Little Mama.

Julia has never had any interest in playing with her dolls. The only ones whom she showed any affection were her stuffed bunnies and even that was short lived ... until recently. The other day, as she was playing in a playground, Julia found two rocks and started calling them her babies and gave them a push on a swing. Since then she's started bringing home just about anything she finds in the garden whether it's a little pine cone, an acorn, a leaf or a stick.

She is "wrapping" her baby pine cone in a leaf which serves as a blanket.

Her shoe serves as a bed for her baby pine cone.

Julia is playing a doctor giving her baby a shot and taking her (his?) blood pressure.

Oh, so much affection!

What is she going to bring home next? Worms? Thankfully she likes to keep her distance with them.

First Snow Fight of the Season.

While eating dinner tonight, we dimmed the lights in the dining room, turned the lights on on the deck and enjoyed the view of the first falling snow this season.

After the kids finished their meal, which actually went without incident for a change (perhaps due to our new game or the excitement of the snow,) they were curious to get a better look at the snow. (From their reaction, I'm guessing that any memories of last year's snowfalls have been purged from their minds.)

Seth introduced the kids to making snowballs, and David got into it once he understood that it was actually okay to throw them at Seth and I. Of course things slowly escalated until he was tossing snowballs the size of Julia's head.

This is how our hall looked after the kids were done. Julia was walking around barefoot this entire time and was missing her socks. By now she was walking on her tiptoes as snow was scattered throughout the first floor. At one point, Julia got my attention and said "I want to go inside." Sorry, Julia, but you are inside!

David's hands were frozen by the end. I was surprised that he didn't complain sooner. We wrapped his hands in a towel to warm them up and when that didn't work, he defrosted them under very warm water.

It was lots of fun watching the kids having fun with the snow tonight. As soon as David was done, he said he wanted to play in the snow tomorrow morning. Hopefully, there's still snow on the ground when we leave for school in the morning for a little bit of snow play.

Welcome to Neverland

From the hundreds of stories and the occasional movie that our children are exposed to each month, it's interesting which stories they take to and enjoy reading (or watching) over and over. One of those stories in our home is Peter Pan. David has been drawn to the title character, and likes to pretend he's Peter Pan, which is fine as long as he doesn't try flying off the top of the stairwell. Julia occasionally wants to be Peter Pan as well, but Nataliya keeps telling her that Peter Pan is a boy (which will probably confuse the heck out of Julia if she ever watches a live version of the story which always has a woman in the title role.) Instead, Julia is taken to the other major character of the movie - Tinkerbell.

In fact, David has already decided who everyone else in the house is. Nataliya is, of course, Wendy. I'm Captain Hook. Bandit (our pet cat) is the crocodile, Tick Tock.

I'm sure there's a psychology thesis tucked into all this! After all, while choosing me to be a major character in his life, by making me Captain Hook, is David telling me that he sees me as his adversary rather than the protective and loving family-man like the Indian Chief? And is there a sort of Oedipus complex thing going on that he would choose Nataliya to be Wendy, rather than the loving and understanding mother, Mrs. Maradeth “Mary” Darling? And why choose this story over another, like Lilo & Stitch where family is stressed above all else? Is it possible that David feels stressed at the idea of being a big boy.

Okay, take it easy - I'm just having fun with this! But... do a Google search for psychology "peter pan" and you'll get some interesting results... For example check out this excerpt from here:

Peter Pan runs away from his past (repression and denial) and blames Captain Hook for all the evils in the world (projection). Peter's own crusade against evil (reaction formation) stems from his superego insecurities. Peter's Shadow represents his paranoiac tendencies and his persecution complex.

Anyway, this blog entry has gone from cute to scary, so I'll just stop now.

When playing is all one wants to do.

On the days, when instead of napping we prefer playing hide-and-seek,

we get out of the house

and head to the forest to play with a friend.

Play, celebrations and just about anything else we could fit in one summer day.

Catching the butterflies (the moths will do).

Digging out worms and just about anything that crawls, placing them in a jar and insisting on bringing it inside.

Coming up with an idea of placing a jumping rope on two chair. Trying out his invention.

Using mommy's handmade blanket for a cape and pretending to be a cool superhero.


Celebrating Bandit's birthday even though it is really in March.

Having a blast at his cousins' Birthday party.

More pretend play continues...the house is filled with Captain Hook, Tinker Bell, Peter Pan, butterflies and fairies.

Summer sure is fun!

When a "Time Out" Is Still A "Time In"

Julia makes her way to the small trampoline and slowly climbs onto it with all four limbs. With her last leg in the air, moments from completing her ascent, she feels a tug on her clothes and a shriek. It's her brother, David, who in his quest to amuse himself has found his unsuspecting little sister. A stronger tug pulls her off the trampoline and a push knocks her onto the ground. He follows it up with half a dozen slaps and a happy shriek. In the wrestling world, it would be considered entertainment, but Julia's protests assures us that she's not entertained in the least. Mommy is forced to quickly intervene, giving David a "time out."

This is a normal everyday occurrence in our household. In fact, there are days where it occurs almost every ten minutes. I don't believe he's trying to hurt her intentionally - at least not usually -but he tends to play a bit too rough with her.

To curb this behavior, we've tried imposing time outs. While his time outs used to mean something with regard to his treatment of Julia, they've lost a bit of their impact. The main reason is that after David starts his timeout, Julia will actively seek him out and plop herself beside him! At this point, David will still be in time out but he can continue his rough play with Julia.

In fact, despite any pain or discomfort David inflicts on Julia, they're inseparable. If one child is absent, the other is visibly upset. Julia is always very happy to see her big brother, despite the inevitable "abuse."

So how do you discipline a child from hurting his younger sibling, when that younger sibling will purposely seek out the attention of the older sibling? Other than moving David's "timeout" from the corner up to his bed/room, is there anything else we can do? Could it be possible that we're a bit too cautious? Is it possible that we're disciplining for normal play? Is there a real danger here or just a perceived one? My psychology classes in college didn't cover these scenarios! (Then again, perhaps I was asleep during that particular lecture...)

Yeah, I know there's no guidebook that clearly gives the answers so I've decided to ask a professional.

"Cannot predict now."

Damn you, Magic 8-ball!!