Four Feet More

The boy won't let me cut his hair.  Every time I say, "Eamon, how about we give you a little trim?" he replies, "No thanks.  I kinda like my hair like this."


He thinks it makes him look like a Jedi. 


I think perhaps I should catch him during one of his sleepwalking episodes and cut his hair then.   What do you think?

Time to wipe off the dust and sweep away the cobwebs hanging around Four Feet More.  I've wanted to post oh so many times in recent weeks, but life keeps getting in the way.

A constant distraction is my little student (we'll call her Jane), who I believe has Oppositional Defiant Disorder.  I've begun playing a covert game of "opposites" with her, just to get through the day.  If I want her to stand I'll say, "Jane, can you please sit over there?  Thanks!"  Then she'll come and stand by me.  If I want her to sit, I'll say, "Jane, I need you to stand over here.  Please do NOT sit in that chair."  Then she'll go and sit in the chair, looking quite smug about defying me.  This of course sends the rest of the kindergartners into a tizzy, "Mrs. ____!  Jane is sitting in the chair!"  I just sigh and say, "Jane's going to do what she wants, I guess."  So far, this game has been working, but it's a bit tedious and exhausting.  And I'm not sure if it will last through the end of the school year.  Fingers crossed, it will, and hopefully next year's teacher will have more success curbing her ODD than I.  We've got just 18 days left until Summer Break - I think I can make it!

About next year... I've been told by both my principal and the union that because there are so many surplussed tenured teachers (due to education budget cuts), the chances of temporary (non-tenured) teachers getting hired back next year is, "slim-to-none."  Here we go again.  Another summer of uncertainty and that unsettling feeling of "will we make it financially?"  Part of me is looking forward to being laid off though.  I can maybe do substitute teaching, and help Jeff with his real estate business.  Or perhaps I'll homeschool Eamon (Vika would not be a good homeschooling candidate, for a variety of reasons).  With the increased class sizes, no prep time, and 10% pay cut teachers in my district are facing next year, it might be a good time to sub.  Maybe by the Fall of 2011, the state of California will open it's eyes and start making education more of a funding priority.

On the homefront, May has been a bit unsettled too.  Perhaps because of the stress I'm dealing with at work, I don't have the patience to deal with the stresses at home.  Jeff and I have been very conscious of our reactions and trying to remain calm, but the kids definitely do test us.  One such moment came last weekend.  Eamon's PTSD was in full swing and he was in a rage about something so minor,  that now I don't even remember what it was.  The rage took on a scary form though, kind of like those we saw during our first months home with the kids.  I actually had to do holding time with Eames, something we haven't done in years.  For those of you not experienced with therapeutic parenting, "holding time" is essentially when a parent holds a child through their rages, both to keep them and the people around them safe, but also to show them that even when their behavior is at it's ugliest, we are still there, helping them through it and loving them.  And Eamon's rage was ugly.  He was screaming at me, yelling hurtful things and trying to hit me.  It was almost as if I was exorcising a demon.  You have to know Eamon to understand how bad this was. He is such a sweet, affectionate child who would give up his favorite toy if it would make someone happy.  He is constantly telling me he loves me and saying "Cheek!" - my signal to give him my cheek to kiss and then kiss his cheek in return.  For him to act like this, something had to be really wrong.  The frustrating thing is, I have no idea what it was!  He has no idea what was causing him to behave that way either.  It's a problem with no clear source and no clear fix.  So, I held him through his rage, breathing calmly, telling him I loved him in a soft voice and encouraging him to calm down.  Which he eventually did do.  Then I got up, went into my bedroom and cried. 

