Andy, who was standing at the dessert table helping himself to rum balls. I'd say he got at least 3 in him before I fully grasped what was going on. I could barely bring myself to acknowledge this doctor for the rest of the evening.

Rum at 2. Way to go, me.

horror

12pm today. In the Spirit Halloween store at the mall, buying costumes for the party next weekend. I'm wandering around. Andy's following me, looking at everything.

We come to the scary mask section.

Andy runs behind my legs. I ask, "What's wrong Andy?"

He says, "I'm horrified."

rosy cheeks

I can't exactly explain this.

On Saturday Andy was being rotten. Drinking water and spitting it out and blowing wet raspberries in my face. I told him no, and got another raspberry. Finally I took a firm hold of his arm, told him no again and ordered him to sit down on the floor.

Instead of sitting down, he ran over to his father, turned around and presented his hind end to Shawn and said, "Have to beat my butt now."

Shawn and I burst into hysterics and at the same time felt terrible. We've never laid a hand on this kid. So what this whole butt-beating bullsh*t is about is beyond me....

But it was darn funny.

not good parenting

It's Halloween time again, and that means Boo at the Zoo. We decided to go last night. The kids dress up and go to various candy stations set up around the zoo. There are a few animals on display that aren't asleep, but the main attraction is the train ride.

Now if you've read either blog you know how much Andy loves trains. When we got to the zoo we'd already gone to Wash Pa during the day and ridden a few trollies. But he was still jonesing for more choo choo. So while we made the candy rounds through the zoo, he kept one ear on the train and reminded us that he wanted to ride it. As we walked under a bridge as the train sped by, he burst into tears because he thought he'd missed his chance. When we got to the station and waited in line, he again sobbed when the train left and we had to wait for the next one. I have a photo of him sitting on the bench in his skunk costume in tears and misery because the train had pulled away sans Andy.

Finally we were on this train. Andy was loving it. We went through the ostrich pen, in the dark. We went through the woods, in the dark. Awesome Mommy. Awesome Daddy.

Then the first group of guys came out of the woods wearing masks and screaming at the passing cars and passengers. Uncertainty.

The second group of guys came out of the woods. He jumped. I made the mistake of verbally acknowledging the fact that he jumped. (If you're not yet a parent, take note: if you don't verbally mention something, sometimes it can help avert disaster. Sometimes.)

The third group of guys did him in. He started to cry. People shrieked with horror/glee. He cried harder and clung to me like a tick. He buried his head in my coat and at the same time couldn't stop looking out into the woods in that fearful/obsessional way children do. Unfortunately at this point we still had another two-thirds of the ride ahead of us and I knew that more guys were lurking in the woods.

I tucked him into my coat and sung the Thomas the Train song to him. He finally stopped sobbing so hysterically and saying, "I'm scared Mommy!" I knew we had one more set of guys to go through though and I tried so hard to keep his ears and eyes covered. Of course it didn't work. He had finally calmed enough to ask me to keep singing to him when the last four guys came howling out of the woods.

And of course it started all over again. The sobbing. The clinging. The terror. The pitiful little baby voice saying, "I'm scared Mommy! I want to go home now! I want to go home now!"

Just awful. For the rest of the evening he was pretty quiet. He was visibly disturbed by a skeleton in a corner and he told his Meme all about the scary men in the woods when we got home. I was more than prepared for a 3am nightmare, but thankfully the bad dreams stayed away. For now.

So. I am officially the worst parent alive. I took my child on the train ride from hell, thinking he'd have fun and enjoy it. He was absolutely horrified. It was pretty much my worst idea ever.

I suck.

chewed out

He had a sippy cup in his teeth and was shaking his head back and forth and the sippy cup was flying around smacking me in the arm. I snatched it out of his mouth and put it down.

He yelled, "No Mommy! You're ticking me off now!"

bipolar

This is what Andy told his father this morning as he sat at the breakfast table before school:

"Hi Daddy. I woke up this morning. I cried and cried and cried. I was happy."

Somehow I don't think we've properly explained the nature of various emotions to him.

piglet

Uncle Davey is home this week to do some work on one of the family houses. So of course Andy has been all over him like a piranha on a pork chop. Today Davey and Andy and I picked up lunch for ourselves and our mom (Meme) and brought it back to her kitchen.

Andy was hurriedly working on his giant pile of rice and beans. Davey set his plate down next to Andy's elbow and went in search of silverware. Andy promptly helped himself to Davey's meal and in particular went to work on the tortilla chips. When Davey came back and absent-mindedly picked up his plate Andy suddenly got very upset.

He threw his hands out to the side and said, "Oh dear! There goes my food! Davey took it away!"

It was mighty difficult to explain the exact nature of the situation to him. Parents and grandparents freely share whatever is on their plates with the little free loader. Davey obviously just doesn't get it.

not surprising

Today on the way home from school I asked Andy what he'd done and what he'd learned.

He said, "No means STOP."

I asked, "Who said that?"

He answered, "Miss Kim said, 'Stop, boys! Stop everything!'"

Looks like there's all sorts of trouble to get into, no matter where a young lad finds himself.

don't tease me

Andy just got very angry at the little crane in his train set, burst into tears, and announced, "I'm running away!"