Lots of updates

If you've been watching the Twitter feed, there's no doubt you've seen a lot of the exciting changes that have happened in the past few weeks. Sania has taken leaps and bounds through quite a few milestones. As you can see in the photo gallery linked from the picture above, Sania is now sleeping in a (little) big girl bed. She is now also potty-trained, though still sleeping with a princess pull-up, mostly because she likes them.

Reid got his progress report from the old kindergarten, and he did very well. Kindergarten is a strange animal; he's there for all of two hours and forty-five minutes, and there isn't a ton of instructing that can be done in that time. Still, they lay out the kindergarten equivalent of standardized tests to basically create some kind of baseline for his reading, sound-making, and other fundamental skills. The teacher ran through them with us at a crisp pace during our first parent-teacher conference, and although she refrained from declaring Reid a super-genius, his numbers were pretty solid.

Reid is wrapping up his first extracurricular activity. I haven't thought of it as such until just this second, since again "curricular" activities are contained within a half-day of kindergarten, but his K-3 drama class has been lots of fun, it appears. He will perform an un-named role in the finale performance of "The Brave Little Tailor" this Wednesday. Reid has emphasized that he doesn't have a major role because he doesn't have a costume. Apparently, neither astronauts nor Spider-Man have a role in this particular play. Quite a shame.

Emotionally, you know Reid is sometimes a touchy sort. I think, though, that overall he's been more stable, and less likely to burst into tears when signs point to him not getting his own way, which is a nice thing. Unfortunately, Sania has picked up where he let off, throwing hissy fits and demanding an enormous amount of personal freedom, considering she's two and a half. Not, however, a surprising development. Enjoy the photos.

Siblinghood

Since my sister had her twins last week, I've been thinking alot about what siblinghood really means. I don't mean between my sisters and I, but between Reid and Sania, and between my niece Petra and the two girls who will be known for decades as the twins, Ailsa and Quinn.

Reid and Sania have a peace, albeit an uneasy one, most of the time. They like to torture each other, but it is over a certain sheen of true sibling affection. I feel absolutely secure in asserting that they would do anything for the other, that when they are truly frightened, either could take comfort in the care of the other. That at this early date, K and I have raised two children who understand so clearly that they are in a family and that these people in the family are their defenders, friends and protectors, makes me proud.

Of course, I don't think we consciously raised our kids this way; which is to say, we didn't make decisions by saying, "what will most focus the children on understanding their relationship to one another?" It's just a good side-effect, I guess, of keeping them close but not too close, giving them opportunities to share in positive outcomes -- nothing high-minded, but rather fun things and tv shows or whatever.

Anyhow, it is one of the things I look forward to for my own kids -- that they will grow up and understand and live in this complicated, marvelous relationship forever. And I look forward to it, too, for my niece Petra and her two new sisters. She will be their leader, protector and elder no matter how interested or not she is in that role. They may run roughshod over her (and my sister, and her husband, and their dog), but the natural order will take over at some point, and Petra will be the one the twins look to when they are concerned, or are interested in solving a problem, or learning a new kid-trick, just as Sania learns so much from Reid now. And that's an exciting thing to think about.

Global Financial and Discipline Meltdown Edition!

From October2008

The news folks, around the globe, is the utter demise of the world's financial system as we know it. Naturally, this takes center stage everywhere but in our house, where the news is actually that Reid is doing pretty well in kindergarten, has started something called drama class for K-3rd graders, and listens to his parents infrequently at best.

In truth, we've had worse goes of things with Reid in the past, but we are experiencing some growing pains around our afternoon schedule. There's a complicated series of events where Reid and Owen come home to Owen's house and play for a while and while the siblings of both boys (Sania with Owen's brother Nathaniel at daycare; Owen's sister at the Montessori school R and O attended last year) are rounded up by K on her way home from work. When a vanload of children from two families rolls up to a house full of other children from the same two families, only one thing can result: TOTAL CHAOS!

Inevitably, Reid and Owen are involved in some complex play that includes elaborate make-believe scenarios, shoelessness and the very real prospect of Reid ordering Owen around like a nervous helpmeet.

Extraction is always a challenge, as Reid sees playtime as without boundaries. Also, he's an effective whiner.

But this is only the first obstacle, as if K can get Reid away from Owen and drag him home, our nearer-neighbors -- fed earlier by their au pair -- circle our house like lions, waiting for the van with their playmate.

Each of these entanglements gives Reid an opportunity to beg, plead and harangue his mom with all the five-year-old weapons in his arsenal: "IT'S NOT FAIR!" and "YOU NEVER LET ME DO ANYTHING!" and "JUST A FEW MORE MINUTES!" and "I DON'T WANT TO EAT DINNER!" and "I'M OBVIOUSLY IRRATIONAL!" et cetera.

