wild*life

Fall is in the air and everyone’s still a little jumpy since Halloween.  Although the plastic is down and the kitchen is now accessible and well lit (but essentially empty Fernando), Nate still can’t enjoy his dinner.  And the day after All Hallows’ Eve, Jake’s teacher Miss Letty did something on the ceiling with flashlights and witches.  That day, apparently 8 out of 11 kids had an accident at naptime.  She lamented with a smile, “Oh, the weetches, the weetches.”

This week we were leaving the sushi joint in Willow Glen (where, I kid you not, the waitress said in recognition, “The 3 Orders of Gyoza Family!”)  After dinner, as we walked toward the dimly lit parking garage, some lady let out a loud, raucous laugh.  Jake startled a bit, grabbed his dad’s hand and looked warily over his shoulder, “Dad, is that a witch or something?”

Oh, the weetches, the weetches…

Is that Jacob in a ballet class?  Wow, you guys are so progressive.

Alas, that’s not a picture of Jake.  That’s a picture of his clandestine twin, Mayme Rose, who lives across the entire country and elected to wear her identical lion costume to ballet class on her birthday earlier this year.

It would totally be love at first ROAR, I know it.

Does every kid say “lellow”?  (You know, assuming they speak English…)

As previously mentioned, this was the Year of the Lion (again) and the Year of the Sock Monkey (my choice).  As my last year of choosing, I totally give myself an A+ for cuteness.  The boys had a costume parade at school which, last year, was recognizable as a parade.  This year it was recognizable as a mob.  As predicted, our two animal zoo was extra terrifying… headless.

Nate spent the whole time hiding his hat behind his back.

One slight tangent regarding the costumes in Jake’s class…  Almost every day I get to have breakfast with JJ and several of his classmates (his whole class is almost entirely girls, Nate’s is the opposite).  In any case, these little girls almost all wear princess dresses to school every day.  Literally it’s breakfast with Cinderella, Ariel and Tinkerbell.  This week Tinkerbell changed it up and came in a brand new Hello Kitty tiara and head-to-toe coordinating outfit, including new glitter shoes.  The only way I could tell it was Halloween was that Mia was wearing a homemade rainbow costume.

When we got home that evening, we met the Pizza My Heart delivery man, the fifth member of our family.  Yes Fernando, that’s directed at you.  Then we spent an indeterminate amount of time searching for a shoe before we hit the streets with the early birds.  As expected of a second child, Nate was a natural.  He was marching up to the doors of strangers, followed by his excited but leery lion bodyguard.  Some magical trick-or-treat spell came over them and they both wore their headgear the entire time… it was truly miraculous.  Three doors down, Nate tried to take the proffered candy basket, twice.

Jake’s lion costume is flood-ready.  I don’t think we had that problem last year.

When we got home, I made my typical mistake of thinking we’d have less trick-or-treaters than usual because it’s a Wednesday and it’s threatening to rain.  I handed out small handfuls and then had to revert to the measly 1 fun-size piece per visitor.  I also had to keep a very close eye on Jakey.  If you come to our door, you totally want the extra generous, headless lion throwing candy into your bag.  When it came to the insanely cute, homemade garden gnome girl, I let it go.  But the teenager who told me he was “Nothing”?  Here’s some snack-size malt balls.  Next year, make an effort.

We passed out over 550 pieces of candy and had to turn our lights off early.  I’d like to give a shout out to the geniuses at Hershey’s and Nestle that added the new “96 pieces!” badge on the front of the bags this year.  I’m greatly appreciative that I no longer need to calculate which brands have the most pieces via the serving size times number of servings (Kit Kat, by the way).  I salute innovation in candy packaging.

While Jacob and I manned the door, James changed Nate out of his costume.  I turned around and he was wearing a diaper and a little Penn State t-shirt.  Really, James?  Fortunately, no one misinterpreted it as a costume in extremely poor taste.

November seems to be the month where I either become acutely aware of an increasing obsession with one’s nigh-nigh, or it’s when studies show a clinically proven pacifier addiction begins.  Either way, it’s clearly a tipping point.

