Meadow and Katie - NY/Dallas

We've found Meadow with Katie when she's asleep quite a few times in the past week or so. It's as if Meadow is protecting her or keeping her company, that she shouldn't be all alone in her room. It's really cute and I love my blond daughter for looking out for her little sister.

Lots of people in Dallas are surprised we have a dog. It's amusing because they often think that we must have just gotten her. They can't quite believe that we had a golden retriever in an apartment. I guess it's not surprising because most people, NYers included, don't quite understand what a good life a dog can have in the city. Meadow was well socialized. She had the best elevator etiquette around, and she had far more walks than she has in Dallas. But it's the overwhelming preconceived notion that dogs need a backyard that gets people here (and other places). So it only makes me wonder what sort of preconceived notions people must have of me when I say we've just moved from New York. Sometimes it's actually funny to explain to people that we didn't have a backyard, we didn't have a parking spot or a garage, and we didn't even have our own washer and dryer. These are all things people in Dallas take for granted.

So many people have also said to me, "You're from NY? You don't have an accent." I mostly skip explaining that many aspects of NYC accents are class-based (similar to the British) and most people of our SES don't have strong accents. I sometimes say, well some people have them, some don't. My mom and one of my sisters have much stronger accents than I do. It's really no different than people in NYC saying to Peter, "You're from Texas? You don't have an accent." I actually hear an ever so slight hint appearing every so often now from Peter, but if he drops his gs, I get mad. A little too Sarah Palin-esque for me.

But I wonder if being from NYC really turns people here off, so to speak. I've heard that it wouldn't and that Dallas people don't feel threatened by NY because it's not a Southern city - if I had come from Atlanta or Houston there would be more competition. I really wonder what sorts of assumptions people make because we're from NY. I truly and passionately miss few things in NYC. The ability to walk places aside, I miss the food. I lament the lack of good Italian food. Black and white cookies, if they exist here, are completely tasteless. And I miss little things, like getting a good portion of the Sunday NY Times on Saturday. It's difficult to read 2 Sunday papers all on Sunday when you have a 3-year-old.

Sushi for lunch

It's not unusual for people who know Katie well to brag about her eating habits. She's an incredible eater, both in breadth and depth. I was a really picky eater (bet no one is surprised!) and I'm continually amazed not just at her willingness to try new things, but the fact that she likes so many different things. One of her favorite foods of late is sushi. Now if you know me, you know there is no way I would give my preschooler raw fish - I won't touch it myself (and many thanks to Pamela's mom, a microbiologist, for reaffirming this). And I think Ania was actually the first to introduce her to sushi (she's a fellow no raw fish person). Katie loves all the vegetable rolls and asks for them at many trips to Whole Foods. So last week, as a special treat, I let her have it for dinner and take some to school for lunch. I fixed the chopsticks with a rubberband and paper so she can use them. And yes, my daughter had sushi for lunch.

It made me think of a scene in "The Breakfast Club" where Molly Ringwald brings sushi for lunch. In 1985, it was a novelty for a high school student to bring it for lunch and they made a point of this in the movie. In 2008, it's so common place that my 3-year-old brings it to preschool.

Katie's first movie

We took Katie to see the movie Bolt last weekend. We went with our friends and their daughter Ellie. Here are the girls in their seats. Although she's 10 months younger than Katie, Ellie is an old pro at movies and loved the popcorn that she kindly shared with Katie. Katie found the movie a lot more scary than we thought it would be. She has explained to everyone since then "I liked Bolt, but I didn't like the middle part, it was too scary." My empathetic daughter burst into tears when Bolt was lost and looking for his person.

A real teepee

Besides having a resident live turkey for Thanksgiving, Katie's preschool brought in the "Teepee lady" who told the kids how Native Americans lived and ate and slept. Love this!