I was so drained, both physically and emotionally, and it was incredibly painful to see my son acting that way.  While I was hiding, Eamon burst into the bedroom, perhaps ready to initiate another fight.  But then he saw me crying, and his little body just deflated.  He sat down beside me, kissed my head and began rubbing my back.  I hugged him and then asked if I could have some time alone to collect myself.  He said yes, and left the room.  About 5 minutes later, there was a knock on the door and Eamon came in carrying the drawing below.  I asked him what it showed and he said, "That's you, Mama, being calm and showing love, and that's me being angry.  But you're still holding my hand."  On the back of the paper was written in big green letters, "I am sory mama."


Poor guy.  I didn't mean to make him feel guilty, which is why I went into the bedroom to cry.  But he saw me and felt guilty anyway.  However, since that day, it seems that Eamon and I have come to a bit of an understanding.  We're almost back to the relationship we had before he started school, and he seems much happier this week than he's been in months.  So, while this incident was one of the worst ever, I think it was good that it happened.  Hopefully we'll soon get to the bottom of what's been eating at the boy so that we can deal with the problem and move forward.

On a positive note, Vika's progress report from school came back with outstanding marks!  She has struggled a bit academically, so it was wonderful to see her success.  She even received and A+ on a science test (an especially impressive achievement to her science-challenged mama)!  The girl's been devouring chapter books and really seems to be coming into her own academically.  In a month of "steps back," this was a very satisfying "step forward."  Go Vika!

So, there is it.  My month so far in a rather large nutshell.  Hopefully once school gets out I'll be a more regular blog poster and reader.  Thank goodness for Facebook, or I'd be out of the loop entirely!

Yesterday, Eamon gave me the journal he's been working on in school, and since I shared some of Vika's writing, I thought I'd share some highlights of Eamon's as well. For ease of reading, I won't type it verbatim because reading words that are spelled phonetically (by a first grader) can be tedious.

• Oct. 12, 2009: "I can do a back flip. I can jump. I can't jump in outer space. I can't stay alive forever." (this one made me a bit sad - the boy thinks about dying way too much for one so young).
• Nov. 19, 2009: "We saw a REAL rattlesnake in the science lab today. Of course, it was dead and in a jar..."
• Dec. 17, 2009: "What would happen if my toy Russia Mishka became real? I would hug him and pretend he is a big monster and pretend he is a USA army person and call him Captain John William. He is the best stuffed animal..." (I wonder how he came up with "Captain John William"?)
  
• Feb. 4, 2010: "I love the way Mama cooks. I love the recipe for hot dogs my Mama makes for me. My Mama makes a lot of food for me." (for the record, I almost NEVER cook, and I don't believe I've ever made the kids hot dogs. That's Jeff's department. I wonder if Eamon wishes I cooked more?)
  
• Feb. 5, 2010: "I would love to go on a long journey to a far away place. I would go to Hawaii and race my sister on a camel. I really, really want to go to Hawaii." (I think he might be disappointed by the lack of camels on the islands.)

It's funny that Eamon writes much the way he talks - kind of a stream of consciousness type of thing. I can hardly wait to see what he writes in his next journal!

Eamon is very preoccupied with marriage. He is always mentioning which girl he wants to marry someday (and sometimes, which boy - we do live in the San Francisco Bay Area, after all, so he's seen both kinds of couples), but the names change almost weekly. Last week it was Robin or Annie. Then it became Sophia or Vika's friend Aimee (he's branching out to older girls). He also says he wants to marry me, or Vika, or some other family member. I just remind him that marriage is about making someone you love a part of your family. Since Vika and I are already his family, he can't marry us. I also am constantly telling him that since he is only 7, he doesn't need to worry too much about marriage just yet. He should save that for when he's older.

Then came an enlightening discussion with Babushka about "Sassy Girls" vs. "Cool Girls" (you can read her write-up of it here). According to Vika and Eamon, "Sassy Girls" are girls that wear short skirts, high heels, and cropped shirts so their bellies show. They are also really flirty and act like they're so pretty. Cool girls wear cool clothes but don't show their bellies. They act like themselves and aren't mean to other girls. Eamon told my mom that he wants to marry a Sassy Girl. So she dispensed the sage advice that Sassy Girls are fun to look at, but Cool Girls are the ones you marry. Eamon nodded as if he understood and the subject was changed.

