Birthday #6

After Thanksgiving, much of this past weekend was dedicated to birthday party preparations. At the same time, Jack has been in the process of installing our new kitchen island. Here, you can see past the party streamers to the island, which is veneered in mahogany.

A birthday party calls for...cupcakes, of course. We're now using Cherrybrook Kitchen products (egg-free, soy-free, all-natural), and the results are delicious. These cupcakes are topped with chocolate covered sunflower seeds (Trader Joe's), which are mighty addictive.

Sunday morning, Binbin was like a broken record, or scratched CD, or misfiring MP3 (if there is such a thing). Every 2-5 minutes: When are people gonna' get here? Answer: They're coming at one o'clock. So, the morning was filled with busy-decorating-work like: how about if you spell out a Happy Birthday message to yourself with blocks?

The goodie bags were neatly arranged on the sideboard, and the previous night, Binbin insisted on sleeping under the dining room table in order to make sure they stayed in good order, which they did!

Caption for picture below: When are people gonna' get here?

We set up our party plan in the living room. Here is it:

In case the printing is too small, we began with 6, then it became 7 and finally 8 Labors (modeled after Hercules' labors, which provide one legend for the origin of the Olympic Games). The first labor is: text-twist.

Binbin here using his fingers to help figure out letter order.

Here, Emma, Anja, Zoe, and Chase on the sofa with their thinking caps on.

Cooper comes up with winning words: I, a, & yap.

I don't have photographic evidence of the 2nd labor (word bingo), which required some emergency help from Lorraine because sometime between a month ago when inspiration hit and Binbin's party, I seemed to have misplaced about a dozen bingo cards. Anyway, with assistance also from moms Melinda and Kristin, everyone got a bingo...and subsequently moved on to the 3rd labor: the egg balance relay. Here, Zoe passes to Cam, while the gang cheers wildly.

The 4th labor was an egg hunt, with clues for finding a map that would lead to the minotaur along with a puzzle providing a clue to the location of a sword for slaying the minotaur. Anja took her turn and smiles for the camera while others work on the puzzle.

With sword in hand, the 5th labor was to find the minotaur, which Jack brilliantly made of paper mache and expertly hitched up our giant maple tree. The 6th labor is, of course, to slay the minotaur. Amy steadies the beast. Emma gave it the coup de grace, spilling the minotaur's guts, or candies, as the lucky kiddies would have it.

Our fine Olympians, crowned in laurels and wearing medals designed by Sebastien Lee Xiabin Kline, bask in their triumph.

Happy Birthday was sung; cupcakes were consumed; presents were opened; and raucous partying was had by all.

To Binbin's friends, thank you all for some awesome fun presents and thank you for coming to celebrate!

a costume? no, thank you.

As per usual, Binbin had nothing of that dressing-up-for-Halloween and trick-or-treating stuff. No, he would NOT carry a sword. No, he would NOT wear a fireman's hat. No, he would NOT. Well, it's perfectly possible to have a grand time without the props and the impersonation. How, you ask? Try the following:

1. Invite a friend whom you adore to come over for brunch (Amy will do just fine, thank you!)
2. Run around with said friend, creating cardboard vehicles, building forts, and freeing the world of pesky grown-ups.
3. Go shopping at the newly opened Trader Joe's in Portland (Yes, folks, believe it or not, TJ's has arrived!)
4. Purchase a new add-on for a favorite game (builders and traders for Carcassone...yippee!)
5. Decorate the house (light the jack o'lanterns, make an orange and black sign with the words, "Trick or Treat")
6. Keep a constant lookout for trick or treaters.
7. Alert parent with escalating incitements to "come quickly, come quickly, come quickly" and "hurry-up, they're coming" and "I see more kids, I'm running up the stairs to hide" and "no, YOU give out the candy"
8. Get a surprise visit from friend (Anya in her fabulous pink fairy get-up)

May visions of twizzlers and willy wonker's loffy toffy dance through your head!

eating autumn

Days are getting shorter, temps are cooler. We are filling up our stores for winter. Early this week, we picked up our pork share (half a piggy, bacon and smoked meat to come later). Our vegetable share is now filled with root vegetables (up to 18 pounds this week of potatoes, onions, daikon radishes, carrots, and beets) and some greens and cabbages. And yesterday, we picked up two turkeys, 17 pounds and 23 pounds, respectively. That makes forty pounds of bird!

