Update on the house

So, the countdown is on. I've given our 30-day notice for this apartment. We'll be back in our house in less than a month.

The latest developments:
The exterior has been painted. We love the main color, but not the trim color. We already repainted it once, and I think we will repaint it again. Maybe a burgundy, against our contractor's advice.

The tile has been set in the 2nd floor bathroom and kitchen. There are small glass accent tiles in the shower and on the floor. Plus, we have radiant heat under the tile in the bathroom. As Lucas would say, "Ooh la la!"

The backsplash for the kitchen is made of white subway tiles with glass accent tiles.

The newest news is that we are redoing the 1st floor bathroom (thank god!). We will do plain white subway tiles with black accent tiles. And finally we will get rid of the horrid brass shower/tub fixtures.

Also, most of the lights are in. And so is the front door, but it still needs to be painted and installed. More to come.

Master storyteller

Lucas is really into hearing stories these days. In these stories, Lucas is the hero, with his faithful sidekick Maggie. He loves them. He used to say, "Tell me the story about me and Maggie in the forest."

But now he says, "Tell me the story about me and Maggie in the forest and we're running around like a couple of monkeys, and Maggie gets lost, and then I look for her, and then I tell her we're playing hide and seek and she comes to look for me and I give her a carrot and we run around and go home. Tell me that one mommy."

No two are alike

Today we went over to Jennifer and Ella's house for a late afternoon play date, which turned into a dinner party (Thanks Jennifer!).

Ella and Lucas had a lot of energy to burn, so I said, "It's jumping jack time". So they both faced me and we all started to do jumping jacks.

Jumping jacks is a loose term with little kids. Lucas was doing some kind of weird side step, with random hand-clapping. And Ella was jumping frantically, clapping her hands as she went. They were so excited and uninhibited, just having a great time. I watched until they ran out of energy and realized that no two jumping jacks were ever alike.

I thought I was going to pee in my pants, they were so funny. No words of pictures can capture what I saw, but I will try to capture one on film and post it here.

Happy Valentine's Day

In the spirit of Valentine's Day, this morning I stayed at Lucas' school for a little bit to read a couple books to him and his friend.

There was a cute little book with bees called, "Being a Friend". I thought this was an appropriate choice, being Valentine's Day and all. Basically, the message is that to have good friends, you need to BEE a good friend.

I asked Lucas and Ian to talk about what it means to be a friend. They started off innocently enough.

"Share toys with your friend"
"Be nice to your friend"
"Play with your friend"
"Draw with your friend"
"Play trains with your friend"

It was really cute to have these two little kids talk about all the things friends should do. But I should have stopped there, because the mood suddenly turned:

"Don't kick your friend"
"Don't push your friend"
"Don't grab things from your friend"
"Don't hit your friend"
"Don't call your friend a baby"
"Don't call your friend a blockhead"
"Don't call your friend a poopyhead"
"Or caca"
"Don't call your friend stupid"
"Don't call your friend diaperhead"
"Don't call your friend..."

Something I wish I could do

Aside from sing in tune, this is something else I hope I can do at some point in my life.

I sometimes poke fun at the odd things that go down in the Bay Area, but there is so much to love about this place and the people in it. People here are trying to make changes to help improve things for future generations, and I truly respect that.

I read today on SFGate.com about one such group of people called the Compact. http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/02/13/BAGH3H7DH71.DTL.

These brave souls have vowed not to buy anything new in 2006. They can buy things used as much as they want, but new purchases are limited to food, health and safety items, and underwear. They have a blog, Yahoo group, and monthly meetings. Members help other members search for things they need, like shower curtains or maps.

This story really resonated with me. If it wasn't for our new addition, I think we could almost swing this. We have purchased a couple of used items for our remodel (sink and bathtub), but I don't know if we could have found enough used paint in the colors we wanted.

I try to do my part in not buying things new all the time. It started in high school when I would frequent the used clothing stores on Telegraph. And Lucas has had lots of hand-me-downs from friends and Hannah's on Solano. When we buy books, we always check the used books first. Berkeley Parents Network has been a great resource, we got a double stroller from there when we needed one for our nanny share.