However, later he said something which showed that the topic was still clearly on his mind. "Mama," he said. "I think you're right. I shouldn't worry about getting married. It's making my head go [insert crazy face and frantic hand movements here]."

I imagine deciding which kind of girl to marry would be a bit daunting for a 7 year old. Hopefully in 20 years or so, he'll have figured it out.

Actually, it's his 3 front teeth. They've been gone for ages, and we'd ll really like them to start coming in now. So Santa, if you've got any pull with the Tooth Fairy, could you put in a good word for Eamon, please?

Eamon is turning 7 today. He’s changed so much over the past 4 years that he’s almost a different child than the one we adopted.

Before he was quiet and unsure. Doctors said he had a “speech delay.” Now he talks a mile a minute about anything that enters his mind - a verbal stream-of-consciousness - but usually about Transformers or Star Wars.

At 3 years old, he was very small, wearing clothes for an 18 month old. Now he’s caught up to his peers and seems so tall sometimes that I stare at him in wonder. What happened to my little munchkin?

When we adopted Eamon, he was shy and uncertain of his safety in this new life with his new family. Now he is open and extroverted, unashamed to do his freaky dance in a room full of strangers, and always wanting to make people smile. In restaurants, he walks the long way back from the bathroom so that he can catch the eye of other diners and say, “Good day!” Often as we leave, he points out all his new friends, waving goodbye to each as we pass.

Eamon has grown a lot in 4 years and it is amazing to see how far he has come. He will often say things like, “Mama, I wonder what I’m going to be like when I’m a grown up?” Truth be told, I often wonder that as well. But then I see him putting on his tie so that he can look good for Babushka, and I smile, knowing that he’s going to be quite a remarkable man, indeed.

Eamon the day after we brought him home (Christmas, 2005)

Eamon this Summer

Tonight Vika and I were treated to a home theatrical, courtesy of Eamon. In a very dignified voice, he asked us to come see the President in his room. Then he quickly ran to his table, set down his light saber (sheathed in a gold, plastic scabbard to make it look more old skool) and banged his gavel (a light saber handle) to gain our attention. In a loud, clear voice, he spoke into a microphone (made of another light saber handle) and began telling us about money.

He pointed to a penny and said, "This money has Lincoln Log on it. It's one cent."

Then he took out a piece of paper and said, "These are the important rules that Lincoln Log wrote."

1. Keep people safe
2. Make sure no one really dies that much.
3. Don't say bad words, like "You're a loser!"
   

Next, he proceeded to show us the "Obama money," which wound up being a sticker with a picture of a whale tail on it because "Obama doesn't have money yet."

He began to tell us about Obama's rules, but became distracted by a green plastic crystal from his make-your-own light saber kit, which apparently was not where he thought it should be. After putting it away he stood up, and with a flourish of his hand sketched an elegant bow, thus ending his performance.

It was interesting, to say the least.

His presidential lesson also made it quite clear that the boy has entirely too many light sabers.

As we were driving around in the car during Spring Break:
- "Mama, I'm glad you adopted me because I'm having fun with you almost every single day!"


While eating his breakfast at a rapid pace:
- "I'm jammin' Mama! I am on the crab!" (a reference to "The Deadliest Catch." - when the fishermen are doing really well, the narrator says they are "on the crab.")


After making a rare solo foray into a public bathroom*:
- (hands spread and brow furrowed in indignation) "Mama, I went into the boys' bathroom, and there were GIRLS in there!"


*He was in the girls' bathroom.

It is a truth, universally acknowledged, that a child in possession of a new pack of gum must chew that gum ceaselessly until it is nothing more than a sticky mass of flavorless goo.

