Communion

I don't know why attending church needs to turn into an adventure in this family, but it seems to just happen. I won't go into all the details, except to say that a dropped toy (a purple plastic eggplant, actually) just may have noisily rolled under the pews from the back of the church all the way to the front during the reading of the Gospel; a young Jackson child participating in the Christmas program just may have very publicly picked her nose and wiped it on her oblivious teacher in front of a packed house; another child just may have mistaken the baptismal font for a wading pool...

Lately communion has added some "excitement" to worship. Last week when it was time for the sacrament, Mira got mightily offended that in our church, you don't take communion as a kindergartner. (To her, it was just one more blow in the long line of injustices she suffers as the Littlest Kid.) Her whispered protests grew louder as the usher got nearer to releasing our pew, while I countered back through gritted teeth, "It's not a SNACK." She harumphed and crossed her arms belligerently (several times, to make sure I was getting the point). Despite her disgust with the rules, she did accompany us to the front when it was time to partake in the Lord's Supper, because Lord knows she is not going to risk missing out on any action.

Gracie had her first communion more than a year ago, so you might assume she knows the drill. But last week, she forgot to take the grape juice that's available for those who don't want the real deal, and threw back the mini cup of wine. Threw back meaning drank, but not swallowed. As soon as she tasted the wine, her eyes widened in panic and I could tell she was holding it in her mouth. I hissed "Swallow!" but she shook her head wildly. Her cheeks were puffed out and her eyes were watering as we made our way back to our pew. I motioned for her to sit down (pretty sure my emphatic motions made me look like an NFL ref calling a "clipping" penalty) but Randy hustled her out of there because he could see she was struggling. Meanwhile, Mira was still smarting from the injustice of missing communion so she resumed her grumbling. I was distracted by what had become of the wine Gracie was hanging on to, and felt my patience wearing thin. I brought out the big guns. "You know what communion means? It means Jesus' blood and body. And you don't get to have it until you're ten!" Not surprisingly, she scowled and declared, "I'm not having that!"

As we left church, walking past the carved sign that has the Suffer little children verse, Gracie lamented about her wine debacle. We reminded her that she didn't even come close to matching Randy's finest moment in our communion history:

It was Easter 2009. Mira was just nine months old and still taking a morning nap. For this reason, I went to Easter Sunday services with the older three kids and Randy stayed home with Mira while she slept a bit longer. It was a beautiful day and he could walk to church with the stroller when she woke up.

As I mentioned earlier, our communion wine is typically served in individual plastic cups. Our bread takes the form of those flat, quarter-sized wafers. But in 2009, our church decided to mix things up a bit for the Easter service. "We will be taking the Lord's Supper by intinction today," the pastor announced, and went on to explain to us unadventurous Lutheran-types that intinction meant dipping the bread in the wine. "The server will hand you a piece of bread. You will dip the bread into the wine in the challis, which another server will be holding. If you forget and put the bread in your mouth before you dip it in the wine, ask the server for another piece." Simple enough, right?

Only if you hear the instructions.

A couple other details about the day:

• It's a darn big church. And it was Easter Sunday. There were about a million people there.
• The older kids and I arrived just before the service started, so we had to take a front-row pew.
• Mira slept a little later than Randy expected, so instead of taking a leisurely stroll to church he ended up jogging.

Randy and Mira got to church as communion was finishing up, just in time to bring up the rear of the line. "There's Dad and Mira," one of the kids said. Randy looked a little harried and breathless from his fast trek. We gave him a small wave so he would see where we were sitting and the thought crossed my mind that it was good they were last in the line. More chance for everyone to see my darling new baby in her pretty Easter dress! (Not very pious, I know.)

When Randy's turn came to take communion, we saw him put the bread right into his mouth. Then we saw him shake his head at the server. A couple times. We saw the bread server's puzzled expression. Randy moved over to the wine server and we saw him trying to wrest the huge challis from her hands. She resisted and for a few seconds they grappled over it. "What is Dad doing?" one of the kids whispered. Finally, maybe to protect the baby that Randy was holding in one arm from getting doused with wine, the server gave in and let go of the challis. Randy took a healthy swig, handed it back to her and made his way over to us. He sat down next to me and said under his breath, "I don't know what that wine lady's deal was. She wouldn't give it to me. And that other one kept trying to give me another piece of bread."

I would like to tell you that in that moment I turned my thoughts inward the and contemplated the significance of the Eucharist. That I was not fighting back hysterical laughter in church on Easter Sunday.

I would definitely be lying.