Saturday, friends Rusty and Sarah hosted their annual cider pressing party, and we were (typical!) the first to arrive. They were still getting the press put together, but it wasn't long before we were dumping apples into the hopper and churning out apple mush to press into cider. Rusty's truck was loaded up with 20 bushels for the kids to put into buckets to bring into the garage. Binbin had a grand time with new friends, running around the yard and setting up base in the old chicken coop. Freshly made doughnuts kept everyone fueled up for the duration.

We cut out a bit early in order to make one more social stop to Dave and Irene's place where Dave was cooking up his buffalo wings. He even made a few "naked" (without the spicy sauce) for Binbin, who gobbled those up in no time. Delicious home-made deep-fried food times two! Is this what junk foodie heaven is like?

We went home well-fed and proceeded to...brine our 17-pound turkey. Yeah, we probably should have hit the sack, but we decided that we wanted to cook one of birds fresh. So, into the cooler it went...along with two cups of salt and plenty of water. I couldn't make it until midnight, so the bird came out of its salt water bath after only 2.5 hours. I dried it off, put is back into the cooler and set it into the breezeway until morning.

Well, I'm now won over to the brining and drying process because this bird was the most delicious turkey I've ever eaten. The skin (which was buttered and salted before going into the 425 degree convection roasting oven) came out like Peking Duck! Crisp and salty. While the meat was tender and moist. It had flavor without being gamey. Amazingly, since our oven runs like an oven on steroids, the 17 pound bird took a about 2 hours to cook! We invited friends to join us for 1 o'clock supper...well the bird came out of the oven at 11 am, and rested an extra long time. Fortunately, a bird that big stays warm a pretty long lime.

So, Thanksgiving dinner rehearsal was a success, and we learned some lessons along the way, so come late November we should have the timing better. We invited Binbin's friend Anja and her parents, Carl and Lorraine, to help us eat the turkey, gravy, cornbread stuffing, corn and peas (from this summer's CSA), cranberry sauce, and rolls. We never managed to get to the salad. Binbin and Anja played in our pile of leaves, before tromping in for baked apples, which Lorraine brought to share. Everything was delicious, and we were so happy to feast with friends.

livin' la vida acadia

This Columbus Day weekend was our third visit to Acadia National Park, off the coast of Maine, and it was a particularly special visit because...guess who came with us? Yeye and Nainai. Moreover, we celebrated Yeye's birthday on 10/10/10. It was auspicious and filled with chocolate cupcakes with vanilla frosting and colorful sprinkles. Here's Binbin doing his best Vanna White imitation



Here's the group effort blowing out the candles.



Our first two days in the park were spent doing hikes. The Acadia Mountain hike on the western side took us up for gorgeous views to the east and southeast. The hike is "moderate" according to our guide, and involved a fair amount of scrambling up boulders and rather steep descents. We had a nice lunch with good views before coming down. On Day Two we drove to the southeast corner to hike up from Sand Beach to Great Head. We were again rewarding with fantastic views for lunch. Our descent took us through rocky, dry terrain spotted with human-sized bonsai-looking pine trees. It felt like walking through the gardens of Kyoto at times. The fall color was at peak, and the hills were ablaze with reds, yellows, and oranges.

Our third day, we split up. Yeye and Nainai walked into Southwest Harbor to fetch lobsters (round two!), while we rented bicycles. Here's Jack and Binbin all set to start on the carriage trails to Aunt Betty's Pond and Eagle Lake.



Our first rest was at Aunt Betty's pond.



Our second, longer break was near the end our ride around Eagle Lake.





Time goes by quickly when you're having fun, and we had a lot of fun. This time, instead of camping out, we rented a cottage (The Veranda) at Anna's Quietside, just a three-minute walk from downtown Southwest Harbor. For Yeye and Nainai, the cottage offered creature comforts: hot water, full kitchen, a separate bathroom, and an outdoor, propane-fired lobster cooker! Binbin found good stuff in the hospitality suite, too: a bingo game (everyone played), various sizes of cars, wooden blocks, and wooden clothespins, which could be transformed with a little imagination into just about anything!

We made it home on Tuesday afternoon. This morning (Thursday), Nainai and Yeye headed home. We miss them already.

Since I haven't downloaded photos from my phone in ages...I found a few surprises with the Acadia snapshots.

Here is one of Binbin with friends Coco and Ellie one foggy morning in Boothbay Harbor. We're on our way to their island to catch crabs. That was in August!



And here's a picture from September: Baba's birthday!

getting well into fall

Has it been over a month since we last posted? Time is zooming by, isn't it?

On the big news front: Binbin is officially in kindergarten. And, even better, he loves it. He is so proud waiting for the bus with his way-too-big adult-size LL Bean back pack. Is it possible that we could feel even prouder of his enthusiasm?