Such is the case with Eamon. Previous experience has taught us that Eamon is not the most responsible gum-chewer. In addition to the numerous wads he’s swallowed, we’ve found pieces of it ground into his bedroom carpet, a string of it attached to his sweater, and a chunk stuck in his hair. So it was a surprise when the Easter Bunny (dang his furry hide) decided to give the kids each a pack of Trident. This went along with his 2009 Easter basket theme of “Healthy Minds, Healthy Teeth” (I didn’t think up the theme, I just went along with it).

Right away, Eamon dug into his gum and began chewing it noisily. He did this throughout the day, looking and sounding much like a cow chewing its cud. Fortunately, Vika lost her pack of gum somewhere at Babushka’s house, or else I’m sure I would have had dueling gum smackers in my ear all day long.

Despite Eamon’s love of chewing gum, this time he took it a bit further than I ever would have anticipated. Each night when I go to bed, I “wake” the boy up and take him to the bathroom. I put “wake” in quotes because Eamon is seldom truly awake during these times. He’s generally still half-asleep, and he never remembers these trips the next morning. When I went to take the boy to the bathroom the other night, he began chewing his cheek. “What on earth is he dreaming about?” I wondered. Then the subtle scent of bubblegum wafted past my nose. Surely the boy was not chewing gum in his sleep. Unfortunately, that was exactly what he was doing. Thus began the frustrating exercise of trying to extract a piece of chewing gum from a not-quite-awake child’s mouth.

As Eamon sat on the toilet, eyes closed and head wobbling in semi-consciousness, I said, “Eamon…spit your gum out!” He just kept chewing. So I tried again, a little louder this time. “Eamon! Spit out your gum!” He still kept chewing. Soon I was saying loudly, “EAMON! YOUR GUM! SPIT IT OUT! “ By this point, his eyes were still closed, but he was frowning and shaking his head frantically from side to side indicating that no, he was not going to spit out his gum. Exasperated, I started tapping his cheeks and patting his shoulders to get him to fully wake-up. I tried tickling him, shaking him by the shoulders, and even prying his mouth open with my hands. The boy was not waking up and he was not giving me his gum.

By this point, Jeff had come upstairs to see what all the ruckus was about. With a “For crying out loud!” he grabbed the squirt bottle off the shelf and sprayed Eamon with cold water to wake him up. Eamon squealed in dismay, but kept his eyes firmly shut and his gum safely tucked in his cheek. It finally took a team effort to retrieve the wad. Jeff pried Eamon’s teeth apart while I reached in with my finger and swept the inside of his mouth. I scooped the gum from out of his cheek and triumphantly threw it in the trash! Then I calmly walked my slightly-damp, still half-asleep son back to his bed.

Easter Bunny, if you’re reading this, NEVER give my child gum again!

Thanks.

Eamon is generally not a morning person. I have to ask him repeatedly to get out of bed before he will begin doing his morning chores. That's why what happened the other day was a special occurrence.

As I was getting ready for work, Eamon came stumbling in to the bathroom, all rumpled and groggy, and said with a sleep-thickened voice, "Mama, I need to show you something." Curious, I let him grab my hand and pull me into his bedroom. He led me to the window and pointed outside at the sky, which was orange and yellow with pink clouds. "It's called a 'sunset,'" he said. "I like the pink clouds."

I smiled and told him that actually, it was a "sunrise," and yes, the clouds were very pretty. "I'm going to get up early every morning so I can see the sunrise Mama," Eamon stated, rubbing his eyes.

And that was the last morning he woke up early. The next day we were back to our regular routine of me reminding him several times to get out of bed before physically lifting his legs over the edge and pulling his body up. Oh well... at least I got to see one sunrise with my little man.

I guess it's something that every parent goes through sooner or later. Just when you think your child is looking pretty good, they grab the scissors and give themselves a haircut. I had a minor experience with this early on when Vika trimmed a lock of her hair. But fortunately, it was a small lock, and was kind of off to the side of her face, so it wasn't terribly noticeable.

