THREE IS A MAGIC NUMBER

lily and pearl. you turn three today. it's an interesting age, three. it really is. you finally get everything. almost.

you are little people without the learned pretense of reason or inhibition.

you are both prone to trouble these days. you could cry for 40 minutes non stop, and then when i threaten you'll be punished, the tears turn off like a faucet, and you say, "don't put me in trouble, i'm not crying now!!" you play to your numbers, divide and conquer and many days you defeat us easily.

you both say incredibly entertaining things these days. your dad and i are never far from laughter thanks to you two. (pearl said, "daddy, actually i want an actual wind in the willow story." not a made up one that bc3 is prone to.)

and your stomach's are bottomless pits. you could have eaten 6 chicken nuggets, a pile of fried rice, some dim sum, a slice of pizza, broccoli, and a bowl of grapes, and you will still cry hunger 5 minutes later. what you really wanted was a "cheese string" and a dora yogurt drink and you will not stop complaining till you get them. your favorite place to eat those 2 items is on the edge of my bed right before bed while watching dora. you can suck down 4 juice boxes without a second thought, and still have room for strawberry flavored dora.

speaking of said cartoon girl.. she's your favorite at this moment. i guess i can't complain too much about her. at least it's not bratz or some other poor female roll model. at least dora's got friends, and can read a map. she can't be all that bad, however i'm not sure how crazy i am about a 7 year old kid having to find her way to the beach, alone with only a "monkey on her back" and a backpack that eats her crap! you are also into little bear (which makes me absolutely crazy, because he just does shitty stuff and doesn't get punished for it) yo gabba gabba, and the imagination movers.

favorite books are cinderella, where the wild things are (i'll eat you up, i love you so!!! in response lily will exclaim with real fear, "do not eat me up!!") wind in the willows, and james and the giant peach.

this year, in a proud moment for dear old dad, you chose to be wonder woman and super man for halloween. no generic princess's here (not this year at least!) lily you insist that you are super man, NOT super girl. you actually didn't specifically pick those superheros, in as much as we suggested and you didn't burn down the house with your hair on fire in protest.

you know all the lyrics to superman, batman, wonder woman theme songs.. and it's not per se a true knowledge in as much as you mumble the words until there's a part you know, and then you sing louder.. for instance, "spiderman spiderman mmmhhmmm spiderman. mmhhmmn mhmm mmhmm muhmm spiderman, mmhum hummh hmmm spiderman." there's some real talent there. a real love of music. prodigies in the making.

lily, you are loving, sweet, shy, and emotional. you are definitely my squeaky wheel. you give the best hugs. you are my heart.

pearl, you are bright, independent, kind and so thoughtful. sharp as a tack, nothing gets by you. you are my old soul.

you two are really the most amazing people, my favorites really. the best things to ever happen to your father and i. some days we want to tear our scalps off because you behave so badly, and some moments you are so endearing and sweet, you break our hearts.

this evening, while in bed,

i whispered to pearl, "i love you so!"

and she asked, "mommy, why do you love me so?"

and i said, "because you're my baby girls....and you're the sweetest babies ever."

happy third birthday, lily and pearl.

8:30 PM

it's approaching that time of the night. the time we set as bedtime for the girls. we're all lying in bed now watching the latest episode of some inane pre-school show. the girls are screaming "MAP, MAP, MAP!!" it's a bad habit we've established, watching 30 minutes of tv before bedtime. it's passive, but i found myself needing it. just needing to shut down for a little while, but still be with them. they are calm, i'm settled, diapers are changes, pj's are donned and bedtime is looming.

after the show, we all climb into their shared bed.. a mattress on the floor. we turn the lights low, and we read books, tell stories, and sing quiet songs. bc3 is the story teller and i sing the songs. we've taken to singing "kookaburra sits on the old gum tree," "twinkle twinkle," "somewhere over the rainbow," and that old jump rope song, "strawberry shortcake cream on top..tell me the name of your sweetheart." classics. songs i remember from childhood myself.

bc3 tells the story of "wind in the windows," as pearl calls it. he tells it different everytime.. the actual book is just too wordy to actually read. same with "james and the giant peach"...scary parts gleened over, no mention of ghosts at all.

the best story told is the one about princess mommy and monkey daddy. it's the 2 minute version of how bc3 and i met, our first date, our engagement, and the appearance of prince toby, princess lily and princess pearl.

if all goes well, we kiss, hug, and tuck in. we close the door "just a little bit" and they are off to sleep. if all goes well there is no screaming, crying, begging for 5 more minutes, cries of hunger because of course we haven't fed them dinner, fruit, dessert, cheese sticks, nuts and yogurt.

i breath a sigh of relief, but always secretly, later in the evening, i peer in their room, hoping that they wake up so i can spend just a little more time with them.

CONVERSATIONS...

the scenario: dinner, this evening. pretty good behavior all around. minimal prodding with EAT, EAT, EAT YOUR DINNER.

me: pearl, finish what's on your plate.
pearl: no, mommy, it's a bowl! (it was a bowl)
bc3: pearl, if we want to split hairs, we'll go to a barber.
pearl: nooooo, daddy!! my name is not barbara!!!

we could not control our laughter after that one.

