Knock-knock. Moooo!

It was one of those days when it was just too hot to go to the pool, so I filled up the wading pool for the kids. And what does Dominic do? Makes his own diving board. How safe.

Meanwhile, the other comparatively tame males in the family spent a morning building a working model of Leonardo da Vinci's catapult and then shooting cannonballs down the driveway. Unlike some less successful projects, this one worked!

Finally, a joke. Vincent is quite the little joke-teller. Thus far his favorite goes like this:

Knock knock. 

Who's there?

Interrupting cow. 

Interrupting c-- 

MOOOOO!

But now that Dominic can talk the joke is a little different.

VINCENT: "Knock knock."

DADDY: "Who's there?"

DOMINIC: "MOOOOOOO!"

VINCENT: "Stop it, Dommie! Knock knock."

DOMINIC: "MOOOOOOO!"

DADDY: "Who's there?"

DOMINIC: "MOOOOOOO!"

VINCENT: "Make him stop ruining my joke!"

DOMINIC: "MOOOOOOO!"

Personally, I think the new version is the funniest. :) 

Echoing "I love you"

The happier moments of fishing

Last night I was trying to coax Dominic into saying, "I love you." He was more interested in stabbing a Lego wheel axle into my eardrum, so I might as well have been teaching him to say "useless endeavor." But after having little language other than BOAT, MORE and NO, our little guy has suddenly found his voice. Or his words, at least. Suddenly, it seems, there is an echo in this house -- specifically, an echo of his big brother.

Whatever Vincent says (and Vincent says a lot!) Dominic repeats the final word. So if Vincent hollers out, "I need milk!" I hear an echoing "MILK!" If he says, "Catherine, you're being a meanie!" Dominic reinforces his message with "MEANIE!"

And if Vincent hits his head on the table, you can bet that Dominic will climb up on a chair and beat his head against the same spot.

Such was the case at our fishing expedition earlier that evening. It was an episode of unhappiness all around; the kids were tired, it was above 100 degrees, and Vincent was channeling his inner two-year-old and throwing a fit because I refused to let him swing his baited line behind his head and cast it like the big boys. Add those all up and our evening went something like this:

VINCENT (stamping feet and screaming each word): "I want to cast my own line!"

DOMINIC: "LINE!"

ME: "Absolutely not. Give me the pole."

VINCENT: "No!"

DOMINIC: "NO!"

ME: "Time out. Five minutes. Sit down on that bench. Now!"

VINCENT: "If you don't let me cast that line I'm going to throw it into the water!"

DOMINIC: "WATER!"

So I figured, if he could parrot Vincent so well, the least the boy could do would be to parrot my "I love you." We sat in the hall outside the bathroom waiting for Vincent to stop complaining that his pajamas were too tight/ too loose/ too hot/ too cold/ too fuzzy and I held Dominic's hands and said, "Dominic, say 'I love you.'" Instead I got the wheel axle in my eardrum, and after doing this about ten times I gave up.

But a few minutes later he wandered up to me, this time without the wheel axle. "MAMAMA," he said. He sat in my lap and held onto my hair, which he does when he's tired. It was bedtime. Way past bedtime, technically. I kissed his cheek and said, "I love you, Dommie."

And he replied, "I la-ya," and kissed my cheek right back.

That, right there, is what makes a million evenings of fishing worth every second.

A summer of animals

Yesterday Dominic and I were out running when we passed a woman and her two yappy chihuahuas. My sweet little boy waved his pudgy fists and called out, "Buh-bye doggies." I was so shocked I had to stop running. Dominic is not the type to bestow kind greetings on passing animals; he is more likely to Houdini out of his straps, use the cup holder as a launching pad and quarterback-sack the poor mutts. But more to the point, Dominic thinks dog are bears.

Until recently his vocabulary consisted of BOAT, MORE and the ever-popular NO. Imagine these hollered at sound-barrier decibel levels. Dominic, do you want a bath? NO! Do you like ice cream? NO! His NOs are rather indiscriminate; I think he just loves being contrarian. 

In the past weeks he has picked up more and more words, but none have attained the popularity of BEAR. Every animal we encounter is a BEAR.

In an effort to stimulate his vocabulary I even bought him animal flashcards. We've been going over them every day. A recent session went something like this:

ME (holding up zebra card): "Dommie, what's this?"

DOMINIC: "BEAR."

ME (holding up cat card): "Dommie, what's this?"