When Jake was this age, I declared Operation Bye Bye Nigh-Nigh on November 1st and the mission was accomplished by November 15th.

Based on a picture captured yesterday morning, it looks like he may already be holed-up in a Nuk den somewhere.

A week or so ago I went out to a wonderful birthday dinner with my pirate girls and we got to talking about kid’s shoes.  I shared that JJ used to switch off between his two pairs of footwear: his rocket shoes and his trail shoes.  It was working out well.  They were wearing evenly and it seemed slightly healthier to give his shoes a chance to breathe for a day or so.  But then something changed and his favorite rocket shoes could no longer be trusted.  We had to completely cut-off contact.  They were the enemy.

So one of my friends, also the mom of two little boys, shares the plausible wisdom that I should only buy one pair of shoes at a time.  Based on experience, it made sense.  I had found the perfect brand of indestructible shoes (Keens), and now I had found the perfect theory to support only shelling-out significant dollars when he complains about his toes hurting or something.  I’m kidding.

And then on Halloween I brought the boys home and we all immediately removed our shoes at the front door, per our training.  I put Nate’s shoes together on the floor and was then distracted by the million costume, candy, carving, and dinner preparations that needed to occur in a restricted time frame.

A bit later I have the lion and the sock monkey ready to hit the streets.  The lion gets his trail shoes and he’s ready to go.  We can only find one sock monkey shoe.  We look everywhere.  It’s getting darker.  Kids are coming to our door.  We gotta get outta here.  I dig up some old Converse, strap ’em on and we get going.

We’ve been searching for the sock monkey shoe for almost five days.  Jake has hypothesized that a Trick-or-Treater entered our home and absconded with one Pediped.  Besides the dangers of water, I began to lose faith in my new “1 Pair at a Time” theory.

Today James texted me this picture.

That’s our mail slot… right next to where the shoe was last seen.  How did I know it was an inside job?

Many years ago, someone asked James a question we no longer remember…  His response however, has entered the realm of Fucillo Family lore, “I work for Habitat for Jaimie.”  Ha, ha.  What a clever man I married.  And on that note, this is the beginning of Week 4 of Extreme Makeover: Kitchen Edition.

Right now we’re waiting on Fernando.  I’m always on the lookout for good rock band names (I really don’t know why), and I think Waiting on Fernando™ is quite promising, thus my suppositional trademark.  Though actually waiting on Fernando, our cabinet maker, is not my favorite.  I’ve known since Day 1 he’d be the bottleneck on this project.  I’ve known this based on one part actual cabinet making complexity, one part mischievous repartee, and two parts sparkly eyes.  He has the same charming eyes my high school best friend’s boyfriend had.  “I’m going to miss deadlines” kind of eyes.  I make-up somewhat relevant reasons to visit him every other day.

So, our fancy camping set-up continues.  We’re getting dangerously low on clean laundry.  And I’m concerned the local eating establishments are upping their projected revenue forecasts based on our frequent patronage.

James was in there earlier today putting the trim back up.  Nothing like having to wear your least favorite, back of the drawer clothes to revive a man’s dormant home improvement skills.

Now that’s what I’d call contributing to a worthy cause.

Halloween is breathing down our necks… just four days away.  I bought six crows online that got four stars instead of five for being “too real.”  I guess some rural resident had their faux crows eaten the first night they were out.  That totally sold me and so I bought a few to test them out.  I’m envisioning over the years becoming “The Birds” house.  Spooky, right?

Our new crows drove the neighborhood raven flock completely ballistic.  Now, our local crow friends generally outweigh the counterfeit ones by at least thirty pounds and give off a distinct “I’ll peck your eyes out” look.  In any case, they immediately appear up on our power line cawing in alarm at the baby crows posed realistically around our front yard.  (Shhhh.  There’s one outside right now… I’m poised to protect my decorations at any cost.  Somebody hand me that toddler to chase it away.  That thing looks seriously dangerous.)

