3!

Seville turned 3 last Sunday! We had a birthday tea party for her on Saturday with family and a few of her little friends. It was so cute. Here are a few pics of the big event:

The happy 3-year old.

Playing with cousin Ashlynn

Wrapped up in her new fairy blanket that Mommy made

The spread: tea, little cookies, scones of various types, Devonshire cream and jam, egg & cress sandwiches, cake.

The rest of the pics can be seen here:

Holidays

A few pics from our holidays:

Seville & Daddy Conquer a Tree

Makin' Gingerbread Houses

Having a tutu party (all the Engstrom girl cousins got tutus for Christmas)

Making Gingerbread cookies with cousins.

The rest of our pics can be seen here:

Is Santa Claus Real?

This discussion came up in my family for the umpteenth time this Christmas. Most of my family members know that I don’t advocate teaching in a literal Santa Claus, and some agree with me, but I’ve never spelled out why I have such strong feelings about it because I don’t want to create controversy or make anyone feel criticized about their parenting choices. Like I told my family, all parents need to make The Santa Decision for their own families, and it doesn’t make you bad parents one way or the other. BUT, that said, I think there are implications to the relatively modern Santa-phenomenon that people don’t think about. Here’s my synopsis, in pros and cons.


CONS TO TEACHING SANTA IS “REAL”

•    UPSTAGES JESUS CHRIST: Children are inherently more drawn to a Santa figure than to the real Savior: A mystical, magical being that flies, has magical reindeer, sneaks through your chimney to bring presents, lives in the mystical north pole, has elves, etc? That is far more titillating to a child than the story of a Jesus Christ whom you learn to know and love only in your heart. Jesus Christ will not bring you a Barbie or fly from house to house with a magical sleigh. Jesus Christ takes some effort and commitment to know and love. The real Savior can’t compete with toys and flying sleighs, and so Santa trumps Jesus’ birthday celebration year after year.
•    PROMOTES CONSUMERISM: Santa Claus represents the consumerism that is taking over Christmas. Many people complain that Christmas has become all about presents and “stuff” rather than Jesus Christ (or family, or love, or peace, or charity, or whatever).  A lot of that comes from a Santa figure who is – let’s face it – all about presents and “stuff.”
•    ON GRATITUDE: Children who believe that Santa brings their gifts miss an opportunity to learn about gratitude - to understand that gifts come from people who love them who took time to think about them and make or buy something thoughtful.
•    TEACHES ENTITLEMENT: If children think presents come from Santa, out of the blue, at no cost to them or anyone around them, it just encourages an entitlement attitude that children (and people everywhere) are not in need of.
•    ON GIVING AND SACRIFICE: Children who believe Santa brings gifts their gifts miss an opportunity to learn about giving, that gifts are both received and given. If your presents come from Mommy and Daddy and others who love you, you learn that you have the opportunity to give gifts too.
•    ON CHARITY: Children who focus on Santa miss an opportunity to learn about charity, that if gifts come from people, not magic, children learn that we all have a responsibility to care for one another (because no magical being is going to fill in the gaps where humanity fails to provide for each other).
•    JESUS-SUBSTITUTE: Santa Claus is a “counterfeit” in my view: you often hear that Satan’s most effective tool is creating counterfeits of sacred things in order to detract from them. I know this may sound extreme to many, but look at what Santa Claus has become in our society: a “magical,” mystical being who encourages you to be “good” and who loves little children?  These are semi-Jesus attributes, but Santa falls far short of the true miracle of Jesus Christ’s gift to us all, and to allow Santa to take the spotlight robs Christmas of its true message.

