Know many dentists where your child would be greeted with a family bear hug from the dentist and his wife? Me neither–but I’m happy to know one. 🙂
Yesterday Finn accompanied me to Dr. Vandi’s office for his first official checkup & cleaning. You might remember that the Doc has been a figure of some intrigue for ages: at 18 months Finn liked to pretend to visit Dr. Vandi, and a year ago he got big mileage from playing with dentist’s masks sent by the Vandis. The boys are equally famous around the office, with Mrs. Vandi following their adventures via the blog & Facebook.
Long story short, Finn nailed the visit! He was a champ about getting his teeth X-rayed, biting down as the camera whirled past. He was even a little annoyed with my explanations: “I know it’s an X-ray, Dad-O. It’s like the Curious George story, where George swallowed a puzzle piece…” Finn (and Leo) particularly liked getting a tour of dental implements from hygienist Charles (who, it turns out, hails from a country where real lions live in the forest; hat tip to Ghana!)
Check out our little gallery, plus a couple of clips of our boy in action. Now, here’s hoping Henry stays cool & calm (sans chocolate raisin) during his visit tomorrow!
Another year, another successful candy haul! Swashbuckling Blackbeard & Bob the Builder looked great in their duds, and of course they’re really gotten into craving the sweets. In this little gallery, you can see Henry even (jokingly) trying to eat a candy wrapper!
Following trick-or-treating, and while Margot dispensed candy to 400+ (!) kids, I took the job of winding down our two sugar-addled amigos. After they caught me humming Michael Jackson’s “Thriller,” they demanded to hear the real song, after which I hipped them to a video of 1500 Filipino prisoners doing the Thriller dance. I think it’s safe to say they enjoyed it:
(Apparently I went as Scooby Doo for Halloween, given my goofy giggling during this clip. ;-))
Another Halloween has come and gone, so before it’s too far gone, here are a couple of pics of the guys from preschool yesterday. They got to wear their costumes and have a little parade. John and I took them out for trick-or-treating in the evening, and they both absolutely loved it! Finny asked if he could put his costume back on today because it would be Halloween again, and the first words out of Henry’s mouth upon waking this morning were “I want candy!” Uh oh!
“Goonie, I’m a bridge! Walk under me!” Showing admirable judgement for a 2-year-old, the little guy declines. 🙂 (Soon enough he was begging to be lifted up to match his big bro’s moves.)
As Beldar Conehead would say, “We will honor your Halloween ritual by paying homage to the symbolic vegetable orb!” 🙂
We’ve had fun taking the lads to the pumpkin patch with their Pasitos amigos, and then over to Casa de Wiggin for their first pumpkin carving. Check it out!
Q. What do twelve bucks & an idle Friday night get you at Goodwill?
A. Pinktastic threads!
Today we helped little friend Charlotte celebrate her third birthday at a pink-themed party, so last night we did a quick run to the store and got a few fun accessories. Henry kept disappearing in his lid, and I felt like cutting holes in the top so that he could look through it (a la that kid from Fat Albert ;-)).
Yesterday we took the lads to an apple orchard for some apple picking with a few of our (and their) friends.
We drove over towards Watsonville, and as we arrived, the sun broke through the clouds and set us up for a perfect day. Everyone had a blast. Finny was excitedly counting the apples in his special green apple bag, and at the bottom of the (very steep) hill, there were cute horsey tire swings for the kids to ride, and a shady spot for the parents to rest. Here’s a little gallery of the proceedings.
After our orchard adventure, we drove over to Moss Landing and picnicked on tacos and burritos in a cute little park. The park was next to a terrific little art gallery, where the artist had built all sorts of fantastic play houses for kids, including a submarine turret, caboose, and lighthouse. Needless to say, the kids loved clambering around and acting as lookouts from the top of the sub.
We took a bunch of our small apples to preschool today to share with the class, and we made apple crisp out of some of the bigger apples. Finny and Henry enjoyed sampling the goods as they transferred them into the cooking pot! It was a terrific way to wrap up the weekend.
Update: Here’s a little video from the outing, wherein Finn makes a special beverage suggestion. 😉
Dad-o and I work pretty hard to come up with new, exciting experiences for the guys. The world’s a big place and there’s lots to see and do, so we’re trying to take advantage of as much of it as we can (and as is age-appropriate)! This past Sunday, we headed north to San Francisco for a boat tour of the SF Bay. They guys were pretty excited about the idea of a boat ride, having read about all kinds of ships in various books, and having seen a ton of them at lake Tahoe last month. Turns our our good friend Reen, a San Francisco resident of many years, had never taken a boat tour of the bay either! So we picked her up on our way to pier, and off we went to embark on our mini-adventure.
