Asher's favorite video

This is Asher's favorite video right now.

He wants to watch it over and over and over again.

Thanksgiving Report

It’s probably been about 6 years since Deenesh and I gave up on traveling for Thanksgiving and have just the whole turkey shabang for ourselves. So it’s a nice bonus to have my mom living down the street so we can actually have a family Thanksgiving this year.

My mom very delicately broached the subject with me as to how we would proceed with the meal. Thanksgiving is her favorite holiday so this was a serious business. We decided to do it at our house and then we got to the sensitive business of divvying up the food preparation. Mom quickly volunteered to do the turkey and the stuffing. And the mashed potatoes. And the minced meat pie and the cranberry pudding.

“Um. So we’ll take care of the vegetables?” I said.

“Okay. That sounds good.” She replied.

Some might think I might take offense that perhaps she was questioning my cooking abilities, or that I would feel sad at missing out on Thanksgiving preparation.

Those people clearly don’t know me. All I could think was “score!”

So the meal was wonderful. Mom came over to do the preparation, Asher picked out the turkey himself (yeah Trader Joe’s for antibiotic free humane turkey), I helped peel potatoes, and Deenesh took Asher out to the playground.

Before my mom came over I was scrubbing down the kitchen and trying to dodge the helpful advances of my 2 year old ("I do it! I clean!) until I finally had the brainstorm to send him to his own kitchen to scrub it down.

He did a very thorough job.

In the end, it was probably cleaner than my kitchen.

Ah Asher. After coming home from the playground draped over his father in a semi-comatose state after having used up all his energy at the playground (and then forcing his dad to carry him all.the.way.home), he then rallied. We put him down for a nap at 1:30. At 3:30, yes TWO HOURS LATER and when he would normally be waking up - he was still going strong singing to himself and chatting in bed. (I tried to get in a nap myself, but it was difficult to get any sleep over his chatter). He finally drifted off around 3:40.

So it’s perhaps no surprise that he looks pretty spacey-drowsy in all the photos since he ended up with a much shorter nap than normal.

The meal turned out beautifully, though Asher maintained his long-time disdain for all things green “I no like it” (to the point that he tries insisting he won’t eat until he takes the one.single.green.bean off his plate), took small, forced bites of mashed potatoes (!) and cranberry jelly, before also declaring “I no like it”.

So he basically stuck to the stuffing and the turkey, eventually concluding that he really only wanted turkey with skin. *sigh* what happened to our kid that would try anything?

After dinner we took our desserts to our neighbor's house to join in their dessert family extravaganza, the highlight of which was the adorable kid parade running around the house with Asher bringing up the rear.

Click here for Asher's first and second Thanksgiving posts.

Domestic Goddess

Today I made homemade noodles to add to the turkey soup Deenesh made from leftovers.

We had a LOT of leftovers.

The recipe was pretty simple, I remembered seeing it a while back on one of the blogs that I follow.

Of course, it would have been much easier if I actually owned a rolling pin.

Then the noodles probably wouldn't have been quite so thick.

And probably would have been a lot nicer looking.

But Asher assured me that they were delicious.

And I thought they were fantastic.

Deenesh declined to have any soup. He claimed he was full.

(Despite the facial expression in the photo Asher really did love the nooodles. I think Deenesh was just setting me up to look bad with this photo).

Asher's Driving Tips

Patience:
I must admit that driving in Williamsburg can try one’s patience. The other day, in mild annoyance after watching someone wait forever to make a right-hand turn with no discernable traffic within miles, I finally honked. Asher, back-seat driving as usual, said, "Patience Daddy, no no beep." Of course, a few minutes later at the next traffic light when everyone was stopped, Asher asked me to beep.

Encouragement:
Today, I was driving on one of Williamsburg notorious areas for tourists, and the driver ahead of me ended up holding traffic by not using an available turning lane. I may have muttered a “friggen idiot” under my breath. Later, I was turning into the library and someone was making a very slow turn in front of me, when Asher said, “Daddy, say F%#K.”

Before anyone makes any judgments, I always drive carefully with Asher in the car, and he has made me be more patient even when I am driving alone (sad to say, but my two-year old is my super-ego). But, I guess Tracy and I have both been guilty of potty mouth.

Red House

I hate to say it, but I think our beloved red house might be mad at us.

In the 3 months since we’ve been back 1) the hot water heater has broken 2) the grinder pump has failed 3) we’ve had a leak in our ceiling and now 4) the water pipe to the kitchen sink sprung a leak.

When we tried to get the water turned off the brittle hose tore further causing a massive spray of water. Since our kitchen is upstairs the water then started pouring through the light fixture in the laundry room. It was practically comical – kind of like a sitcom, or one of those 80’s home fixer-uper movies.

So is it just me or does it seem like our house was mad at us? I thought perhaps it was because we left it for 2 years, but upon further reflection I recalled the massive water clog/back-up we had in the master bath just a few short weeks after we brought Asher home from the hospital. A back-up that caused massive black sludge to come up both sinks and tub, that came with a horrible smell, and that threatened to require cutting a hole through the master bedroom wall and an extensive pipe replacement (which was thankfully avoided after several water vacuums, plunges, snaking and finally air blasts), and which put the master bath largely out of commission for about two weeks right when we had a new baby and several out of town guests.

That’s right. A new baby. So perhaps the house isn’t mad at us so much as jealous.

After all. Before Asher, Casa Roja was our one and only pride and joy.