Thanksgiving Luncheon

The 3s classes had the most adorable Thanksgiving luncheon last Friday. All of the children worked hard to decorate Indian outfits. (The teachers told us that it's now pc to say "Indian" as well as Native American. The kids prefer Indian). And they got Indian names. Although they picked them out of a hat, Liz and Jennifer insist that there's some karma to them. Katie's name was "Spring Blossom." Of course this is perfect for her, especially because she's the only spring child in her class and her Hebrew name means "Spring Daylight."

We invited our surrogate grandma Macki to the Thanksgiving luncheon. She was thrilled and I think she really enjoyed the sheer adorableness of the festivities. The meal - for kids only - was less that Thanksgiving-ish. Dinosaur chicken nuggets don't quite count, and I was not happy when Katie asked me today if I made nuggets for her for Thanksgiving tomorrow.

Here was Katie's place setting. Love the placemat and the styrofoam and feather turkey.

Besides singing "Any Turkey Can Tango" and a few other choice Thanksgiving songs, the 3s classes listened to Marcy tell a Native American legend. Katie has Marcy for "imagine that" (an after-school drama and pretend class) and she was very into the story. So was her friend Brian.

Fuzzy sweaters and home

It's a little strange that both Katie and I are very into fuzzy sweaters or fleecey type things. They are about the only thing I want to wear. And Katie will take Cozy blanket with her in the car and wrap herself in it at home. If I'm wearing a fuzzy sweater, she'll literally feel my sleeve while she's walking.

I think it's a comfort cozy thing. Well obviously. But it's more that I'm not quite comfortable here so the least I can be is all bundled up cozy no matter where I go. I'm preparing our new home for Thanksgiving. While I couldn't be more thrilled to celebrate Thanksgiving in our new home, there's something a little disconcerting that it's in Dallas. I'm hoping that by putting the efforts in here, setting the table - Oma's table - with all our things, that maybe I will feel more at home.

Katie, as you can see above, still has her thumb as the ultimate security object.

Tangoing like a turkey

Only at Temple Emanu-el preschool will you get a real live turkey living in the "living science center" the week before Thanksgiving. The preschool director lives on a farm and brought in one of her turkeys - Mrs. Gobbles. Mrs. Gobbles isn't really in danger of being eaten for Thanksgiving and we're hoping Katie doesn't make too much of the connection between her and the one on the table. Having a live turkey at preschool was a highlight for me - it's definitely not something you'd get in NYC. Ann and Katie and I went to see the turkey after her ballet class. Katie danced like a turkey and only at her Thanksgiving luncheon did I see that "Tangoing like a turkey" was an actual song and danced they learned.

The preschool director put Mrs. Gobbles in Gan Shalom for some fresh air the next afternoon. Guess what the turkey did... Flew away. It took 5 people, running and in cars and a golf cart to get Mrs. Gobbles before she ran onto NW Highway.

Ballet at school

As I've mentioned, Katie's school has really fantastic after school classes. She loves them all. I wasn't sure what she thought of the ballet class because she doesn't talk about it much, whereas in nyc, she talked about ballet all the time, sang the songs, and danced all over the apartment. Peter rightly pointed out that in nyc, ballet was all she did. Here there are so many activities that compete for attention (kids are very much generalists at this age).

On Tuesday there was an open ballet class and Ann and I went to see Katie dance. It was completely adorable, of course. Katie was really into performing, which was great because a lot of the girls saw their moms/parents and cried and wouldn't participate. She did keep running over to give me and Nana hugs though.

At one point, the girls were lining up to "do skips" across the room and Katie yelled "I want to be the leader." And her teacher Miss Belinda said "what a surprise." Katie smiled the whole time. She does love ballet.
Katie leads the skips

A fun birthday party

We went to Katie's friend Noah's birthday party last Sunday. Katie had a great time running and jumping and swinging on the rope. From what I understand, birthday parties in Dallas take on the general form of go to someplace fun, do an activity, and have cake. It's not really too different from NY, though NY seems to be big on pizza at birthdays too.

Katie purposely planted herself right next to the birthday boy when it was time to have cake. She likes Noah a lot, but Peter also thinks that she probably wanted cake first too.