We totally lucked out on the weather. It was a gorgeous, sunny day without a cloud in the sky. As we left the pier, we spied the big floppy sea lions sunning themselves on the docks. As we motored past Alcatraz we told the boys that’s where “bad dudes” get sent to jail. “I’m not a bad dude!” exclaimed Henry. The most exciting part of the tour was when we cruised underneath the majestic Golden Gate Bridge – a new perspective on such an impressive landmark! Finny was fascinated by all the small sailboats that were practically tipped completely over in the stiff winds coming off the ocean.
Now, I won’t claim it was a photographically brilliant outing: trying to corral the constantly running G-Man as he swerved across the gently pitching deck, always eager to do a header down some staircase or other, kept Dad-O largely off the camera. Still, here’s a little gallery. Everyone had a ball, and our little sailors can’t wait to do it again! (The strangers in one of the photos were some kids doing a photo scavenger hunt on Fisherman’s Wharf.)
Despite our clear wishes, Finn loves shoving bits of fuzz up his nose–or should I say, he loves having Leo do it. For months now Finn’s claimed to be our ally, advising us, “I keep telling that crazy Looen not to keep shoving stuff up there, but he just really likes to do it!”
Meanwhile Leo has become fast friends with Menace (short for “Bushy-Tailed Menace”), Finn’s little chipmunk from Colorado. Leo drives Finn’s “Massive Crane” while Menace sits in the operator’s cab. As they’re a really professional crew, Finn tells us “They even have little [company] jackets.” (I’ve gotta get to work in Photoshop making those happen!)
Anyway, long ago we used to have big fun passing little objects through a knothole in Finn’s floor, sending them down to the basement & then back up. Finn’s big-guy bed ended up over the hole, so it’s been long forgotten. During a bedtime story the other night, I said that Menace had flown up in the air, gone down a crack, and ended up in a mysterious area: Under the bed! In the story Leo & Finn headed to the rescue and discovered (cue dramatic music) the hole!
“Raarh,” said Leo. “That looks like a great hole for stuffing things into! It’s like a nostril in the floor!!”
And do you think it was “game on”? Because oh yes, it was on. 🙂 Ever since then Finn (or rather, Team Leo) has been enthusiastically driving the crane under the bed, then lowering its hook down into the basement. I came home yesterday to discover that Finn had arranged a step stool to facilitate hooking on cargo, and that now a fuzzy toy chicken was swinging freely around the basement! “Mom-O asked if this was a chicken-swinging factory,” he reports, “and it is!!”
When I went to capture the action on video, I told the guys that Grandma & Grandpa would love to see it. As you can hear in the clip, Henry was sure we’d see G&G on the camera itself, so afterwards we fired up the iPad for some quick video chatting with my folks. What a neat way to show them a little slice of the guys’ lives!
PS–As the story continues, Leo & Menace stuff tons of popcorn down the hole. When they go to the basement to see the resulting “corn cone,” the neighbor cats scratch at the window, then *burst* through and spray corn everywhere. The boys then each grab a gato (Finn taking the fatty, Hen the smaller one), flip them upside down, and sweep with them like feather dusters. They kickstart the cats’ “motors” via their tails, then use them to suck up all the corn. Vrooooom!!
G-Man tries on some warm-looking headwear at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk yesterday. (We had a blast playing in the sand & sea, but boy it can be unexpectedly chilly over there.)
Oh, Henry: Might you ever get a haircut *without* becoming a hysterical bucking bronco? The little guy keeps flipping out (almost literally) in the barber’s chair: “I don’t like the bee!” (buzzing clippers). Ah well: at least he finally wore himself out yesterday, making his post-chop sucker all the sweeter.
On Saturday the lads & I got down & (very) dirty at Rancho San Antonio, checking out old vehicles (“Not zooming,” notes Henry; “Non-zooming,” corrects Finn), trails, and animals. Having learned where bacon comes from, Finn dubbed a pair of hogs “Makin'” and “Fakin’.”
A wiser, more discreet father would’ve probably edited out the middle section of the clip above; unfortunately you’re stuck with The Nack Daddy & his inner 3-year-old. ;-p
We’ve been making the most of our warm weather & remaining long days, partying in the back yard. Lots of water is getting passed around (“Octoberfest isn’t going to prep for itself,” G-Man seems to say), and the guys like to sneak into a little nook near the back stairs. “This is my secret muffin-eating area!” declares Finn.
What a whirlwind weekend we had! We’re just back from visiting north Lake Tahoe with our friends Michael, Juliana, Cyrus, and Hazel Wiggin (aka “the Wigii”). Having slept since returning, I’m still a little bushed, but here are a few photos. Random anecdotes:
Both boys were eager to see Michael & co. On a little hike Henry would point at every single building and ask, “Is that Michael’s cabin?”