With Eamon, I wasn't so lucky. Jeff was going to drop him off at my classroom yesterday after school, so he called to prepare me: "Jenni, Eamon cut his hair." Oh no. He'd finally gotten to the point where he had this cute, shaggy kind of "skater boy" hair, and I wondered how bad the damage was. When Eames first walked into my classroom, it didn't look so bad. He had his bangs kind of swept over to the side, and I thought maybe it would be OK. But as he began playing and his hair started to move back to it's normal resting place, the haircut was painfully apparent.**

Obviously, I had to give him a trim to help these new bangs blend in. But, if I gave him a cut as short as his bangs, I was afraid he might look like Mo from the "Three Stooges." In the end, I decided on a compromise. I cut his hair shorter, but not as short as the area Eamon cut himself. I figured that yes, he may look like a dork, but it's fitting punishment for him cutting his hair.


** I don't know what is with the dorky smiles in these pictures - I guess it's the best I could expect given the circumstances.

It’s been a long week. Within hours after getting home from “Wicked,” I was struck with a fever and chest congestion. The fever lasted for 2.5 days and I am only now starting to get over the cold. I stayed home for much of last week, in bed recovering. But, during that time, I made a few interesting observations.

The first is that daytime T.V. absolutely stinks. Truly, there is nothing on. If it wasn’t for the Masterpiece Theatre miniseries of “Jane Eyre” I had on DVD (thank you Netflix), I would have gone insane.

The second observation, as this post title suggests, is that cats don’t like black olives. Jeff loves making pizza from scratch. And since Friday was his birthday and I was too sick to really do anything special for him, he made a couple of pizzas for the family. Salami and black olive, and this Italian dried beef and black olive (both were excellent, BTW). While cleaning up the dinner dishes, I missed a little ramikin of black olives, which were left sitting on the counter overnight. Our cats, little scavengers that they are, couldn’t help but investigate these curious black orbs and attempt to eat one. What I found in the ramikin this morning was an olive with the impression of cat teeth on either side. The other 3 olives were left untouched. I smiled as an image of Oona (our tabby and the most likely culprit), eagerly picking up the olive with her teeth came to mind. I could just imagine a look of feline disgust come over her face as she opened her mouth and let the olive fall back into the bowl, discarded as unworthy of consumption. After finding and eating half a poppy-seed muffin the other day, the black olive must have been quite a disappointment for her.

The final observation made this week is that my son can relate anything to "Star Wars." Anything. A mundane conversation about something that happened during our day will prompt him to say, “It’s like in 'The Clone Wars' when …” or, “That’s like what happened in 'Star Wars' when….” This morning, Eamon was going on and on about something and Jeff made his standard “That’s neat Eamon” reply. Eamon then said, “I hate when he does that.” I looked at him and asked, “Oh, really?” To which the boy replied, “Uh huh! It’s like in 'Star Wars, Episode 2,' when Obi-wan tells Anakin to stop and he doesn’t, and Obi-wan says, ‘I hate when he does that.’” God help me, am I raising a future Star Wars Convention attendee? Is he going to start dressing in Jedi robes and learn how to speak Huttese? While I think it’s great that the boy is so passionate about “Star Wars,” I’m thinking we may want to begin directing his attention to other areas as well.

Vika and Eamon are vastly different creatures. As you have seen in this post and others, Vika is more practical and "cut to the chase," whereas Eamon is more sensitive and very much an "old soul." Here are some things he said this past week which I found amusing. I think I'll add them to my growing list of "Eamonisms."

While watching Bear Grylls on Man vs. Wild eat a fish he'd just speared and roasted over an open fire:
"I think that fish is missing his family."

Said in an excited voice as he and I headed to my brother's Super Bowl party (it was just the two of us, Vika and Jeff stayed home):
"It's like we're going on a date!"

