Hope at Two

Last night, The Civee and I realized something- we’ve kept our daughter alive for two years.

It’s amazing the progress she’s made over the past 12 months. She’s getting better at understanding what we say, her speech is coming along (something we were concerned about earlier on, with her being born with a cleft lip and palate) and she went from having no hair to having a halo of hair that would make Art Garfunkel jealous. Here she is over the past 12 months:

As with every other stage, Hope is a lot of fun right now. We enjoy having her to ourselves, especially considering in a few months she won’t be the only kid in the house.

I know soon she won’t be as big a Weezer fan as she is. And she won’t repeat everything I say with such enthusiasm (she learned Hello, Newman! last night). But she is an incredible little girl. And The Civee and I are proud to be her parents.

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I Would’ve Gotten Away With It; If It Wasn’t For That Kid

For a few different reasons, The Civee and I rotate Hope’s toys in and out of use. Doing so makes the most of our space and allows her to concentrate on a few items, making the most of her time.

A few months ago, we put Hope’s wagon down in the basement. Like the other items we’ve taken out of the lineup, we don’t make an issue of it. The toy just disappears. Hope has a stroller now, so it’s not like she doesn’t have anything to push around. We all forgot about her orange and blue wagon until last night.

The Civee was at school, so Hope and I were hanging out. We were looking at some cards (her current favorite item) when she spotted one with a little red wagon on it. She started shouting “Wagon…Hope’s wagon. Push. Hope want wagon.” I tried deflecting the issue, moving on to the next card, but that only frustrated her. She started crying, demanding the wagon, but I was determined to keep it where it was. Until we had the following exchange:

Me: The wagon is…being fixed right now. It’s away.

Hope: Wagon…downstairs…basement!

Me (puzzled): Wait…what? Who told you that?

Hope (nodding): WAGON. DOWNSTAIRS. GET NOW!

I couldn’t believe it. This little not-yet-two-year-old had just Scooby-Doo-ed me. I was actually impressed with her figuring it out, so I went and got her the wagon (which made her quite happy). Later, after The Civee came home, I discussed what happened and she told me she had no idea how Hope knew where the wagon was; she had forgotten it was down there.

I don’t know how Hope did it. The next time I’ll have to act less impressed.

King Tom

Hope Cracks the Code

The Civee and I are in trouble.

Tonight, I was getting Hope changed as part of her bedtime routine. I was starting to prepare for the next step when I noticed something was missing, so I decided to ask The Civee.

Me: Did we bring up any M-I-L-

Hope: -K. Milk! Milk!

The Civee and I don’t do the spelling thing all the time, but I guess we won’t be getting away with it much longer. Maybe we’ll have to start using signs or a foreign language, but it will only be a matter of time before she figures that out too.

This isn’t the only worrisome thing to happen lately during Hope’s bedtime. The other night, as I was putting her in her crib I said “I love you,” to which she replied something that I swear was “I know.”

It was tough not to crack up, but I’d really like to know how and when she watched The Empire Strikes Back without me.

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The Making of the Green Potatoes

So we actually did some St. Patrick’s Day related things today. The Civee, Hope and I all wore green. And we went to the Columbus St. Patrick’s Day parade. We went to COSI (one of Hope’s favorite places) a few hours before the parade and let Hope play. Then we snagged a spot on the lawn, waited about 20 minutes, and watched as the first half of the parade went by us.

Hope enjoyed the festivities, but was getting low on energy, so we left for lunch. Later on in the day, we decided to add a festive twist to dinner by making green mashed potatoes (one of The Civee’s family traditions). Each night as we make dinner we’ve been allowing Hope to do one or two small things to make her feel involved. We let her add the green to the potatoes. She immediately wanted to sample her work.

She had to wait a little while, but I think the wait was worth it.

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The Wearing of the Green (With Other Colors That Don’t Match)

Over the past week, we’ve been getting Hope ready for The Civee’s favorite holiday, St. Patrick’s Day.

She’s been wearing a lot of green, which she likes. However, we had a bit of a problem yesterday, as she wanted to pick out her own pants.

I want it on the record that I did not dress her this way.

Also, this picture was taken on a Friday. I think she’s trying to steal a bite of Big Boy’s burger. While she’s learning about St. Patrick’s day, she also needs to learn about the whole not eating meat on Fridays during Lent thing.

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Post-Movie Weather

Becauee of this great Smarch weather we’ve been having, it’s been a lot of fun to be outside.

I’ve gone running, played in the backyard with Hope and one night this week, The Civee, Hope and I even ate dinner outside. I think this is the first winter in Ohio where I haven’t complained about the weather.

Earlier today, and I can’t remember why, I got to thinking about what I can best term as “post-movie weather.” It was this feeling from my younger days (when I had summers free) of exiting a movie theater on a hot summer day. I’d go from one environment, dark and very cool to hot, bright and humid. I think that was the only time I didn’t mind the combination of heat and humidity.

