Actually, given the way the season started, we thought it was going to be a lot worse, but the kids have stayed largely healthy until now. I credit a lot of that to Steph and her drill-sergeant command of the hand gel routine.
Steph is developing a minor addiction to Mario Kart - so cute!
See you later, all...
Robby really likes to play with the toy kitchen these days. I would say he has a future as a chef if not for the fact that he likes to stand on the open oven door and slide the knife through the closed microwave door. I hope he's not getting it from watching me.
Of course, it's really just me. Steph can't ever remember what the word is. We decided that she should get to choose the word next time so that she can remember it. But...at least so far...it seems to work. When I say it she looks at me very angrily, but she stops what she's doing long enough to keep her out of trouble.
And I haven't even had to yell it yet.
Matt
Well, first I should mention that I lost my wedding ring on Monday. We think it fell off at DSW - just one more reason to hate buying shoes. Pretty much hopeless at this point, because if it IS around the house or one of the cars...well...we may never find it.
Yesterday I made a haphazard first attempt to have 'daddy school' with the girls. Crazy idea of mine that the kids aren't getting enough of their parents' specialized knowledge. Just to have little 20-minute or so 'lessons' about things I want them to know, or things I think they ought to know a little better than the average kid. I decided I wanted to teach them a little about brass instruments, since they can't seem to get the names right. Brought everything in, let them play them, nothing fancy. Nothing too exciting or fun for kids, but it was bugging me that they still get trombone and trumpet mixed up, so I wanted to start with that. In other words, this one was for me.
Went ok. I'll make the next one more fun for them. It's hard, because as Steph pointed out, we don't want to step on what they're getting from Kindermusik...and they're at different places developmentally. We'll keep trying. First 'mommy school' is Friday.
Had a good meal out at Gold Star - they have a Kids Eat Free on Tuesday deal, and we have been doing SO well with not eating out, we don't feel bad when we do it as seldom as we do. Probably the first meal we've had in a long time which did not involve a single child screaming all the way through. It was blissful. Skyline is far superior flavor-wise though...
That's all for now - expect another update tomorrow.
There is a spectrum of communication, which deals with importance and frequency. They are inversely related. The more often you talk to someone, the less important or momentous the subject matter is likely to be. You can trace this over history, in a general sense, truncated below:
Most of human history: Letters. Sometimes painstakingly crafted, works of art in themselves. Sometimes the only surviving documents about people who have long since passed...and yet we can learn so much about their worlds, their lives, their realities. But at the very least, they contained a certain weight, a certain critical mass. People wouldn't take the time to send a letter saying "Not much happening here". You knew when you had 'enough' to take the time to write.
Fairly recently: Email. Easy to send at relatively convenient times. Free. Correct spelling optional. Since there is no act of writing, easier to put together, and ultimately, reasonable to send out with very little actual content. But still, it takes some time, so usually you have SOMETHING to say.
Allow me to pause for a moment and point out the similar history of written communication in the world of art. Moving from ancient times, stories passed on through oral tradition, painstakingly memorized and repeated, people devoting their entire lives to retelling the story......on to novels, crafted over years and years and as a result, limited in quantity but all the more precious and valued. You could go two different directions from here - novels give way to short stories, but short stories largely die out - they can't seem to find a home, and the amount of work needed to craft them far exceeds the appreciation. But in the meantime, in our modern age we start churning out formulaic novels and so our favorite 'authors' can put out an impressive body of work but the value of each individual one becomes less and less.
And here now, the paths of communication and art converged somewhat, a few years ago in the world of blogs. Communication like a letter or email, but put out there for all the world to see and judge like a work of art. And the main criticism with blogs back when they were a fairly new phenomenon was that it was people's random thoughts and who really cared? Blogs were everywhere, people would write what they thought when they thought it, and we could all SEE it. But each individual blog post was less and less important. Who can remember a blog post that changed their life?
But this wasn't enough. We pushed it further along the spectrum. Next it was facebook, with status updates about what people had for dinner, or the condition of their sprained ankle, trumpeteted like a billboard for all your 'friends'. And it went even further with twitter. Happily, twitter still seems to have a decent backlash population...those who think it's a little silly. But most of my peers in 2010 are quite comfortable with facebook and its place on the communication frequency/importance spectrum. It seems to be where we are right now, and I respect that.
But for me, I fit more in the blog category. I'd like to think of myself as a 'letters' guy, but the fact is, I don't have time. I'd love to have the freedom to sit and construct a beautiful thought and then translate it to words for all to understand...but I have sibling fights to manage and diapers to change. The only reason I have the freedom to put all THIS into words right now is that it's 'records day' and all my 'records' are up-to-date. So while I don't have time to make all my thoughts beautiful and reasoned and heard, I also don't want to let my communication slip into virtual belching of whatever trivia is happening at that moment. I still want my communication to MEAN SOMETHING.
This is why I don't do facebook. It's too far in that direction for me. People say I'm stubborn or a snob. I'm not. I don't criticize most people for doing it - I may make fun of some of the worst excesses, but by and large, people are staying connected that way, and good for them. I just fit somewhere else right now. And having this blog seems to do it.
There's just one problem.
I really really suck at keeping it updated at all.
So I am going to try one more time.
Recognizing that my ability to post less often but with more important and meaningful info is not particularly keen right now, I am going to try to post once a day. Really. I am. It's on my list. If I can make myself get up early to work out, I can stay up a few minutes later to give a daily update on the goings-on in the Specter Family, which is what most people who follow it really want in the first place. So the posts will mean less, but they will at least be regular...and more important than a tweet.
So, keep checking back. Expect daily updates for real. Now.
Thanks all,
Matt
Well...
Yeah, of course we miss the kids. But I'd be lying if I told you I'm walking around miserable and aching for them to get back. It's been nice. We've gotten all the wrapping done. We've kept the house in nice condition. We've gotten all the laundry done and kept doing it. We got a chance to walk around IKEA. I've been able to sleep in a little in the mornings, since I'm only responsible for myself. The babies have seemed to enjoy it too. It's been like a mini-vacation.
Come Saturday I will be glad to see them, because they're my kids, they're fun to be around, they're hilarious sometimes, and I love 'em. But I certainly liked NOT having them around for awhile as well. Steph and I are both sad to have missed their first time at Disney, but there have been and will be lots of other firsts and amazing memories to share. At the end of the day, it pretty much comes down to "Thanks Mom and Dad for doing this."
Okay, I need to finish getting ready for our 3g play. More soon!
Matt