Why the long silence? Chalk it up to enjoying life, immersing ourselves in the wonderfulness of fall.

One of our annual fall highlights is the Common Ground Fair, several days of hippy-dippy tree-hugging fun in the countryside of the aptly named town of Unity. This year, we camped two nights, and Binbin spent a lot of time running around with the neighbor kids, Oliver and his sister. By Saturday evening, he had run me into the ground, and I just crashed and burned, mustering just enough energy to take 2 doses of Children's Benadryl to help with the raging sinus headache and hay fever caused by all the dust! Sunday morning, Jack and I both came down with the cold that Binbin had brought home from school. We have been laying low this whole week, though Binbin was perky and ready to party by Monday noon! What is it about little kids and their ability to heal? I want some of that!

This weekend, Keena is hosting her annual pumpkin-and-harvest-day at the farm on Saturday, and I am hoping to run (and finish!) the half marathon in Portland on Sunday. I'll try to keep you all better posted.

Binbin's favorite things

Song to sing: little houses on a hillside...

Self-entertainment: reassembling Legos into imaginary fighting machines

Foods: broccoli, haddock

Treats: Hershey's, fruity gummies

Family activity: camping

Veg-out TV show: Wipeout on Hulu

Art activity: making pinatas

Colors: black, brown, grey, white, silver, red

Books: Harry Potter, Clone Wars character encyclopedia

Chore: getting the mail (if there's something in the mail for Binbin)

A witty turn of phrase for a five year old...

"You are the whole mama in the best world." -Binbin

home again, jiggety jig

We've been back home in Lisbon Falls, Maine, for about a week and a half now. We had a fantastic road trip to Rockford, Illinois to visit Yeye and Nainai. There were a lot of highlights...here are just a few.

At the top of Binbin's list was: getting not one but two legos. Upon our arrival, Yeye whisked him up to his room, and on top of his bed, he saw Creationary. And if that wasn't absotively posilutely great, Yeye took him to the Lego Discovery Center, and he picked out the Armored Assault Tank, aka, the AAT. What more could a little boy want?

Rockford isn't known as a tourist destination, but it has its share of good family fun. Jack was especially thrilled to see the Show of Shows, featuring Rockford's own drum and bugle corps, The Phantom Regiment. Here is a brief introduction to 2008 video of a winning performance. And one sunny day, we also watched demonstrations at the Rock Valley R/C Flyers club.

The road to Rockford took us through lakeside town of Union Pier, Michigan, where Chris and Joelle call home these days. Binbin spent days splashing in Lake Michigan with Eli and Lexie, and evenings catching fireflies and shooting rounds of foam ammo. We feasted on local organic blueberries and homemade yogurt. Dee-lish! We're so glad to have had the chance to catch up and spend time with old friends.

Now, the days are still warm and sunny, but there's sometimes a nip in the air, telling us that fall is on the way. On Friday, our CSA share was all that your family could eat in beans, cukes, squash, herbs, plus 6 ears of corn. Friday night, we made pesto (with freshly roasted sunflower seeds to substitute for pine nuts). Saturday, we made maple granola (last week we had a bit of a scare, as Binbin's eyes swelled alarmingly. we think he reacted to the locally made granola, which might of used commercially roasted sunflower seeds!), and canned dilly beans. Sunday, with more experience on the canning front, we did 7 more jars of beans, plus we made a two-bean salad. After all that, we *still* have about 4 pounds of beans to process! Both Jack and I have profound new respect for folks who can.

After returning, we reconnected with our friends here, and Binbin had playdates with Amy, then Robbie, then Coco/Ellie/Augie, then Anja. Other playtime has been spent playing Carcassonne, a strategy building game with tiles. Binbin routinely bests both Jack and me.

trippin'

We're on Day 5 of our road trip, arrived in Rockford, affectionately Rock Vegas, yesterday afternoon. Binbin has just exhumed from the basement depths a cardboard treasure box of old toys, containing Jack's old miniature plastic soldiers. The happy little boy has been on a roll. Yesterday Yeye led Binbin up to his room where...voila...the much longed-for Lego Creationary game lie atop his bed. His cup runneth over.

Our journey to the midwest began Monday morning. Jack and I caught a few more Z's after the town siren sounded around 2:30 am. Jack's own alarm chimed at 3:30. We packed our last remaining items (cooler snacks and bed pillows), before rousing Binbin for the drive to Cleveland. Yup, you heard right: Lisbon Falls, Maine to Cleveland, Ohio in one day. We eased the car out of the garage right on schedule: 4 a.m. Binbin, amazingly, sat awake in the back until about quarter to five. He and Jack snoozed until 7 or so, when we made our first pitstop. A second, longer stop came in Bennington, where we ate at the historic Blue Benn diner. It was nostalgic for me (I ate there with fellow students while studying art history at Williams), and delicious for everyone.

