Good Morning

Sigh. I like my daughter. We had the sweetest, easiest morning, just the two of us. She chose her clothes (jeans! a shirt that was not pink!) and put them on herself. I made her a scrambled egg, then let her have a tiny sliver of cake. We watched the weather, then filled out the different forecasts on a map of the Western U.S. (it will be 60 degrees and rainy in Tacoma, by the way). She brushed her teeth and hair. We talked about the weather some more on the way to school. She said, "I like it when we cooperate." I said, "Me too."

The Animals That Live at My House

Clifford has been having some behavior problems lately. I have considered starting a new blog called WhatCliffordAteorDestroyed.com. His casualties include:
• A bar of soap
• The video cable for the Wii
• A Bible
• The lids of several very expensive shampoo and conditioner bottles
• The cardboard box of a set of poker chips
• His own feces (or maybe Ramona's)
• Various markers, crayons, stamps, stamp pads and pots of paint
• The legs of a toy high chair
• Bills, catalogs, that invitation we failed to respond to
• The bottom of the door to Jason's office
• Half a bottle of lemon furniture polish (the rest created an oil slick all over the hallway)
• The cushion on one recently (and expensively) reupholstered chair (note: for months the chair just seemed lumpy)

While this list is amusing, it is mostly...sad. Poor Clifford. He has never been bright (his mantra: "My head is too small for my body, my brain is too small for my head."), but he has taken a nervous decline that's worrisome, and the lengths that we go to protect him (and our stuff) from himself are getting extreme.

So today I took Clifford to the vet for some bloodwork (thyroid can make older dogs go nuts) and decided it would be beneficial for Lu to go. Educational and all that.

It was a complete comedy. The tech could not get our poor nervous dog to pee, so we ran around the yard at the vet's office being encouraging, but nonchalant. Lu used the distraction to create a grand bouquet of zinnias (despite my alternating cries of, "Clifford, go potty. Lucy, those aren't our flowers and if you pick them—Clifford, go potty." As I paid the bill, I watched Clifford huddled in Lu's carseat as she alternately berated him for sitting in it and yelled for me to hurry up.

The afternoon ended with me catching a specimen of Clifford's pee in our own yard, then trying to get Lu out of her carseat while holding said pee, to her wails of "EW, WHAT IS THAT? THAT'S CLIFFORD'S PEE. GROSS. DON'T TOUCH ME, YOU TOUCHED CLIFFORD'S PEE."

That pee is in my fridge now.

What I've Been Thinking About Lately

Happiness is like fitness or housekeeping for me: something that takes energy and focus, does not come naturally and has been sadly neglected for a while.

So I am thinking of starting a happiness project. I first read about Gretchen Rubin's Happiness Project in a great article called 10 Ways to Be Happier (Liz brought Real Simple to our girls weekend. I brought Us Weekly). The author explains how she found herself in danger of wasting her life — her wonderful life — by not working on her happiness. She started a systematic study of happiness, a blog and has a book coming out next year. I have found her inspiring. We'll see how my project goes, but one of my first tasks is to make a list of ten things I am grateful for (thanks for the assignment, Liz), in no order:

• Jason's patience
• My sense of humor
• Our health
• My amazing friends
• The hope and energy driving the election
• The fall weather
• Good books
• Lucy's energy and intelligence
• My family (the one I was born into and the one I married into)
• Our safety (something I so take for granted I rarely lock a door)

This Just In!

Potty Training Breakthrough Alert: Over the strains of Keith Olbermann I heard some faint moaning from Lu's room. Jason went in to investigate: she was grunting, half-lidded, headed for the potty. Jason came from the bathroom, pumped his fist in victory and said, "She peed like a race horse and didn't even wake up."

This is a big step from midnight cries like "DAAAAAD, I HAVE TO PEE!!!" or the dreaded "MOOOOOM, I PEED IN MY BED!!!" (and subsequent laundry).

Bad Wrap for Nap

While we were at the Children's School family picnic at the Northwest Park today, the head of school, Ms. Wallin, approached me to share a funny story about Lucy.

She said that Lucy was standing in line to go into the nap room one day last week, and as Ms. Wallin passed, Lucy said, "Excuse me, Ms. Wallin, I'm not supposed to be in this line. I am not a napper."

They proceeded to have some negotations/dialogue about the merits of napping, during which time Lucy conceded that while napping isn't JUST for babies, it is mostly for kids who are "very young, not older kids like me." Ms. Wallin explained that everyone benefits from a nap, that she herself liked to take naps sometimes, that she thought it would be quite nice to take a nap that day.

Lucy said, "Well, you can have my cot."

Princess Persuasion

Lu knows how much I dislike the princess thing. Last night, she wanted me to read her a Disney princess book, and she tried to persuade me by explaining, "Well, they aren't princesses, they are just really pretty. With pretty dresses on. And crowns. But look, they have horses, Mom, and I know how much you like horses." I held firm. I really don't like horses all that much either.

Decision 2008

Small choice has always been a big part of keeping the peace in our house: it helps Lu feel some power in a world ruled by bumbling adults. But she has further slowed down any morning or nighttime ritual by insisting that all decisions be made via "Eeny Meeny Miney Mo." Which toothpaste to use? My_mother_told_me_to_pick...cinnamon! Which socks? My_mother_told_me_to_pick...blue! (The irony of this being she NEVER does what her mother tells her to do.)

This method has saved us lots of fighting and deliberation. Don't tell voters in swing states.