DOMINIC: "BEAR."

ME (holding up butterfly card): "Dommie, what's this?"

DOMINIC: "BEAR. ROAR."

Shortly after that I left his side for 20.2 seconds, only to come back and find that he had eaten the alligator card. ROAR.

In honor of Dominic's burgeoning animal vocabulary, I thought I'd post some pictures to show just how many animals we've seen this summer. And by animals, of course, I mean BEARS.

Bear-huntin'

In a rare fit of spontaneity, I convinced our family to start our vacation early so we could have an extra day in Asheville visiting the Biltmore House. So we hurried up to finish packing our clothes and Catherine's 17 gazillion stuffed horses, shuffled Genie off to the neighbors', and rode on out of town. Around 10:30 p.m., when the rain was pelting the windshield so hard that we couldn't tell which way the hairpin curve was swinging, I decided I would revert to being boring and predictable. Life is safer that way.

At the Biltmore House - no bears there either.

Finally we checked in to the hotel, unloaded our toothbrushes and jammies, and tucked the kids into bed. But then, just like in our favorite Knuffle Bunny stories, we heard a horrendous wail because...

CATHERINE
                              REALIZED
                                                       SOMETHING.

11:03 p.m.
CATHERINE: "My horsies! My horsies are still in the car!"

ROGER: "I am not going to get your horses."

ME: "You know you will."

ROGER: "Absolutely not. She can sleep without her horses for one night."

ME: "I give it five minutes before you're at the car."

Cue wailing and sobbing as Catherine contemplates a cold, lonely night without her beloved horsies. 

11:05 p.m. 
ROGER: "Oh, fine. I'll go get them."

ME (to Catherine): "I hope you're happy. Daddy will probably get eaten by a bear in the parking lot."

The very next day, I started to wonder if I wasn't a bit prophetic because as we pulled in to the parking lot of our hotel high in the Smokies above Gatlinburg we saw a sign that read: "BEWARE OF BEARS." A big, stuffed, flag-wearing bear greeted us on the porch. And the upbeat owners described how just that morning two teenage bears -- how can you tell a bear is a teenager? Does it talk back? -- wandered through the parking lot. Indeed, our whole trip, it seemed, was filled with near-bear sightings: the cook was surprised by a bear as he gathered blackberries for the fruit compotes, fellow travelers had watched a bear from their balcony while they munched on waffles, the waitress had hosted a mama bear and four cubs in her yard that same day.

Yes despite staking out a raspberry patch and hanging out on our balcony in the early mornings with binoculars hanging from our necks and cameras at the ready, we saw no bears. That didn't stop the kids from rehearsing what they would do should they see one: Vincent would smartly clap his hands to scare them away. Catherine would invite them inside for a berry salad. 

And Dominic? He has a new word. You'll never guess what it is.

I Lift My Lamp Beside the Golden Door

Our graham cracker flag

The other day we were in Kroger and Vincent just randomly intoned, "I lift my lamp beside the golden door." While the cashier and the other shoppers gave him strange looks and stepped away, I explained to them, "Statue of Liberty."

In honor of the Fourth of July (and because we love our country!) we got the kids a CD that has all sorts of American songs on it as well as readings of important documents, like the Gettysburg Address, the Preamble to the Constitution, and the Declaration of Independence. The upside is that they've memorized most of these great writings and can spout out the Declaration on a moment's notice.

The downside is that if I hear Catherine humming "When Johnny Comes Marching Home" one more time I might break the CD.

Don't look too close or you'll see all my flaws!

Anyway, they've been wanting to learn more about American history. So we've read all about Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Ben Franklin, Molly Pitcher and Paul Revere, we've read about Betsy Ross' life, painted her flag, cut out her five-pointed star and made graham cracker flags, and recreated the Boston Tea Party by dumping the pillows off the beds. We studied the great landmarks, both natural and manmade, of the United States and created a lapbook about our nation. Catherine and I even sewed patriotic napkins.

Needless to say, our little patriots are very excited about the Fourth. And not just because I have promised to bake a flag cake with lots of frosting. It's been fun teaching the kids about our country, and it has instilled in me a new appreciation for the brave men and woman who risked their lives for freedom.

I'll leave you with the words by Emma Lazarus that are inscribed at the base of the Statue of Liberty, so that if you ever hear a little boy quoting them in Kroger you can just smile and nod instead of looking at him like he's an alien.

"Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore,
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door."

Happy Fourth of July, everyone.