Things I would have a hard time buying used: shoes, socks, bedding, and towels.

See the above picture of the father and son buying fabric at a 2nd hand store? In the past week, I sent an email to friends to give away that same shirt (see picture at right). I bought it for Kevin many months ago, and he never wore it and said I should give it away. I think that's a little creepy. (The shirt has already been claimed by my brother.)

Here are some excerpts from this story that I find inspiring: From John Perry, who works in marketing at a high-tech company. "We're trying to get off the first-market consumerism grid, because consumer culture is destroying the world."

Says Peter Sealey, adjunct professor of marketing at the Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley, and former chief of marketing at Coca-Cola and Columbia Pictures. "It's a crystal-clear statement about what can be done to get us away from being a disposable society."

For more information:
groups.yahoo.com/group/thecompact
sfcompact.blogspot.com

Future careers, in pictures

A doctor or dentist - Lucas had his first trip to the dentist last week. After some stalling he sat in the chair and Dr. Bob counted and brushed his teeth! Lucas got a little goodie bag with cool dentist gear, shown above. He also walked away with two toothbrushes. Since then, when we brush his teeth, he wants them brushed twice, once with the red brush and once with the blue brush.

Olympic shotputter - This is Lucas throwing stones into the Truckee River. He liked to hear them splash in the water.

Track star - This is outside the Lawrence Hall of Science, where he loves to run around in the big space before you go inside. Who knows if this is a career he will pursue, but I wanted to include this picture because it really captures his spirit and zest for life.

Architect - I built the first couple layers of the foundation for this stack of sticks at the Lawrence Hall of Science. Then Lucas pretty much took over and was so focused on building this until there weren't any more sticks in the box. I kid you not, it was 20 minutes of silent concentration.

Master ship builder - I'm not sure what the job market is these days for ship builders, but Lucas built this ship completely on his own today. He was quite proud of it, then proceeded to knock it down.

Lucas' sensitive side

Through all the wrestling, staged car crashes, and general rowdy behavior, Lucas' sensitive side has started to emerge.

Earlier this week I said to Lucas, "Lucas you're a good friend to me" and he said. "You're a good friend to me too." Later that day he said, out of the blue, Mommy, you're my favorite friend."

And then yesterday, I was out for a walk and had to just run back in to get my wallet and keys. I only popped in for a second and said a quick "hi" and "bye". When I came back a 1/2 hour later, he said, "Mommy, you left and you didn't give me a hug or an eskimo kiss. And not even a regular kiss and I was so sad." You can imagine my guilt, thank god I was only gone a 1/2 hour.

So today I said to Lucas, "Lucas, I have a good time with you. You're my best friend." He was eating his snack at the time. After a long pregnant pause, he opened his mouth to say something. But instead, like a typical guy, he changed the subject and said, "Mommy look at this. I found a big raisin."

Lucas goes to Reno

This past weekend we visited my cousin, Cathy, and her family in Reno. Lucas has been looking forward to this trip since he found out, via their Christmas card, that he has two older cousins (Connor age 6 and Cassidy age 9). Also, I thought it would be a good opportunity to introduce him to snow, finally!

We went sledding one afternoon. Lucas had mixed feelings about snow. He enjoyed the sledding, but he didn't want to wear the gloves and then said his hands were freezing. He found a good way to keep them warm, by wrapping them around my neck!

Kevin was a big hit with Connor and Cassidy. There was a lot of wrestling going on. Basically, it was Kevin vs. Connor and Cassidy. And Lucas was in the mix too, letting out little screams and war cries and running around like a whirling dervish.

At first it was unclear whose side Lucas was on, but then I figured out what was going on: Kevin would pin down one or the other cousin, then Lucas would come in with the old headlock. He was surprisingly tough and tenacious during the wrestling.

Lucas most enjoyed playing with his cousins, which usually meant following them around and doing whatever they did. The first thing he said when he woke up in the mornings was, "Where are my cousins? I want to go play with my cousins." Then he would go out and say, "Hi cousin!", though he would also call them by name. They were great with him too. Our first night there, I heard Connor say to his mom, "This is the first time a little person has ever stayed here with me." It was a great weekend.