The lake water is quite chilly, so the guys mainly enjoyed their first boat ride (sailing all of 20 feet from shore in a pumped up raft) and getting carried by me. As waves smashed into us, they’d happily squeal and yell “You darn Lake Tahoe!!”
The Wigii are quite fit, and Michael would goad me into doing macho stuff (crazy push-up combos, swimming out into the lake, etc.). Now Finn, who tried his hand at the push-ups, loves repeating Margot’s idea for a reality show: “Man Up! with Michael Wiggin.”
We picked up our cabin’s keys from “the Vacation Station.” Henry’s taken to repeating whatever someone has said but adding “not” in there (e.g. “We are *not* home”), so I think he’s visited “the Negation Station.”
At a beachfront park on the way out of town, we met a friendly second grader named Juan. He played tag with the kids, playfully taunting them with “Toodles!” And thus “Mr. Toodles” was born.
On the way home as Margot & Finn slept, Henry & I chatted back & forth. The boys have a running joke where they call minivans “mouse vans” (as in Minnie Mouse). Spying one, Henry volunteered “I see a mouse in it!… I don’t see monkeys in it… Must not be monkey vehicle.”
All in all we had a ball, and we hope for many happy returns!
Greetings from (mini-)vacation! At the moment the whole family is resting happily after a long but uneventful drive up to Lake Tahoe (our first time here–rather amazing given that Margot & I have lived in the Bay Area for a combined 15 years!). We’re sure to have more photos and stories to share soon, but meanwhile, here’s a quiet little shot of Henry enjoying the accommodations back home yesterday. As Bill Murray in Lost In Translation might say, “For Relaxing Times… Make it Front Porch Times.” 🙂
In this week’s episode of “Brave or Foolhardy? The JNack Parenting Adventure,” I bundled up the lads for their first air show. Margot was off for a girls’ weekend with her friend Alethea, but I was ably supported by my fellow plane-nerd Bruce & his son Noel. As Noel is used to looking after his 4-year-old sister Anja, Bruce says “He’s good at sheep-dogging little kids.” That’s quite true, and I think Henry might need to register the online name NoelFan09 for future use. 🙂
We cruised up to Santa Rosa (about 2 hours away, north of SF), fueling up with melon chunks & cookies at a “Food Hole” (Whole Foods) along the way. I’d foolishly forgotten our stroller, making for some serious tot-lugging. As such I couldn’t get a ton of photos, but I got enough for a little gallery. Highlights:
Seeing a bunch of real fire airplanes up close. At bedtime later we made up stories about them (inventing a trio called Hoser, Big Belly, and Tank, who save Hoot, Milos, & co. from immolation).
Walking up the tail ramp & then around inside an enormous C-17 Globemaster III. Now Henry announces, “I’m a C-17! I’m putting trucks in my big boca!”–after which he tries to ingest my fingers (the “trucks”).
Enjoying the bunk beds on an old DC-6 Liftmaster. Finn especially liked picking at the ancient seats (“Look, Dad-O, I’m making the foam disintegrate!”) until I put a kibosh on that fun.
Watching the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office demonstrate the Henry 1 chopper! The machine is used for retrieving lost hikers (just like Harold in Thomas’s Misty Island Rescue). I didn’t record the video below, but we watched a very similar demonstration, complete with booming explosions, “bad dudes,” & smoke. Too bad we never did find their booth & get Henry 1 T-shirts.
Thanks to Noel & Bruce for being excellent wingmen*! Our guys were troopers with the sun & noise (“The [F-15] Eagles were too loud,” Henry keeps noting), and I foresee many happy returns.
With that in mind, on my birthday I/we gave the boys a pretty great treat: front-row seats to the Exxxtreme Destruction of our driveway via a team of workmen, followed by its re-paving. For months we’d been meaning to repair the damage necessitated by our sewer line work, and last week we finally made it happen. Finn & Henry were *thrilled* to pull up chairs and watch a jackhammer-wielding Bobcat lay waste to our concrete, then scoop up the shrapnel, after which workers laid rebar & finally poured new cement. Check out our gang enjoying the show.
For me Finn’s verbal inventions were the best part. Some months ago we started making up stories about a cement truck driver named Zeke. Our barber Tom has three sons named Tom, Julian, and Clemente. Finn decided that Zeke’s boys must be named Tom, Julian, and Cemente. Thus we loved playing name-that-dude, assigning names like “Zeke” to the workers. Oh, and Finn (often aka “Blackbeard”) dubbed the hairy, heavyset foreman “Chubbybeard*’–though not to his face! 🙂
* He’d previously dubbed his pirate Mom-O “Curlybeard”
Know many dentists where your child would be greeted with a family bear hug from the dentist and his wife? Me neither–but I’m happy to know one. 🙂
