By the time some of you will read this, Claudine will have started her first day at school. She’s familiar with the building and familiar with the rooms and the general curriculum. After all she’s gone with us to drop off and pick up Mia since she was a newborn and has taken classes there herself for the past 2 years. This, however, has not made the anxiety of starting school any less stressful for any of us. She’s not used to being dropped off and she won’t be familiar with the new teachers.

I don’t know if you can tell what kind of personality MIss C has through the stories and photos from this blog, but I capture her at her purest, most comfortable and chatty self. In reality though, if you were to meet her in the street, she would probably hide behind my legs, cover her face and not acknowledge you, not because she is being rude, but because she is really shy. Although I’ve seen improvements over the past year, it takes a while for Claudine to warm up to new people, and it becomes an even greater challenge if you happen to be a guy. You have to earn her trust, but when you do, you will be rewarded with the silliest faces, some of the wittiest banter from a 3 year old that you will ever hear and a personality with equal parts charm and goofiness (I believe she’s now the goofiest person in the house).

That said, we are not expecting the morning to be easy at all. We’re not really sure what to expect.

ps. a blog reader commented that she thought Claudine was much older, like 5, not 3 years old. She’s a super tall kid, taller than anyone else her age we know and even taller than some 4 year olds we know. She’s also very verbal and draws like a 5/6 year old. Also, she has a very big head. Seriously, that kid has the roundest head I’ve ever seen. I know it’s because their head shapes are very different (Mia’s head is a lot more narrow), but Mia’s bike helmet won’t even fit on Claudine. Like not even close.

Oh, hello there, baby Claudine. See? Big, round head. (baby c photo credit: chardean)

“Sometimes I sneeze when I get excited because it’s like blowing confetti out of my nose. ” – Mia

“I have a lot in common with Daphne from Scooby Doo. I’m pretty. I’m popular. I sometimes wear the same outfit 3 days in a row. I also wear a headband.” – Mark’s sister’s 8 year old neighbor

“I’m allergic to unicorns.” – Claudine

“Sometimes when I get excited I don’t show it. I just wiggle my toes instead.” – Mia

“Do you know Lady Gaga? What?!? You live in NY and you don’t know Lady Gaga??” – the same 8 year old neighbor to Mia

(rolls eyes) “I think everyone in the whole wide world knows by now that Mia was in the hospital.” – Claudine

We’ve been in Seattle since Monday (I’m a few days behind in the way of posts) and Wednesday turned out to be the kind of day we least expected.

First of all, I’d like to thank Lecia and Alexi for their incredible hospitality. We are staying with them this week and they couldn’t be more gracious and helpful, especially today.

We had plans to wake up early and ride the ferry to Bainbridge Island and drive to the Dungeness Spit. We made it on to the ferry and Alexi, who happens to be a doctor, suggested we stop by the medical clinic in town as soon as we got off the ferry to get Mia’s swollen knee checked out. I had noticed that her knee had been warm to the touch, and the warmth, redness and swelling seemed to have spread even during the time we were on the ferry. After an exam, we were advised to head straight back to the ferry and check Mia into the ER at the Seattle Children’s Hospital.

I suppose there’s a moment in every parent’s lives when your child is hurt or sick and you have to take them to the ER or hospital. I guess we’ve been lucky so far. This was our first visit with either kid. Mia wasn’t happy that she got stuck at the hospital while the other kids played. She wasn’t happy that she wasn’t allowed to eat or drink the entire 6 hrs we were there. She wasn’t happy with the needles and IV. She got to watch lots of TV though as we waited around to get blood drawn, lab tests and her knee x-rayed. There was a period where I was starting to really worry. There were all kinds of talks about septic arthritis, infection in the joints and possibly down in her bone, admittance to the hospital for a few days, and possibly missing our plane ride home next Tuesday if prolonged anti-biotic treatment through an IV was required.

In the end, the doctors consulted and decided that she had enough white blood cells to send her home and fight it with an oral antibiotic and a close watch on the knee. We have to go back on Monday for a followup to make sure the antibiotics are doing their job.

