Boys Versus Girls

Today has been the day of boys versus girls. We were listening to Free to Be You and Me in the car on our way to a play date this morning. Specifically, we were at the part in Boy Meets Girl where he says, "You're bald. Bald, bald, bald. You're bald as a ping pong ball are you bald!"

Ruby: Boys are bald and girls have hair.
Me: Most of the time. But, girl babies can be bald. You were bald when you were a baby.
Ruby: But now I big and I have hair.
Me: Yes, you have long hair now.
Ruby: And when I grow up, I going to be...myself!
Me (confused by the transition): Sure. You can be yourself.
Ruby: I going to be myself!
Me: Sounds good.
Ruby: I GOING TO BE MYSELF!
Me: Perfect.
Ruby: When I grow up, I going to be a big girl like Stella, Annika, Rachel, and...Jason!

After swimming with Liam, Ruby had to go to the bathroom. Naturally, I took her in to the women's restroom. She noticed the floor was wet.

Ruby: Why the floor wet?
Me: Someone else walked in here with wet feet. It was probably Liam.
Ruby: This the boys potty?
Me: No, this is the girls potty but Liam was with his mommy so they came in here.
Ruby: This the boys potty?
Me: No, but little boys and girls have to go with their parents. Since Liam is with his mommy, he had to go in the girls potty.
Ruby: This the boys potty?
Me: No. It's kind of like when you go to the potty with daddy. Even though you're a girl, you have to go in the boys potty because daddy is a boy.
Ruby: This the boys potty?
Me: Let's go eat lunch.

After swimming, the kids were changing back into their clothes. Liam went upstairs but came back down naked. I took Ruby into the bathroom.

Ruby: What's on Liam's bottom?
Me: I don't know. Was their something on his bottom?
Ruby (running out of the bathroom pointing to Liam's boyhood): What's that?
Liam's mommy (looking out from the kitchen): I'll let Ruby's mommy answer that =)
Ruby: Mommy, what's that?
Me: That's a penis. Boys have penises and girls don't.
Ruby (silent but still looking).
Me: Does mommy have a penis?
Ruby: No.
Me: Does daddy have a penis?
Ruby: Yeah.
Me: Does baby Louis have a penis?
Ruby: No.

And that's our lesson on boys versus girls according to a 3 year old.

It's a girl!

As you probably guessed from Ruby's attire in the Father's Day post, Ruby is going to be a big sister. Baby Goo Goo got a clean bill of health this morning. If everything continues to go well, we'll see her again around November 18.



BTW, Ruby named her Baby Goo Goo. We waited to tell her about the baby until after the first trimester because the thought of having to untell her seemed too sad and scary. About a month before that Ruby declared, "I going to be a big sister someday. Him going to be a girl. I going to call him Baby Goo Goo." Apparently Baby Goo Goo is coming from the real baby store, will drink from her toy bottle and went with us to Kauai...and was still there after we came home =) We thought it was great she was so excited about having a baby sister. Unfortunately, she changed her mind a while back saying she wanted a baby brother and would name him Louis. Um...that's not going to happen. Hopefully she'll change her mind again.

Swimming Without Daddy

A few months ago, Adam came home from swimming and said the instructor wanted to move Ruby to the next level class. I looked it up. The next level meant Adam would no longer be in the pool with her. He's a swimmer. He said she was ready. I occasionally take a dip to cool off while sitting out in the sun. I couldn't believe it. We signed her up and waited for the new session to start.

We missed the first day so she could join her friends at Norah's fairy party (well worth it). So, yesterday was her first day. As soon as she woke up, she said she didn't want to go swimming which is strange since I usually put on her bathing suit and she runs out the door. We told her how proud we were that she was a big girl. I told her I was so excited to see her swim (I normally stay home with coffee and a magazine). We reminded her we were going to a birthday party as soon as swimming was over. She wasn't thrilled but finally got dressed and got in the car. As we pulled into the parking lot, Ruby pointed and said, "That is the pool where daddy and I used to swim." Ah ha! We figured it out. Ruby thought her new swimming class meant a different swimming pool. As soon as we told her that she was swimming in the same pool, she snapped out of it. As a matter of fact, we were 10 minutes early to the pool and she kept saying, "I please get in the pool now?"

