On the trail of Alexander

Alexander the Great cut such a swath through Asia that 2300 years later, you can still find traces of his army. There are blue eyed tribes in Afghanistan that claim Macedonian descent, pockets of Ancient Greek dialect spoken in Nothern India, and drachmas and statues of Hephestiaon littered everywhere.

Our Alexander Bear is doing his best to live up to his namesake. When I come home, there are often subtle clues to what he's been up to during the day. See the fruit cups scattered on the floor? Alex has been doing his favorite game of rearranging the pantry. He takes all the items he can carry off the lower shelves and lines them up on the kitchen table. Don't interfere! Like Alexander the Great, he's irritated when he doesn't get his way and will howl at you.

Alexander the Great left his legacy in the hands of his friends, so we read the stories of Ptolemy. Our Alexander depends on Jonathan to narrate some of his adventures. I came home the other day and there was a lampshade on the kitchen counter. Chris didn't know where it came from, so I asked Jonathan. He told the following story: "It came from the guest room. Alex and I were up there playing and he started breaking the lamp! I told him to stop it but he kept breaking it even harder. Only the light bulb broke. The bottom of the lamp is okay." We're expecting an invasion of the other bedrooms any day now.

Weird Science

There was a really neat accidental experiment done in the Pacific Ocean a few years ago. A cargo container fell off a ship and spilled thousands of bath toys into the water. They've been washing up on shorelines from Mexico to Alaska ever since, and someone got the idea that you could map the oceanic currents by plotting where all the toys wound up.

I don't know who came up with that, but I suspect they have young children.

Last week, I started to notice some Beanie Babies popping up around the house. We have a giant box of them that we got from my sister, who used to be a collector. They have all their ear tags nicely preserved and are in pristine condition. She didn't have room for them in her house, so they came out to live with us. I had dug through the other week to see if we had a camel, since Jonathan was learning about camels for school. We did, of course - we seem to have one of everything - but I wound up putting it back in the box and latching the lid. The box is still in our bedroom because it's darned heavy.

The next day, I found the camel, sans tag, in a pile of Jonathan's toys. I thought Chris must have figured it would help with his school project. However, the next night at bedtime, Jonathan didn't want to snuggle with Liver, Pancreas or Triglyceride. He pulled out a beaver Beanie Baby and asked me what kind of animal it was. This one was also missing a tag.

Hmmmm. Chris usually thinks the kids have too many toys, so I thought it was strange that Jonathan's Beanie Baby collection was expanding so rapidly. We had given him one oversized panda, but that was it. By the time we had finished putting both kids to bed, it was already nine o'clock, and I didn't think of asking him about it. That night I saw the box was still latched shut. I barely saw Jonathan the next morning as I rushed off to work, but I got home early, while he was still napping.

He came downstairs an hour later, cradling the camel, the beaver, and a capuchin monkey. It was time to investigate. I asked him "Jonathan, where are you getting all these animals?" He was happy to tell me. "I got them from the box in your room. First the camel, then. . . this one, and then the monkey!" I said "Didn't they have tags in their ears?" He grinned and said "Yes. I pulled them off! My panda had a really hard tag. So I used my teeth."

Mystery solved.

I can do it all by MYself!

That's Jonathan's proud cry these days. From climbing into his carseat, to riding his tricycle, he wants us to know he's independent and a big boy. Except when he's not in the mood, that is. We often put on his shoes or his coat when he cries out "Help! It's too hard for me."

I introduced him to a website recently called Starfall.com. It teaches phonics and reading and is really quite clever. At first, Jonathan was content to put his hand on the mouse and let me guide the cursor, but pretty soon he wanted to do it on his own. However, computers are so sensitive. One spin of the mouse wheel and the page would scroll down to the boring stuff at the bottom of the webpage. Or Jonathan would get so involved that he'd wind up manuevering the mouse on the edge of the desk and run out of room. Then he'd chant "mommy help mommy help mommy help!" That got old quick, especially since Jonathan loved his new "letter works" and wanted to do them every evening. So I decided to teach him some mouse skills.

It's amazing what these kids can learn with the proper motivation. I jsut refused to fix the messes Jonathan got into. Instead, I told him slowly and methodically what to do. "Pick up the mouse. . . move it forward. . . put it down again. Good!" He had it down by the end of the first evening. He immediately grasped how to navigate through links and knows where all his favorite games are. He even learned how to play Memory, since the computer can enforce waiting for turns and looking at only two cards at a time.

All that letter work paid off when Jonathan read his first word. He saw a picture of kids playing with letter blocks and sounded out "Duh. . . uh. . . guh." It's a good think I was already sitting down when he then announced "That says Dog!" I gave him a huge hug and bragged about it to everyone I saw over the next few days. Jonathan must have realized that this was a pretty special trick. He now insists he can read everything. We went to the grocery the other day and parked next to the cart corral. The sign said "Please return carts here." Jonathan volunteered to read it to me, and this is what he came up with: "Please put the wagons here so they don't bump the other cars." And of course, ended it with "I read it all by MYself! I'm a big boy now!"

Indeed he is.

Strange Love

Our boys are both cuddlers, but they go about it in odd ways.

Jonathan has become the Phantom Snuggler. Sometime between one and four in the morning, we can count on the pitter-pat of little feet. A face will appear by the side of my bed, saying "Mommy, let me in!" Half asleep, I hoist Jonathan up into bed with us. He pulls on my pillow to maek a spot for himself, then expertly tucks himself under my arm. Later in the night, he'll migrate over to Chris's side. I generally wake up again at about six with his feet digging into my ribcage. If we tell him he has to stop wiggling or go back to his room, he'll lie absolutely rigid, arms at his side, hardly daring to breathe. At the first hint of sunshine in the window, he's bouncing up and down, saying "Morning's here! Wake up!"

Alex, thankfully, sleeps soundly these days. He's actually sleeping better now that he's finally getting good naps in his crib during the day - I think he was just overtired before. He's so anxious to get to bed in the evening that he won't let me cuddle him anymore. Once he's done with his bedtime milk, if I put him on my shoulder, he fusses and flips sideways. He's asking me "It's bedtime - why am I vertical?" So I have much less time with Enormously Heavy Sleeping Baby Furnace these days.

He does most of his cuddles in the daytime. He's taught himself to walk backwards and is enormously proud of this accomplishment. He likes to show off when we sit on the floor to play with him. He'll slowly back away, bouncing up and down with a quiet "Eh eh eh." However, once your attention wanders, watch out. Pretty soon he'll run up to within five feet of you. Then he'll turn around and back into you until his butt is resting on your knee, at which point he sits on the floor and leans into you.