The rest of the drive included only brief stops for gas, picnic lunch, and bathroom. We rolled into the Holiday Inn in East Cleveland area around 6 pm. Unpacked a few things, had a simple dinner of fried chicken, then enjoyed a relaxing swim. Cable TV kept Binbin entertained (when jumping from bed to bed didn't), and we had a nice sleep.

Tuesday's drive brought us to Chris and Joelle's place in Union Pier, Michigan for a 2-day visit. It didn't take long before Binbin and Eli were as thick as thieves ("Wanna' go catch fireflies?!" "Yeah!"). Lexi joined in and held her own against the two older boys. On Wednesday, we had a fantastic day at the beach on Lake Michigan. Joelle's cousin taught Binbin to look for Crinoids, a fossil found commonly on the shores of Lake Michigan (see crinoids). He quickly became a pro fossil hunter and we now have a collection of fossils that looks like a package of smarties; they're small and round with a hole in the middle.

Thursday we woke reasonably early and we all went back down to the beach to enjoy the morning before we got back in the car to Yeye and Nainai's house. The Lake decided to show us some of its variety and kicked up some nice waves that everyone enjoyed. Mama got knocked over by one wave while holding Lexi in one hand and Binbin in the other. They all got wet and had a good laugh about it.

Our ride to Yeye and Nainai's was uneventful except for a bit of traffic through Chicago. Binbin has settled into his temporary home and has decided to sleep in his own room rather than in Mama and Baba's room. (Although we love him dearly, it kind of nice to have a bit of a break.)

Playdate with Anja

Binbin's new friend, Anja, invited us all out to her Pepe and Mimi's lakeside home for a super fun-filled playdate. Here they are in Pepe's speedboat. The first ride was definitely speedy, as Anja spurred her Pepe on with shouts of: "Faster, Pepe, faster!" The second ride was a more leisurely troll around Thompson Lake.




Part of the afternoon was spent on a little sandy beach. While Anja practiced some swimming skills, Binbin quickly took to catching minnows. He netted over two dozen, sometimes catching three in one swoop.

Bath Heritage Days ferris wheel

The city of Bath on Merrymeeting Bay hosts Heritage Days every July 4th weekend. We drove up early Friday evening to catch a ride on the ferris wheel. The view is pretty great, as you can look over the freeway, the bridges, and down into Bath Ironworks.

summer adventures

On one of our mother-son summer adventures, Binbin and I went down to Two Lights State Park. Binbin had just picked up a Maine State Parks "passport," with pages for stamping your visit to each of Maine's 48 state parks. The first snapshot has him making a goofy face at the little playground, which featured an interactive wheel of truth. You make a statement like: "I'm the most awesome Mama in the whole world" or "I'm really really good at Legos" and then give the wheel a spin. It responds with "right on!" or "kinda" or "nah!"





The rocky terrain at Two LIghts is pretty spectacular. We picked up schist (?) and bragged, "I'm so strong like a superhero that I can break rocks with my bare hands!"



Here' Binbin taking a closer look at a natural quarry.



AFter our time at Two Lights, we realized that, despite the name, there were no lighthouses to be explored in this state park, so we drove up to Portland Headlight to get a closer look. Well, that light is a working light, so there is no public access. Still, we had fun, ate a snack, and Binbin posed with the lighthouse for this photo.

and now, for some random shots

What do you do with random pics that are significant in some little way? Well, when you're 5 years old, there aren't categories or genres, and anything can go with anything. It's just that simple, and why not? So here are three random pics from about a month or two ago.

Holger, Claire, Julian & Adrian come to visit

Way back in March, or was it April? If it didn't happen yesterday, I pretty can't remember. But what I do remember is that we had a fantastic visit with Holger, Claire, Julian & Adrian. It was a beautiful day when we all headed out to Reid State Park beach for a picnic.



Later that week, we had to have Maine's finest crustaceans for supper, excepting Binbin and Jack, who declined in favor of steak.



Adrian was an indulgent big brother to Binbin. And they played and played...and...



then they passed out.

