John's first week of pre-school

John on his first day of preschool. Sept. 11, 2007.

As I did with Zoey in Texas, 5 other moms and I are doing a co-op preschool. This is something I wouldn't have considered if I hadn't first done it out of sheer necessity--preschools in our neighborhood in Dallas were a bit pricey and we were and are a bit cheap--but now I continue the co-op preschool because I love it. For me it is the right balance of home school and having a little free time to myself. We have class two days a week and I should teach once every six weeks. We rotate teacher from week to week but keep the same routine. John loves it.

John and his class.

John is going through a color with the whole box of crayons phase. This way everything looks like his favorite tie dye shirt. By the way since someone asked, John doesn't wear that shirt every day. I know he is in a lot of pictures in it but that's because there are actually two tie-dye shirts and they are both his favorite. He wanted to wear one on the first day of school but the clean one had several large holes because John thought it would be an even a cooler shirt if he cut it up. Needless to say I made him wear something a bit more respectable.

I wanted him to look as respectable as possible because I am a bit worried about John being the problem child in the group. Before preschool started we had to write a profile about our child to share with the other teachers. As I wrote it, I became nervous, in the first paragraph John wasn't sounding too good. I might as well include a portion of his profile here:

John doesn't listen. We joke that his name should be John John John John John! He is not ignoring you he is just deep in his own world. (I'm not as fortunate as Christy to know much about my child's imaginary world.) John takes things apart. He went through a period where he felt it was his duty to remove all the cupboard handles in the house. He runs and jumps constantly and when he is in a chair he has a hard time sitting still. He has atrocious table manners. And as you all now know he is allergic to peanuts.

Now that you know the worst, let me say John does have a few redeeming qualities--besides good looks and a winning smile. First, he loves stories. A surefire way to get John to sit still and be quiet and stop taking things apart is to read to him. He will sit still for hours on end--I've never gone beyond three hours but I suspect he could go much longer. He also is happy to sit in a corner and read his books. (He has no idea that he can't read.) John also loves to follow commands. Often when he is underfoot I ask him to build me a castle and usually he will go and do this. In general John likes to please, he just doesn't have a good sense of appropriate behavior (Why shouldn't he take the toilet seat off the toilet and wear it around his neck? It seemed the thing to do.) He has a big heart and is almost impossible to offend or hurt and is very affectionate. Sometimes you may need to remind him to be gentle when he gives you or another child a hug.

Sorry about the toilet seat story once again, but I thought since so many of my friends and family are far away you might appreciate hearing a little bit about what John is like at 3.
Thankfully John behaved on the first day of school. He listened and was obedient and as far as we know he didn't take apart any of their appliances.

Dude

This is what happens when you have a baby born in La Jolla, he starts saying "Dude" at a tender age. Actually we think Will picked up on the word much earlier than the other kids because it is what Bill usually says to John when he is in trouble such as, "Dude! Why are you wearing a toilet seat ?" Anyhow since "Dude" is such a versatile word it has greatly expanded Will's ability to communicate. Dude can mean so many things from: "Cool" to "What's up?," to "Did you see that?" to "See you later." It's all about the intonation and facial expression. But mainly Will just uses the exasperated form of dude either because that's what he hears all the time or because he's tired of sitting in the high chair or stroller being ignored. Other words in Will's repertoire include: mom and dad, Lizzy, balloon, ball, mine, no, hi and bye. Just this week he started saying please and thank you which is a nice substitution for a greedy growl and a satisfied growl. All of my kids are big growlers at this age, I'm not sure if this is typical or just my kids.

This photo was taken at the beach on the first day of school Sept. 6. We went there because Bill's brother and his family were visiting us. I don't have any good photos of their visit but fortunately Collette is an awesome blogger and you can read all about their California visit at nathanandcollette.com/2007California.html There are some nice photos and if you are thinking of visiting us in San Diego you might get some good ideas of things to see and places to go. Collette has a talent for planning vacations as well as blogging. So you better check it out, dude.

(In case you were wondering because you can't see my facial expression or hear my tone, "dude" here means "friend" but on another level it is a sorry attempt to be clever and funny and bring this whole piece full circle and if you could hear me and see me say it I dare say I'd look and sound a bit self-conscious since "dude" doesn't slip out of my mouth naturally.)

Catching Up what I should have posted Sun. August 26

These are some pictures I was waiting for from the week after I dropped my camera in the tide pool. My parents were visiting so even though I didn't have a new camera yet, we do have some pictures of Zoey's birthday. Lizzy wanted to make Zoey's birthday cake and she did. I really didn't help. She even frosted it while I was at Zoey's soccer practice. Zoey is now seven. This year is not birthday party year for Zoey but we went out to lunch and she had scallops for dinner.

I did help make my mom's birthday cake-- a fruit trifle. This might be my favorite dessert pound cake, fresh fruit, a custard sauce and whip cream. My parents have visited us every year for Zoey's birthday and almost always stay around two more days to celebrate my mom's birthday too. I think it's great that the two Zoes share the same birthday week.

That Saturday after not checking my email for several days, I read an email from Bill Sherman saying he would be in San Diego that very day. We tried calling him but were unsuccessful. That evening when I got back from the grocery store, Bill (my Bill) said , "You'd better go back and get more food. Bill Sherman and his dad are coming for dinner." It wasn't a fancy dinner just french dip and oven fries but it is always good to see Bill Sherman and his dad (whose name is Jerry by the way). Bill and Jerry were great company and even helped move some furniture. Now if you don't know the saga of Wild Bill Sherman I don't think I have time to write it all here but to sum up. We met him 11 years ago when he was driving through Salt Lake looking for someone to ice climb with (we don't ice climb were not that cool but Bill's (my Bill's) sister does). Over the years Bill Sherman in between his many adventures--Denali, South America, Thailand, Dominica-- would show up on our door step. Bill is currently in Michigan doing surgery residency. Though I told Bill this (my Bill) and he said," Really I thought he was in Pennsylvania." So Bill Sherman when you get a chance you can clear us up on that?