In truth, this is all age-appropriate behavior. Unfortunately, Sania is getting a lesson in bad behavior, so she'll be sure to hit these lowlights when she, too, turns five. If not sooner.

Click the photo above for some fun pics from th last few weeks.

First Day of School and Other Distractions

From Random Shots and First Day of School

Hey everybody. The photography has been piling up in here, so I've put a bunch of photos up tonight. These are a batch of random photos from August culminating in Reid's first day of school. The photo above is Reid and Owen, standing on the curb, awaiting the first of potentially 4,600 bus rides they will take in their lives.

Also, there's a video which explains, once and for all, while we don't have spaghetti for dinner at our house very often.

The video is taking a while to encode, so I'll embed it in the morning. in the meantime, you can find it by heading over to our Vimeo page. And of course, click on the photo above to see a bunch of pics.

UPDATE:

Why We Don't Eat Spaghetti with Red Sauce All That Often from Rizkerson on Vimeo.

More Pictures; Lots of Travel

The travel schedule for Rizkerson Industries LTD's sole blogger has been hectic as of late.

Thus little blogging, light activity on the Twitter and lameness in the picture department.

But help is on the way. Well, I'll be done travelling around the end of the month. And to tide you all over, here's a massive batch of photos I will be captioning on airplane rides and waiting in airports during the next week or so. The photo above was taken at Reid's birthday party at our community pool. He's somewhat excited. The picture below is from our vacation in Bald Head Island. Sania has pigtails. That is all. Click on either for a gallery of goodness.

Lots of Pictures, Lots of Heat

Well, the story round here folks is that it's hot. Real hot. We spent two days at the pool thanking our lucky stars that such a thing was invented. Reid snapped out of his year-long swimming stupor and while he can't actually swim, he has recovered the fearlessness and general disregard for his own safety that characterizes 5 year olds the world over. He jumps into the water and loves loves loves it. I hope this sticks around until the big vacation at Bald Head Island, because last year's business with the moaning and groaning and abject fear of all things wet? That wasn't very much fun at all.

Picture-wise we have a bonanza to report. We have some early photos of the elusive "Penelope Sawsan Rizk Gray" known to inhabit parts of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In fact, we have photos of Sania struggling to comprehend the fact that she is not permitted to poke this newest member of the family in the eye. In at least two of the photos in this set (and several I didn't include) Sania is clutching or grasping for this little baby, and out of frustration, she appears several times to kiss the baby's hand (rather than her preferred place to kiss, inside Penelope's head).

We've got scenes from the wedding of my cousin Mike and his fiancee Abby. They are a cute couple, and they had a homey, Slovak/Jewish/Arab ceremony lakeside and a big party in a barn with barbecue and spontaneous bass fishing. We didn't catch much of anything, as all K and I did the entire time was hold, chase, cajole, beg, corral, or search for our children.

We've got a couple shots from Aunt NayNay's big Memorial Day party, moved this year to the weekend after b/c of the aforementioned wedding, and rained out mostly as well. Moisture was the order of the day. Reid would stand under the eaves and holler a weather report through the screen door, "Still raining!" Then we played bingo, naturally.

You'll note that special occasion or not, Sania's hair always looks magnificent. In her mind. In reality, she won't let us touch it, and the resulting mop of hair still pulls off a certain je ne sais quoi until the strands in front of her mouth take on enough errant food matter to alter their appearance. Then it's all downhill from there. Click on the photo above or here to see the rest of the pics.

Spring Concert and other Springtime photos

Over mother's day, Reid's school held it's annual Spring Concert/Mother's Day Celebration/reason to close for the day. Wonderful times. Moms are invited to come to class and watch their children show off some of their work, and then later the kids all sing a slew of songs with predictably hilarious results.

Reid's entire class appeared to be singing something between completely different songs and a complicated round, in which they ran roughshod over the meter of the song and dared their schoolmates to catch up. The result was a weird echo effect because you watched your kid stop singing and heard the rest of the room belt out the final few words.

Reid looked fly and when I get the video camera fired up here, there may be a moment where he completely un-self-consciously pops his collar. Classic.

In the meantime, check the photos by clicking the one above. K says she's going to put together a whole pile of pictures of our kids in things, boxes, buckets, bowls, sinks, whatever. Here, they're in a box bobsled style. Neither knows what a bobsled is, but they both dutifully repeated my assertion that they were in a bobsled. The next morning, Reid was crestfallen to hear we had recycled the box. He wanted to save it until he could go bobsledding. Such an optimist.

A month! Already?!

Tamra at Good Intent pointed out that I haven't posted anything on the blog in a month (and happy birthday to you, Tamra). It's true that I feel the Twitters are a substitute, albeit an inadequate one, for more consistent posting. Nevertheless, I've got lots of material -- almost all of it longer than the confines of a 140 character Twitter post -- to take note of here.

