Exquisite Motor Skills

Okay, maybe they're just fine... but whatever they are Larkin has been very busy honing them lately. Not long ago, Larkin's art was all abstract... big blobs of bright color that were sometimes identified as specific items and sometimes not. Suddenly, she is drawing specific, recognizable things and coloring them in. Like this envelope decoration:

That second item in the row is a bed post. Seems a little out of place with the other Lucky Charms, but who am I to judge? And then there's this Mermaid Monster:
I was informed that this is a picture of a monster that Larkin and the other members of the Winx Club defeated in magical battle. Writing has been a favorite pastime lately, as well. It is still more art than "writing." She asks us to write something out for her and then she copies it herself. This is how it all began:

Larkin was writing a series of symbols that were more or less letterish and periodically asking us to read them to her. At this stage, numbers were included now and then so she would write things like "PL8": plate! We would do our best to explain how we were decoding her symbols, but it seemed like she was getting tired of writing nonsense syllables. Then she asked us to write her name on another sheet of paper for her to copy. Shortly after, she wanted to write a whole letter to Uncle Felix the same way. It hasn't arrived yet, so I'm not sure if it's legible or not. The letters were all pretty clear, but she didn't really see any need for traditional word spacing.

Larkin has also just had her second overnighter at a friend's house, this time with the fabulous Lowes. They have both gone off without a hitch... except for Finn's slight despondency at being without his favorite person. Oh, and Larkin's tendency to wake her hosts up at or before the crack of dawn. I mean, she's just so excited to be there!

Trouble Shooting

I'm not a big fan of guns and was kind of wondering how I would feel when the kids inevitably became fascinated with them. On the other hand (Felix, you can vouch for me here) the vast majority of games I played outside of school as a child were "war games." And look how fabulously peaceful I turned out. ;)

We recently got a couple of squirt guns after the kids found one that someone had left outside the library. I was somewhat surprised to discover that I didn't have any negative emotional reaction at all. I mean, these weren't Big Scary Guns, they were Fun Plastic Toys.

Yesterday we went to the park to meet friends and Larkin and Finn were very excited to take their new squirt guns with them. I remembered at the last minute that the family we were going to meet did not allow their children to play with guns. I told the kids what I remembered and said I thought it would probably be pretty rude to take our squirt guns to the park. Finn wanted to know why it would be rude. I asked him to imagine watching other kids play with something that looked Absolutely Fascinating only to be told that he couldn't touch it. He didn't think that sounded like fun and both kids agreed it would be friendlier to leave the squirt guns and play with them when we got home. Larkin wanted to know why some kids aren't allowed to play with guns. My best off the cuff answer went something like "Real guns are powerful and destructive things... it freaks some people out to see kids treating something as a toy that has caused so much trouble in the real world." Larkin summoned up some remarkably righteous indignation (I think this is almost verbatim): "But these aren't real guns! I don't want to play with real guns! Do people really think kids are so stupid we can't tell the difference between a weapon and a toy!?!?"

Whew, dodged that bullet. So to speak. I wasn't quite ready to go all gun control and break the news to them that children are killed every year because they were playing with their parents' guns. All things in time.

Gushy Mushiness

Neither Emile nor I have ever been accused of being the world's most emotionally demonstrative individuals, but we seem to have brought two of them into the world. I think I've mentioned before that Larkin tells us she loves us every time she forgets what she was going to say mid-sentence. Well, Finn has taken to yelling our names at the top of his lungs when he is across the house from us (if more than one of us is across the house, it's "Hey, Guys?") and when we respond, he says (much more quietly), "I love you." And he'll keep yelling at us until we say we love him, too.

We've been talking a lot about age, growing, relative size and babies recently. For a while, Larkin was mathematically fascinated by the fact that Finn would *always* be 2 years younger than her. "Wait, you mean when I'm 54 he'll be 52?!" This morphed into a conversation about how much bigger they will be when they reach that ripe old age, as well as how much smaller they were not so long ago. Initially, Larkin was seriously jonesin' to get older. Ten was apparently the perfect age. Finn, however, got a little freaked out by the whole aging notion and crawled up into my lap, wrapped his arms around me and said, "No me want to grow big. I want to stay little so we can snuggle." Sigh. Larkin apparently took his gentle admonition of her enthusiasm to heart and also got slightly paranoid about the possible pitfalls of growing older. A long conversation about the pros and cons of being children vs. being adults ensued. Reassurance was issued that I would be happy to snuggle them no matter how large they got. I'm not sure which parts of that conversation were most influential, but Larkin now tells me several times a week that she's glad she's still a kid and thanks me for helping her have such a fun childhood.

Score!

In other (less serious) relationship news, this morning Larkin informed me that she had "broken up with the pink xylitol candies." I believe my response was: "Huh?" She patiently explained to me, "That's what happens when you don't like something as much as you used to." Thanks, YouTube.