When I was putting him to bed and giving him a hug goodnight:
"Mama, I could hug you forever."

When Eamon says things like that last one, it's almost enough to make me forget how challenging he's been lately!

This morning, like every morning, Eamon had difficulty waking up (he's a night person, like me). After sleepily putting on his clothes, he managed to drag himself into the bathroom where he, Vika, and I stood, like three zombies, looking at each other in the mirror.

Eamon yawned lazily, and then asked, "Mama, why does morning always have to be so early?"

That's something I've often wondered myself.

Since I've been prepping for 4 days worth of subs (I'm going to a teacher training Monday - Thursday), I find that I have absolutely nothing interesting to talk about. *sigh* What a sad state of affairs. I guess I could tell you the cute way Vika pronounces "asparagus" ("spasketius") or how proud I was of the calm way Eamon reacted to a kid who was yelling in his face, but instead I leave you with this: a motivational poster of Boba Fett - my favorite character from Star Wars (simply because he had a jet pack, and my 7-year-old self thought that was just the COOLEST).


Hope you all had a good weekend! Perhaps after being "GLADified" next week I'll have more exciting blog fodder.

Today you turn 6. It seems like an eternity ago you were turning 3 in an orphanage, completely unaware that we were out here, thinking about you and hoping that you were having a good birthday. We were waiting to go to Russia to meet you and Vika for the first time, and were quite saddened by the fact that you would spend yet another birthday without a family to celebrate it with you.

Those days are long gone now, and the little boy whose picture I stared at 3 years ago is so different from the boy you are today. The mischievous sparkle in your eyes and your goofy little grin never fail to put a smile on my face. Your affectionate nature and kissable cheeks make me want to hold you in my arms for hours. Although you can only stand being there for a few minutes before you are off to do something else. Often you will say, “I love you Mama!” while doing everyday things, like coloring a picture or watching TV. Even though you seem to say it with very little thought, it still warms my heart every single time.

Your face is so expressive, that we can always tell what you are thinking, even before you say a word. Because of this (and the “Lollipop Guild” way you quirk your mouth) Papa and I say you have a “rubber face.” It’s part of your charm, and I hope it never changes. You are also an old soul, understanding things on a deeper level than most children your age. If someone is sad or hurt, you are the first to try to help him or her feel better. You find genuine happiness in the happiness of others.

Eamon, you are a remarkable young man, and every day I feel lucky that you are a part of my family. You are the son I was always meant to have – my little buddy and the delight of my heart.

Happy birthday little man. I hope you have a wonderful day and get all the Star Wars toys your heart desires!

A few weeks ago, Eamon reached a major milestone in his short life: he graduated from preschool. Now, I know some preschools have their kids wear caps and gowns, and they give the occasion an atmosphere of importance seen at high school and college graduations. In fact, one family I know had a graduation party for their 5-year old, renting a hall, hiring a caterer, and inviting 200 people.

Well, this may come as a surprise, but we didn't take Eamon's preschool graduation quite so seriously. Luckily, neither did his preschool. They called it a "crossing the bridge" ceremony rather than a graduation, and the only attire stipulation was that the kids dress in their favorite outfit.

For Eamon, this meant his Darth Vader costume.

He was actually looking pretty fierce, until his teachers gave him a gold top hat to wear during the ceremony. It was all a bit Sith Lord meets "A Chorus Line," but Eamon was happy, and it provided us with good blackmail photographs for his teen years. :)

Some alien life from must have taken residence in my son's body. It's the only explanation for what has been going on during the last 2 hours.

It's a well know fact that Eamon hates to clean his room. The worst part of my day is evening chore time, when he needs to put away the toys he was playing with. My request to him to clean him room is usually followed by groans, foot stomping, and all too often, flopping around on the floor like a 2 year old.

Seriously, it sucks.

