abc to 182

sometimes we like to keep things tame:



and sometimes we like to rage:

dada, go werk

violet loves to give kevin the business. let's say i volunteer that we're going to ride the train, yay! "we can all sit together, violet, mama and dada!" about half the time, violet will drop her little choo-chooing arm and turn sullen: "no dada. go werk!" sometimes this plays to kevin's advantage, of course. "dada's going to change your poo poo diaper!" "no dada. go werk!" she's a little slave driver, that one.

on the car ride home the other day, something came up about how the dogs go poo poo outside. violet volunteered, "dada go poo poo ow-syy."

lately violet is obsessed with her three little pigs book. i was recalling the story for her on a walk to the coffee shop, and when i got to the part about how the big bad wolf burns his bottom when he tries to climb down the chimney, violet -- who is really into kisses for boo boos -- suggested, "dada kees bii baa wuf bah-um."

so in the world according to violet, kevin is an ass-kissing workaholic who shits outdoors.

happy father's day!

but on the flip side of the coin, violet reserves her most delighted giggles for kevin. when i pick her up from daycare, she usually gives me a look of desperation and declares "eat!" as if she thinks i'm going to drag her out of there before they dispense the dixie cups of the world's most budget animal crackers. but when kevin walks in the door after work, she breaks out in a grin, sometimes in a peal of delighted laughter.

apparently she wants his haircut too.

many nights, kevin is, in fact, still at "werk" when i'm putting her to bed, and she always asks for him, expecting his goodnight kiss. sometimes, when i explain that he's still at work, she turns forlorn: "no dada werk. ho hows!" she doesn't yet get the distinction between "home" and "house," so she likes to sandwich them together, as if to cover her bases.

on sunday morning kevin's big gift was sleeping in.

as usual, violet and i went to the local farmer's market to do our produce shopping for the week. we spent a long time in the petting zoo, and she was pretty tired by the end. "do you want to go to the park?" i asked, to which she replied, "nooo. wah go ho see dada. ho hows." it's like she knew it was father's day.

we make a lot of these "come home" videos to send to kevin when he's busy werking.



i yuh yoo too, dada.

the smirk

violet walked into the kitchen and handed my phone to kevin the other day. she constantly asks to "type," so i let her. usually what i find is a google search for qqqqqqaaaaqawaqqq. her left thumb must like that corner of the keyboard. the other day, no lie, i discovered an open website dedicated to getting your anxiety under control. what's she trying to tell me? anyway, kevin accepted her offer of my phone and then asked me, "why does the screen say SD card deleting files?" well... problem "solved"? i never made it to the verizon store for help retrieving my locked data, and thus you will never see the video of violet flawlessly performing mozart at carnegie hall.

on the upside, my camera works again, allowing me to share more cuteness with you.

swimming lessons! kevin and i have been taking her to the (politically correct) parent-child swim classes at the ymca, and she is doing great. we weren't sure what to expect, but they really are teaching some valuable skills to the 6-36 month range. violet can pull herself out of the pool and has gotten (too) brave about jumping back in to us. she kicks vigorously while holding onto her kickboard, and she is starting to figure out that she's supposed to circle her arms while we tow her around on the noodle, chasing after rubber duckies. she can monkey crawl along the wall, but she is not down with being floated on her back. unlike several of her classmates, she'll tolerate being dunked, although i won't say she enjoys it. she talks about the "swih pooh" all week, and about "tee-cheh cho-cheh" (teacher joseph), who referees a cutthroat race of red light/green light.

the latest neighborhood happening is dandelion hunting. or "daa-lie," as violet calls them. "wah boh daa-lie." when she blows, most of the florets end up in her mouth or ours. when kevin walks the dogs alone in the morning, he takes note of the patches of grass with the best finds for later. unfortunately violet now seems to think that she's allowed to pick any flowers, anywhere. a farmer's market vendor was not pleased to see a stalk of bamboo go missing from his stock, and i'm sure the trader joe's security cameras have violet on watch for petal-lifting. neighbors' flowerbeds suffer the most. this photo excepted, we grab her hands to stop her, but she's quick.

her quickness is noted regularly by the daycare staff. if she goes to smack/shove/pinch another kid, the teachers will pin her arms (hug-style) as they recite the "we don't hit our friends" party line, but before they know it, she's kicking her legs, still trying to get at whatever kid stole her plastic dinosaur or looked at her sideways. the teachers tell me they're often stifling their laughter behind their backs, but man, i know violet knows they're laughing and am sure it only eggs her on. do i smirk a lot? does kevin? because violet is smirking ALL THE TIME. i know you probably think i'm reading adult comprehension into her expressions, but i'm telling you, she smirks. i've tried so many times to capture the smirk on camera, but do you think that little rascal will give me the satisfaction? she's so over posing for photos that i spent a half hour trying to get a decent shot of the "ladybug tattoo" that she came home with the other day. i finally resorted to the bag of shredded cheese to get the job done.