On the other side of town, Mark was dealing with a sudden flat tire that was discovered in the morning and a dead car battery that was discovered later that day as he was trying to make his way up to the hospital. It was real nutty.

When they gave Mia the green light to eat, she chose to have apples, gold fish, and a half size can of lemon lime soda. She was pretty happy to see Claudine when she got discharged. We drove to Mark’s sisters place for dinner and came back to Lecia’s with just 1 kid. Claudine wanted to have a sleepover with her aunt, but Mia wanted to stay with us because she was worried about her knee. As we left Claudine there and drove away, I realized that we had never been away from her before. The girls have never slept apart. Mia said she was going to miss her. Another first in a day of firsts.

It’s a sad day here at our house. Now that I am back home after a meeting earlier this afternoon, I’m trying to keep it together. For the girls. Today is our PT nanny’s last day. For the past 6 years she’s been coming every Tuesdays and Thursdays since Mia was 3 months old. It was inevitable someday…kids grow up and they go to school…the needs of a family change…but it doesn’t make it any easier when your heart and emotions are involved.

Claudine understands that today is Mala’s last day with us, but she doesn’t fully comprehend what that means, not at 3 years old. I was trying to take these photos this morning, but she was being a complete clown, unlike Mia, who was much more subdued. I suspect she may ask why she’s no longer coming at some point, but for her, today is like any other day. Mia, on the other hand, has been taking it rather hard. Sometimes I’ll see her get real quiet and tear up and I’ll know that she’s thinking about it. It’s a big change for all of us and a big change for Mark and I too as we go into uncharted territories of not having 2 solid days of babysitting that we could always rely on. If we were juggling with work and and the kids before, we’ll be juggling even more now. But I can’t imagine what Mia must be feeling through all this. At 6 years old, some things in her world have changed through the years – new schools, friends moving away, and even new homes, but the one constant has been her nanny.

The kids are out now with our nanny, but I’m anticipating a lot of tears when they get back home in an hour or two. Mia needs to be brave, we all do. Mala’s new job is actually only a block away so this has comforted us during this transition as we know that the girls will still be able to see her once in awhile. Still, I know it’s not quite the same.

*ps. damn…that was hard.
*pps. OMG, it just hit me. We don’t have a babysitter anymore. We are so screwed.

I have no idea where Claudine learned the universal hand sign for rock. I’m pretty sure I haven’t shown her any Ronnie James Dio videos (RIP), but she’s been doing this all over the place. Dayum, I can totally see my future.

I remember a friend of mine, who has a teenage daughter, telling me that at some point you end up feeling like your kid’s personal assistant and chauffeur when they reach a certain age. She chaperones her and her daughter’s friends to concerts. Um, what!? I’ve never really given much thought to parenting a teenager before. I think I would have died if either of my parents went to any concerts with me. They just dropped us off and picked us up after the concert and when we were old enough, we drove ourselves or took the subway. I know times were different back then, but yeah, now that I think about it, I cannot believe that my mom dropped me and my friend off at our very first concert and just drove off. We were only 15.

Ever hear of Heavy Metal Parking Lot? The cult classic documentary about the parking lot of the May 31st, 1986 Judas Priest concert in Maryland? Yeah, this. That tour was my first concert ever. Would you drop off your 15 year old daughter at a stadium parking lot with these wingnuts? I’m thinking like I should maybe be embarrassed about this, but I’m totally not. I know I’ve mostly talked about the Cure, the Smiths and Michael Jackson on here, but before the whole Goth phase took over completely, I was also a bit of a metalhead at the same time (primarily 70/80s British metal, not hair bands!). I totally remember being in my friend’s living room and buying those Priest tickets on the phone, not even knowing if our parents would let us go. We were so excited. I think we must have used her older brother’s credit card.