Randy's version:

Thinking I was doing an extra good deed by hurrying the baby over to what was left of Easter services after her nap, I decided to walk her over in the stroller because the weather was so pleasant for an Easter morning. My nice walk to church turned into a brisk jog as I realized that I had to hurry if I was going to make it before the end of the service. Unfortunately, this meant that I was jogging in layers of thick dress polyester church clothes and arrived at the church sweatier than was ideal. Breathless and uncomfortable, I had to quickly size-up the church situation as I walked in, but I was relieved to see that I was just in time to hurry down to the front, get in the end of the line and take communion – what a great dad, letting the baby nap AND making it in time for Easter communion! Something was different about communion today, people seemed to be getting real bread from one person and there was a woman with a large, Harry Potter-type medieval goblet who seemed to be offering it to people. Now, I thought I remembered something about special occasions in church when hygienic caution was thrown to the wind and everyone partakes from the same cup in the spirit of the resurrection - this must be one of those times, I guess... When you're at the end of the line in front of the entire congregation, who are all waiting to move on to the next thing after the long communion session, you feel a bit of extra pressure to be quick. So when it came my turn (as the last and only person in front of the whole church - the bald sweaty dad with the baby along with the bread-giver and the woman with the goblet), I knew I had no time to think. Still somewhat breathless and sweating profusely in my tight-necked clothing, I was handed a piece of fresh bread – well, of course I popped it in my mouth as fast as I could to move on the the wine. I guess I did not register the looks of dismay on the servers' faces as I reached for the goblet, only slightly confused by why I was being offered another piece of bread. The next part is kind of fuzzy, but it seemed weird to me that the wine lady wouldn't let me just have the goblet. I literally had to pull the thing away from her so that I could get my sip of wine and she just didn't seem to want to give it up. What didn't make sense to me was why, as I was joining my family in the pew, why they were all silently laughing - some with tears in their eyes - seemingly at me?

BIG GIRL Kindergartener (or, The Sleepwalking Urinator)

The only thing funnier than a cross-looking sleepwalking kindergartener is a cross-looking sleepwalking kindergartener who fell asleep after a bedtime shower with her wet hair in a braid, which is now sticking straight up over her head like a rhinoceros horn. Seeing her, it's hard not to feel like it's the braid-horn that is displeasing her, even though you know she's not aware of it.

But I'm jumping ahead. Kindergarten started last week, and Ms. I-am-TOO-a-big-kid was in her glory. After the first day, it was as if all of her suspicions that she really is as old as her siblings  - or at least as capable - were confirmed in her mind. After all, she went to the bus stop. She rode the bus. She ate lunch - two of them in fact. (She bought hot lunch even though she and Randy had carefully packed her Hello Kitty lunchbox. She ate that lunch for snack.) She had recess. She went to gym. She rode the bus home. It seemed her dreams of achieving the same independence Ethan enjoys had finally come to fruition. Sure, she can't drive yet, but that's probably just months away, right?

When my older kids came home from Kindergarten, they needed time to decompress every day. All that activity was exhausting! Ethan sat at the table and drew pictures. Abby wouldn't speak two words to me and disappeared into her room. (Later I would hear the muffled sound of doll dialogue in her different voices.) Gracie snuggled next to me on the sofa and tried to sneak her thumb into her mouth.

Mira hopped off the bus, yelled "See ya!" to the neighbors and informed me, "I'm going to see if Alec is free." (Alec is our sixth grade neighbor who patiently teaches Mira basketball moves and other important sports skills every five-year-old girl needs to learn.)

Whoa whoa whoa! -- can you tell me a little about Kindergarten?

I couldn't believe she wasn't tired. I know she runs at full steam all day.

But she was tired. It became evident when she sleepwalked the first night. And every night thereafter the first week of school.

Yep, that's a tired Kindergartner!

Besides the sticking-up braid incident, Mira's sleepwalking involved:

• Going into our room and sitting on the bed (no one was in the room)
• Hiding behind Ethan's door
• Climbing into bed with Gracie
• Using the toilet and then standing on her stool to wash her hands. Except her stool was nowhere near the sink, so she just stood there with her hands out.
• Nearly giving Abby heart failure when Abby stepped into our bedroom to grab a hairbrush and caught sight of Mira sitting on our closet floor.

When she has these nocturnal adventures, she looks like the classic sleepwalker: glazed-over expression, staggering steps, deep confusion... In short, like a diminutive drunkie. Usually she seems to be looking for the bathroom, so Randy took to referring to her as the Sleepwalking Urinator.

She's raring to go again in the morning, bursting at the seams to get out to the bus stop. When I let her go she races outside and calls, "Hey, guys!" to the big kids. But not before she gets a kiss goodbye from me. She has her lips in a big, earnest pucker all the way across the room as she runs toward me for the kiss. So incredibly sweet. I'm so glad she's five, even if she doesn't think she is.