•  ON FAITH: Here’s the nutshell version: If you teach your children that Jesus is real, and also that Santa is real, and they find out Santa is not real, why should they believe Jesus is real?  I have friends who advocate teaching Santa as an allegory of faith. Which is fine and good as an allegory. But for a child to be taught that if they believe whole-heartedly in something they cannot see that seems fantastical and a little other-worldly, and then they are promptly taught that, in fact, what seems to be far-fetched is indeed not real, that what doesn’t make logical sense and can’t be seen is indeed false – that’s a pretty big “lesson about faith” at an impressionable age, don’tcha think? (And not the lesson you meant to be teaching). I know many many children have grown up believing in Santa and remained faithful Christians throughout their lives, but who is to say it isn’t a factor in the increasing religious skepticism in the modern West? Consider that Santa has been around for just over a century and has been a widespread Christmas icon for a few generations in the Christian West. In that same time period, most western countries have gone from being religious, observant people to becoming mostly godless and secular. We are removing God from our currency and national songs, ceremonies, and monuments, banishing Him from our public places and our children’s schools, etc, so that now, those that still believe in Him are considered by many to be juvenile, blinded, half-wits (not very different from how you viewed other kids who still believed in Santa once you learned he wasn’t real, is it?).  Am I saying all this is Santa’s fault? Certainly not. But who knows how much the confusion of religious icons affects a very young mind, especially as we are learning more about the heavy impact of early brain and child development.
•    PARENTAL TRUST: Some (not all, maybe even not very many, but some) children feel betrayed by their parents when they learn Santa isn’t real. If you aren’t truthful with your children about Santa, they may consciously or unconsciously feel unable to trust you about other important questions. Children need to feel that their parents are a source for reliable information and values, and I think parents should stick to that standard even in the case of Santa Claus.  If a child asks you if Santa is real, and you say, “what do you think?”   (as I’ve heard so many advocate, as a way of “not lying”) you are ignoring their honest plea to know the truth. Why teach a child that they cannot come to you for answers?  I think that the subconscious effect of this on a child so young about something so big (to them) is probably more than we realize, and it’s a chance I don’t want to take, even if the risk is small.


PROS TO TEACHING THAT SANTA IS REAL: After many conversations with many people, I’ve compiled a list of all the arguments FOR believing in Santa that I’ve heard (they really all boil down to a few things).

•    FUN FOR PARENTS: Parents, of course, love the fantasy. It’s really fun to watch the magic of a child’s wonder.
•    “YOU BETTER WATCH OUT”: The naughy and nice list is very useful for parents who want to bribe good behavior during the holidays. Even I have been tempted by this recently.
•    FUN FOR KIDS: Obviously believing in such a fantasy is fun for children (but I beg to differ on this point somewhat. I knew, as a child, that Santa was merely a fun icon and not a real being, and I guarantee you my Christmas was no less fun. I had all the same anticipatory wonder, the same imaginary fun, the same love of Christmas. I just knew where it came from.)
•    OPPORTUNITY FOR IMAGINATION: Parents love to give their kids an opportunity for wild imagination and fun. Obviously we all want to foster kids’ imaginations. (But... if they think it’s real, is that really imagination, per se? Again, without believing Santa is real, kids can have just as much fun with their imaginations, just as they play house, fairies, cowboys & indians, games, etc. That’s imagination, and they know it’s a game. I’m not sure believing something is real is any better, let alone if it even technically qualifies).

I’ve also heard people say “it doesn’t do any harm,” but that’s not a “pro.” It’s a defense against arguments against, and so it isn’t really an argument. It’s sort of the equivalent of saying, “nuh-uh! Does not!” so I refuse to include it in my list of pros, though I figured it needed to be included somewhere.

So there. Anyone wanting to know why I won’t teach my children to believe in Santa now knows.  All you Literal-Santa-Promoters and believers can roll your eyes now (if you haven’t already rolled them a million times :)  

So to each his own. I’m sure if your kids believe in Santa they’ll be just fine (like my husband reminds me about him and his siblings).  I confess though, while on one hand I don’t care how you do it with your kids, on the other, I do wish more people would do what they could to make Christmas about Christ, and not about all the things Santa represents. So if you are Christian, I’ll put in a plug for that much, at least.

R.I.P. Myrtle

Last night, our beloved Myrtle fell victim to Fowl Play (okay, okay. bad I know. and not the time for jokes. Sorry).

We haven't updated since we got chicks back in the spring. As promised, we did indeed get two more for a total of four. It's been a fun adventure and such a delightful thing to have fresh eggs every day from your own chickens who are eating food you trust and living lives that you know are humane.

But today we are officially back down to two chickens.

The first we lost was originally named Florence but we had to revoke the name. Why? She turned out to be a he (it's notoriously difficult to sex a 1-day old chicken, so you gotta expect this to happen now and again). He was a beautiful rooster, but we realized we would have to... "get rid of him"... before he started crowing and causing problems (yes, I mean that in the way the maffia means that) (Discussion Topic: how do I feel about engaging in animal sexism by killing an animal just because it's male, knowing that this has happened in various cultures to human babies just because they were female? discuss).