Music was different back then because the music industry was different. Televised concerts like Live Aid were major events and me and my brother would sit glued to the TV all day long. I remember the day MTV went on the air, but we didn’t get it for a year or two so I used to sneak into the kitchen late at night to watch Friday Night Videos on a tiny TV that sat on the kitchen counter. I’d sit at the kitchen table and watch video after video in the dark with the sound turned down low, almost inaudible, so it wouldn’t wake up my parents.

The first record that I ever bought, however, was this 80s compilation record (as in VINYL, people) called K-Tel Hit Explosion. It had the Go-Go’s, Joan Jett, A Flock of Seagulls, “Eye of the Tiger”, “Gloria” by Laura Branigan (remember that one?) and all sorts of other 80s goodness. I went to The Wiz on Main Street in Flushing with my mom to buy it. I still remember how excited I was holding that record in line at the cash register. It was much like the day my mom took to me to Sam Ash to get my first electric guitar. I swore that I was going to bust balls and practice everyday till my fingers bled so that I could grow up to be a rock star. I was totally planning on being kick ass (see how well that worked out for me?).

Every kid remembers their first record/tape/CD purchase and live concert experience (what’s yours?) and I’ve been thinking about this lately because Mia is really starting to grow up. I see glimpses of how she might be when she’s a little older. When we’re bored Mark and I will sometimes try to guess what kind of teenagers the girls will be and we can totally see Claudine as a goth, but Mia’s sort of a mystery. With music being the way it is, it won’t be a big deal when she’ll want to buy some songs because it will most likely be downloaded, but she will have a first concert someday and either Mark or I will be there. It’s been a long time since Mark and I have been to a concert together, the last being Stereolab 11 years ago and the last big arena rock show I saw was AC/DC at Madison Square Garden in 2000 (on a total whim and so random, but…HELL YEAH! It was epic). It never crossed my mind that there might be more concerts in my future. If I’m lucky it’ll be a band that I actually like, but I know it’s not about me. If it’s something like Justin Bieber (nooooo) or Miley Cyrus (ughhh) then whatever. I can be my old fart self and say music ain’t like it was back in the 80s and 90s, but I was a kid once too. I understand. I was totally into Duran Duran when I was 12.

NYC is a walking town. On average, we’ll end up walking a few miles a day at the end of the day which makes it almost excusable that we don’t regularly work out (almost). It’s funny that when we hit the burbs or some other city or town where cars rule, we’ll automatically enter into that mentality of taking the car to distances we wouldn’t think twice about walking in the city. But in the city, walking is where it’s at.

But it isn’t always easy with young kids. Mia got out of the stroller fairly early at 3 because at that point I was pushing 2 kids up and around our hilly neighborhood which meant I was hauling close to 50 pounds of kid, stroller and bags filled with baby crap in a double stroller. My back couldn’t really take too much. Mia grew accustomed to walking longish distances because her preschool was 4+ very long city blocks up the hill, an equivalent of 3/4 of a mile. For the most part she rarely complained, though sometimes it took twice as long to get to our destination.

If you’ve ever walked with small kids you know what I’m talking about. They stop at every tree or flower. They’ll take breaks on every other stoop. They’ll run up ahead as fast as they can and then run back down, exerting more energy than necessary which fuels more ammunition to the inevitable “I’m tired” whine (so stop running!). They’ll step onto a ledge while hanging on to the wrought iron fence and creep along, ever so slowly, inch by inch. Sometimes, they’ll stop altogether and just park themselves on the sidewalk.

Still, I’m glad that for a month now, we’ve been completely stroller free. I thought it would be harder. Claudine loved the stroller. She was one lazy baby who never learned to crawl, didn’t like to move much and didn’t walk until she was almost 18 months. She LOVED the stroller. We’ve been leaving the stroller at home a few times a week when walking Mia to school. We’ve been leaving it behind when taking the train to Manhattan. And now, the old Maclaren, the same 6 year old stroller we used to push Mia around as a baby before we had Claudine, has been permanently folded and stored in the closet.*

(*can’t part with it just yet. It’s there just in case. This is NYC after all).

