Half-O turned two ...allegedly

As mentioned in the previous post, Half-O turned two (back in the beginning of November).

She had a good day: read in the backyard tent with The Archaeologist, channeled Cinderella til lunch, got to ride in a tow truck, ate dinner one-handed so she wouldn't have to let go of her new calculator, rode the merry-go-round, and blew out her two candles all by herself.

{Yes, her two gifts were an elaborate Cinderella gown (+ crown) and a calculator. No, not because we are ham-fisted parents forcing some sort of toy balance, but because that's what she wanted. She has very decided ideas regarding her gifts. Today she walked up to the Santa at the grocery store and repeatedly told him that she wanted a pink book and a Kermit for Christmas - just repeated it over and over as he stared down at her. Then he finally gave her a candy cane, looked at me and asked, "de que pais son?"}

Throughout these two years of her life, I have been increasingly suspicious that Half-O is not just the infant/toddler she ostensibly ought to be. On more than one occasion, she seems to have forgotten the ruse and almost blown her cover, like last month:
We were singing that song from The Sword and the Stone - the to and fro one - while playing with her animal dominoes. There's the line with "thin and stout" and I stopped and asked her if she knew what stout meant, entirely intending to define it for her in the next breath - but, she absently answered "fat". Now this isn't a song we sing often - she doesn't really know it. I don't remember previously defining stout for her, and if I had, I don't know that I would've said fat - but even if at some point I did, it would have been quite a while ago. She may have deduced that the song was explaining the existence of opposition in all things - but is that less fishy? So I incredulously asked how she knew that and she suddenly became very interested in her dominoes, and then when I asked again, "so, what does stout mean?," she did some non-committal mumbling.

Or the other day:
We were doing some coloring and I asked what color the horse should be and she said, "gray - like a winter day."

Then there are these cleverly couched comments, like back in the spring:
We were standing in line at the store, and I was holding her on my hip when she proceeded to knock on my head and ask "anybody home?".

Or last week:
She said something was very funny, but I didn't catch what that something was so asked, "What's very funny?" and she responded "Look in a mirror."

Seriously she said that.

She doesn't have older siblings, she doesn't play with kids who speak English, and we don't have a TV. So how is she throwing out insults at a 3rd-grade level?

changeling? G-Man? a result of all that protein I ate in the last trimester?

Looking forward to year 3.

DIY: land war in asia

first of all, half-o is awesome - but secondly, she will be the end of me.

this halloween nicely illustrates my protracted demise - plus an easy-peasy how-to for homemade fairy wings.

{yes, peruanos celebrate halloween - though not to the extent that we do in the states. the day coincides with el dia de la cancion criolla, or creole song day, so there are a lot of festivities - just not all are the spooky kind. also, instead of trick-or-treat, you say: halloween, halloween}

so early in october we introduced half-o to the main halloween concepts - mainly the dressing up part. she dresses up all the time anyway, so she was on board. when i asked her what she wanted to be for halloween, she replied: "a pumpkin". we serendipitously happened to have an orange pillowcase in our possession, so though not unique or clever, i was totally on board with her choice. so on board, in fact, that i went and got the pillow case and a green hand towel right then.

here's exhibit a: why half-o is awesome


she was totally down with this modern dance version of a pumpkin costume. she wore it for hours.

{it's been way cool watching her imagination develop. it's also very convenient. i can buy cheap band-aids, and we pretend they're the princess band-aids. we also eat pretend candy. she's even more obedient when in character. if i ask half-o to pick up her toys, she's a bit dismissive. but if i ask pumpkin or snow white or jane/michael banks, they're all over it.}

as the month went along, i'd periodically check in regarding her choice of halloween costume. for the most part, she continued to respond "a pumpkin" but occasionally and increasingly she'd say "a fairy". so in an attempt to avoid a halloween day meltdown - i make a pumpkin, she cries for a fairy; i supply fairy wings, she looks longingly at our orange couch while a silent tear slides down her cheek - i suggested she be a pumpkin fairy, and she excitedly agreed. i am so clever; i am so smart with strategery.

now i can't find any craft or fabric stores here. i believe most people buy wholesale, and i would gladly do that too - and i inquired on an expat site and went on a bit of a wild goose chase, and then decided that i'd rather take the challenge of making a pumpkin fairy out of supplies i could find at home and/or the grocery store over the challenge of traversing this large city in search of standard supplies and then still have to make the costume. i don't mind traversing adventures; i just prefer them without a deadline attached. additionally, i think i do better with macgyver, apollo 13 type challenges anyway (though, not actually those challenges - i just want to make a pumpkin fairy costume in a foreign country).

so thanks to some ingenuity and a little help from the internet, i made awesome fairy wings. they were surprisingly easy and turned out super cool. i fused together 12 sheets of cellophane by placing them between two big pieces of paper and ironing them. the resultant cellophane mass was thick enough to hold its shape, so i just traced/cut out wings. i don't know if you can tell in the pic below, but they're translucent and have a really neat texture. mission accomplished!

halloween arrives. pumpkin? check! fairy? check! half-o? nothing doing.

it totally doesn't matter that i have both a pumpkin and a fairy. she won't put on one piece of it. she won't let me put her hair in a ponytail (meant to be the pumpkin stem). she won't even come too close to me for fear i'll just muscle the costume right on her (she wouldn't be wrong).

no problem - she doesn't realize candy is on the line (and not pretend candy). time for a new tactic ...tactics.