So I’m not sure what we need now. An exorcism? A reintegration ceremony to assure our home that we still love it just as much as before Asher came into our lives?

Otherwise, we might have to make some kind of child sacrifice because I don't think we can handle much more house surprises.

Babble-On

There’s so many things I wish I could capture about Asher at this age (well, all ages really) that just cannot be captured in a post or in a photo, or even in a video (since he is bound to see the video and then start begging to use it). One of the things I hope I will remember forever is the adorable babbling/ramblings that Asher frequently does when he is going to sleep or when he has just woken up. Frequently you can only understand a couple words here and there, but the other day he was particularly verbal. While there was much I couldn’t understand, here are some of the things that I caught

“go to timeout….go to timeout…go to timeout…blankie! Yeah!”

“No, Asher daddy, no MY daddy! Daddy! Yeah! Asher daddy. My!”

“Daddy take that car? That car! Yeah!!! Nooo, daddy take that car? No that car!! Yeh!! I like it!”

“bleh, don’t like it. Bleh, don’t like it. I like this. I like it. I like this lots. Oh wow! I like it lots, oh wow.”

“Band-aid? YEAH! Band-aid, no. No band-aid. I have owie, need band-aid. Okay? My band-aid. Need band-aid. I have owie, I need band-aid. Owie. Okay mommy? Okay? Ow. Ow. Mommy scratch. Look at that. ” (he didn’t have an owie. It’s more like he was practicing what he needed to say later to convince me to give him a band-aid).

He kept it up for an HOUR. Usually it only takes him 5-10 minutes to get to sleep after I leave the room (although the process of putting him down usually takes a while).

On this occasion I found him standing on his bed looking out the window at the car – and more specifically the spot of Deenesh’s missing car. He then informed me that he was waiting for Daddy to come home so that he could say hi. Ambitious plan since his Dad wouldn’t be home for another several hours.

Modern Art Appreciation

This morning Asher took his fall leaf with tissue paper colors pasted on that he made at school off of the refrigerator and in its place he hung up the napkin I had just used to wipe oatmeal off his face.

I figured, who am I to judge his taste in art? So I left it there.*

*Well, at least until he spilled something. I prefer art with a purpose.

In praise of imaginary dogs. Or Why Asher does not need a (real) dog

As you’ve heard, for the last several week Asher has had a wonderful imaginary dog that he puts out on the porch to sleep every night, brings inside every morning, and plays with every day.

I’ve found that imaginary dogs have several advantages over real dogs.

Advantages of an imaginary dog

• 1. Easy to train
• 2. No begging for food
• 3. They can go anywhere – in a museum, in a restaurant, in someone’s home, and nobody bats an eye
• 4. They aren’t smelly
• 5. You don’t have to clean up after them
• 6. They never make you feel guilty about not giving them enough attention or enough walks
• 7. Appear and disappear as needed. Need a distraction? A simple “stop licking me!” “doggie down!” “does doggie need to go outside?” can do the trick. Bored and want to move on to something else? No guilt.
• 8. Wonderful companion in the car, and simply disappear at the end of the car trip (avoiding any “you can’t leave your dog in a locked car” complaints)

Advantages of a real dog

1. 1. Um. Well. I guess they’re soft and warm.
2. 2. Okay, fine. There’s also that warm fuzzy feeling they give you when they greet you and cuddle with you.

All in all though, I have to say I would recommend and imaginary dog to any parent with a toddler.

Asher Needs a Dog!

Sunday morning I was watching Asher, and bad parent, trying to follow the NY marathon and encouraging Asher to amuse himself. Asher decided to pretend to be a dog, and I would half-hearted pat his head every once in a while. After a few minutes of this, Asher bit my toes, hard, and then told me to say bad doggy.

Asher also has an invisible dog who we have to let in every morning. The other day he wouldn't let Doggie in. I asked him why, and he told me Doggie was in timeout because he kept licking Asher.

Happy Halloween

Asher really enjoyed Halloween this year.

I was a little nervous that he wouldn't want to wear his costume, but he wore it to a Halloween party on Friday, and then on Halloween morning he wanted to put his big, blue monster costume right away.

When our neighbor, Stella, saw that Asher was already in his costume, she put on her peacock costume and they played together in the yard.

Asher REFUSED to take it off for nap time.

We have the best. neighbors. ever. One of our neighbors came up with the idea to pull a small keg with cups around on a wagon as we went trick-or-treating. We got candy and everyone not in a costume got drinks (hat costumes excepted).

And just when we thought we were done with the evening we decided to take a quick trip to visit our friends to show off Asher's 5 eyes, 4 arms, 2 horns, and big belly. They had brought their kids by for Halloween visits back when we had nobody to whom to hand out candy.

Adorable right? Their kids have since gotten bigger, and moved on to slightly more scary costumes. Asher's monster costume fit right in.

Well, we ended up sticking around for MORE trick-or-treating. Asher got to chase after 7 year old Tessa, along with her neighbor friend and the neighbor's younger brother (born same day and same hospital as Asher). He had a blast. Although it was difficult to convince him to put the candy in the bag, rather than carrying it himself. You'd think he didn't trust Deenesh or me with the candy.

At one house a young werewolf answered the door, and right away Asher turned right around and said "Up! No more!" We talked about how it was a little scary and after that whenever there was a house with good Halloween decorations he would turn to us and say "Up. Little scary."

Overall, a really great evening.