More photos of the house

Here are some recent pictures of the latest work on the house. The countertops were stained this week and came out great!

Also, more rooms have been painted. This is especially exciting for me, since I've always lived in places with white walls. Unless you count some of the walls in the house where I grew up: fake wood panelling in the family room and a weird dark green wallpaper with an even darker green velour pattern in the two bathrooms.

Aside from a few pedestrian sounding names, like Raccoon Hollow (which is the name of the exterior paint color), or Traffic Light Green, which we are not using, they are all very aspirational and lovely.

Here is Provence Creme in the guest/playroom.

And Queen's Wreath in our upstairs bathroom.

If you catch me scrubbing the toilet in my tiara, you'll know why. (And yes, I actually do have a tiara.)

"All by myself"

Lucas has been saying this a lot lately. He loves being able to do things by himself and will not hesitate to let you know about it. Here he is, "making a pumpkin patch", all by himself.

And just a few days ago, he started asking about me, and things I do myself. Like, "Mommy, you went pee all by yourself? Great job!"

Today we were talking about names.
Lucas: What's Grandma Kay's name?
Me: Kay Young Choi. I was also a Choi before Daddy and I got married.
Lucas: You married Daddy?
Me: Yep.
Lucas: All by yourself?
Me: Yes, all by myself.
Lucas: Before you were born in the circus?

I'm always so proud of Lucas when he tells me he did something all by himself. But it also makes me think of my wonderful friend Sunday, who had temporarily broken up with her boyfriend in college, weeping as she blasted this song in her room. Now they are married with FOUR kids. Maybe she wishes she could sing this song again, for a totally different reason.

On potty training

On Sunday, when we thought Lucas was napping, he had silently removed his diaper and decided to try on a pull-up. I guess the first 20 pull-ups were not to his liking, because he tried on just about every pair in the pack before settling on one. That was our not-so-subtle sign that Lucas might be ready to take potty training up a notch.

I don't get pull-ups. To Lucas, it feels just like a diaper, so, what's the point? Do pull-ups really help in the toilet training process? Or is it an insidious marketing ploy to keep parents buying diapers until their kids are 8 and to pay the Toy Story royalty to Disney? Based on my experience with kids products and Disney, it's most likely the latter, but we'll see.

So we are just going to let him walk around without anything on bottom when we're home with him. It pretty much works, as he goes to the toilet most of the time when he needs to pee.

This is the current pee-pose for Lucas. Pretty clever, huh? He thought it up all by himself. I figured I should take a picture of him doing this before he does a more conventional stance, or gets embarrassed, whichever comes first.

Career aspirations

Here is what Lucas has said, in the past couple weeks, when asked what he wants to be when he grows up:

I want to be a taxi man.
I want to be a construction worker.
I want to ride in a gantry crane.
I want to be a bulldozer driver.
I want to be a mountain lion.
I want to be a mountain goat.
I want to be a gorilla mountain goat.

My favorite is:
When I grow up I will go to work on 4th Street like Daddy. And I will bring home lots of money for you so we can buy bananas, tortellini, trucks, and hot chocolate.

What about Sunny, Kevin, and Maggie?

I know you all want to read about Lucas, but in case you were wondering, the rest of us are alive and well.

Maggie -
I just brought Maggie home from my mom's house today. She had been out there since around Christmas. We shipped her out there after some unfortunate incidents, including a very unpleasant vomiting phase with $300+ vet bills and then a short but ugly episode of dumpster-diving through Lucas' dirty diapers in the garbage. She had quite a time today at Pt. Isabel and then a thorough bath. She's happy to be back.


Kevin -
Kevin's still bringing home the bulk of the bacon for the McKay family. In his off-time, he has been telling some really good stories to Lucas. They involve Lucas and Maggie and always end with a trip to Grandma Kay's house for some kim-bop (Korean-version of sushi). He's also been getting in shape and eating better. Oh, and he's an Aquarius.