This exchange also happened spontaneously this morning, presumably also inspired from some nauseatingly cute cartoon from YouTube (I'm inclined to blame CareBears but have not actually seen enough myself to have convincing evidence):

Larkin: When you love somebody, they are always in your heart.
Me: Well, I guess you two are pretty well lodged in my heart.
Finn: Yeah, because we're so small.

Story Time

Lately, Finn has been telling stories. He always politely asks to make sure he has an eager audience first. My personal favorite so far:

Finn: Jenny, you want me to tell you a story?
Me: Sure!
Finn (in his very quiet storytelling voice): Once upon a time, long, long ago, there was a boy who had a duck.
Me (after a long pause): Is that the end of the story?
Finn: Yup!
Me: Nice.

Today, the kids were playing a game in which Larkin was Finn's cat. This is a favorite, with the particular animal type frequently changed. It usually involves a great deal of tucking the animal in for naps and it waking up extremely suddenly and with great vigor. After the cat was snugly tucked in:

Finn: Would you like a bedtime story, Kitty?
Larkin (affirmatively): Mrow!
Finn (opening the balloon animal instruction book): Once upon a time, there was a girl named Larkin who found a sword. [aside] The story's almost over! [end aside] She lost it again. The end.
Larkin (leaping off the couch throwing cat bedding blankets everywhere): Morning time! MROW!

We recently scored some cowboy boots off freecycle for Finn. I think he liked them okay:

In other news, we've been dealing with a three day (so far) bout of a stomach bug-- no need for details on that one-- and have been talking to an architect about plans for an addition on the house.

Also, we have been reading Patricia Wrede's Enchanted Forest Chronicles with Larkin and they are a Huge Hit. If you are familiar with the books and can think of other fantasy novels with similarly engaging themes (kick-ass princesses, dragons, etc.) we'd love to hear about them. We've only been going through these for a few weeks and we're already half way through the third book, so I'm beginning to wonder what's on deck.

Copious Spare Time

Larkin and I finally finished the dress we were making. Luckily, I got a ludicrously large size a year and a half ago when we began the project. Next time, I'm going to have a little more say in the complexity of the pattern.

One of our couches has been re-designated as horse stables. There are three sections and the kids throw pillow cases over the back as saddles and bring along shoe laces as reins as they gallop off on missions of great daring and rescue. Finn informed me that the three horses were Bronco, Robot and Bruto.
Last night, Finn was watching Larkin play computer games. There is sometimes a bit of conflict over prime real estate in front of the screen... when they get excited they lean forward and block the screen from the other's view. In this instance, Larkin hit Finn when he got in her way. Finn, rather indignantly, exclaimed "Why did you hit me?! I love you!" Larkin sounded quite chastened when she replied: "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have hit you. I should have asked you to move." Conflict resolution in action, man.

Whiskey Pickles Wrote Back!

Should a small child ever write to your pet, write back. It's totally worth it.

Mostly Language Miscellany

I've fallen into the old trap of not posting in awhile and having lots of unrelated snippets to relay. Finn's linguistic mastery is still advancing by leaps and bounds. However, he still calls me "Nenny" even though he can manage "Janey" just fine. On the other hand, I guess it's a step up from the "Ninny" I once was. Larkin has taken to calling me Jen which amuses me a great deal for some reason, especially since no one in our daily life does.

We're not sure if he picked it up from a particular book or movie, or just from imaginative play with Larkin, but Finn has started talking about things being "too dangerous." In play, it's usually used as a reason that he should face threats alone, but it has also been his reason for not wanting his teeth brushed. It's not entirely clear if he has a deep understanding of what danger really is.

This evening, Larkin was demonstrating how a princess takes a drink of water. Finn then asked her to demonstrate how a king takes a drink of water. The result was very similar, with perhaps slightly louder slurping noises. After a brief pause, Finn asked how a king saddles a horse (everything is still very quickly related to horses in Finn's world). Emile piped in with, "He says, 'Footman! Saddle my horse!'" So now that cry precedes every leap onto his multitudinous imaginary steeds.

I think I posted about Larkin's malapropism: "Whoever gets there first gets a rotten egg!" Emile and I generally said we were perfectly happy to let her win so she would get the rotten egg. So last night she called out a modified version while racing to the living room: "Whoever gets there first is an exceptionally clean egg!"

A recent impulse purchase in the craft aisle was a set of plastic "fusible" beads. They come with pegged patterns and you can put a bead on each peg, then iron them to fuse it into more permanent art. Larkin hardly waited for an explanation before she was off and beading. Two hours later, this result:

I have no idea where the pattern idea came from or why the center row is all one color when everything else is alternating, but it's a perfectly consistent pattern. I was particularly intrigued that she made such a regular pattern when her tendency with necklaces is to group all beads of one size/shape/color together. I think I will get her one of those jewelry making trays that allow you to lay out a pattern before stringing it... I have a feeling we might see a lot more transient patterns and fewer completed necklaces.