Katie and Noah enjoying the dinosaur cake.

Katie and Cozy

In the past 6 months, Katie has gotten very attached to the blanket Aunt Sarah and Uncle John bought her when she was born. I think I mentioned this before that the blanket's official name is "the coziest blanket in the world" but it is generally called Cozy. Recently Katie added a gender identity Cozy. Cozy is a "she" and Katie says it's a she because it's pink which is really the first time she's vocally associated pink with girls. I pointed out that most of her puppies are boys and they are pink. No comment.

We're not sure why she's become even more attached to Cozy and Puppies lately. But walking into preschool I see lots of kids with their attachment animals/blankets/objects so I know Katie is not the only one. Cozy and Puppy seem to come in the car more often than I'd like, especially in the morning. But Katie's not really a morning person so I'm adopting the philosophy of "whatever helps."

Here you see Katie draping Cozy on Meadow. And Meadow was a good big sister and cooperated. Katie wanted a picture of it. A few days ago I told Katie that we should take Meadow for a walk after school.

"But Mommy, we don't need to take Meadow for a walk. We have a backyard."

"Well Katie I think that Meadow would enjoy walking around the neighborhood and getting some exercise. It's good for her."

"But Mommy, we have a big backyard!"

Playing basketball

Our house came with a basketball hoop and when Katie and I were away, Peter bought a basketball. Katie thinks it's a lot of fun to try to shoot, though as you can see, she has more fun when Peter puts her closer to the net. Peter was impressed that Katie said she wanted to dribble. We figure she must have learned that in her sports class.
It's getting a little more chilly here, but still "unseasonably" warm to my NY-centric brain. It was windy the last 2 days so it was actually cold, thought back to nice and sunny today. The weather is one of the many differences between her and NY. I don't think that I can do these differences justice at the moment - more another time.

A real seat in the airplane

Since I was traveling alone and Katie's a very tall 3 1/2-year-old, I checked the carseat on our flights (well I gate-checked it on the way there). Look at how tall our little girl is in the seat! Actually it worked well because for the first time she could actually use the tray to watch her DVDs. Thankfully, Katie's a good traveler and contently watched Clifford and Diego and The Backyardigans. Peter picked us up at the airport and I was so happy when I got home to homemade vegetable soup on the stove and fresh flowers. He even made chicken piccata for dinner (in the division of cooking, Peter makes chicken on the stove, I make chicken in the oven). It's nice to be missed sometimes. But nice to be home.

Breakfast before we left

We love Karen and Paul. Elizabeth's parents, Karen has known and loved me forever and even got up early on Sunday morning to have breakfast with us because it's about all we could fit in our busy schedule (and of course they know what it's like because Elizabeth has a crazy schedule when she comes to visit). Katie loves Karen - and for good reason. She's really fun and kid-oriented. It was so nice to see them.

A really full Saturday

Saturday was a busy day in NJ. We went with our friends Anna and Sarah to a different children's museum, which the girls loved. Here they are decorating pumpkins at the museum and of course we had to schlep the pumpkin back to Dallas with us.

And the girls dug for dinosaur bones and the Texan living in NY and the NYer living in Texas both loved the horse ride.
We went for another visit to Oma. I can't say that I think that Oma has gotten worse, but she hasn't gotten better. My visits to see her were in the evening, which is not as good as seeing her in the morning. And she repeatedly called Katie "Sarah" which is not unusual, but just not sure whether that means she thought Katie was me or not.
Eating ice cream in the dining room with Oma. Ice cream is the special treat for visiting Oma.
We ended the day with a full family dinner at Debbie's house. Rachel returned from her amazing cruise to Turkey, Greece, and Egypt. We had take-out barbeque which is just not the treat it used to be now that I can get really good barbeque in Dallas.
Katie and Robin with the jingly wraps Aunt Rachel bought in Greece.

Finally time for bed. Dima reads Katie Mitch's favorite book "Miss Rumphius."

