While we're on the subject

of Beatrice's witticisms, I had to share her first pun. Just now at dinner she was eating a plate of edamame when she pointed at me and said, "You're eda-mommy! You're my eda-mommy!" and began to laugh hysterically and repeat it over and over. (I never said it was a funny pun.)

Earlier today she was trying to push me out of my seat as I was sitting in her playhouse.

"Beatrice," I said, "are you pushing me?"

"No," she said, "I'm trying to drag you nicely to another area."

The Wit and Wisdom of Beatrice Kumar

Beatrice has developed her own strange manner of talking, a mixture of the formal (she uses phrases like "paper napkin" and "clothing drawer," says "as well" in place of "too," and prefers "May I?" to the less grammatically correct but more casual "Can I?") and the idiomatic ("no way, Jose" and "paint the town" are two recent favorites) with the fractured grammar of a toddler. She also says a number of very funny and sometimes surreal things.

A few recent quotes:

We were driving with the GPS on and Beatrice asked me, "What is that voice?"
"It's the GPS on the phone. The voice is giving me directions so we don't get lost. It's telling me how to drive."
"I can show you how to drive," Beatrice said, miming holding a steering wheel.

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Beatrice told me the new tattoo on my ankle was beautiful.
"I want a tattoo when I grow up," she said.
"Where do you want to get it?"
"On my ankle."
"And what do you want it to be a picture of?"
"A sandwich."

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Beatrice believes the song is "If You're Happy In Your Nose, Clap Your Hands."

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Beatrice put her head up to the silent car radio and said, "I think there's a jack-in-the-box hiding in there."

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And my favorite: Yesterday Beatrice was sobbing because she wanted a glass of water. After she got her water and calmed down, she remarked, "I get too much upset regarding water."

Arthur, Month Nine

Arthur is nine months old! And he continues to work on standing and walking, slowly but surely moving towards the day he can walk on his own.

But the biggest news of all: Arthur said his first word! Or words, technically. During his bath time last week, he identified his favorite bath toy as "a duck." A few days later I captured it on video.

He says "a duck" most clearly at about 10 seconds in.

Now, there was some debate as to whether he was "really" saying this word or just repeating after me, so last night I performed a test: I held up the rubber bath duck in silence and right away he exclaimed "a duck!" So I am therefore declaring "duck" to be his first word. (You may remember that Beatrice's was "dog.")

Whether or not Arthur really means it when he says "a duck," he certainly loves babbling, vocalizing, and repeating sounds, much more so than Beatrice did as an infant. He repeats "dog" and "hi" and he also waves, laughs, and responds to pointing. He and his sister have even created their own form of communication which consists of making weird sounds to one another and then laughing hysterically at them.

In other news, Arthur has a newfound interest in balls - in fact, lately all he wants to do is throw balls, roll them, catch them, and chase them. His favorite activity is to toss a ball away from himself, go crawling off after it, pick it up, and repeat again and again.

Throwing a football

He is also a great fan of sandboxes and has finally, finally learned not to eat the sand. Most of the time.

Racing through the sandbox with Beatrice

Arthur continues to expand his culinary horizons - now he eats more and more real (that is, non-pureed) foods like small pieces of chicken, ground beef, tofu, cheese, bread, vegetables, and fruits, though he still doesn't have any teeth and his habit of cramming his mouth full of food and then gagging on it all means that I'm always on the edge of my seat watching him eat. We'll weigh him at his checkup appointment tomorrow, but he remains pretty skinny, despite his love of pancakes, macaroni and cheese, and bagels.

Playing drums at baby gym

Arthur break-dancing at Machine Project's event Infantcore, in which he was an enthusiastic participant

Eagles and Airplanes

I bought Beatrice this new drawing board to keep in the car and she's been using to create some impressive art. Well, mostly she uses it to draw burritos (or an oval that she calls "a burrito"), but occasionally she also does something a bit more complex.

"Two Airplanes"

"An Eagle"

After I took this photo she asked for the drawing board back so she could add a tail.


"An Eagle With a Tail"

The funny thing about her newfound drawing ability is that it seemed to happen overnight - one day she couldn't draw anything except squiggly lines, the next she could draw reasonable representations of actual objects. Another strange example of how the mind develops.

Happy Valentine's Day: The Movie

I wanted to add this little clip to yesterday's Valentine's Day entry:

I've also included the full unedited video clip below. At more than four minutes, it's too long for all but the most devoted Beatrice fans, but it's pretty funny, and a good example of her strange, discursive conversational style. It also involves her bursting into song three times. I particularly like the end, when she starts talking about trick or treating, then declares, "I'm wrapped in my alligator costume! I'm wrapped in my alligator costume! Let's sing a song. 'A...' I'll stand on the bed."

She then sees her dollhouse and says, "I put some family in my dollhouse. In my bed, I was, while I sleep. Daddy said to me.... [long pause] 'go to sleep or I'll take away your toys' . . . Zebra!"

Happy Valentine's Day!

This year we had a more low-key Valentine's Day than last year's custom printed encyclopedias, homemade ice cream sandwiches, and cookie-decorating party, but we did take some time to celebrate.

Beatrice made around four dozen Valentine cards over the course of several evenings to pass out during today's preschool class party and to send to all her relatives and friends around the country. (When I asked her for whom she wanted to make valentines this year, she answered, "Bailey!" Bailey is Amy Turner's dog.)

And Marie helped Beatrice make some even fancier valentines for her grandparents.
Beatrice and I made Dev oatmeal raisin cookies, his favorite, to go along with a dinner of Asian-style glazed baby back ribs with udon noodles. But perhaps Dev's real gift was the dinner I made on Saturday night, triple pork and whiskey black bean chili (I'll post the recipe soon).

And as for me? I got the best gift of all - a dead raccoon! Facebook users probably already saw me post photos of my early Valentine's gift, this wonderful taxidermy raccoon. I don't think I've ever been more excited to own anything in my life.

Even though I picked up the raccoon a few weeks ago, Dev kitted him out for Valentine's Day.

And on his finger? My wedding ring, beautifully cleaned and repaired* thanks to Suzan!
To our family and friends: we just mailed our cards today, but expect them soon

*One of the sapphires was falling out so Suzan kindly took it to a jewelry repair person she knows in Dallas who reset the stones and cleaned everything until it looked like new.