Suddenly, it seems like there are a lot of them. Otto's final (and possibly favorite?) present was a blue and orange and extremely furry puppet that he has been wanting. His name is Blueper, and he has been going on errands with us. He likes cookies.
Max likes Blueper too, so much so that there have been custody battles. We are working on a fuzzy red monster for Max (designed by Max) who will hopefully get along well with Blueper.
It doesn't seem entirely fair, but Otto got an additional monster friend already, since we made a practice fleece monster puppet before we could attempt to make a more complicated furry one. We made lots of mistakes with him, though, so it's good we had a test run.
Glo was treated to a spa day in the apartment on Sunday afternoon—the boys had taken her up without my knowledge, cleaned her feet, served her a bowl of museli and yogurt and entertained her with the toy piano.
Grigia likes her morning hop around the apartment.
And the idea of more fuzzy creatures soon to share our space is a bit daunting, but pretty exciting too.
Otto's big birthday day included:
- making a Raving Rabbid Cake
- preliminary present opening
- train to downtown
- water taxi to Chinatown
- shopping for cheap toys, instruments, kitchen equipment, explosives (pop pops) and CANDY!
- lunch at Ken Kee (yum!)
- setting off pop pops at the park
- water taxi back to Michigan Avenue
- impromptu street performance
- Lego store (and disappointment because they didn't have the set he wanted)
- John Hancock for fancy cocktails
- taxi ride home
- Target for Lego set, thankfully in stock (Queen Anne's Revenge)
- dinner on front porch (grilling out sausages, per Otto's request)
- beginning building of Lego set
- birthday candles and cake
- eating of cake
- exhaustion and bed
It was a very full but very fun day. We were so tired by the end of it all that we went to bed without opening the rest of his presents. We actually forgot. But that meant we could just carry on the festivities the next day too. Cake for breakfast, father's day presents, immediately followed by further Otto gifties. It was all good.
It's funny how things happen. We have been talking about getting a dog for years, and I had told the boys it was something we could consider when we finally finished our attic renovation. Unfortunately, this renovation has dragged on for more than two years, and it's still not done—but it's close to done, and this means we have been thinking seriously about dogs for the last six months. We have been looking around at breeds and thinking about how a dog would work in our lives.
We were out biking through the neighborhood last Sunday afternoon, Father's Day, and we had spent the morning talking about dog possibilities, as we had been looking at a labradoodle from a specific breeder who had a litter of puppies due in the next couple of weeks, which would conveniently be ready to take home at the end of August, when we were home from Alaska and had time to prepare our apartment for a puppy.
We stopped at a little bakery, and there was a woman sitting outside with a big beautiful gray dog who looked like a labradoodle, and I asked her if it was, but she said it was a standard poodle. I've been trying to find other labradoodles in the neighborhood so the boys can see them in person, but funnily enough, I have seen three big beautiful dogs in the last week that I thought must be labradoodles, and they have all been standard poodles.
He was a gorgeous friendly mellow dog, cut with a "puppy cut" so he did not look like the fussy poodle that always leaps to mind, but like someone you want to kick back and hang out with, possibly with a beer or two. The boys really liked him, and we talked with Beth (the owner) and petted JoJo (the dog) and played with him for a long time, and I asked her about the breeder. She said she would get me the information, and that very night, she sent me an email (I was only half expecting her to follow up, since it seems like even people who have the best intentions get busy or forget).
So on Monday morning, I called the breeder, and again, I wasn't really expecting her to have an available dog, but it turned out she had a litter of 3 puppies that had been born in April and there was one puppy who had been adopted but she had just found on the night before (that same Sunday evening) that the woman couldn't take her. If I had called even the day before, she would have told me she didn't have any dogs, not at all. Because it also turns out that the breeder is retiring (she has been doing this for 30 years), that this is the very last litter she is planning to have, and that she is also retiring the stud dog, who is already 13. The dad dog is her very dearest dog and a big gorgeous black poodle who has apparently produced a lot of fabulous dogs and whose stud services are still in high demand, even at his very old age. The mom is a 2 year old dog that she helped breed with another line of poodles so that she could eventually breed her with her stud dog.
So anyway, the breeder has a 9 week old puppy who is available now, and we went out to see her. Again, I thought this was just going to be an exploratory visit, because of course, we were not yet ready for a puppy, we have a trip to Alaska to think about and a house project to finish up, but it felt like I should at least see the option and then could put my mind at ease.
We met her, and of course we all fell in love with her. She is already 20+ pounds, so she will be a BIG dog, much bigger than we had planned. But it just seems like she's the right dog for us. It was some sort of string of lucky events that led us to her. And it reminds me, once again, that no matter how much control we try to exert over our lives, how much we plan what will happen when, sometimes unexpected things fall into our path. And sometimes it's the best thing we can do to jump right in, wide eyed and bushy tailed, and see what happens.