Sunny -
Between Lucas, household tasks, and work, I'm trying to do things for myself: going on walks and runs, watching old episodes of X-Files with Kevin, and hanging out with friends. (In fact, I was just asked by Whitney to write down 50 things I like to do. It took me about 15 minutes, but I will keep the list going and maybe find a way to link it to this blog.) I wish I had more energy but I am still summoned out of a deep sleep every night by the little elf, who goes by the name of Lucas. Lately I've been thinking about how old I feel sometimes. Where did the time go?

Lucas' business venture

Lucas ate a fortune cookie today. His fortune read as follows: "You will embark on an exciting business venture."

I asked Lucas what that meant, he said very deliberately, "I-T-O-A". Thinking this would be a lucrative stock tip, I quickly jumped on the computer and looked it up as a ticker symbol, but found no results.

I searched Google. The first legitimate business I found was the Irish Tour Operators Association (www.itoa.ireland.com). So Lucas is hinting at a trip to Ireland or maybe he will one day be an employee of the ITOA.

I asked him what ITOA meant. He pointed to the fortune and said, "See, it says 'I love you'". Then he put the fortune in his mouth and started chewing on it.

More indoor activities

Looks like we'll have a run of sunny days this coming week, thank God. But here are some games we have been playing to keep active and happy inside:

1) What the $*#&^ did I draw? - One of us draws a picture and the other one guesses what it is. When it's my turn to guess what he drew, sometimes he'll say, "Wow! You guessed right mommy!" And he sounds very amazed that I actually figured it out. (See pictures)

2) Scavenger hunt - I make a list of things around the house (mirror, refrigerator, etc.) and ask him to find these things, then he crosses them off the paper. I try to challenge him a little by saying, "where do you see your reflection?", "what keeps the food cold?". You get the picture. He loves to cross things out. We did this one day for about 1/2 hour.

3) Balancing act - We make a game out of carrying things from one room to another by piling them on his tennis racket. This also puts a new spin on the somewhat tedious job of putting his toys away. Maybe all this practice balancing will land him a job waiting tables at Chez Panisse, if my mom's dreams of him being a doctor don't pan out.

It was "one of those days"

After a friend read the blog, she said, "Wow, you guys have so much fun." True, we do have fun. However it's not all songs, games, and dance-a-thons.

Take today, for instance. I came home around 7:30am from working out. I knew it was going to be "one of those days" when all this went down within the first five minutes.
1) Lucas was a little under the weather, so I kept him home from school.
2) I brought home a little Odwalla juice for him, as I usually do when I work out in the morning. And I always drink about 1/3 of it before I get home and he never notices. Today, he noticed and was not pleased.
3) Lucas had a mini melt-down because I didn't bring home a straw for his juice.

We somehow got through the morning and ventured out to Rockridge for some errands. We went to www.bakesalebetty.com for lunch and had a stand-off over him finishing his chicken pot pie before getting a ginger cookie ("Who won?" you ask? With a toddler no one wins, but no, he didn't get the cookie). Then he didn't nap, though he was clearly tired.

Around 4:30pm, I IM'd Kevin: When will you be home? You need to come home asap! Hurry! Lucas is driving me batty!

I went to the www.cantfailcafe.com to lick my wounds and assuage my bruised emotional self with a buffalo chicken salad.

We're in the home stretch!

So, we're really in the home stretch now on the house. There is actual paint on the walls, which to me, is a good sign. Figuring out paint colors was the trickiest part of this whole thing, aside from coming up with the money to fund a project like this. After what seemed like hours of squinting at little color chips, we are totally happy with our choices. If you love the colors, great, if you don't, I don't want to hear about it.

Soft Fern will be in the living room, stairwell and upstairs office (see above).

Crisp Khaki in our room.

Soft Chinchilla in Lucas' room.

Soon to come...Castleton Mist in the dining room, Provence Cream (excuse me, creme) in the guest/play room, and TBD in the upstairs bathroom and kitchen.

Now the big question is, when do we give our apartment manager 30-day notice that we will be moving out? We're taking bets on this one.

More indoor fun

The break in the rain has really lifted our spirits in this dinky little apartment. Although we've spent a lot of time outside puddle-jumping and park-hopping, we also had a lot of fun inside. Here are some funny pictures from this week.