However, today was different. I didn't even have to remind Eamon that it was evening chore time. He'd been happily rearranging and cleaning his room all afternoon! He emptied out all the drawers of his wardrobe (which is used to house toys and dress-up clothes) and neatly put everything back. He stacked his shoes on a little rack off to the side of his room. And he organized his shelves!!!

What could have brought about such a dramatic change? Had body-snatchers invaded? Or was his milk spiked with Stepford-juice?

Nope. It turns out that Jeff encouraged Eamon to play a "moving to another house" game with Vika's dolls (Eamon is really into playing Papa lately). He also gave him a "cleaning gauntlet" to wear. That's why Eamon worked so hard organizing his room without a fuss.

I hate it when Jeff has strokes of genius that never would have occurred to me.














The cleaning gauntlet






This cracked me up - Apparently, Eamon's knight helmet is a Cubs fan.

Here's a self-portrait Eamon took at Babushka's house.

At first, it just looks like a random shot of his eye and bangs, but look closer. Can you see the reflection of his hands holding the camera in his eye? Eamon swears he knew that would happen in the shot. Maybe he's right, and I've got a budding artist on my hands?

My summer vacation is going by really fast. There was so much I wanted to do while school was out, but I just don't seem to have the time. My project list may have been a little ambitious, but I have made some progress.

• The Kids' Lifebooks: A lot of progress made here. I've put in all the new birth family information and have included most of the major events from Vika and Eamon's first year home. Unfortunately, I'm completely inept at scrapbooking, so I tend to fiddle with the pages until I finally give up in a fit of frustration and just paste the text and pictures down, usually in the configuration I had them in the first time I tried the layout. I'll post some pages later.
• Disneyland Photo Album: Complete! I did this online on Shutterfly, and hope to receive it in the mail soon.
  
• Blog Book: Pretty much no progress here. I'm printing the blog using Blurb, and it's slow going.
• Christmas Knitting Projects: Well, all I can say is, I've bought the yarn for a few of these! I've still got plenty of time though, right? No way will I be knitting furiously up until Christmas Eve this year. ;)
• PIF Projects: I finished the second one of these - now I just have to mail it out and finish project number 3. I've been completely slacking on this.
  
• Eamon's "Knight" Sweater: This is about 1/8th done. *sigh* I'm creating my own pattern for this one and have restarted it 3 times now.... In the end, it should look like a roll-neck raglan sweater with a Gryffindor lion on the front. If I ever get it done, I'll post a picture.
  
• Vika's Caplet: DONE! And she likes it!

Meanwhile, in other non-project related news, we had our "National Night Out" last night. Do any of your neighborhoods do this? It's when neighbors get together for a mini-block party to get to know each other. The idea is that this will help prevent crime. We had Dr. Pepper floats at ours (Which is just wrong. What happened to the root beer?), a fire engine (complete with cute, flirty firemen), as well as a bunch of games organized by the older neighborhood kids.

After much lobbying on my and Jeff's part, our neighbor's dog, DaVinci, won the dog trick competition (he initially scurried away with his tail between his legs, but then found some courage and jumped though a hoop. Twice. Now that's talent!). No one won the chalk drawing competition, although an interesting hopscotch course did get honorable mention.

The highlight of the evening though was watching my son discover the Hula Hoop. Now, Eamon is not what I would call coordinated. He's inherited my family curse for clumsiness and often trips over pieces of lint. However, sometimes he surprises me with his agility. Like when he did a full-on flip into my brother's pool. Where did he learn that? Last night was another one of those times. At first, he was completely spastic with the hula hoop. It would kind of spin around his knees once or twice before falling to the ground. But Eamon kept at it, and by the end of the evening, he was keeping that hoop circling around his waist for longer than I can! He even began to do some tricks, ending with the hoop on a raised foot. Seriously, the kid was good! The other neighbors were watching him with these huge smiles on their faces, enjoying his enthusiasm. At then end of the night, the organizers gave Eames the hula hoop to take home. All in all, it was a fun evening.