Bro Master

Max has started calling mommy Bro. He called daddy Bro-Master this morning. Max’s latest request is for an animal specimen in a jar. He put a dead pocket gopher in a a jar of alcohol today and is eager for more. Mommy and daddy made Max giggle a lot today while he munched on tortas and watched prehistoric mammals on tv. Mommy wishes she could put a few of his giggles in a jar.

barnakolla

Mommy told Max that he’s a barnacle and she’s a rock, and that sometimes he’s a koala and mommy is a tree. Max now likes to play Barnacle and Rock every night when he’s tired, and every morning when he first wakes up. Mommy loves carrying her little peanut – she used to sling him over her hip and go everywhere but its a little more difficult now; the barnacle feels almost as big as the rock.

marshmallow blow darts bro

Mommy and Daddy left Max in a wet field out in the rain with a bunch of people carrying skulls and furs today. Max came home wit a feather encrusted pvc pipe blow gun and spent about an hour happily shooting mommy and daddy with marshmallows, stopping only to eat the occasional bit of ammo.

Yes, OK!

Last weekend as mommy was holding her soft little boy in her arms she felt a moment of panic at the thought of being away from him all day when she sent back to work. Despite the flying rolls of toilet paper, scribbles on furniture, having to have endless conversations with plastic ankilosaurus, mommy still feels enormously privileged to be able to spend her whole day with her little monkey. She loves being able to see everything he does, listen to everything he says, and be part of his strange and funny thoughts.

Max is such a boy – we went to see our friends Tom and Nishie in Marin on Saturday, and little Hashi put on a weddign outfit with a veil (the girls are obsessed with weddings – at 4 and 5 yrs of age!) – and Max ran after her with a look of concern, saying, “I’ll save you!, I’ll save you!” – he thought Hashi was caught in a net.

Max must have had fun, he’s been asking to “go see Hashi” every 2 hours since then… Mommy gets the feeling Max needs to spend more time with friends. Mommy has been trying to line up playdates for the weekend and to send Max to classes during the week. We’ve been invited to a bug party at Maxs friend Marias place next weekend.

When max bumps on something or gets a little bit hurt, he shakes his head and says “I’m OK!” (even if he bumped another part of his body. When he gets hurt he waits expectantly for mommy to say, “Are you OK?” and if mommy doesnt, he gently prompts mommy – “Are you OK?” and then when mommy says it back to him, he smiles, and says “yes! OK!”

Our little weremonkey didn’t sleep much last night, it was a full moon night

We wanted only a little bit of TV yesterday during breakfast, and then went all day without TV – from 7 am to 10 pm! And we were in the flat all day too, because Max didnt want to go out – quite an accomplishment – mommy is rather proud. We played all day long, mommy was getting hoarse by the end of the day.

Mommy tried to feed Max a mini-watermelon, he was convinced that it was a dinosaur egg, though, and squished his toy dinosaurs inside it, and made the dinosaurs get born over and over again

Mommy cunningly made him eat a lot of strawberries by spiking the berries on the horns of various dinosaurs and pretending that they were hauling the food home – Max couldn’t resist the thrill of thwarting the dinosaurs, who would roar horribly and tickle Max for having taken their food.

brownie bear jones

It has been a long, long time! Mommy is in over her head with too much work to do, but thought she would write a few words. Daddy has found his dream job and is thrilled. Max is huge, and will soon be able to carry mommy on HIS shoulders.

Max has started chewing on things all the time – mommy is not sure why. She hopes he’s not nervous about something.

We have decided to name the hamster Brownie Bear Jones. We did our ritual Brownie walk where we let him lose in our long hallway and man the open end so he cant get past us and into the wild messy yonder of the living room.

Mommy feels weird talking to adults; the conversations seem strangely calm with their marked lack of unrelenting requests for a pet dog, parrot, platypus, or alligator.

5 times around the sun

Max has almost finished his fifth trip around the sun. Life has been bus, as always, and mommy has not been able to juggle her way to keeping up this blog. She has about 15 minutes of spare time every day, and that is usually spent on some new project for Max. We made an elabourate halloween costume which took weeks (Max was Rachet with a Clank Backpack).  Then there was the huge horrible fiasco of elementary school applications. Mommy had to tour 20 schools, often juggling school visits between dropping Max off at school and getting to work. We have finished with the horrible applications and now its up to the kindergarten gods.

things are settling down

i watch the celebrations

quietly

i cannot join in

but my pain has dulled

till i come upon a stray picture

a trench full of little faces

round eyes, soft limbs

a frightened huddle of all that is precious

My little Maxs face

and hands

and baby smell

just born somewhere else

the anguish returns, sharp and quick

where are you now, little Maxs

what did you see

which internment camp is your playground

which grave is your bed

bolt!

Mommy brought home Bolt today, we had a family movie night – Max enjoyed the movie a lot. max and daddy has some special time together because mommy had to work later and didnt come home till 7. Max and daddy ordered chinese food and were watching the powerpuff girls when mommy got home.

Max had picked a vase of flowers for mommy yesterday.

Mommy is trying to convince max that the blue text screens before the start of a movie say that you hav eto kiss your mommy in order for the movie to stat. Max doesnt quite buy this but kissed mommy anyway – quite reluctantly.

We sanf “one little two little” today. “One liththul two litthul thwee liththul thilddwun – sitting on a wug!”

Vultro

Max says he has a pet dog named Voltro. Voltro is small and likes to eat chicken and sauce and bugs. Voltro runs too fast and Max has to hold the leash and stay Sto–o-p! Voltro likes to play. Whats mommys dogs name? Whats daddy’s dogs name? We’re not talking about snakes, daddy, we’re talking about dogs! (Daddy tried to tell Ma xhis dogs name was snickers). Ok daddy, thats enough dogs – time to ask Elise her dogs name..

Elise stayed for dinner today. Max was very pleased. We all sat together and had sushi and tempura and then Max curled up in Elises lap and watched the Bee movie. He didnt want Elise to go home. Max wants to visit Elises home next time.

Max and Saura had got married at school yesterday. It was probably Sauras idea since Max doesnt know what getting married means. Apparantly they had had 5 kids and then their house cught on fire and they had to find a new house. When Elaine asked Max who his kids were, he had names several classroom toys and the class pets.

sixty nine o clock

When Max doesnt want to go somewhere he points to the clock and sais “mommy, I want to tell you something – its sixty nine o clock, see? Its too late to go out”.

At bedtime, he says “Just sixteen more minutes, pleeease”

Tonight after we went to bed he said “ok, three deep breaths” – and proceeded to take several deep breaths of theatrical proportions, thensaid “ahh, now we can sleep” and settled down

Yesterday Max did a particularly difficult trick in Rachet and Clank and when mommy asked him how he did it, he said, “I pushed x, and circle, and used my ‘magination”.

Max says “Bacadabara” for Abracadabra.