Lucas and I danced around the apartment listening to the Replacements, Pixies, and Offspring. Lucas was appropriately dressed in his Thomas the Train underpants and rain boots.

We played a fun new game called "Boy in the Bucket". You put a boy in a small bucket and see how long it takes for him to get himself out. In this case, he wanted to stay in there.

We found a new use for Legos. Put them on the tips of your fingers and see what kind of stuff you can pick up with your new Lego fingers. Hint: picking up peanut butter on apples can get messy.

Lucas, the baby whisperer

Today, Lucas asked me what babies say. I said, "Babies say, 'Waahh waahh waahh!'" We agreed that the best way to see what babies sound like was to show him one of his baby videos. I found one from when he was 3 weeks old and turned up the volume so he could hear himself crying.

Lucas said, "That baby wants his mommy. Where's his mommy?" And that's pretty much true, Lucas cried quite a bit as a little baby, and I would spend hours holding him to keep him from crying.

I told Lucas that he was the baby crying in the video. I don't think he believed me.

Kudos on my New Year's resolutions

So today is the official start of my NY resolutions and here is the progress I've made:

1 - I've been running at least every other morning and walking some evenings. I've reached 10K+ steps a day, except Saturday. So I can confidently say I've overachieved on this one.
2 - I'm still waiting (albeit patiently) for more patience to come my way.
3 - It's been too wet and rainy for tennis.
4 - I'm going to sign up for the Bolinas Ridge 10K run in May!
5 - Today is the official start of my resolutions, and according to my rules, it's a special occasion. So I celebrated with a cheap chocolate fix while in the office. (see below)
6 - Done. I already figured out how to install Lucas' car seat all by myself.

I ate two Kudos bars in the office today. How can you pair these up with Snickers and M&Ms and call them nutritious? They're really glorified candy bars, with some adhesive sticking all the candy parts and stuff together. The only thing that makes them healthier is that they are smaller than your standard candy bar. But when you eat two, it's pretty much the same as eating one candy bar, isn't it?

Welcome home party for Kimberley!

Last night we ventured out to San Francisco to celebrate the return of our good friend Kimberley, returning to the Bay Area from Seattle, along with Dan, her man. There was a ton of food, beverage, and four dogs. (Maggie did not attend because the last time she and Daisy got into a bitch-slap session that left our canine hostess with a slightly bloody ear.)

To help celebrate, we picked up a very tasty dark chocolate bourbon cake at www.crixacakes.com in Berkeley. Crixa Cakes is a unique little bakery across from Berkeley Bowl with amazing cakes and other treats.

Professor Flanagan, world-renowned expert on the "manzee", wowed us all with his tales of the equally exotic liger and tigon creatures, which can be found at www.wikipedia.org.

It was a great night with good friends and good food. Kevin and I didn't get home till about 1am, which is almost wake-up time for me.

Breakfast of champions!

Lucas made his first meal this morning, a banana smoothie.

The Recipe:
Take one banana. Cut it into oddly shaped pieces.
Put the pieces in a cup.
Pour in the soymilk.
Mix with the handblender.
Drink and enjoy!

Resolution #6

Learn how to install Lucas' car seat. I figured this out yesterday so I will take it off my list now.

Our funny little monkey

Besides being his general saucy self, here are some more funny things Lucas has said recently:

"Are they talking about me?" (He says this a lot when we hear songs on the radio)
"Are they talking about Grandma Kay?" (When he hears the children's song "Trot Trot to Grandma's House")
"I can't reach because I'm short, just like Grandma Kay" (Grandma Kay is 5 feet tall)
"When this car grows up, I will drive it." (Holding one of his little toy cars)
"Why do you buy this funny water?" (After accidentally sipping some sparkling water)
"I have a joke. I'll stand here and you stand over there." (And that's pretty much the end of the joke.)

New Year's Resolutions, beginning January 10

Are people so cynical these days that they won't even make New Year's resolutions? It seems that most people I know don't want to make resolutions since "they don't mean anything" or won't announce them for fear of publicly failing. Resolutions mean something if you're serious about them, like I am, except possibly for #5.