she's long been obsessed with kevin's tattoo and was quite pleased to have her own, until i washed it away in the bath. she has declared many times, "vivi wah tattoo TOO!" "do you want a butterfly on your lower back?" i asked her. "YEAH!"

uh oh.

and OMG how could i have almost forgotten this milestone. 20 lbs in 20 months! "new cah seat!"

GO D! (and other obsessions)

violet is really into sunglasses lately. i couldn't resist letting her pick out her own pair at h&m. anytime she walks out the front door and is blinded by the sun, she throws her arm over her eyes and cries out, "suh-gass! suh-gass!" she does the same thing in the car if a ray of light happens to cross over her face. of course before she understood the function of sunglasses, she didn't mind the bright light. now you'd think she was a vampire (or a celebrity facing the paparazzi squad).

that's pretty much the story of the day, actually: she's learning the function of everyday things (and plenty of random ones) at an ever increasing rate, and once she knows what something's for, she wants to do it over and over again. the latest crazes are spray bottles, the toilet paper holder and the garden hose.

she's also big into witches, and kevin has parlayed that interest to further one of his own.

oh! more news! she half-pooped in her little potty once! i should get this down for all-important posterity. when she graduated to the toddler room at school, where she sees several of the older toddlers toilet training, we casually introduced her little green potty at home, and she likes to play like she's going to the bathroom on it. so the other day, i noticed her doing her telltale squat after lunch, and i said, "are you going poo poo in your diaper?" "YEAH!" she replied. "do you want to go on the potty?" "YEAH!!!" she sprinted down the hall with as much enthusiasm. long story short, she'd half-pooped in her diaper, but once stripped down, she pooped the other half in her mini toilet. we did some celebrating. i don't expect a repeat anytime soon, but it was awesome how psyched she was about flushing her own poop down the big toilet. when she gets her acceptance letter to harvard, i doubt i'll be quite as excited.

in other news, we've started to let her watch a little TV, by which i specifically mean go, diego, go! man, i can see what a slippery slope this is for parents. i mean, if we weren't actively engaging her to sing, dance, repeat the words, etc., she would just sit there zombified. oh the things i could get done in 24 minutes! so far, kevin and i have agreed that she can only watch one episode at a time, on netflix, with a parent, on the weekend. we'll see how those rules hold up. i have to admit, it's really freaking cute how much she loves diego and baby jaguar. a few days ago, we watched the christmas episode, in which santa and his reindeer are stuck in the snow, prompting diego to enlist linda the llama to (spoiler alert) save christmas for the animals at the animal rescue center. then yesterday, when violet noticed a santa book in her room, she leaped to her feet and barreled down the hall to the living room shouting, "GO D! GO D! WANT TV! GO D!" (i handed pandora's box to kevin and said, "dada, close this.")

also, my heart sank last night when she ripped her sock out of kevin's hand and declared for the first time, "mine!" there's something so much more endearing about "vivi sock!" i guess the third person feels more about the revelation that she has ownership over things, while the first person is a demand for them.

today's tragedy is that the SD card in my phone is coming up damaged, with a week's worth of photos and probably a month's worth of videos not backed up. i've got a few fixes to try, but thankfully i was (as usual) behind in posting, so here are a few more pics of the cuteness that has been violet's latest around town -- the griffith park pony wagon and carousel.

mother's day in the rose garden

my own mom gave me such a nice card on mother's day, expressing her wish that i enjoy experiencing the wonder of life through violet's eyes at every opportunity. what she's really saying (in her gentle way) is that i need to stop worrying so much, especially about all of the ways i'm failing to be the perfect mom. she's right of course, and i don't know why it's so hard for me personally to avoid rapid descent down the "i suck" spiral of self-doubt at every parenting fail, like, say, when i'm checking out at the grocery store and violet swan-dives out of the cart with me narrowly catching her only to realize that poop is smearing from her shorts onto my shirt as she smacks me in the face and laughs about it, inspiring me to make a wry comment about pain-in-the-ass kids to the cashier who is, hello, eight months pregnant. but the truth is that as time passes and violet continues to grow and thrive, i find myself worrying less and less (i would've predicted i'd worry more and more) because it seems pretty apparent that in spite of (or more likely because of) the day-to-day failures on our end, she's turning out pretty great. the most repeated line in my internal monologue? "shake it off, stacey." i like to picture our dogs coming in from the rain. shake it OFF.