1. bribery (promises of candy galore): not interested
2. an appeal to tradition (today is halloween - this is what one does): she quickly deduces the logical fallacy
3. social pressure (other kids will be in costume): doesn't care
4. diplomacy (rational recap of why she should put on her cute costume): no dice
5. retreat
6. stew a bit
7. misdirection (sure, i'd love to help you with your puzzle. while you fit that piece in, i'm just going to put your hair in a ponytail. and while we celebrate our puzzle completion, how 'bout we try on our cool pumpkin costume?): perhaps it was the misdirection; perhaps she felt sorry for me, but my maneuver was met with little resistance.

i quickly secured the wings (large safety pins) while i asked the archaeologist to quickly grab the camera - this truce may not last long.

...but it did. she posed; she danced; she had some imaginative scenario going that entertained her til dark.

she is clever. she is so smart with her strategy of indefatigable caprice. i'm just tired.

later that night she and the archaeologist were on our bed reading when i came in to announce that dinner was ready. half-o responded that no, she didn't want to eat, just read her book. she invited me to join them on the bed, patting an empty spot next to her. i replied, in a sing-songy voice: "but we're having potato pie." without looking up from her book, she replied with the exact same sing-song: "but i don't want it." the archaeologist and i looked at each other with nervous smiles. it was pretty funny - it would've been funnier if she were someone elses kid -she's not yet 2. as we contemplated the potential strong-willed sass the future held, she finished her thought: "i want cake."

Does anyone remember the movie Starman?

I saw it when I was quite young and may not have fully appreciated the real plot/subtext. So perhaps this analogy is off base (or unfair to Jeff Bridges' Oscar nominated performance), but nevertheless: I feel like Starman. I look like an adult human, but standard daily tasks keep giving me pause …sometimes long pauses - almost gratuitous pauses, like I’m exploiting your willing suspension of disbelief.

But here’s Exhibit A) A dinner I cooked for us and an archaeologist friend of The Archaeologist:



It’s not a fancy nor complicated dinner (and the above picture doesn't make it look too appetizing even). I’ve made it numerous times before, often as a last minute meal. But enter Starman. Starman circles the grocery store over and over as if mesmerized by the many aisles and raw meat. Finally deciding on chicken and peppers over rice, Starman is pleased with herself – she’s found food to make for dinner. She’s feeling more like a regular adult human until she realizes that the dish needs spices, and it turns out that very few of the spices have familiar names – return Starman. Let’s stare at spices for a while alternating between expressions of dumbfounded unfrozen caveman and Sherlock Holmes trying to glean some obscure context clue. Meanwhile, Half-O is oblivious and/or unsympathetic to the Starman syndrome – she hasn’t seen the movie and is sick of sitting in the grocery cart. So she decides to knock a bunch of little dishes to the ground so I could look like an awkward and apologetic mime in front of an unfortunate store employee who thankfully was willing to participate in a game of charades. Here’s the dish we took home:



It was only mildly chipped – unlike the other four that were smashed to smithereens. They were like $0.75 a piece. But convert that to the going rate for dignity, and it was kind of expensive. I’m the idiot that spends near an hour at the grocery store – a good chunk of that time staring at 5 shelves of spices – and has no idea what her child is doing. But also – who places a random stack of breakable dishes at the height of a child buckled into a shopping cart? Also, why did the U.S. have to go with pounds instead of grams? I think the Declaration of Independence, the subsequent wars/victories, the Louisiana Purchase et al, and prior to 2008, a dominant economy are enough to prove that we’re our own man. Having our own weights and measures just seems haughty at this point and is currently a bit of a hassle for me.

Oh – and as for the spices, I was hoping I got garlic, pepper, and ginger. I got garlic, pepper, and cinnamon. In my (re: Starman’s) defense, I don’t think the store had ginger. But, I figured ginger and cinnamon are kind of similar – both can be sweet but also have a bit of heat – so I used it anyway – just not very much.

Alright, now it’s time to cook the food. There’s some more pausing as Starman debates how best to clean the peppers – do I need to use bottled water? Is that a waste? Does the oil get hot enough to kill the germs? Then there’s the stove:



I don’t mind that it’s small. The height is a bit of a worry as Half-O can reach it, but she understands hot and steers clear. What summons Starman is that it requires that I light a match and hold that lit match near flowing gas in order to get a burner going. I realize this is not a problem for most people. I, however, have a slight fear of fire. Fire bad (sorry, I can't find the actual clip). I don’t think I lit a match until I was a teenager. But I did it, and then had to do it like 10 more times before the chicken and peppers were done as I kept turning off the gas when I was just trying to lower the heat.

So Starman made dinner, and it was good (we just had ice cream for dessert). I guess I should be glad that I didn’t have to begin my journey of discovery in the buff like Starman – customs would have been a bit more interesting. Do you think we would have been flagged, or moved right through since I clearly had nothing to hide?