I was probably thinking of post-movie weather because that’s what this past week has felt like compared to the typical winter. Overall, very enjoyable for what’s supposed to be more miserable weather.

I’ll have more time this weekend to spend outside. Although it may not all be enjoyable, as I’ll have to get started with the yard work sometime.

King Tom

Fighting Fires With Hope

Hope’s favorite place in our neighborhood is the fire station two blocks from our house. It’s not bad living near a fire station; the trucks aren’t that loud and the firefighters wave to Hope whenever they drive by.

We went out for a walk tonight and as we were headed back home, we passed the fire station. For the past few months, the garage doors have been closed, disappointing Hope each time we walked by. But tonight, the doors were open and Hope went crazy (in a good way). One of the firefighters was outside and waved us over.

The firefighter invited us in and showed Hope the fire truck (the engine, as opposed to the ladder). He showed Hope his helmet, turned the lights on and even let her sit in the driver’s seat.

I think it’s safe to say this made her day. She talked about it the whole walk back home and even when we were putting her to bed.

The three of us take a lot of walks around the neighborhood and I just hope she doesn’t expect this to be a regular thing.

The Civee and I (and especially Hope) are happy to have the fire station in our neighborhood. Thanks to the crew at station 13 for making Hope’s night.

King Tom2 Comments

Work Around the House

The Civee and I have now been living in our house for two years (Hope has a few weeks to go before catching up to us). The house is older and we’ve put some work into it. We have gotten a new roof, a new fence and done a number of other projects (with the assistance of family and friends) around the house.

We wrote a list recently of things to do over the next few months. Not just the typical spring cleaning-type work, but other things we would like to finish before baby number two arrives.

I actually got a good start on the list last weekend. I finished painting/staining a bannister we added so Hope wouldn’t fall off the stairs. I replaced a malfunctioning screen door mechanism. And I removed a few kitchen cabinets, flipped them around and they now open in a direction that makes sense to The Civee and I.

But these were just a few items from the beginning of the list. I still have a long way to go. And this does not make me a handyman. It doesn’t even make me used to my own house at times.

While the screen door closes now, it does so with a snap that it didn’t have before. I can’t store things on the shelf we used to have on the stairs. And while the kitchen cabinets now open in a way that makes sense, I guess I got used to the other way, as this weekend, I kept trying to open them the wrong way.

Still, it does feel good to get things done around the house and checked off the list.

King Tom2 Comments

Indoors Inspiration

Over the past few days, I’ve had conversations with friends about blogging.

One friend is considering starting a blog. The other used to blog prolifically, but hasn’t updated his blog in a while.

Both conversations left me feeling like I should blog more. I had a streak of a few days last month where I was updating regularly, but since then I’ve had a hard time coming up with ideas. My veteran blogger friend suggested going outside. But today it’s nasty outside, so that method of inducing inspiration will have to wait.

At least we’re entering the time of year where the weather is more conducive to outside activities (unless you get hit by a solar flare). So maybe I’ll have more to write about. Or I could just write about being indoors and having nothing to write about.

King Tom2 Comments

Cooking Like the Master

My favorite restaurant of all time may not be around anymore, but I do have one of the chef’s recipes.

The second incarnation of Tomo’s Cuisine closed a few years ago and Chef Tomo Tanaka has disappeared. A few months ago, while reading reviews of his restaurant, I found Tomo’s recipe for Tuna in Daikon Sauce. Since October, tuna has been off-limits for The Civee, so I bookmarked the page with the thought I could return to it later this summer.

We had planned to have salmon for dinner tonight. We’ve had a lot of salmon recently and I was looking for something different to do. I was pondering the preparation when it hit me- what if I modified Tomo’s recipe to use salmon, rather than tuna? It would still be a gamble, because I’ve never cooked with daikon before and could see that getting out of hand.

I went to an Asian supermarket and picked up a daikon for 65 cents. It was a lot like a radish, but the bite wasn’t as strong. The key to the recipe, though, was (as the article mentions) the combination of soy sauce and butter. Surprisingly, the results were good. The Civee and Hope seemed to enjoy the salmon. The fish came apart more than I think it was supposed to, but the flavor made up for it. I’ll try this again, both with salmon, and with tuna later in the summer.

It wasn’t quite Tomo’s, but it was a nice reminder of how good his restaurant was. I may have one of his recipes. but I still have a long way to go before I can do wonderful things with food like he did.

(The original end to that last sentence read “before I can cook like him,” but The Civee nicely raised the point: “do sushi chefs cook?” To which I replied a) if all they do is make sushi, no and b) Tomo cooked a lot. But either way, to call what Tomo did as simply “cooking” would be a disservice)

King Tom