This blog has moved

This blog is now located at http://chronicles-of-nania.blogspot.com/.
You will be automatically redirected in 30 seconds, or you may click here.

For feed subscribers, please update your feed subscriptions to
http://chronicles-of-nania.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default.

She took the Fifth

Nani threw a full-on fit this morning, complete with "I will NEVER! EVER! eat a sandwich like that!!!" and "Mommy, I want you to leave me aloooooooone!"

(The fit was brought on by Lisa making a PBJ in a manner inconsistent with the way Nani wanted it. I actually think she might be getting sick -- she had a playdate with a little boy yesterday who came down with the stomach flu today. She usually only throws HUGE fits when she's fighting off a bug.)

I managed to get her to calm down a little by asking her to -- calmly -- explain to me what had happened, since I wasn't present when she started getting upset. We talked about other options for handling frustration, and I asked her, "So, Nani, does throwing a fit get you what you want?"

"I'm not going to answer that," Nani replied. "It's a secret."

Baaaack when we were kids...

Tonight I was telling Nani how, when I was little, we would play Rock
Paper Scissors while waiting in line at Disneyland.

"That was back before we had iPhones to play with!" I said. "Can you
imagine?!"

Her eyes grew wide.

"Not only that, but we didn't have cell phones! If we left the house
and needed to call someone, we had to use these things called pay
phones!"

...And so on down the list. No cordless phones. No push-button phones.
No call waiting. No caller ID. No answering machines!

Her eyes grew bigger with each item. You'd think we were telling tall
tales.

{Sent via iPhone}

Nani read her first words today!

Nani read two words today, unassisted. In fact, she kind of didn't even realize she was reading.

She asked Lisa why there were two "Ons" and one "Off" on the dishwasher dial. Lisa asked her how she could tell there were two "Ons" and one "Off."

"Because 'On' is O-N and 'Off' is O-F-F," Nani replied.

"That means you read it!" Lisa exclaimed excitedly.

"Huh??"

Apparently the act of reading was effortless for her.

Meeting Buddy the Dinosaur

"That Buddy the Dinosaur [at the KPBS Open House] wasn't real, Mama,
it was a COSTUME."

"How could you tell?"

"The first way I knew is because there ARE no more dinosaurs. They're
extinct. Also, when I shook his hand, it was furry. And dinosaurs
didn't have fur."

{Sent via iPhone}

Doing math!

For a special Sunday morning treat, I agreed to read from Nani's
Garfield comics book during breakfast. She just had to have at least 3
bites of oatmeal between pages (this was also partly to ensure that I
would get to eat my breakfast too!).

This last round, she decided she'd have 6 bites.

"I've had 3! I'm almost done!"

"You're halfway there!"

"Just three more!"

...My child just did math! She did math!!!...

We've been informally doing simple word problems with her in our daily
life, just to introduce her to the concept of counting things, taking
things away, and counting how many are left. It's nothing really
structured, just integrating it into what we're doing with her; and we
never announce "and now we're learning math!" because then she'd be
intimidated like when I ask her to sound out a word for me while I'm
reading a book to her.

Usually we do all the counting steps with her. This was the first time
she just did the math in her head. It seemed pretty effortless.

Of course, her donor daddy was a rocket scientist for NASA for a
while, and has a PhD in physics from Stanford. :) And my math skills
aren't too shabby, either, though I chose to buck the stereotype and
focus on words instead of numbers. ;)

{Non-Nani Content Below - Memory Lane}
I just have to indulge in some memories here, knowing that my math
class buddies are on Facebook...

• Claudia, remember sitting in the back of Mr. Grosdidier's Geometry
class?
• Irisly, remember incurring the wrath of Ms. Heredia for whispering
during class? We were probably just comparing notes on algebra
equations, being the squares that we are...

{Sent via iPhone}

Birthday

Had a lovely time today at Legoland for Nani's fourth birthday. She
got lots of smiles from people because she wore her new Asian-style
"princess" dress that we gave her this morning. Despite no nap, we had
no meltdowns at Legoland; and even after getting home, she continued
to be polite in asking us to do things for her; well, at least for a
while!

Wrapped up the day with "And Tango Makes Three."

More on the princess dilemma another day.

{Sent via iPhone}

Come home now

Yesterday Lisa called me at work a few minutes after 5:30, when I usually head home.

"Nani wants to talk to you," she said.

"Mama?"

"Yes, baby?"

"I want you to come home now."

So glad I've got a kid to help me keep my priorities straight.