Dinner with Donna and Jon

After a 3 hour nap for Katie, we went into the city to see our friends Donna and Jon. Here is Katie and Donna and Meadow's (platonic) boyfriend Kobi. Kobi was happy to see us even if we didn't bring his buddy with us.

Okay Urban Meadow fans, one guess where we went for our one dinner on the Upper West Side.

Our friend Mike (the waiter) was really happy to see us.

And Katie and I were so happy to eat good Italian food. She had the guitar string spaghetti and I had the gnocchi. And even Gennaro was glad to see us and I told him how much we miss him in Dallas.

After dinner, Katie and I hung out at their apartment for a while - so comfy, familiar, and like home I didn't want to leave. Ethan came home from his school dance and played with Katie. For at 13-year-old boy, he is so good with her and Katie adores him.

Katie loved playing the toy Ania bought her. It's her new favorite.

Twin cousins

Katie had her first sleepover at Robin's house! This was very exciting for both of them, especially Katie. Robin isn't a great sleeper and certainly sleeps much better at her own house. So I'm happy to report that the girls got a lot more sleep than they did during their June sleepover at our apartment. But Katie was still exhausted and pretty much a wreck the next day.

Debbie made cinnamon rolls with the kids the day before and when she served them for breakfast, Katie told her "my mommy makes me cinammon rolls too." We all got a good laugh out of that one. I cook well, I bake well, but I would, at this point in my life, never think of making cinnamon rolls and my sister knows me and knows that. Why Katie said that - we have no idea.

Pete, Mitch, and Robin were all off from school on Friday but the boys didn't want to leave the house. So I took Katie and Robin to the little local zoo. Katie was a mess, didn't want to walk, didn't want to be there, just pretty much exhausted. Eventually she and Robin had a good time running around. I bought Robin an outfit that matched Katie's. Here they are as twin cousins. Robin is still teensy bit taller than Katie, but you have to look very carefully to notice.


Twin cousins and the tapirs


Asleep as soon as they got into the car

NY!

The hard thing about not living in NYC is the fact that I miss all my friends who do and my family in NJ. Katie had 3 days off from school because the NAEYC conference was in Dallas this year and all of the Jewish preschools closed so that the teachers could attend. It happened to coincide with NJ Teacher's convention, meaning that Katie could spend time with Robin. So Katie and I headed to NY/NJ to visit friends and family. It was difficult to see everyone we wanted to and trying to squeeze people in did not work as I had liked. It's hard to blog about this because I don't want people to feel hurt or excluded. It turned into a whirlwind of a trip with little sleep for Katie and lots of time driving between my parents' house, my sister's house and the city.

The really great thing was that hanging out at Donna's or at Kelli's, I felt so comfortable it was like we had never left. And of course being with Ania was such a treat. We continue to enjoy each other's company and I continue to look to her for parenting advice. Katie ran into her arms when she saw her and the first thing Ania did with her was her hair in beautiful French braids.

November in Dallas

Our pool is too cold to go in, but Katie noticed the sprinklers came on this afternoon out front and she correctly guessed that they would come on in back shortly after. She was prepared - she quickly changed into her bathing suit.

Peter thinks it's unseasonably warm here. It doesn't matter. I'm enjoying it - I couldn't be happier in a t-shirt. The sprinklers came on because we had winter grass planted and it needs to be watered, so we are preparing for winter. I'm really looking forward to not having snow though I've heard that there can be some pretty bad ice storms.

Katie continues to be a little testy to us. This afternoon she started crying hysterically because I wasn't going to make miso cod for dinner (it needs time to marinate). We thought that was pretty funny.

"Did you blog it?"

We went to the Ft. Worth Zoo today. Katie was pretty cranky. I think one of the problems with big life changes and 3-year-olds is the fact that you never know if their cranky behavior is because of the big life change or just because they are 3 and cranky. Everyone is allowed to have bad days. I think Katie was pretty testy this time last year too. I'm hoping it's a stage and I'm hoping it's developmentally appropriate. She's just generally such a happy and easy going kid, it's confusing for us when she's not.