Jared was all prepared to man-up and learn how to slaughter a chicken and provide for his family. But then we learned that there is a Rooster Relocation Program (No, that's not a joke. There really is. We live in Portland. Things like that go on here). Anyway, since our Rooster was truly free-range and not genetically bred to have double huge enormous juicy hormone-laden breasts, we learned he would be mostly sinew and might make good stock, but that's about it, other than maybe a couple tough bites of tiny breast. So we spared his life and donated him to a local farmer. That was a couple months ago. Goodbye Rooster-Man (as he came to be called).

Then we were left with three: Strawberry, Rosie, and Myrtle.

Last night we lost Myrtle (the one on the right), who hadn't even lived long enough to lay any of her much-anticipated blue eggs (it would have happened probably in the next few weeks). We've followed the trail of feathers and tried to figure out what happened. As near as we can figure, with the temperatures suddenly dropping well below freezing, the local band of raccoons has gotten more aggressive and started their prowling much earlier. We think we didn't lock up the chicken pen soon enough after dark last night, and the raccoons must have gotten in before we did. This morning only Strawberry was out clucking for food. Rosie re-appeared a few hours later. Myrtle hasn't come home, but based on the bounty of feathers blowing in the wind near the coop, we are pretty certain she didn't make it. Tonight we heard the raccoons attacking some poor creature in a neighbor's yard, and it was quite early. Earlier than we managed to lock the coop last night, so it all seems to make sense.


So today we are explaining to Seville about death and chicken-heaven. She doesn't seem too distraught about it. I actually think it's good for her to be exposed to the reality of mortality when she's young, but of course it's not like she really understands.

Forrest-Inspiration

My little bro and his wife came to town last weekend. While they were here they went to the beach, and invited anyone to come along who wanted (we wanted). Despite a dismal forecast, it was the most pleasant beach weather I've seen in a long long time. Perfect and sunny and beautiful.





You can see the rest of our pictures here:

Forrest-inspired Hug Point Trip

Knee Surgery + 5 Weeks =

Finally! Backpacking!

Last time we went backpacking Jared said he wouldn't go with me again unless I got my knee fixed. See, my knee does this thing, occasionally, where I'll be walking along just fine, and then suddenly and without warning, something shifts and I can no longer bend my knee or bear weight on it without excruciating pain. Then later in the day or the next morning or a couple days later it will shift back and everything will be fine again. Very mysterious.

Now, walking around normally, this is no big deal; I can go home and rest it until it goes away. But of course, this doesn't usually happen when I'm walking around normally, it happens most times when I'm doing something active. Like, say, backpacking. And in fact, we were once backpacking in Joshua Tree National Park when it happened, 4 miles in. Joshua Tree is, may I remind you, a desert, and so having a finite amount of water and an undetermined amount of time before we get more was a little nerve-racking. We had to stop and make camp in the wash right there, I took as much ibuprofen as I had in my first aid kit, and hoped it would "sleep off." I was able to gingerly walk in the morning and hike out (if you can do anything "gingerly" with a 40 lb pack on your back).

Anyway, that was the trip Jared said he wasn't doing it again until I got it fixed. The problem was, no one knew what was wrong with it. Pokes and prods by my favorite orthopedic surgeon plus MRIs at various angles showed nothing. And so no one was quite sure how to "fix" what ain't broke. But I had a standing offer from the doc to go in there and take a look anytime. 5 years later, finding myself a) desperate to be able to recreate the way I used to, b) not pregnant, and c) not breastfeeding, I decided my window of opportunity was now, and called up my old doc to schedule "the procedure."

Bless his heart, Dr. Weintraub found a floating piece of cartilage in my knee that didn't belong. It was not the kind of thing that an MRI would pick up, and since it was literally floating, unattached to anything, it would explain how the pain would move around and be totally unpredictable. I guess it could just get wedged into various parts of my knee joint - and then feel kinda like somebody's jabbing fork between my bones.

So anyway, now it's gone (yippee!), and though my knee is far from better a mere 5 weeks later, I was able to go on my first little backpacking trip, without worrying about my joint freezing up on me at random.

