Edwin: "What would happen if a dentist attached resistors to your teeth and then one of them falls out?" Daddy: "I think they're called 'braces,' not resistors!"

Theodore is slowly learning a few signs such as "more" and "please". It is starting to help reduce his whining. But I wish it were faster.

He's sick again, but on the plus side, he actually *likes* his nebulizer now!  When one of us offers it to him, he will gladly take it now, rather than yelling at us for coming near him with it.

He also does this imaginative play with stuffed animals. He has these long, unintelligible conversations where they are having a discussion with him about something.

I  was letting Zachary stay up late tonight so we could experiment with his vision.  He may be unable to see in stereo, or possibly intermittently, so I got some chromadepth glasses and a 3D puzzle for him. These are the same glasses Crayola uses for its 3D sidewalk chalk, but not the usual blue/red or polarized glasses. It's really hard to "test" whether or not he can actually see the images popping out, precisely because all red images pop out ahead of all other images, and then orange, and so forth in rainbow order. So even if he can't see the depth, he could easily fake it or even convince himself, not to mention us, that he can in fact see it.

I told him he could stay up all night looking at pictures with the 3D glasses if he wanted to.  He had every intention of doing just that.  He has also been experimenting with +1.00 reading glasses, and he's had them on most of the night.  It might help prevent his eyes from crossing, but it probably can't hurt him if it doesn't help, since we plan to go see a pediatric specialist very soon anyhow.

I asked him why he wanted to stay up all night.  He looked at me with his mischievous grin and said, "Because you can go CRAZY!!!!.. and you get to eat more food too!  Let's eat some!"  So we did.

And then we snuggled and I let him watch Vivaldi’s Gloria.  He thought it was very long, but he seemed to enjoy it, jumping over just a few minutes of the work. By the time the clapping came at the end, I glanced over at him, and he was fast asleep, on the sofa, with his oversized reading glasses on. VERY CUTE!

Edwin is always playing with words and definitions. Tonight, one of his lines of reasoning was like this:

What does O-T-I-O-N spell? Would that spell ocean but in a funny way?
What does M-O-C-E-A-N spell?

My mom was with us when we went to Germany this year, and she stayed with us a couple of days both before and after that trip.  On the last full day of her stay with us, we made a day-long trip to Shenandoah National Park, which was about 2 or more hours of driving each way from home.

We were all ready for some rest after we dropped her off at the train station the next day.  All of us, that is, except Edwin and Zachary.

Zachary and Edwin had somehow decided that this was the day we would be going to the beach.  I'm not sure how they got this idea into their heads, but they did. Even before we dropped off Grammy, they had colluded to write on the wipe-off board which is on the fridge, "To Do: Go To The Beatch". Zachary insisted that since it was on the to-do list, we would be obligated to do it. I figured that Edwin would not be interested in this plan, especially since it would involve again sitting for about 5 or 6 hours in the car, on the very next day after having already done this!

So, literally as we were driving back from dropping off my mom, I turned to Edwin and said, "Edwin, you wouldn't want to do this, I'm sure, and we surely would not make you sit in the car another 6 hours like yesterday. So, today is not a good day to go." But Edwin's face grew a huge smile and he said, "Mommy, I want to go to the beach!"

I thought about it for a few seconds and realized that there would probably never be another chance for the next 9 months and also that we would have two extremely unhappy boys if we stayed home.

So, we went. We packed enough food so we could eat in the car both ways, and we drove there, spent a couple of hours on the beach, and then turned around and came home. It was really wonderful.

And this is why our family is always tired.

This is really a Zachary story, but it involves most of us.

Theodore is at Green Hill Daycare in Silver Spring. They tried a new photographer this year.  The products more nearly resemble what you might expect from a wedding photographer, IMHO.  But, I was teaching that day, and Michael had E & Z in tow when he went to pick up Theodore.

Edwin spent the time trying to disassemble the plumbing in the bathroom at the daycare, and meanwhile, Michael was trying to figure out how best to keep me happy with his choice of picture package.  Zachary offered the sage advice of simply buying the most expensive package, thereby leaving Mommy no room for dis-satisfaction.

Having no better strategy, Michael agreed to this plan.

But then, this package appeared in our possession a couple of weeks later.  It was huge. Inside was a framed piece of artwork which measures 23.5" x 23.5".

I had been expecting a standard portrait about the same size as his brothers' which are probably about 8"x10" each. I was thinking maybe I could get three real frames and display the three boys together. Nope.

I was really bothered by this.  "I don't live in a castle!" I complained to Michael. "Where am I supposed to put this? It's not fair to Edwin and Zachary!  And what am I supposed to do next year? How much wall space do people think we have? Who buys these portraits?"  Well, Michael pointed out, we kindof did.  (I probably would've been less upset if the rest of the order had arrived on time, but the useful portraits were all delayed by at least a week more.)

Michael suggested we hang the portrait in the boys' bedroom, since Zachary had asked him to buy the thing in the first place.  I thought that was silly, but Michael insisted that the boys love Theodore and would love having it where they could see it. So, it sat for at least a week.

Finally, wanting to get rid of the box in my living-room, I told Michael that I was going to ask Zachary what to do with it, and see what he had to say.

Zachary didn't even hesitate.  "It goes right here on this nail Mommy!" (There was already an empty nail in the living-room, right over the sofa.)

And that's how Theodore's life-sized portrait came to be hanging right there over the sofa.

Theodore needs a story.  So, here's one.  About a week ago, I started looking through a bag of clothes Yumi brought over which are too small for Sol.  I put the first shirt in the bag on Theodore and showed him the shirt that was the second shirt. It has cars and trucks all over it.  Then, I put the shirt back into the bag and thought nothing of it.

About 5 minutes later, Theodore comes up to me with the cars shirt in his hand, clearly asking me to change his completely clean new shirt out for the cars shirt. It was the first instance of him telling me what he wanted to wear. We have been trying since then to honor his repeated requests for clothes with cars and trucks. He has even been known to find his transportation PJ's (handmedowns from both Edwin and Zachary who also loved them) and bring them to us as a way of asking to have them put on him.