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| A little feral, yeah. |
There's a reason she's had a cute little pixie cut most of her life. Child despises any form of hair styling and baths are often several day negotiations. And yet, she's a wild child with her mama's indomitable locks.
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| We shall not be subdued quietly into a ponytail clip!! |
Our familial hair is wild, independent, and a little clingy. It likes going straight for the face. When my hair was hip-long, it also nearly killed me in a variety of implausible ways, so hopefully the lockdown isn't another three or four years (best guestimate on how long it'd take to go super long again, but then again two years ago, my hair was ear length, so who knows!)
Recently Chaya's started having moments of sheer hair induced rage, screaming about her hair getting in her face. Demanding reparations. It's been close to just snipping her bangs with kitchen scissors, but... but...
Barrettes! We have barrettes now. They aren't perfect. Her hair has the wildness of her ancestor's, so no amount of styling, product or bondage will keep hair out of her face. But they're diverting!
She likes to change barrettes roughly twenty times a day. She also likes to share with me.
Quaranstylin' heck yeah!
... aaaaand of course she doesn't really wear them herself after the first couple of days.
But we're voguing it here. All the fashion.
Apparently we have some work to do on "braiding". I'm amazed she stayed still enough for these atrocities to be placed in her regal mane, before finding a mirror and screaming TREASON! BETRAYAL! It was not... not... good. Eventually she managed to unbraid her hair and scream "I fixed my bunny ears!" victoriously. So... maybe not braids.
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| BOOOOOOOOOOOOORN FREEEEEEEE!!! |
But it's not just hair we care about here. I don't own a pair of sweats right now, so let's just say, fashion matters in this household.
Before the lockdown Chaya was kind of 50-50 on whether she even wanted pajamas at all. It was frequently an ordeal to explain to her she couldn't wear the exact same outfit for a few weeks in a row. More lately she will change at random through the day. I guess to mark time? So pajamas have become much more of an important thing. Today she insisted on changing into a "nap dress" before her nap. So...
Day clothes...
Night clothes...
We wear them ALL.
The family has a bit of a routine in which Andrew starts Chaya's bedtime and I change into pajamas before coming in to tuck her in. Due to Christmas tradition, Chaya and I have some matching pajamas. They are adorable on her and... immaculately unflattering on me, of course. Andrew receives these matching pajamas as well, but they have a way of mysteriously "ripping" or "tearing" or somehow ending up in the trash.
Regardless, Andrew doesn't put on his pajamas before Chaya's bedtime and I do, and Chaya is way more interested in matching mommy. As such, she usually sends Andrew out to report on what pajamas I'm wearing before she lets him dress her in her own pajamas.
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| I know, I know, I was really cute with short hair, but NO I'm not gonna try it! |
Sometimes I get the correct pajamas. Sometimes I coordinate with her in advance. Sometimes I even change my pajamas on her demand. But the nights kind of go like this:
Overheard from Chaya's bedroom after Andrew pops out to check on my pajama status:
Andrew: mommy's wearing polar bears. Do you want to wear polar bears?
Chaya: I want to match my sister (imaginary twin Zoey - they like to match)
Andrew: What is your sister wearing?
Chaya: SCREAAAAAAM. I wanna match Zoey
Andrew: Uh, ok. Is Zooey wearing polar bears?
Chaya: No! Penguins.
Andrew: Ok, so let's put you in penguins?
Chaya: I want to match my sister and I want my sister to match mommy.
Andrew: Um, ok. Should we change Zoey's pajamas?
Chaya: No!!!
Andrew: Mommy is not changing her pajamas. So...
Chaya: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
(muffled discussion continues until... Andrew emerges from the bedroom carrying our mostly naked child.)
Andrew: We've reached an impasse
Me: (taking a shot in the dark) How about Zoey wears penguins, I wear polar bears, and you wear tigers and we'll be a little zoo together?
Chaya: I wanna wear tigers
Me: HURRY!! Before she changes her mind...
(After a few bedtime stories. Once I've turned the light out and begun to sing her a bedtime song)
Chaya: Mommy, I want to match you now.
And thus Chaya goes to bed in polar bear pajamas. I'm not sure what Zoey ends up in. We neglect our other daughter like you wouldn't believe, but she's immaculately self sufficient.
Developmentally appropriate milestones keep coming:
Chaya's going through a "poop" phase. It is apparently the funniest word ever, though pee and vomit have their charm. Little Rabelaise Jr. likes to look at me and announced "You've pooped!" But let's not stop there. This needs to get creative. Not only did I poop, but "you pooped on Daddy's shoulder!!"
Her current take on Dream a Little Dream (her bedtime song)
Stars pooping bright above you
spring poops seem to pooop you poooped
Bird pooping in the pooping tree
poooop you pooped on me
And If You're Happy and You Know It
You pooped on daddy's shoulder
then you cried
you pooped on daddy's shoulder
then you cried
poop poop poop
poop poop poop poop
Mommy pooped on daddy's shoulder
and she cried.
Other - cuter - play rituals involve us being a mama and baby animal - shark, bunny, kangaroo, bee, snake, dinosaur, dragon... We go through a morning ritual and then the mama drops the baby off at animal school and becomes the teacher. The baby animal learns to draw or write and then goes on the animal playground. We've done every manifestation of this game and she rarely tires of it, but sometimes she riffs on it by moving into the afternoon portion of the animals' days and having company come over. I've been the mama and the baby everything. When Chaya's a mama, she lets her baby throw its own diaper away and put on a new one. Very free range. But me-as-baby-animal actually does have to take a nap and I don't complain a white about that, personally except that animal naps are typically only a few seconds long.
We have also spent mornings talking on Chaya's remote control "phone" and taking any variety of selfies with ourselves and Zoey and Chaya's snake, Purple (my snake is orange).
So... I'd say Chaya has a better grip on reality than most people right now, honestly. If we can figure out zoom a bit better, I might have to get her her own TED Talk.
She also managed to quite non-chalantly get a bead stuck up her nose and spent roughly a half hour picking at it before telling me what was up there. It was big enough no tweezers were getting it out, so fortunately she finally laughed hard enough that it popped out of her own volition. It was an interesting prelude to nap time though, for sure. I think we'll edit that part out of her self-help tours, though the snorting it out had some cathartic triumph for sure.
Not that it's all roses and sunshine.
Four year olds don't always like the rules. Four year olds like Chaya can express affection with a fair bit of rampage and terror. And stir crazy four year olds can inflict some damage!
Chaya misses the playground. It's not easy having it be directly under your window and out of reach. She still talks about going back to school. Every Monday evening she asks if Pam is coming over for their Taco Time Date. Looking at all the analysis that suggests we'll be in rolling lockdowns for the next two plus years, I'm very strongly switching sides from minimalist to hoarding. Chaya's new yard is gonna have swings. The living room can have a trampoline. The stairs can have slides. A climbing gym in her room wouldn't hurt anything... Bring it!!! And me? Big screen tv? Mini wading pool? Let's go for broke.
Maybe some kind of automatic elevator just in case the PT I've started slogging through doesn't make my knee all happier. Speaking of which, time to go down the stairs and drive to preschool for another week of distance Pre-k! This week, we're going to have a live zoom preschool experience. Chaya will get to share and tell. SO far, it's gonna be a balloon. But we'll see what strikes by Thursday.
Happy April Whatevereth. Hang in there!
By the way, the letter of the week is R.
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