Well, here they are. Feel free to let me know if you catch me cheating on one.

1. Exercise at least three times a week; OR, walk at least 10,000 steps 4x a week.
2. Be more patient.
3. Pick up my tennis racket again. I'll take Lucas out to the tennis courts so I can work on my serve and he can fetch balls for me. Maybe a weekly tennis lesson when the weather gets better.
4. Run a race, a 10K with a stretch goal of the Big Sur Half Marathon.
5. And of course, my recurring resolution... Eat less chocolate. I will only eat chocolate when I go out for a nice dinner. Also, chocolate as a condiment is fine, like oatmeal chocolate chip cookies or mint chip ice cream. Or on special occasions, like my birthday, anniversary, Columbus Day, and every other sunny day. I shouldn't be so strict with myself or I'll probably just eat more of it.

Going for the Gold!

The intense rains have kept us inside the past few days. For a kid like Lucas all this indoor time can be a challenge. In an effort to expend his boundless energy, we've set up obstacle courses for him through our little apartment.

The course usually goes something like this: Run around your tricycle, jump over the laundry basket, jump over the train tracks, and jump on Daddy lying in bed. So far, basket jumping is his favorite activity (see picture).

Anyone who watches Lucas will get caught up in the spirit and enthusiasm of this new sport.

Old people, a different perspective

I was in the video store last night and was standing right by the movie "Sideways". A funny movie about two guys in their mid-30s, who go on a wine-tasting trip before one of them gets married.

Two college-aged guys were standing by me, commenting on various movies, deciding which one to get. This is their conversation about "Sideways".

Guy #1: Have you seen "Sideways"?
Guy #2: Yeah, it was kind of weird.
Guy #1: I didn't really like it. I mean, who wants to see a movie with a bunch of old people in it?

A great Christmas!

This was an exciting Christmas for us all. Most families gather round the Christmas tree, but we gather around Lucas.

Lucas started out opening all his presents with enthusiasm, from clothes to books to toys. He would yell out, "Look, I got CLOTHES!" And he got down on the floor with his Pop-Up Aesop book, looking at all the cool illustrations.

Towards the end of the gift-opening session, Lucas could predict what the present would be just by the shape of the package. At the end, he was just looking for big boxes to open. I couldn't even get him to open another flat package, which he knew would be a book.

At the end of the day, we all had full full bellies and Lucas scored big in the gift department: books, trains, cars and trucks, a tennis racket, and a horse on a stick with a moving head, which of course everyone had to try out. I think one of his favorite gifts was the big box that his wagon came in. He spent a lot of time in there and would order us to drag him around the house in it.

Before going to bed, I told Lucas that Christmas is over and it would be another year till we had Christmas again. He looked at me and said, "When I'm three, I want two things for Christmas. Star stickers!" I guess he'll tell me the other thing that he wants next year.

Dude, where's my train?

After much deliberation, we decided it was time to take Lucas to see Santa Claus. Lucky for us, Santa had taken up temporary residence in Broadway Plaza in Walnut Creek. So two nights before Christmas, we all stormed Santa's house to wait for the little guy to go face to face with the big guy.

Lucas was a little tentative at first, but went ahead and sat on Santa's lap. SC asked what Lucas wanted. Lucas said, "A train that makes noise." The photographer snapped away and we got a nice picture. Lucas hopped off Santa's lap and Santa said, "I have a little gift for you."

Imagine Lucas' horror when Santa pulled out a little Christmas book. "Where is my train?" he cried once we had been ushered to the side of Santa's room. After all the build-up, talking about how Santa would bring him presents, and all he got was a book, Lucas was disappointed to say the least.

Cures for insomnia?

I've been having lots of sleepless nights lately. There are a few things at play here: 1) Kevin staying up late to read or watch re-runs of X-Files; 2) Lucas coming into our room several times a night; and 3) The incredibly loud walker who walks around on the landing outside the apartment. But I've recently spent some nights at my mom's house, and even then, I still can't sleep.