Since we were going with Jared's sister and her husband and their 2 month old baby - and bringing our own toddler who is, just this year, really too big to realistically pack in in a carrier - we were looking for a short, easy hike. Where to go?!

A few years ago, just after we got our GPS, we decided to do some adventuring by picking a spot on the map and seeing if we could find it. I once found a tiny blue smudge on a map that looked like a mountain lake and thought it would be fun to see if we could get there. After much twisting and turning on dirt forest service roads we got about as close as we figured we could by car, and bushwhacked the rest of the way there. Indeed, we found not only a beautiful, shallow, warm, idyllic, natural mountain lake, but a trail, just north of where we'd been bushwhacking, that would have saved us a lot of time and scrapes on our ankles (and arms, this being Oregon, after all). There was also a firepit and good campsite on the north side of the lake, and I remarked on our way back that this would be the perfect place to bring friends or family members who were a little leery of backpacking, because it was such a short, easy hike to a secluded beautiful place.
So we decided to try and find it again. Of course, we couldn't remember a thing about it. Not what it was called, not how we got there. We couldn't even agree on which National Forest it was in. So we almost had to give up. Then Jared had the brilliant idea of getting out the old GPS and seeing if we marked any points on it. And after searching through our marked waypoints, converting the coordinates and finding a map I could plug them into (did you know you can plug GPS coordinates into Google Maps? Works flawlessly. Awesome. Took me ages to figure that out.), we found our spot.
And so with in-laws and kids in tow we headed up there on Saturday morning to see if it was still there.

And so it was....The rest of the pics...

2009 Cripple Creek Backpacking Trip

Fourth of July

We spent our Fourth in Sunriver with my family...

in a cabin on the Deschutes River

Seville was afraid of the fireworks Uncle Jason was setting off, and needed Daddy to cover her ears...

All the women in the family wore pigtails on the Fourth of July to the firework show (Seville liked the far-away ones)

The rest of our photo album is below.

Sunriver

Playing Make-Believe

So one of Seville's favorite things to do lately is pretend we're all somebody else. She pretends to be friends or cousins sometimes (in which case I pretend to be their Mommy), but mostly we pretend we're each other. So at least once a day she'll announce that she is Daddy or she is Mommy and then Daddy and Mommy get assigned parts - one of us has to be the other one and one of us gets to be Seville. It's pretty fun. And she is actually very obedient when I say things like, "Mommy, are you getting in the car fast?" "Yes, Seville!" she'll say, speedily getting into the car. Only it's more like, "Yes, Seviiwe!"

The other day, after Seville took a bath, Jared came into the living room to find her doing this...


"I'm Mommy! I'm on the computer!" she announced.

Seriously, is this what she thinks of me? Leading up to my recent concert with Cantico, I was on my computer it seemed all day every day (I was managing web-sales and other stuff for the concert, as well as singing in it), so after I heard about her little "imitation" of me, I vowed to stay off my computer unless she was asleep, for a while. So far it seems to be working, and the impression she has of me as an ever-computing Mom is fading into the background. Now when she pretends to be me, she says, "I'm Mommy! I'm driving!" (is that even better? hm.)

Little Peeps

Nope. Not the marshmallow kind.

We have real actual chicks! I've wanted chickens for some time now, but we just finally got ourselves together enough to do it. We got baby chicks on Wednesday, and Seville is totally enamored of them (as am I. I mean, really, who wouldn't be?)

They're really unbearably cute. They are so soft and fuzzy and weigh about as much as a paperclip and do nothing but peep and poop all day. Believe it or not, the constant pooping is a commodity I was looking forward to. I want the fertilizer. But obviously I'll be even more excited about eggs, when they come. It will be a while yet.

In the meantime, we need to find names for them (which means we can't eat them, as I understand it. You can't eat something that has a name.). Our neighbor, who has long teased us about our cat's name (Richard Parker - after the tiger in "The Life of Pi" - we always use both the first and last name, as in the book) says he fully expects sophisticated first and last names for the chickens as well. We'll see.

New York City - Auntie x11

My sister, who lives in Manhattan, just had a baby. She's sooooo cute and tiny! Dutiful aunt that I am trying to be, I went out to visit her. I didn't bring a camera because Delta charges for every bag (even your first one! jerks!), and so I was trying to cram the trip into a carry-on. (My sister gave me a hard time all weekend about how I looked like a tourist with all my multi-purpose clothes and shoes - there is apparently no worse insult in Manhattan. Like how in Germany the worst thing you can do is call someone a pig-dog. oooooooh.)