Ruler of the School

My baby is five, and Kindergarten is just days around the corner.

I remember the first time Ethan stepped on to the school bus 12 years ago (my shoddy memory does still have a little bit of juice left). He seemed just like a little business man on his way to the office, and the idea that he was actually going somewhere on his own without me, seemed ludicrous. He was such a little "Leave it to Beaver" type; shirt buttoned up all the way to the top and oh so earnest. The world of elementary school was brand new to us, with intimidating unknowns like playground dynamics, bus cops, peer mediators, gym class... He may as well have been boarding the bus to Lord of the Flies. We were all so inexperienced.











I still smile at the memory of this exchange from Kindergarten:

Ethan, very solemnly: “I heard some kids saying a very bad thing on the bus.” Immediately our minds jump to bullying, racial slurs, sexual harassment…
Ethan: “I did NOT join in.”
We gently ask: “What was it the kids were saying?”
Ethan, reluctantly: “Well, they were saying, ‘Kids rule parents drool!’”

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Mira. Mira would find "Kids rule parents drool" hil-arious. Confident, belly-laughing Mira would eat a Kindergartner like Ethan for breakfast.

It's a little scary.

I think every parent worries the first time their child heads off to school. I know we fretted a bit over Ethan:

• Were there Mean Kids on the bus?
• Would he be able to find the bathroom? (Yes it was right outside the Kindergarten door, but still...)
• Would he manage to get lost in the (admittedly teeny-tiny) school?
• Would he get picked on by a gang of elementary school bullies at recess?

You still worry even when it's Number 4. Of course, our fears with Mira entering Kindergarten are a little different than when Ethan went. It's more like:

• When other Kindergartners go home and repeat some interesting-sounding phrase they learned at school that isn't exactly desirable for a five-year-old and their parents say who'd you hear that from, will the answer inevitably be "Mira"?

Yeah it's pretty much that one fear.

I should clarify: it's not swearing. It's teen language:
My bad
AWK-ward!
Photobomb
BUST-ed!

And there's the trash talking she does with Ethan: "Dude, you're going down!" "Don't you even DARE!"

You try to control your child's experiences and guide her language, but you can't make her unhear things when she's surrounded by a houseful of teens and their friends.

You know how there'e always that one kid in class who KNOWS MORE?

yep.

If I were smart, Mira's school wardrobe would probably consist of t-shirts in every color of the rainbow, all with the same message printed on them: "I have teenage siblings. Blame them, not my parents."

Hell Hath No Fury Like...

It's tantrum time.

I don't mean this actual second as I write those words, more like "this whole spring." My darling baby has turned into a BEAR.

Although I may remember precious little on a day-to-day basis, one parenting nugget that has stayed with me for my entire career is that Age 4 Can Really Suck. I first learned this fact when Ethan was four. My easy-going, shy little boy was suddenly defiant and angry - angry that he was not in charge. Of everything. He became a frequent brandisher of "The Claw," meaning that when frustration overtook him, his reaction was to snarl at me through gritted teeth and make a menacing claw at me with his hand. (The boy was unknowingly channeling wrestling sensation *Baron Von Raschke, who made the pose famous.) [See interesting footnote on the Baron below.]

Age four took the form of moodiness, foot-stomping and door-slamming a year later with Abby, and when Gracie hit four... Actually, Gracie was an easy four! (The Shoe Tantrums came later. Since this post is about Four, I won't delve too much into that period except to say that Gracie morphed into a holy terror every. single. time. she had to wear shoes. On one particularly bad day, Randy got so frustrated that he threw Gracie's shoes out the front door. Incredibly, on that same day but in a separate incident, I also lost my head and threw her shoes into the driveway. I may or may not have yelled, "As God is my witness, I will not be defeated by shoes!" Probably not our best moments as parents.)

Mira's four-year-old meltdowns make The Claw look like child's play. She embraces her rage, ignoring my attempts to distract, calm or warn her about consequences, and then BOOM! the firestorm hits. Her meltdowns are textbook, like something you'd see in a Will Farrell movie: she lies on the floor, kicks and screams, throws objects, and eventually gets her face all snotty. Of course, it's no fun to be in the throes of a tantrum by yourself, so she gets up to follow me from room to room, her shrieks approaching and receding like the Doppler effect.

One morning, as Mira was in mid-tantrum about something, Ethan mentioned to me that he'd gotten As for the trimester. "That's amazing!" I said over the racket. "You are the Golden Child." Abby interjected from her bedroom that she had also gotten As and was cleaning her room (a rare occurrence). The two of them started bantering back and forth about why each should be the Golden Child. Suddenly the tantrum stopped and the hoarse, furious voice of the preschooler - or maybe it was Linda Blair in The Exorcist -  screamed, "I'm the golden child!" (Except her speech trouble got in the way so it was actually "I'm the golden chi-lid! I'M the golden chi-lid!") Ethan just laughed and said, "Yeah, I'm pretty sure you're definitely NOT the golden child right now." You can imagine how well that went over.