For those of you who knew me, pre-Lucas, I was super high energy with only 5-6 hours of sleep a night, a definite morning person. I'm still getting the same number hours of sleep, but it's interrupted sleep, which I'm realizing doesn't cut the mustard.

The benefits of being awake at all hours: 1) I get a lot of work done around the place. Like making soups or loaves of French toast to put in the freezer or paying bills; 2) I get a lot of real work done. My co-workers and clients think that I'm such a dedicated worker since I'm sending emails from 11-4am. Also, I frequently have to interview folks in other countries, so I can interview someone in Kuala Lumpur, midnight my time, but it's 4pm in Malaysia.

The downsides of being awake at all hours: 1) I'm pretty tired all the time; 2) I'm cranky; and 3) I've had one really stupid car accident (refer to hot chocolate incident below), and a minor bump that, luckily, did not result in any trips to the auto body shop.

My mom says I should sleep with an apple above my head. I think I'll try it now and see if it works. If you have any non-pharmaceutical suggestions, please post here.

Forget Big Brother, what about Santa?

Lucas is really into the whole Santa Claus thing this year. I thought he wouldn't get into it till next year, but once again, he's proven me wrong. I told him that Santa's watching him and he always asks me to sing the song "Santa Claus is Coming to Town".

After a particularly dramatic breakfast this morning, I went to get ready for work. Lucas came in, still kind of weepy from breakfast. I sat him down and told him that he needs to listen more and do what I say. He looked at me with his eyes wide open and asked, "What's Santa Claus going to do about this?"

Lucas looked so concerned about this, I almost felt bad. But alas, I took this as a "teaching moment", as we would say in the toy business. I said, "Santa saw you and said, 'Lucas has to listen to his mommy.'" Lucas said, "Okay, I will listen because Santa is watching me."

The price of honesty, roughly $400

My $801.90 hot chocolate (see below) was actually more like $1200. I had left a note for the owner of the Volvo that I hit and got a response.

A very kind man, who I will call Dr. D, was the unfortunate owner of the vehicle. We never actually spoke, but traded voicemails over the next couple weeks. He assured me from the get-go that he was not the litigious type and said over and over that he appreciated my honesty.

We decided to skip going through insurance and Dr. D was gracious enough to go with a little patch up on his bumper and a wheel alignment, since that's what he would have wanted "if he was in my shoes". It still cost me almost $400, but I'm grateful to Dr. D for not making a bigger stink out of this.

So I had to dish out $400, but when I die, if the "intelligent designer" needs to know what kind of life I led and whether I can live "happily ever after" or if I have to go to the "other place", I'm hoping Dr. D will give me a good recommendation.

Car-by-the-hour

We have had just one car since 1998. Just a few months after we moved to Berkeley we sold Kevin's car since he never drove it. Every once in a while we would need a 2nd car, like if one of us worked late and didn't want to take public transportation home. In those rare cases, we rationalized taking a cab, since it was still cheaper than owning another car.

A couple weeks ago, when our car was in the shop after the hot chocolate incident, we REALLY needed a 2nd car. One rainy morning, I had to bike with Lucas to his school, in the rain! He thought it was fun, but I felt pretty guilty toting him around in the rain on my bike. So I came home and signed up for City Car Share (www.citycarshare.org), which I think of as a co-op for cars and trucks.

Today was my first day using this spiffy service. It was so convenient and kind of fun too. At first, I felt a bit conspicous driving a purple car with the CCS logo all over, but what a lifesaver! So if you see someone honk at you from a purple CCS car, it might be me!

The Christmas spirit

Lucas and I headed over to my mom's the other morning to help her decorate for Christmas. He was jumping and running through the house saying, "We have Christmas! We have Christmas!". We put on Bing Crosby Christmas music and Lucas danced up a storm.

And tonight we went, for the 2nd time in the past week, to the Christmas Merry Go Round in Tilden Park. We met up with his friend Owen. We rode the Merry Go Round for a little, had some hot cocoa and a gingerbread cookie. Then Lucas and Owen entertained themselves by running around in circles, laughing, and having a great time.