The best thing was that I put the crows out while the boys were at school.  Jake noticed them right away as we got out of the car.  He kept asking, “Mama, are those real crows?”

“I don’t know, are they?”

He gave them a wide arc and got down low, eying them suspiciously.  He waffled several times between real and pretend.  “No, they’re not moving…”

“Are you sure?”

“Rooooooar!”  Arm waving.  “They’re pretend!”  His relief was palpable.  Today we’ve seen a lot of neighborhood dogs and pedestrians giving them more than one long look…

Anyway, the real reason I’m writing this blog is to actually document a short guide on picking out early childhood Halloween costumes.  There is a real science to it so pay close attention:

YEAR 1: Your baby’s first Halloween.  This is a great time as you can zip them into anything head to toe, with a giant face on the hood, and they’re none the wiser.  Usually their arms are too short to reach up and tug at their costume and even if they are long enough, their fingers are essentially useless.  So if this is your baby’s first Halloween, I recommend you go crazy and pick out the cutest most impractical costume you can find, buy, or sew.  If you’re going for originality, steer clear of bugs, wild animals and superheroes.

YEAR 2: This is the year of limbo.  It’s not all out dressing-up your little defenseless doll baby, but you do still get to pick-out their costume.  Rule of thumb for Halloween #2?  No hoods.  I remember looking around Jacob’s entire toddler class and every single Mickey, donkey and duck was headless.  Costume suggestions might include professions without headgear such as dentist, lawyer, tortured artist?  I’ve been pre-selling Nate’s sock monkey hat for weeks (it’s the last year I get to decide on a costume… ever).  I may be able to wheedle one completely costumed picture.  We’ll see.

YEAR 3: Your reign of power and influence is waning… rapidly.  Your child now has a distinct opinion about their costume.  The good news?  They may have warmed back up to wearing something on their head.  They may also feel obliged to change their mind… repeatedly.  I’d recommend waiting until mid-October before committing to a costume.  And then if you’re buying the costume, recycle all of the Halloween costume catalogs flooding your mailbox and make sure you socialize the chosen costume for a couple of weeks before the big day (you know, get it out, put it on, oooh and awww to cement the decision as final).

YEAR 4: Forget about it.  You’re just a means to an end.  If you’re lucky, they may want to be the same thing they were last year.  This year Jake wanted to be “a fireman with an axe.”  Then he wanted to be a lion again.  Now he wants to be a lion with an axe.

Never a dull moment here in Balconia.  I don’t know if I’ll be able to sleep tonight.  I’m all hopped-up… on VICTORY.  So now you know this story ends happily.  However, about an hour ago…

Imagine Jake and I are reading books in the bottom bunk.  Tonight we read Little Blue Truck to emphasize the importance of teamwork.  I heard James cuddling, then coaxing, then commanding Nathaniel to sleep.  This is day three of The New Nate.  I excused myself from book reading to check on the situation, grabbed the knob to Nate’s room and it wouldn’t budge.  Panic welled-up from my feet.  “James, the door is locked.  How’d he get the white safety thing off?”

“I dunno, Jaim.  He must have ripped it off.”

This happens to be one of our only doorknobs that has a push button lock on the inside and a perfectly smooth knob on the hallway side.  No hole.  Nothing.  We uselessly shake the knob for fifteen minutes.  Nate is crying.

“Turn it Nate.  Turn.  The.  Knob.”  He still doesn’t understand “turn.”  After a few minutes it’s quiet.  I quick grab the baby monitor.  All I see is a black screen and a red dead battery light.  It’s now completely quiet.  I think Nate has given up.

I give up, too.  When faced with intense stress I like to freak out quietly and watch Modern Family.  Come to think of it, this was the exact predicament of the last episode I watched.  Maybe James will figure it out or it will magically resolve itself.  James is not appreciative of this approach and so I mentally review our options (this seemed to work well during my last life or death situation in the garage):

1) Get James to kick down the door and then pay our contractor, Sam, untold amounts of money to fix the damage while he’s here already making untold amounts of money reconstructing our kitchen.  It’d probably be $2,000.  These days, any house thing you need done is $2,000.