appropriately, we spent mother's day stopping to smell the roses at the huntington library. nana, poppy and auntie courtney made the long trek from san diego to pasadena for the afternoon.

violet loved being on the loose in the green expanses. in fact, the only time she wasn't on the move was while heartily enjoying the brunch. here's mama and violet

in their more natural state

we tried to get a girls picture

but violet had a cookie or four to burn off

cookies really do make frequent appearances on this blog, don't they?

crib posse

every day it's everybody into the crib and everybody out again, over and over. i'd like to say that violet plays in her "keeb" with her absurdly large posse of stuffed buddies on her own, but she still insists upon mama and/or dada chaperoning the activities. i will say that several of these animals have suspicious looks sewn on their faces. the funniest is that she's straight up rejected two: big eeyore (she prefers his smaller counterpart) and "bob," an admittedly odd bunny-monkey-giraffe hybrid. "what are eeyore and bob doing in the laundry hamper?" kevin asked me the other night. at least we know where she hides the bodies.

some of you may also remember spanish monkey - a puppet (voiced by kevin) who talks like the dos equis (most interesting) man (in the world). he was violet's FAVORITE toy in the early days. now he's been banished to the back of the closet. in fact, she is suddenly afraid of all puppets (though not muppets thankfully). at barnes and noble last weekend, she cautiously sidestepped her way past the rotating tower of puppet animals for sale and then sprinted for the thomas the train table. i don't think i've mentioned last month's attempt at a meet-and-greet with the easter bunny. let's just say he won't be initiated into her posse anytime soon.

also, a couple of longish videos for the grandmas.

here's violet helping "baby doll" drift off to peaceful slumber:



and here's violet demonstrating the miracle of genetics via her obsession with sanitization and clutter elimination. yuv yoo dada.

nana howwwwww!

violet loves going to nana's house. to say she's obsessed isn't an understatement. everyday she talks about three things without fail.

1) "nana howwww. vivi go. go now!"
2) "go tain. vivi ride. ride now!"
3) "ama tuck. see. go park. go now!"

train rides, seeing the ice cream truck at the park, and nana's house. that's the good life for violet. what's amazing to me is that she's totally onto our deflections. later, tomorrow, soon, this weekend, next weekend, next month, this summer. she knows those phrases are her cue to respond "now!" of course when it's us saying "now" (diaper, car, bedtime), she knows that's her cue for "no!"

it's also amazing to watch her sense of humor continue to develop. if we respond to something with "that's silly" in a laughing tone, she'll often realize that she's told a joke. she'll smile with a twinkle in her eye and tell it again. she remembers them too.

sample dialogue:

v: dog tain. ride.
me: that's silly! dogs don't ride trains.
v (giggling): no! roo tain. pe-e tain. ride now.
me: rudy can't ride the train! petey can't ride the train! only people ride the train.
(of course sometimes the joke can't be sustained.)
v (suddenly pissed): no! dog tain! ride now!
(a fire truck passes her car window, saving me from an angry meltdown)
v (entranced): want fi tuck. tuck come back. ride now. vivi ride tuck.
me: that's silly! you can't ride the fire truck. the fire truck is going to the emergency.
v: vivi go mergen-c. go now.

another recent favorite:

v (at a traffic light): red!
me: that's right. red means stop.
v (with a sly grin): red go. geen stop.
me: that's silly! red means stop and green means go.
v (suddenly pissed): no! geen stop. red go.
me: you're not going to do well in sexual harassment training.
v (indignant): GEEN STOP! RED GO!
(grimly resigned to my fate, i turn the ipod to "5 little monkeys")
v: ...
(47 seconds later the song ends)
v: mo' monk song.
(47 seconds later the song ends)
v: 'gain. mo' monk song.

i love the abrupt turns from hilarity to rage. she inherited the soul of comedy from her dada.

kevin, however, has a lower tolerance for performance than even me, and so far violet doesn't mind being the center of attention. which brings us to these belated easter pics from our belated easter celebration at nana howwww. a dozen doting adults, one delighted toddler.

although violet enjoyed nana's feast, along with the "chicks" made by cuzzy kristy

naturally she was on the hunt for more.

what do you mean shell game? where's the f'n chocolate?

from rocking chairs made over a century ago:

to this:

 "siri, vivi want ama. want now."

still, nothing beats the fisher price farm, despite the mysterious disappearance of the farmer's wife. could that be the weight of guilt i see on kevin's eyelids?