This was a great Christmas, especially for Claire. My brother Tim and his wife Cindy came to Texas for the holidays along with my parents. Everyone came to Austin, and we hosted everyone for Christmas for the first time. Tim and Cindy really hit it off with Claire. Claire had countless games and jokes with them all through the two days they were here. She started things off by showing them her very favorite new show, a Pixar animated short film which Kit had recorded, called One Man Band. She tried to get them to laugh and scream at all the funny bits.
As Cindy noted, Claire is the perfect age for Christmas. At four years old, she loved every present she got. There was no complaining about not getting the “right thing” or not getting enough. And she just loved having all the fun people around to entertain.
At three months old, Little Molly was not as excited about Christmas. In fact, this year, she could not tell Christmas from the Fourth of July. She was a little worn out from all the excitement of entertaining her aunt and uncle and grandparents on Christmas Eve, and she slept quietly upstairs almost the entire Christmas morning, through all the gift exchange. She did not have a chance to appreciate her many presents, including one from Santa. Molly’s time to enjoy Christmas will come soon! You could say she was the big present to us this year.
Kit’s parents will come up to Austin to celebrate a late Christmas next week. They will certainly bring more entertainment, fun, and toys for Claire and Molly, and some much needed baby siting for me and Kit!
This was a banner year for us… we had Molly, Claire is doing great, we moved to Austin for Kit’s great job, I made some positive adjustments to my job. It doesn’t get any better than that. This may be, on paper, our best year ever.
But in reality great news comes with challenges and keeps us busy, and we did not get around to writing a real Christmas card about our great 2009. So after some hand wringing, we ended up with something very simple.
Claire does not always want to eat. Usualy she wants to do something else, namely play. But when she sets her mind to it, she can really put it away.
We went to EZ’s for lunch the other day, and Claire picked the kid’s hamburger meal somewhat surprisingly over chicken tenders and pizza. I am not sure what was “kid’s” about the burger. It was a full sized grown-up burger, even a pretty big one. I was expecting Claire to nibble around the edges and then play with her favorite new little baby doll from Book People. Kit and I got to talking and tending to Molly, who was crying in her portable car seat. Then I looked over and saw Claire eating the last bit of her burger. Wow, that thing was almost as big as her head, and now it was in her stomach. I even checked the floor — no burger.
As a matter of contrast, we had burgers again tonight (we are making a point of eating real healthy right now 😉 ), and Claire literally did not touch it. She ate grapes, a pear, an apple, and some cheddar goldfish crackers. Maybe I gawked at her too much back at EZ’s when I saw her hamburger disappear.
A few weeks ago, Claire was talking about her friend Jad at school. She told us, “Jad has a wizard in his car! He really does! They keep him in a cage!” Now that seemed odd and a little creepy, but kids this age have a powerful imagination. I figured either Jad made it up and told Claire, or Claire just made it up herself. The odd thing was that Claire was so insistent about it, and she referenced Jad’s mom. “His mom even said they have a wizard in their car.”
So I was at a birthday party for another kid, Lucy, in Claire’s class. While the kids had their bounce house fun, I chatted with the other parents. I told Jad’s mom that I heard they have a wizard in their car. She laughed and said, “Lizard. Sometimes we keep a lizard in our car when we are watching it for our neighbors. He does have a little cage.” We had a good laugh. She said she remembered when she told the kids about it at school. Claire seemed really surprised and said, “Really?!?!” in an astonished way.
I was telling Kit about this whole story, and the fact that it is a lizard and not a wizard. Claire was sitting there in the room with us. When Kit and I chuckled about it, Claire looked a little embarrassed and said quietly, “It’s not funny”, then turned her attention to a toy. I actually kind of hated to squash this little spec of mystery and surprise in Claire’s world.
Today was Molly’s first day of school. Of course, Molly was unaware of this exciting milestone.
Kit’s mom, Claire, Molly, and I all piled in the car this morning and headed off to school together. Molly is still adjusting to car rides and complained (ie, cried) a bit on the way to school.
Per the teacher’s suggestion, we dropped Claire off first at her class and then headed across the parking lot to the “small building” where the baby Chicks have their classroom. I had been taking Molly along to drop off Claire for a couple of weeks now, and Claire was still so proud to show off her baby sister to anyone who would look, including other kids, parents, and teachers. Yes, everyone in Claire’s class already knew Molly, and many were still fascinated by the sweet little baby in the car seat.
When we first arrived at the small building and set Molly down in the Chick’s room in her car seat, a big baby named Bobby showed up immediately to investigate. Once we got Molly out, he tried to climb into, or maybe tip over, her car seat. The teachers laughed and said that was Bobby.
The teachers suggested putting Molly in “the pool”, which is a round padded area in a sunny corner of the room. The main point of the pool is that is has short padded walls a few inches tall, so she is somewhat protected from Bobby and the like. We laid Molly down in the pool, and she did not complain a bit. She was immediately transfixed by all the neat stuff to look at. There were big windows with curly trees right outside, toys and mirrors in the pool, and interesting sounds from a few other babies.
We dropped off Molly’s milk, formula, bottles, diapers, diaper cream, extra clothes, pacifier, etc. We also filled out Molly’s daily note stating when she had woken up and eaten this morning. Then it was time to go, but it felt weird just leaving her there. Molly did not seem to mind or even notice. She was just looking around happily un her little corner. Still, we hung around a few minutes to make sure everything was okay. And everything stayed okay. So off we went, feeling a little weird, but without notice.
That afternoon when we picked Molly up, they said she had a great day. She did a lot of cooing and sleeping, and she loved to watch the other babies. I think Molly is in good hands and probably having more fun at school than at home.
Claire asked me for a blank sheet of paper today, then ran off to her room with the paper and a purple marker. She emerged about 15 minutes later to hand me the paper, explaining, “See? It’s Molly!”
Wow! I did not expect to recognize a real image of Molly, but there she is. You can see a very clear face in the middle. I am not sure what the other stuff is. Maybe blankets, diapers, etc? Anyways, that face is amazing. Seriously, that is what Molly really looks like when she is tired.
McG Kids 
