Red Light/Green Light

I wanna green light!
Alice does this thing when we’re driving where every time I stop at a stoplight or a stop sign—she yells from the top of her lungs, “Go mom, go mom!” I always have to explain that I can’t go until the light turns green. She just doesn’t get it, though, and she keeps on yelling until the light turns green and I finally “go.” So the other day…true to her assertive nature…she tells me again, “Go, mommy, go.” Again, I start to explain to her, only this time I keep pointing to the light and I say, “See, that light is red, when the light is red, we can’t drive…when it’s green we can go.” I looked at her face through the rear-view-mirror and she had this look of pure joy and understanding. She got it. I could just see her thinking, “Oh, it all makes sense now…she isn’t making random stops just to make me mad.” The rest of the drive she sang “I wanna green light…I wanna green light.” Wow. It’s amazing when they get it. It’s like when Alice started saying see ya. Lily was just flabbergasted. She thought it was so amazing that nobody taught Alice how to say “see ya” or when to say it…that she suddenly just started using it correctly. Lily said, “I can’t believe how she can learn about all these words…it’s so amazing.” Of course what Lily didn’t realize is that her wondering about this is even more remarkable as Alice learning to talk.

Anyway. This whole learning process is fun to watch, and believe if you will, I do believe I’m learning as much as they are. I know…you thought that I already knew everything. Lily seems so amazed when I know something that she’s learning at school, like where the big dipper and Orion’s belt are. Also that I know the order of the planets and that Neptune is made of gas.

Squidward

On another note, Canyon’s birthday was a hit and the bucket and sea creatures greatly appreciated as well as a wooden treasure chest that he had buried and dug up over and over again. Trieste made a great Mr. Potato Head piñata, which was just what Canyon had ordered. Several weeks ago, Canyon emptied his Mr. Potato Head, tied a string to the top and filled it with toys. For days he carried around his Mr. Potato Head “piñata” and even impressed his little friends with it’s simple design and concept. Sometimes Canyon reminds me of that Sponge Bob episode (bear with me if you’re not a Sponge Bob connoisseur) when Sponge Bob finds a small piece of paper (I believe it was Squidward’s garbage) and does all of these neat-o things with it, in the process impressing an array of invisible, but audible children. Anyway, Squidward…who moments before was throwing it away, suddenly is trading his house, furniture, clarinet, and the shirt off his back…just to have that stupid piece of paper. Canyon’s kind of like that. He’ll sort of create something really cool and fun to have out of nothing…and suddenly his tribe of friends and cousins would do anything to have a broken Mr. Potato Head piñata, “moon rock,” rope tied to bungie cords, bucket-o-sea creatures…etc… Needless to say, the real Mr. Potato Head piñata was a true hit (see Trieste’s blog for pictures). Ah…the birthday season…Dustin and Lily, just around the corner.

By the way…we still haven’t learned the concept of yellow light. I think it means speed up.