Winter Queen Takes Throne

Winter arrived with little fanfare save frosty mornings and daylight hours increasing ever so slightly in length. Death and new beginnings, bring them on, with cups of hot tea.

Darling daughter, almost 20-months now, learned how to start the iPod boom box playing. You see her here having just played some Johnny Cash for her own enjoyment. Notice also that her hair is freshly brushed here, yes, by me, at her request.

Both kids got bikes for Christmas, although the girl is small for hers yet. The boy seems to be starting to get the hang of it, with the training wheels attached anyway. Mama talked him out of the light blue bike with pink flowers, in favor of a more boyish green one, but sweet daughter was allowed a pink one - The Tigresse, which I've nicknamed Tatiana in memory of our lost wild-hearted Siberian.

Beach in Alameda

Kids & I had a great time at Crowne Beach in Alameda the other day.

Nothing Like Family

So here one can clear see the blatant insanity that runs in my family. Such a delight, to run wild, unfettered by the chains of reason. Mother, John, and Sam, of course, on Thanksgiving. Dough, for some reason the machine won't let me post these photos, but soonn....

19-month Old Rockstar

With my enthusiastic coaching and the promise of candy our darling daughter managed to push poop directly from her body into a small pink European-style potty the other night. Cheers filled the air, candy for all, and the good feelings go on forever, like rural roads. I have to give the boy some credit. The night before he overheard Mama Bear and me discussing potty training, and afterwards he insisted that we read them their new potty training book "Lift the Lid", a book featuring many flaps to lift to reveal hidden objects and such. He kept asking to go back to the first page and look at the candy hidden in Mama Rabbit's skirt pocket, such a smart boy.

The girl grows every day. She used to cry when she woke up, then she moved on to calling our names. Now she just stands there grinning, practicing psychic paging, and it works heck of good.

We used to forget to clean her old bottles out of her crib right away, which led to some sour milk drinking incidents. Now she hands me her bottle before I pick her up each morning, such a good helper. She also insists on brushing her teeth each morning, something the boy never did.