Everything with her parents is a test right now. We told her that we were going to do a lot of walking so she wanted her stroller. Fine. She hasn't used the stroller once since we moved (and remember that this was our primary vehicle in NYC) - she even walked the Texas State Fair. But she constantly wanted to be pushed by Mommy and hold her doll or not hold her doll or see this animal and not this animal. The fact that she didn't want to see the bats and rattlesnakes was pretty consistent to past zoo behavior, but that's about it.

I'm thinking now that maybe it is related to the big move. The last times we went to the zoo, it was the Bronx Zoo and right before we moved we had 2 trips, one with Anna and Sarah and one with Ania. Both were infinitely more fun. And she kept saying that she wants to go to the zoo in NY with Robin.

It's a nice zoo. Everyone says it's much nicer than the Dallas one but I didn't think it was amazing. One neat thing they had was an exhibit of Texas animals, though I was disappointed not to see an armadillo (the only one I've seen here was dead on the side of the highway). I asked Katie what her favorite part and she said watching the lion poop. Then she said "Did you blog it Mommy?"

The lion had a mane so I asked her if the lion was a boy or a girl. "He's a boy." "How do you know?" "Because he doesn't have a bow." So I explained that we know he's a boy because he has a mane, like some daddies have beards. And then we saw a lion without a mane and with 4 little cubs (Katie won't call them cubs because she thinks the term cub is reserved for bears). I asked her again what kind of lion it was. "A boy lion." "But Katie, it doesn't have a mane, remember like the boy lion over there." "It's a boy lion. It doesn't have a bow."

What has the cartoon world done to my daughter that she thinks wild animals should have bows?

Dinner with Ariel and Tinkerbell

We had our first family over for dinner on Saturday night. Samantha came with her parents and her little brother Matthew. Katie called him "Little Matthew" to differentiate from her friend Matthew from school. She asked me many times before they came over to get some of her baby toys out of the closet so that he would have something to play with. He was most fond of the doll stroller and the stuffed Elmo - we definitely had that phase!

Katie wanted Samantha to bring her Halloween costume so they could dress up together. So Ariel and Tinkerbell played in the backyard before dinner. It was nice to have people over, especially now that we have space and a backyard.

Tinkerbell

Katie has a pretty good dress up collection. I've purposely tried to steer away from specific characters in her dress up because I'd prefer if her play was not scripted or defined by Disney. I suggested that for Halloween she could be any number of things - a doctor, a vet, a princess, a ballerina, a hula girl, a fairy. She decided that she wanted to be a princess and she was going to be Snow White. "Why can't you be Princess Katie?" "I don't want to be Princess Katie. I want to be Snow White." So, as I explained below, I decided that one Disney designated character in her dress up collection would be okay. When we got to the store, she decided that instead of Snow White, she'd be Tinkerbell. No problem with that, I like Tinkerbell, she has a little more imagination than Snow White.

Katie was a great Tinkerbell. This was (obviously) her first year trick-or-treating to houses. It was a little strange in a number of ways. First of all, it was 80 degrees on Halloween. And 80 degrees here is perfectly beautiful, not hot. Tinkerbell is very weather appropriate here. And we're used to buildings where the doormen give you lists of doors you can knock on and at what times. Here, we looked for vague clues like whether the lights were on or they had decorations up.

Katie was a little hesitant to go knock on people's doors. I understand that (and a little fear of such things is good). She would only go to her friend Matthew's house first. He lives around the corner. He and his family were outside and we got a cute picture of them.
After Matthew's house, Katie needed some encouragement to knock on the doors. The second house, we got lucky. There was a little girl there who is almost 3 and she and her mom joined us for trick-or-treating around the neighborhood. It was either having another little girl with her or the fact she got the hang of it, and Katie became a little more confident and had a good time.
Katie trick-or-treating with our neighbor we just met, Magriet. Magriet has an Oma too.