Anyway, there are a total of two pictures of me in New York, both taken from my brother-in-law's cell phone, so the quality is great, as you'd imagine. This one is in some fancy hotel where we asked if we could change a diaper...

And this one holding the baby in the Theater District before bidding my sister and her hubby farewell for the evening. (They went to a Broadway show, while I took the baby back home via subway and bus and took care of her until they got back.)

I didn't really do anything New York-ish while I was there. It would have been more or less the same if we'd been in some po-dunk town in Iowa (sorry, Iowans). But Manhattan is definitely its own thing. We were running errands one day and I went to pick something up at the drugstore. I'm crossing the street to the Walgreens when I look up and realize I'm on Times Square. Everyone around me is dressed up, hustling and bustling, taking pictures, full of energy. Meanwhile I'm here just buying diapers. Funny.

Kids' Questionnaire

This little questionnaire has been floating around my extended family for a few weeks. You can get pretty hilarious answers from kids when you ask them questions about their mom. Anyway we finally took the time to ask Seville the questions. She's a little young for this, and we skipped some of them, but some of what she said was pretty cute. Jared did the asking, while I was sitting there:


1. What is something Mommy always says to you?

“Um.... [gasp!]... that’s MY chair!!!” [she made me get out of her chair before we continued]

2. What makes Mommy happy?

“I make mommy happy.”

3. What makes Mommy sad?

“The bunny makes mommy sad.” [there was this Easter Bunny in the room we had been playing with. I think she was just searching for something to say, since obviously I'm NEVER sad.]

4. How does Mommy make you laugh?

“...um... yeah..”

[Asked again, in different ways]

“...um... the bunny... [laugh]... um... tickle me on my tummy.”

6. How old is mommy?

Uh.. 2

7. How tall is mommy?

Seville addressing Daddy: “Um... you make mommy taller and taller.”

Daddy: “Oh really?”

Seville addressing Mommy: “Mommy... do you... daddy makes you taller and taller?”

8. What is your mommy's favorite thing to do?

“She likes to do me if I will be gone in the toilet.”

Mommy: “...uh...what was that, will you say that again?”

Seville: “you won’t put me in the toilet.”

Mommy, laughing: “That’s true. I won’t.”

11. What is your mommy really good at?

“Mommy is really really good at to me.”

12. What is your mom not very good at?

“Um... She...She’s not getting the bunny.”

13. What does daddy do for work?

“Um... he drives.”

13. What does mommy do for work?

“She drives too.”

14. What is your mommy's favorite food?

“Um... salad.”

17. What do you and mommy do together?

“Um... we are gonna make things.”

20. How do you know that mommy loves you?

“She loves somebody.”

[Daddy asks the question several ways, trying to get a response, and eventually Seville, understanding that we must want her to say something different, gets creative:]

“She bites me in the morning.”

Easter & Fake Easter

So I got this hat at an estate sale last summer. I thought it was to die for, and it fits Seville, so it was to be her Easter Hat for this year. The rest of her outfit was made to match, including the organza silk shawl.

Here she is enthusiastically running around looking for Easter goodies.

And taking a break to devour a peep.

And swinging, as she is wont to do every time we step foot out of doors.

The funny thing is, none of these pictures is really of Easter. We staged a fake Easter today (which was beautiful) because actual Easter Sunday was a day of torrential rains and cold. After taking Seville's dress off for her nap last week, I couldn't bear to make her wear it again for the hunt afterward, lest she freeze. We used the same easter eggs (she's 2. She doesn't know the difference ;). We even used the same real, dyed eggs. Are those edible after a week? I'm scared)

Here are the rest of our pictures, for those interested:

Seville Thinks Cows suck on Pacifiers

Here is a picture from one of her favorite books.

One day, I was reading to her and she pointed at the bull and said, "it have a fafoo!" ("fafoo" is her word for pacifier.) It took me a second to realize what she was talking about, but I looked at her little face (she was sucking on a pacifier herself), then back at the picture, and laughed and laughed.

Now anytime she sees a cow picture in a book, she thinks it is sucking on a pacifier.