NEW YORK CALLING...

i'm in london at this very moment. sitting in my hotel room. it's 1:11 here, and i leave for the airport in 4 hours and 30 minutes to board a flight home to new york. back to bc3, back to lily and pearl, back to toby and the triumphant return of pudding the cat.

i've been gone since last thursday. i was travelling on 9-11, which did not sit well with me, but i had no choice in the matter. i wasn't in new york to remember. i was in paris, i don't speak french so have no idea if it was even covered in the news. i'll return home tomorrow, and then leave the very next day for a weekend away with bc3, to celebrate our 8th anniversary. we were married 3 days before that tragic day, and i always think that if it had been 1 weekend later, we would not have been married in 2001. our wedding was in little italy and it would have been cancelled.

i'm not happy about leaving the girls again so soon, but our trip was booked, hotel paid for, babysitters arranged. and bc3 and i could use some time alone. it will help us appreciate all we have, the girls, our family. although i'm crystal clear about what i have waiting for me at home. i'm anxious, can't sleep, and i can't get home to new york soon enough.

BINGO WAS HIS NAME-O

MY CRAZY GIRLS....

FRAULEIN LILY

so as previously posted, my summer motto is "I AM THE BOSS!!!" triple exclamation points, all caps, shout out loud.

tonight, i said to bc3 about lily, "i will break her." 5 time outs tonight in a span of 1 hour. that's one for the record books.

i don't want to sound like miss prima donna, but i had to walk home from the train station this evening because a certain miss lily c would not let mr bc3 change her stinking, and i mean stinking diaper! he couldn't get her in the car, and when i arrived at the train station, they were still at home. so i walked. in bad shoes. and i got blisters. grrrrrrr!!!

i got home and decided a lecture was in order... a "you must listen to daddy, and mommy had to walk home from the train station because you were not behaving and i got blisters" lecture. i also decided that the barbie radio would be confiscated along with broby and muno yo gabba gabba dolls as punishment (if you don't have pre schoolers, don't know what noggin is, and have no idea what i'm talking about, open up another window and google it!)

a screaming, hollering, and all hands on deck tantrum ensued..."I WANT MY MUNO PUNO DOLL!!!!! I WANT MY BURBIE RADIO!!! IT'S MINE! " exclamation points, shout out loud. time out...#1.

then macaroni and cheese dinner (lazy tonight) where lily decided she forgot how to feed herself.. through sobs, "i don't how to feed myself...!" ranting... time out #2.

within 30 more minutes, time out #3, #4, #5... during the latter two she was sent to her room. she just wouldn't feed herself, continued to hang on me, and just carry on.

so she finally, after to5 decided to eat her dinner, the whole thing, including the edamame, which was her "treat."

then she recounted the whole evening, telling me how many time outs she had, and how she wasn't behaving, and that pearl was behaving, and that she wants to be a good girl and how she just ate her "ememames" because she was behaving "now." complete with sorrowful nods punctuating her contrition.

one of my favorite lines from sound of music....

"Fraulein, is it to be at every meal, or merely at dinnertime, that you intend on leading us all through this rare and wonderful new world of... indigestion"

i think i'll have this lazer enscribed on a titanium plaque, it's so damn bang on to what my night was like.

THE SUMMER OF '09

it's the beginning of august and it feels like summer is yet to begin. mid summer and i have not even turned on my sprinklers yet! the rain has been relentless and you can't rub two non raining days together. everything feels moldy, damp and overly green.

so this summer we have been wasting our money on pull ups instead of diapers. the whole subject annoys me because i'm throwing away money on something who's only function is life is to hold shit and piss!! anyway, i'll say every so often during the day, "who has to go potty?" and inevitably the answer in return is, "NOBODY!!"

their favorite movie this summer is little mermaid. the other day at the beach, pearl lost her new bead bracelet. when bc3 told her ariel has it now, she figured in her head that ariel would give it back to her when she watched the movie next.

their favorite show is YO GABBA GABBA. we are earnestly trying to figure out how we'd pull off dressing up as ygg for halloween, and we've figured out we are two persons short, casting as follows:

toby to play the part of broby(green striped monster
bc3 to play the part of muno (red one eyed creature)
me to play the part of Dj Lance (skinny black guy in orange skin tight jump suit)
and the girls fighting over the roll of foofa. (pink thing)

we have no one to play plexi the awesome yellow robot or toodee, the blue cat like monster. the girls of course both want to be foofa because she's pink and has a big flower on her head. i was actually trying to persuade pearl to be toodee. this was word for word a conversation i had with my 2 3/4 year old daughters.

"pearl, you can be toodee!"
"mommy, no, i want to be foofa!"
"no mommy, pearl can not be foofa, i am foofa!"

i promise you, if we came down your street looking like the above, we'd be the talk of the preschool set....

talking about pre school. the girls will be starting said "pre school" in the fall. they like to call it "free school." believe me if it were free, i wouldn't have formica counter tops, laminate kitchen cabinets, and ugly tile floors. i can't wait for the day it actually becomes "free." i look forward to the day when they can sing the alphabet song without the lyrics in the middle being "elmo- n- o- p." this "learning through play" concept is wearing thin... now i want my moneys worth. proper days of the week, instead of everyday being sunday, and some rudimentary physics.. not too much to ask, is it?

they've also developed a pretty ripe sense of humor. pearl has taken to calling me moms, as in, "no problem moms." then she stares at me to see if she gets a laugh or reaction.

i've also decided my mantra of the summer is, "i am the boss!" meaning 2 little girls are not going to rule the roost. tantrums, whining, and meltdowns will not elicit positive outcomes. time outs are to be strictly enforced. bedtimes at a timely time. cry it out has reached new heights.

so even though we've been thwarted at every turn, we have managed a few nice beach nights. although there is barely evidence of it because we can never remember to bring our camera. here are some pics from last saturday night. it was a rare beauty of a day and we enjoyed it thoroughly.







Oh.. and lest we forget... i turned 34 this summer!