Guys, the weather in NY this weekend was hot. No, no, you don’t understand. Don’t complain to me about your warm 85 degree weather when I’m talking temps in the 90s H.O.T. Still, even though I would personally have rather stayed home with the AC on, we spent most of the weekend outdoors. While Mark was down at the Food Film Festival, I was at back to back birthday parties in Prospect Park and playdates with the girls on Saturday, and back to the Park for another class picnic on Sunday where Claudine got a little diploma. It was a busy social weekend, even if I did have to take 5 showers over 2 days just to cool off. Also, this all day activity and running around in the sun all weekend is for the birds. Or at least young people. My aching back, feet and sciatic pain is making me feel really old.

We ended our weekend with a lemonade stand in front of our building. Mia’s been asking to do one for ages so we set up some leftover limeade and cookies from Saturday’s event. The girls held their attention in and out of those 2 hours so Mark felt like he was back at the Flea as he ended up pouring Limeade and ice in cups to “customers”. If you were lucky enough to pass by, you would have had regular Flea goods at a highly discounted price. In the end, the girls made $18 (not bad!) and yes, it was mostly from neighbors who came out after I posted on Facebook. But that’s what neighbors are for, right?

Speaking of neighbors…one of our neighbors put out some free books on the sidewalk for taking and Claudine grabbed this:

She sat in that little lawn chair with a serious expression for about half an hour, thumbing through the pages of this American Girl book on “our bodies”. I glanced over at one point and noticed that she had been staring intently at 1 page for quite some time. I walked over to see what she was looking at. Well, I didn’t expect to see THAT – an illustrated, 4 diagram spread on how to insert a tampon. Okaaay, then. Let me put that book on the top shelf and save it for another 5 years. I’m not ready for this. Just not ready.

School isn’t officially over yet (that happens on Monday at noon), but we’ve been saying good bye all week. This is Claudine’s last 2 months at home before she enters school for the very first time in September. Lot’s of changes coming up. I guess Mia’s inherited some of my sappy sentimentalism because she’s been pretty emotional and mopey the last few days. At her end of year class breakfast celebration this morning, all the parents stood around and remarked how fast the year flew by. Some things you say to just say, but we meant it. It’s put me in a funny mood. I’m also feeling the slow pokey-ness of summer. Hard to motivate when it’s 95 degrees today.

Mia had her first ballet recital yesterday. It reminded me that I have, perhaps, a lifetime of opportunities to sit in the audience and watch my kids perform – in school, at recitals, performances, math leagues, whatever. It really hits you on occasions like these, that you’re a parent. Not so much the everyday, walking your kid to school, giving your kid a snack kind of stuff, but this.

It also reminded me of myself at that age taking ballet for a couple of years. We used to have formal pictures taken, something that we did every year, in our fancy tutus and leotards. We’d be instructed to pose and the photographers would snap a photo, much like class photos that you’d bring home from school. I remember overhearing one year, the photographer whispering to her assistant “that kid is really awkward and gangly”. She was talking about me, age 7 or so, as they were trying different poses to get a shot. I wasn’t supposed to hear that and they probably don’t think I heard, but I still remember that comment to this day and how it made me feel.

Just remember that kids hear everything. Some throw-away comment might make an indelible impression on young minds. They’re not as stupid or unaware as you think.

Looks like we’ve got a new voracious reader in the family. And for a new reader, happiness is finding a whole bookshelf of new hand-me down books waiting for you at your grandparents’ house. Mia started reading earlier in the school year. It started out with single words. She’d call out signs when we’d drive or walk around the neighborhood. She started reading simple sentences soon after and now, as we near the end of her Kindergarten year, she’s reading whole books, even books “without pictures”. Now that she’s reading, I need to watch what I have open on my computer when she sits next to me or peers over my shoulder. Claudine can still nuzzle up with me and watch me while I’m working, something she often likes to do, but Mia is now too far advanced a reader to have any papers or documents casually laying around.

I can’t even tell you what joy it is to go find your child in her room sitting in her bed reading a book to herself when you’ve wondered why it was so quiet. We’re entering a whole new chapter here in our house.