2) Go outside and break the glass in the window.  Then we have to sleep with Nate in our room, suffer through a wet and drafty night, and pay Sam $2,000.

3) Wait until the morning and hope that Nate wakes-up with improved fine motor skills and opens the door.  Lie awake all night and pray there isn’t an emergency that requires we implement option 1 in the middle of the night.

4) Hope James comes up with some unknown handy-dandy fix.  He’d already told me he couldn’t take apart the doorknob, that a locksmith couldn’t do anything (because there’s no lock), that he can’t take the hinges off the door because they’re on the inside, and that a credit card wouldn’t work on this specific door.  He seemed particularly resentful that these types of problems always fall into the “men’s work”category and so I turned to…

5) My last and only hope: Google.

I click on the very first link as it looks crazy promising “How to open a locked door the MacGyver way.”  Apparently written by a former BYU-Idaho dorm resident.  Perfect.  I have a plan.  It involves a piece of paper, dental floss, and a vacuum.  Serious problem: our vacuum is locked inside with Nate.

I swallow the rising panic and re-read what the vacuum is for.

James comes in from outside with his flashlight.  “The windows are locked tight.”

“OK.  I’m going to open the door like MacGyver.  Get me a cord from the garage.”  (I’ll leave out the requisite disdainful skepticism of my plan and follow-on hushed squabbling.)  James returns with an orange extension cord.

After two tries we had the cord looped around the doorknob on the other side of the door.  It particularly helped that I was able to peer in from outside, call James from my cell phone, and coach him as he lowered the cord.  Luckily I could also see Nate was sleeping soundly… completely oblivious to the freaky lady peering in at him through his window with a flashlight.  The whole reason we’re in this mess in the first place.  How ironic.

We tried and tried.  Looks like the MacGyver method isn’t for us.  Our doorknob is too slippy.  Our cord isn’t grippy.  How could we expect to fix a $2,000 problem with the October school lunch menu, a box of free dental floss, and a dirty extension cord?  The internet always makes everything look so good.

I went back to the couch and started reading about the credit card method.  I also researched the hammer method.

James convinced me to go back to the extension cord and give it the ol’ college try.  Just one more time while he shakes the knob.  Pop!  We did it.  WE DID IT!

Nate didn’t bat an eye.

Nate has conquered his fear of the plastic ghost.  He yells unintelligible profanities at it, shakes his little fist, and then hits it with the palm of his hand to show it who’s boss.  Unfortunately, the fear phase continues…

On our road trip last week (which was bliss… more on this later), we encountered a strange northwestern obsession with scarecrows.  Is it just autumn?  Is it a redwood forest, small town thing?  I’m not quite sure.  I do know there was a scarecrow in front of just about every shop, restaurant and house… in Ashland, in Jacksonville, in Fort Bragg.  Nate was particularly petrified of a woman in a white polyester dress guarding the kid’s playhouse at the Mendocino Coast Botanical Gardens.  More of a haunted house if you asked him…

The worst though was at breakfast in Mendocino.  We were eating in the beautiful dining room of the MacCallum house and Nate had a nice view of the front door and a large coat rack, piled high with big jackets and an array of hats.  He was convinced it was some kind of 6-headed man.  Poor kid couldn’t keep his eyes off it and kept pointing and calling for help.  We finally moved him to my side of the table so he couldn’t see it and then he was able to polish-off a dinner plate-sized “bunny” pancake.

Last night, back in his own bed, the neighbor’s flood light woke him up in the middle of the night and he was inconsolable.  An alien spacecraft perhaps?  He was so completely freaked out by invisible dangers outside the bedroom window that I had to rock him to sleep tonight, which never happens.

The crazy thing?  We’ve caught him twice over the past few weeks with a live bee between his thumb and forefinger.  The first time, at our house, I thought surely it was a fluke.  But then he did it again during one of our standard weekend picnics at Happy Hollow.

The thought of pinching a live bee…

James?  I need you to rock me to sleep.