Here's our girl swimming by herself:









Ruby did great and loved it...even though she got in a little trouble. There was one other girl in her swimming class. When the instructor took the other girl out, he left Ruby on the wall and said there was one rule - keep your head above the water. As soon as he moved away, she put her face in the water, dunked under and blew bubbles. We stayed out of it and she got busted. As Adam put it, since she's my kid, it won't be the last time =)

Happy...

...Father's Day Adam! Maybe we'll be able to surprise you next year!







What a difference a year makes!

Have any room for dessert?

Tonight at dinner, the waiter asked us if we had any room for dessert. Ruby pushed her plate to the middle of the table, pointed to the empty space and said, "Yes!"

Busiest Weekend Ever!

Some weekends we have lots to do. Some weekends we have nothing to do. A few weekends ago, we had the busiest weekend ever. I originally thought about bagging out of a few things because of nap time and bed time but decided to throw caution to the wind. Thank goodness I did because Ruby was great and we had a fantastic weekend.

We started A's birthday celebration at Great America. It's not my thing but I didn't want to miss our baby friends. When I saw the grad night crowd I considered turning around and driving back home. Instead, Ruby and I braved the line and crowd, found the GVZs and B lined our way to an empty Kidzville.







Uncle Kevin's school had a fundraiser at the San Jose Giants game. Our whole family went. As a bonus, my teaching partner took her family. The only downfall to our job share is that we don't see each other so I love time we do get to hang out. L, N (another Nanor) and R had a blast.



We experienced our first Pump It Up Junior party for A's Birthday Party. I'm sure you're not surprised to hear that Ruby was in heaven, didn't speak to us the entire time and was head over heals in love with Minnie Mouse. She took Minnie by the hand showing her around the jumpy house room. She even invited Minnie inside a jumpy house. Thanks for being a good sport when A's dad shoved your head through the little door Minnie!



After a nap and marathon play session with the neighbor kids, we rounded out the weekend with birthday dinner for Grandma. It was casual and fun but was extra special since it's been I don't know how many years that everyone was together for her birthday. By Sunday night, Ruby was a zombie. She was only upright because the couch was holding her there.



I had to work on Grandma O'Brien's real birthday so I left Ruby some money to take Grandma out for ice cream.



Word on the street is they ate it before lunch. What happens with Grandma, stays with Grandma =)

P.S. Thanks baby friends and baby friends' husbands for taking Ruby on rides at Great America. I'm not sure why it didn't occur to me I couldn't do it myself.

P.S.S. Ruby didn't want to take off her helmet after she played with her friends so she wore it to dinner, back home and upstairs for bath time. To each his own.

Monterey Bay Aquarium

Adam decided we should go to the Monterey Bay Aquarium over Memorial Day Weekend. He had a feeling it wouldn't be that busy and Grandma O'Brien had two free tickets. Perfect!

From start to finish, Ruby was a great kid. We offered to let her watch a movie on the drive down but she was perfectly happy playing and talking. She was excited when we finally arrived claiming to remember the last time we went. It was over two years ago so I highly doubt it but was glad she was excited.

I decided that it must be a little stressful and scary to go to things like that as a little kid. She spent most of the day surrounded by legs, getting bumped into and having us move her from place to place so she could see and be safe. In general I think that people aren't very respectful about personal space (ask my friend about the guy who nearly ran me over with the grocery cart when I was eight months pregnant) but it was out in full force that day. While we were making Ruby wait in line and take turns, grown ups cut, pushed kids out of the way at the touch pool, ignored general traffic patterns, etc. Oh, and don't even get me started on the parents who ignore their own children, push you to get the perfect photograph and let their entirely too old children go bananas in the toddler areas. As a teacher, it takes everything in me not to shout, "1, 2, 3 all eyes on me!" and make then line up, eyes forward with duck tail arms =)

Regardless, we had a fun day. Ruby wasn't that into the fish but loved the kid areas, statues and touch pools.







When it was time to leave, we let Ruby pick out a present from the gift shop. She picked a polar bear because she said the polar bear movie was her favorite part of the aquarium.





We're trying to reduce the amount of stuff she has but feel good thanking a kid who is in the car 24 minutes after she wakes up, drives two hours, walks around the aquarium, has lunch and drives home without putting up a single fight.