Recently, my mom witnessed Mira's unbecoming side and took matters into her own hands (after her reminder that "four-year-olds are big girls" fell on deaf ears). On Mira's wall there now hangs a No Tantrums chart. If Mira can get it filled in, she gets a special date with Grandma. (And, of course, she will be the Golden Chi-lid.)

*Interesting Baron Fact:
Starting in 1995, the Baron appeared in several music videos produced by Harder/Fuller Films. Videos by Afghan Whigs ("Gentlemen"),  Low ("Shame"), Souls ("Cello") and Harvey Danger feature the Baron in various guises. Around this same time, I was periodically working with Harder/Fuller Films on their music videos. When "Gentlemen" was filmed at the old Grain Belt brewery, Randy came along as an extra for a crowd scene. Our friend Rick Fuller nabbed him to be the second "circus muscle man" - alongside the Baron. So, Randy had a brief appearance on MTV circa 1995. Fifteen minutes of fame, baby!

Pysanky, a.k.a. Ukrainian Eggs, 2013

2013 yielded a nice crop of eggs, especially since we kept making Ukrainian eggs even after Easter was over. Abby has gotten good with the kistka - she can do designs as complicated as anything Randy or I can do. (In case you're wondering what a kistka is, or how we make these eggs, here's the explanation.) Below are some pictures.

I'd like to note that the brown egg I did was probably laid by "Regular Legs," a hen belonging to my boss Anne (Regular Legs was formerly the coop-mate of Yellow Legs, who has since died). Anne always generously donates a carton of eggs to our endeavor, and I love the different look a brown egg gives me. Regular Legs is my all-time favorite pet name (if chickens are pets???) Except for maybe Ellen Barkin' as a dog's name, which is what we were going to name Fred if he was a girl.

All the eggs we did this year, including a few by friends or family who tried psyanky for the first time. (And yes, that is a Hunger Games bird egg in the back left, courtesy of Abby).

Randy's eggs

Abby's eggs

Jules's eggs

One by Randy and one by Gracie

Talk-talk

Wow, has it been this long?

I haven't felt inspired to write a blog post in awhile. Or rather, I have been inspired, but certain family members don't find their antics as blog-worthy as I do. (Something about teenagers and tweens and extreme privacy needs, apparently). Sure, I could share stories about mood swings so intense that they're almost comical. For example, a child might be very cheerful and chatty, telling me about something funny a friend said or did. Then this child might go in the kitchen and look in the refrigerator for a few seconds. When he or she comes back out, I might ask, "Hey, has [the friend] started driver's ed yet?" Without warning this child and I are no longer buddies; I have inexplicably become the enemy in the span of 4 seconds. I get a dark glare and a disgusted, "I don't know!"

[OK, PSY-cho!]

Despite their toddler-like mood swings, I should add: I do enjoy the teenagers 99 percent of the time. Or at least 90 percent of the time. Maybe 87 percent... And the depth of their mortification at me, at what I say, or do, or ask -- O.M.G.! -- actually amuses me.

The littlest kid also provides a regular stream of blog fodder, but everything that happens with her is such a whirlwind - she's at 78 rpm and my brain is struggling to run at 33 (a reference that will be lost on anyone under 40), so I forget a lot. I should probably carry one of those little dictation tape recorders to help me remember all of her high-jinks and funny sayings. She continues to attend speech class and her pronunciation is improving, but her use of pronouns... not so much. She's got "she" vs. "he" down, but "him" vs. "he" challenges her. All five of us correct her, but since she likes to talk trash and/or accuse Ethan of misdeeds he may or may not have committed, we end up with a lot of exchanges like this:
"Ethan said him going to put me in jail!"
"He's going to put you in jail, sweetie."
Or
"Ha ha, Ethan's a monster and him have a tail!"
"Ethan's a monster and he has a tail."

Sometimes you hear what you're repeating back to her, grammar corrected ("He's going to take your arms off and he's going to sew them to your butt") and you just shake your head at it.

It's not always grammar we're correcting. I had to tell her the other day that you don't refer to your mother as "hey woman," and even though Ethan might say "Don't be a pansy" when he's wrestling with her, that's not nice talk for little girls.

Another gem she learned from Ethan is this:

I shudder to think what impression she might make on the kindergarten class next year. (Kindergarten round-up is coming up this month!)

"Mom, Ethan said I going to kindergarten round-up and him going to catch me with a rope and tie me up!"
"He's going to catch you with a rope and tie you up..."