Today is the day. My sweet little boy is seven. And because I was so very belated with last year's birthday video, I was very diligent this year and had it done in record time, i.e. two days BEFORE his birthday. Wow.
I was a bit worried about this video, since we were without a camera two separate times in the last 12 months, so there are gaping holes in footage from the last year—notably all of last summer and the most recent winter...where are all the movies from the blizzard? There are none, my friend.
And on top of that, we just realized last week that our new foolproof back up drive has failed, and much of the video I did have from the last year was on it, now lost (but hopefully not forever—the foolproof back up drive comes with warranty for one-time free information retrieval). I'm currently in denial about the situation, since if it truly remains lost, it means that all my photos and videos since 2001 are gone. Too sad a thought to consider.
But somehow, despite all these issues, I had ample footage for a video, and I even had to tag on a little bonus song at the end to sneak in a bit more.
It was a good year, full of many new and wonderful things and lots more of the same old wonderful things. We continue to find joy in rolling down hills and walking together, almost anywhere. Since Otto's last birthday, we have seven new pets in our lives, the six chickens and Grigia, our rabbit. And we are finally, seriously considering that dog. More than seriously, really. And this makes Otto very happy indeed. He has always wanted a dog.
Every year when I sit down to write about my children, I look back at the things I have said about them in previous years, and I realize that they are still basically the same. Despite all the growing up, there is this core of who they are that is still there, that doesn't budge. Little things, like the fact that Otto still prefers a diet of meat and candy, and big things, like Otto is still the best listener I know. He hears and understands everything everyone is saying. And even though he does his fair share of talking, he is, without a doubt, the listener in the family.
He loves stories, hearing the ones that other people tell him, seeing stories in movies or TV shows and listening to books read aloud. He is quite an amazing little Lego builder, able to tackle very large sets completely on his own, without losing interest. He is still interested in how things work, and sometimes when he is quiet for a while, staring intently at something, he will announce suddenly that he has figured out how it works. Sometimes this is a mechanical device, or a scientific concept, sometimes it is an observation about human nature. And he is almost always absolutely correct.
And, just as I remember Max at the same age, Otto has taken off with his drawing in the most spectacular way. I think 7 is a magical age for drawing.
Otto has an amazing ability to be present in every moment, and he is also the peacemaker in the family, the one who always wants to move past feeling mad or sad and back into the good feelings again. He can usually see everyone's side, understand everyone's perspective and can point out the things that another person is saying or doing that might need examination. But he is able to do this in such a gentle way.
He continues to be a wonderful little brother, supportive of his big brother's every effort. Max is really lucky to have such a devoted friend. And we're all really lucky to have each other.
Otto does tend to hold a grudge and become irritated at random children at the playground for taking too long to go down a slide or for mistaking him for a girl (even after he has told them multiple times he is a boy). I often catch him making faces at them (always careful to do it out of sight of the target, but somehow needing to unleash his feelings somewhere).
This year has included lots of big changes for a boy who doesn't like change...but he has adapated to it all and come out smiling, jumping, even dancing. He is such a treasure. Happy birthday, you sweet little thing.
Visiting Grandma and Grandpa always involves lots of fun outside projects and visiting the various animals they keep (intentionally and unintentionally).
We said hello to the baby chicks.
We took a trip to the aquatic store and picked out some baby koi for the pond, and then we released them and wished them the best (there are bull frogs 10 times their size who also call the pond home, a fact we didn't take into consideration until we were letting the little unsuspecting fishies take their first swim from bag to pondwater).
There were nine fish upon release, and we did our best to identify and name them all. But by the next morning, we could only definitely find five of them. We hope they are just hiding and getting adjusted and that they were not frog food.
Otto released Zip into the pond, his favorite fish, named for his extremely deft swimming abilities.
Sunset snacks by the chicken house. This is how my parents spend most evenings together, having drinks and watching the sun set as the chickens mill about the garden.
My sweet mom took two days off school (which is even more notable, given that those days fell in the last two weeks of her teaching career—she is retiring at the end of the year after a wonderful 30 years of being the most beloved teacher around). We had a fancy lunch together at the Boxwood Bistro, and although the boys got a kick out of building silverware sculptures at the table, we still managed to mostly behave ourselves and not make Grandma feel too embarrassed to have us around. We even had tea (since our original plan was to go to a teahouse that had closed).
And then we were off to the zoo. The Nashville Zoo is really nice and heavy on birds, which pleases the boys.
I love how my sweet boys can make fun for themselves anywhere we go. For instance, the craft store. While I busied myself looking for boxes and packing supplies, Max and Otto found a bunch of letters and spelled out words that made them laugh.
The boys and grandpa. They have such cute grandparents.
It was a lovely visit. We had perfect weather for the drive home, and we managed to drive all the way in one go with a couple of quick, perfect stops. One included a big inflated jumping balloon.