There are concerns, of course, about the general march of life in the Rizkerson household. Reid is growing up in some ways -- finding new friends, moving toward a new school, getting excited about camp -- and seems to be completely unchanged in other ways. He sometimes is still needy, mostly in response to his sister's more age-appropriate neediness. Sania is, despite this, a surprisingly independent and focused individual. She likes things her way. Each night we read a book together and at the final page, she encourages me to lay down a certain way, and "go sleep daddy." And then she jumps on he and laughs hysterically. She designates one parent (me) to put her down for bedtime, designates another (usually K) to hold her for breakfast, and a single deviation from plan leads to a thorough rebuke. Very thorough.

And yet, in little ways, they are both growing up. Sania and Reid helped me make breakfast for K on Mother's Day, and their help, although negligible, was surprisingly non-destructive. Two kids, on chairs, flanking a man turning pancakes, and nobody got burned. Not even me. Both kids, turning and nibbling "practice pancakes" with spatulas. For a moment, I paused to think about this. Sania, at age two, is more independent and able to process more information than her brother at this point in his life. She's more fearless, and while that means she's more likely to do something silly, she's also more accomplished, because she tries more things. Reid tried fewer things because, the story goes, I was a crazy parent following him around and making sure he didn't hurt himself. (For the record, I disagree with the interpretation that being protective of my son was somehow wrong. I'm no less concerned about Sania than I was about Reid; I'm just outnumbered.)

Reid, quietly approaching the five year mark, is at times a revelation. He is able to communicate so much now. He still stumbles at times, and relies on strange little dependencies to get the ideas across, but it's clear that his main problem is only that his vocabulary has failed to keep pace with his imagination. For months and months, he would tell stories about his imaginary friend John. We went through all sorts of Socratic sessions trying to determine if John was real, if John was a threat, if imaginary people were threatening, and on and on. Then John disappeared. Recently, he made a resurgence when Reid started beginning stories with, "Know what? My friend John..." did this or that incredible thing. I told Reid I thought we had seen the last of John. Now he starts stories, "Know what? My friend not named John..." did this or that incredible thing.

There are other times when Reid seems like he hasn't changed a bit since his last birthday. He's a crazy kid. He gets wound up and hollers and runs around and whoops and you're just about to be done with it, and then he stops, and takes a quick, tender turn like the sensitive little boy he is. And it just breaks your heart.

Sania -- possible because Reid wishes it weren't so -- has decided like Reid did most of his first three years that Daddy is the go-to-guy for bedtime. (I seem to help K fall asleep, too, for what it's worth; maybe sleep-companion is my true calling.) For months, Reid has mostly handled this problem with grudging acceptance. Tonight, though, he just wanted his dad, and it was too late really to disengage from Sania. She's still young enough to throw the kind of tantrum that will really ruin your night. I apologized and told him I would read him stories tomorrow night. He closed the door to return to his room, but behind it I could hear him crying.

I've got pictures, from Reid's spring concert, from the kids tonight sharing a box (Rizk family tradition, natch), and even video of Reid somewhat-singing various spring time songs and other bizarre choices. I'll try to get that stuff up, well, not this weekend, but maybe the one after. Sorry.

Baba's Here, and the Eating Is Easy

My dad came to town this weekend for Sania's second birthday, kite flying and lots of delicious dining. It kicked off with Reid and Baba tossing a few steaks on the grill and having a barbecue Friday night as we enjoyed the end of a week of beautiful weather.

Saturday was kites and koshari. Unfortunately, kite-flying duties and generic forgetfulness conspired to leave me lacking photos of the actual kite-work. Reid was excited until he got bored, and Sania had a great time though it is unclear whether she understood that the string she was holding was connected to an actual flying object. She mostly just squealed with delight and tore around the grass where we found some wind and got to flying. K would exhort her to run in one direction to get the kite up, and Sania would gleefully run the wrong way, hysterically scanning the sky for whatever we were all pointing at while the kite crashed earthward elsewhere. Good times.

Koshari and tahini made everybody feel better. Reid made about four meals (including dinner tonight) out of just tahini and pita. I don't see anything wrong with that. Click the link above for a few pictures from this weekend.

Two New Galleries, including Sania's Second Birthday and Reid's Green Thumb

Funny story: We got a new camera at Christmas, and it's really nice (if I may say so myself). So basically, we opened the camera Christmas morning, and forgot about all other cameras we own (which take fuzzy pictures and have small viewfinders). Then, yesterday for Sania's birthday party, we realized that the battery for the new camera was flat. So we reached for one of our oldies and found some surprise pictures we never uploaded of preparations for Christmas.

So, we've got some surprises on this roll. It also includes some springtime frolicking, and Reid getting his green thumb on. Click the photo for more.

