Christmas but no snow

I suppose this was Cybele's first real Christmas that she can maybe sort of slightly remember. It was nice and quiet this year with just the five of us and Aunt Maggie. The kids were all pretty excited about presents and Santa and snow, which we didn't get. We did have a snow recently as you can see from this picture and Cybele enjoyed it as she seems to enjoy everything. She is incredibly good natured and very easy to entertain. That being said, Cybele is not always happy. When she is unhappy it is easy to know because she tends to release a very high pitched shrill scream that means we must figure out what she wants and we must do it immediately. She mostly makes this noise while we are at dinner at a restaurant or at a store that she has deemed boring. The general public loves it. But most of the time she is just my little snow bunny. Laughing and somehow keeping up with her brother and sister.

rampaging!

Cybele will eat most anything. she gets a little piss-y if there's no banana to be had for breakfast, but otherwise, she eats anything anytime. pickles and olives, broccoli and (especially) cauliflower, beans and rices, meats and potaties, bread and all kinds of cheese, even the cheddars, even the bries, &
catfood (once). this vast array gives her the energy she needs for what she currently seems to regard as her primary vocation: rampaging. running from room to room endlessly, constantly checking to see if elias and sophia's room is open, 'cus it's her favorite, and when it is she plows in there and sits in each of the seats in turn, finds her favorite, flops down on it, rolls around on it, gets up, leaves the room to rampage to another, so she can return to her favorite one and repeat the process. she is seriously zealous about her maraudings and leaves a wrecked mess in her wake. most of the time, this is hilarious. when everyone else is tired though, i wish we could put mittens and rollerskates on her. then it would be hilarious all the time.

fish

on friday, elias' dance teacher, miss celine, told me that elias said he was going to get his mommy a special christmas present.
the one he told her he'd chosen reflected the fact that elias is very thoughtful.
he pays a lot of attention to other people and their interests and is able to devise presents peculiarly suited to such interests.
at least he is able to do so with regard to his mommy.
for most of this school year, he would draw a picture nearly every day at school that said 'i love mommy'
with himself and his stick-figure mother. recently, pictures of fish have been creeping in more, but i'm sure he's not trying to replace her pescatorially. the funny part is that he doesnt complain about missing her when he's at school, except very rarely; he just expresses it with a picture, daily, ritualistically, which must make it feel better. well-adapted.

Blades of Glory

Today we went ice skating. It was awesome... and terrifying. It was terrifyingly awesome. The whole school went which may not have been a great idea because there is such a broad spectrum of skill levels and ages, but it wouldn't be the Children's House if we didn't do things strangely. Elias was one of the first kids out on the ice. He got on, and fell. Got up, and fell. Took a few steps, and fell. Then he fell and hit his head. After screaming for a while, and passing an abbreviated neuro check, Elias took off again. Then he fell. This time he hurt is hand. After checking all his fingers and making sure nothing was broken Elias took off again. This time he took a different approach. He fell on purpose. This seemed to be much more fun to Elias because he was in control of the falls. Turns out Elias is not too bad on ice skates. He was probably one of the more confident kids on skates and he stayed on the ice for a solid two hours. I wonder if Indy has an ice hockey team....

new boots*

sophia has new boots. they are the cutest lil sh#tkickers. sophia doesnt like wearing shoes much. even in the winter she tries to get around the hassle. one good way to get her to wear appropriate footwear is to buy her new shoes. heeeey, wait a minute. girls are sooo sneaky. she doesnt dislike shoes, only shoes that are more than a week old! outrageous. anyway, it's hard to keep track of exactly now old four is, but i think sophia commonly makes me forget. she is tough and good at looking out for herself and her needs. she gets shuffled around a bit, being in the middle, and she doesnt mind much i think, we middle children adapt quickly. but she really makes the most of it when she gets one on one attention. when she doesnt, she just eats snacks and draws. she can do both things all day gladly. well, four is not very old. it's very young, and very adorable. sophia is very young and also fearless and intrepid. she's my rough tough hard-to-bluff baby girl

The difference between right and wrong

Sophia talks nonstop these days. I guess by these days I mean the last four or five months so its not really something new. She just kind of gets on a roll and she can't stop. One of the teachers at the school thought that we could probably run the school off of Sophia's energy if we could just figure out a way to wire her.

Well the other day she was jabbering on and on as usual. I try to pay attention to everything she says but sometimes I find myself listening only enough that I know when to say uhh huhh or really? in between breaths. This time I was forced to pay attention because the big kids were arguing about the accuracy of what Sophia was saying. So I stopped, listened and then had to inform Sophia that she was wrong. Sophia promptly decided that she must test yet another of her theories which I also sadly informed her was incorrect. After her third wrong idea Sophia stomped her feet and stated in all seriousness "See, I'm right... I'm always wrong". This time she was right. So does that mean that she's wrong, again?

march-dance

cybele is starting to do slapstick. i am amazed when i see her doing this thing i can remember doing myself (though now i cant imagine why i did) when i was little. she crawls around on the ground with her head on the ground like the front of a bulldozer. she seems to find this is deeply gratifying. she also has a march-dance she does. she perambulates the house lifting her right leg high with every step and stomping it down. sometimes she accompanies this by lifting her arms up and out and mimicking snapping. but i think she's gotten lazy with her vocabulary development, because she has such good non-verbal communication skills that with a small handful of syllable combinations she can express and get what she wants. she is very dance-y these days.

Ritalin for Toddlers

I finally understand how young children end up on stimulant medications for ADD/ADHD. I have the most hyper child that I have ever procreated and I suppose that if you weren't madly in love with this sort of behavior it could seem troublesome. Cybele is truly a maniac. She is in constant motion from the moment that she awakens until the moment that we force her to go to sleep. She, unlike our other children has the run of the entire house and she utilizes every inch of it. When I say every inch, I really do mean every inch. For example, recently cousin Bridget came for a vacation and we were making cookies of course. Spritz cookies with chocolate drizzle and sprinkles on top, which means there were sprinkles for decorating on the table and we were going back and forth between the kitchen and dining room while the cookies baked. At one point during this process Uncle Boo laughed loudly and we all came to see what was so funny. Cybele dancing with the sprinkles on top of the table of course.