Only in Berkeley - holiday ideas

There's a great resource in this area called the Berkeley Parents Network (BPN for short, website is http://parents.berkeley.edu). If you need a recommendation on a painter, questions about potty training, or concerns about a depressed pet, you can find this and more on BPN.

In the recent Announcements email that came out, I had to laugh out loud at some of the listings that one would only find in an area like Berkeley:

Music for the Soul of Parenting: Topics range from breast feeding highs and lows, the challenge of children's wants and desires, and the intimate story of a teenage birthmother, to a deeply reassuring lullaby and a fierce and determined vow to make a world worthy of our children.

Family Political Action, a way to introduce your children to political activism in a friendly, easy atmosphere.

Holiday Recycled Crafts Fair. Tired of buying garbage at the mall? Come buy garbage from us! Bags, peace banners, toys and more crafts from around the world made from reused & recycled materials will be on display. Proceeds will benefit GAIA's (Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives) work to stop waste and create a toxic-free future.

Our Charlie Brown Christmas tree

Every year Kevin and I debate on whether we should get a Christmas tree. Our first year in our house, 2000, was the only time we got a real tree. Last year, we bought a small potted rosemary bush shaped like a tree and planted it out front after the holidays.

My mom solved the tree dilemma for us this year. She gave Lucas a little Christmas tree. The tree is small, reminiscent of the one in the Charlie Brown Christmas TV special (it was a centerpiece at a Christmas party the night before).

At first I thought he would be disappointed because he's seen the big trees in other people's homes, but he LOVES it. He has spent so much time re-arranging the decorations and taking ornaments on and off and playing with them. Last night we spent about an hour constructing train tracks that went around the Christmas tree.

This morning Lucas ran to his tree, picked it up and said, "Hey mommy, look at my BIG Christmas tree!" Maybe we'll get a big tree next year.

Concrete counters and new home for fireplace

We're nearing the home stretch on the house, though the home stretch has been stretched a bit. Move-in date looks like the end of January, which translated from contractor-speak, probably means February.

The concrete counters were poured last week. They will be a sligthly different color after they're stained, but they look pretty good as-is.

The latest is around our beloved fireplace. The contractors thought the fireplace would like kind of look like an afterthought with the stairs now next to it. So they created this "frame" for it. I can't wait to move back in!

Beautiful day by the Bay

Someone has been asking for more pictures. I admit, this blog has been lacking the visuals lately. But here's one from today, a beautiful view of the Bay Bridge at noon.

In the driver's seat

Lucas is quite the backseat driver. "Turn left Mommy", "Slow down", and "Mommy, drive with two hands." And any chance he gets, he'll try and scramble up to the driver's seat.

Lucas has had ample opportunity to test his driving skills this past month. At the Oakland Zoo, he was finally tall enough to be allowed to go on the car ride. He LOVED it! (As you can see in the picture, his friend James, did not take to it like Lucas.) He went around and around many times. He took his driving very seriously. I heard another mom talking about Lucas, she said "Look, he really thinks he's steering!" I would call out orders to him, like "Turn left Lucas", "Don't forget to turn right.", just to add some realism to his fantasy that he really was driving.

On our trip to LA for Thanksgiving, Lucas experienced his first pony rides. The pony ride where you just go around in a circle was good for beginners, but after a while, we put him on the ponies that trot around the track. Again, Lucas was in the driver's seat and loved every minute of it.

Before we know it, he'll be asking for keys to the Volvo station wagon. Unless of course, it's not cool enough for him.

Need holiday gift ideas? Ask Lucas!

This evening, Lucas was playing with his trains and out of the blue announced, "Santa Claus is going to give me a train for Christmas!" According to Lucas, his teacher told him that. This must have been a hot topic at school, because we haven't even talked with him about Santa or Christmas yet.

Also according to Lucas, Kevin, Uncle Rocky, and I will also get trains. For grandmas Kay and Trudy, Papa, Uncle Joe, Uncle Brady, and Maggie goldfish are in order. "But the goldfish is not for eating. You put it in a bowl and feed it." And Auntie will be receiving a taxi car.

Need gift ideas for your loved ones, just ask Lucas!