So, the birthday party itself was a blast. We converted the basement into a jungle and the kids went wild. Click the photo below to see more pics.



Reid's Grammy and Pawpaw sent down a care package for Sania's birthday and of course included some nice stuff for Reid as well. One of those items was a packet of seeds and a book about growing your own beans. He was psyched. We immediately had a snack and then planted the seeds. Reid tells the story in the video below.

Reid Plants Some Seeds from Rizkerson on Vimeo.

One More Video

An Hour in the Basement from Rizkerson on Vimeo.

Saturday in the Living Room With Sania and Reid

I've thrown together a couple quick phone videos to enjoy. Because I want to actually get these one the internet as opposed to having them die on the shores of good intentions, they're un-edited, and funny. Enjoy.


Sania Really Reads a Pirate Book from Rizkerson on Vimeo.


50 Seconds in the Life of Reid from Rizkerson on Vimeo.

The Late March Photo Spree

This weekend is unscheduled, though the weather won't be cooperating very much. So we're going to be taking a lot of pictures, but mostly inside.

The photos at this link are from our trip earlier this month to Atlanta, as well as from this morning's sitting-around session. We spotted a pair of deer during breakfast. They, too, were eating breakfast, in the form of daffodils in our back yard.

I've got a couple movies from this morning I'll be posting shortly, but need to help some kids with puzzles. I hope everyone enjoys the Twitter feed, which is also available at twitter.com/rizkerson.

February and the Weather is Chilly

Hey everybody. I hope the Twitter feed is working out for you. If you're absolutely desperate to get the latest Tweets from the Rizkerson clan, you can follow the easy instructions for setting up your own Twitter account and getting updates on your phone! But that sounds crazy.

Anyhow, here are some new pics from the family.

We've had a surprisingly busy winter already, hosting dinners and other shindigs making for lots of antics in the house, and lots of dishes in the sink. I have started a calendar counting down to the day Reid can wash dishes. Then I'll be free!!!

Aw, you know I could never let go of the dishwashing. It's just got this grip on me.

Reid and Sania made Valentines tonight for some random assortment of folks. Sania is deeply embedded in the do-what-Reid-does no-matter-what phase. He made a Valentine for his BFF Owen, and so did Sania. Awesome.

Weirdly, the children's eating habits have fluctuated wildly. Some nights, Sania is an eating machine. Other times, it appears she'd be willing to starve if it weren't for white bread and crackers. She is absolutely committed to drinking milk at almost every opportunity. Each night, when I pick her up, I offer her some paltry snack of crackers or something and water from her day at daycare. And every night, she greedily consumes the crackers and wails like a widow about the milk I don't have in the car. So sad.

Reid is such a strange kid sometimes. I feel like I want to be invisible and follow him around to see what kind of information he is storing in that crazy head of his. He dreams up these wild stories -- of Africa! of Spider-Man! of vegetables in Africa! -- and then recites bizarre contextual facts from these imaginary universes which completely confound his mom and I. "Really? They grow special corn in South Africa? With superpowers? Amazing! Eat your meatballs."

He is also such a finicky dresser. Winter is an especially tough time for the clothing-inhibited youngster. Each morning, he reviews his garment selection like a queen, rejecting some items and unreasonably insisting on others. He often throws a curve ball by demanding to wear a sweater underneath a t-shirt or three shirts without any kind of logical layering strategy. By the end of a day at home, shirts and pants are everywhere and Reid has changed into the thing he seems to wear for the end of every day, shorts and a t-shirt. Even today, with a high of 30, a cold coming on and a whole face chapped from the frigid temperatures, he came home and stripped down to his lighweight uniform. He says it helps him run fast.

Click any picture to see a gallery of new photos.

Pics of Post-Christmas Family Fun

Hey, everybody. We've got a bunch of new pics of the kids hanging out being kids together on the Picasa site. The kids have been pretty good since Christmas. You always worry that the kids will become hellions at the terrifying intersection of no longer fearing Santa's wrath and the staggering amount of overstimulation from the holidays. But they've been pretty good. The only thing you really take away from Christmas is that every gift is hit or miss. There were last minute additions to Christmas that turned out to be huge hits, and other sure-fire fun toys which have already begun to collect dust. What can you do?

Speaking of what people are doing, yesterday I set up a Twitter account for telling folks what the kids are doing. It's really just an experiment for me to see how the technology works in case I need to utilize it somewhere in my real work. Also, I like the idea of capturing things that happen, quick little tidbits that might be the seeds of future posts or just potent memories. I'm working on getting the Twitter feed on this page somewhere, but my late night experimentation failed yesterday. I'll try again tomorrow night. In the meantime, get your fill of our half-formed thoughts at twitter.com/rizkerson.