Binbin then, Binbin now

"Binbin's yoda collection in the mouth"
-written by Binbin

Binbin's switched from plain wooden blocks to rubbery yoda puppet, but some things never change!
-written by Mama

Binbin Superhero 1 and 2

Binbin, like many little 5 year olds out there, is way into superheroes. Some of his favorite superheroes include: Spiderman, Batman, and Ironman. He's got superhero T-shirts, the Ironman glass, and has watched Batman and Ironman movies. Inspired, he began constructing all sorts of things to wear, just like Ironman and Batman. Here are the results:




For fun today, he also put on Baba's motorcycle gear, which also makes him into a superhero form. Watch out, bad guys!

Summer! at last!

You may not remember, but we (and all of our fellow Mainers) certainly do, the gloom that engulfed our state for most of June and July last year. So, it's been nothing less than euphoric to experience summer at last! We've had several days already in the high 80s, bright sun, fluffy clouds, and blue sky. Sometimes, truth be told, it did get a little too hot. Like on Father's Day, when Binbin invited Yeye and Baba and the rest of us to the Portland Seadog's game. I thought it was pretty hot for about 80 degrees. Well, that's because is was really 89! We sat under the full might of the sun for much of the first five innings, wilting even as we consumed cupfuls of ice. We didn't stay to see the home team lose to Akron; but we did enjoy the fan support for one of the Chinese-American players: Ray Chang.

There's lots more to share about our summertime adventures, and I hope to put up some pictures, too. (I told Binbin part of our afternoon would be spent downloading, then uploading pics from his new Bean camera, which Ah-gong and Ah-po gave him!) For now, I want to tell about this weekend, which is fresh (literally) in my mind.

In the summertime, we get our produce from Little Ridge Farm, about 2 miles down the road from us. Keena runs the farm, but this weekend she and Zach are on vacation on Block Island, so they asked us to harvest the first bunch of ripe shell peas...600 feet worth of plants! We headed out early morning yesterday and today, so as to avoid the heat of the mid-day sun. And, it was glorious, pure and simple. Binbin helped pick peas from time to time, then he would scamper off to run around and explore the farm. There's much to see and do. Freddy the cat kept him company, and showed him a secret room in the underbrush. Dora and Dudley ducks have hatched 7 fluffy brown ducklings. Dora is the protective father. When Binbin got too near his precious little ones, he would stick his head out down low, tense his wings to the rear, then waddle headlong at top speed to chase Binbin away! It was so funny! We visited Keena's baby turkeys this morning, and they seemed to have matured almost overnight, trading much of their downy softness for tiny versions of mature turkey feathers. A couple of them spread out their tail and wing feathers and strutted around the makeshift nursery, practicing to be top turkey.

This morning, we also stopped to pick raspberries...again the first of the season. The branches reached out from row to row, heavy with green fruit, making a prickly maze for us to negotiate. It's hard to imagine that just two years ago, these bushes were but bare sticks in the ground that we helped Keena to surround with mulch and to water. The raspberries have a wonderful perfume, and even the pinkish ones that Binbin says he prefers have that flavor, just without the sugar.

With our Little Ridge Farm share, and this fantastically warm weather (global warming?), we have feasted ourselves on: lettuce, tatsoi, another variety of bok choy, Japanese turnips, spinach, shell peas, snow peas, and last season's rutabaga (Yeye liked that!). We've topped off our healthy veggies with strawberry-rhubarb crisp and tartlets. Jack has also discovered a remarkable cheese, a goat's cheese with an ash rind, called Clair de Lune made by Spring Day Creamery in nearby Durham. It's got a liquid creamy center (like a truffle) and a blue cheese finish.

We hope you are all having a great summer, doing fun things and eating fresh foods!

mad-eye moody

Yesterday, Binbin woke up with a puffy right eye (see pic). Question: what caused it? What is... a) conjunctivitis (aka pink eye), b) a kiddy brawl over ice cream at Cote's, or c) a black fly bite.


If you guessed (a), you are in good company with the nurse who called and left a message on our answering machine after we left the house for the doctor's office, but you would be wrong. If you guessed (b), you like the same kind of tall tales that Jack does. If you guessed (c), you're right! For a gift, you may choose from a mesh protector for your face or a sample of deet or a tiny no-see'um black fly swatter! Enjoy the long weekend!

"Course opinions" vs. "Student evaluations"

Well, it's May, and close to the end of the spring semester for many colleges and universities.

Binbin found a pile of old, unused course evaluations and while we were reading bedtime stories one evening, he went to work. You'll see the results right here. He went to office hours 50 times. He received an average grade of 4 on his first two papers. And, he expects to receive a grade of 110 in this course. How is that possible?

Perhaps it's the kind of logic that comes of having attended only 10% of the classes, while meeting with the professor 50 times outside of class.

If nothing else, he put 110% effort into this exercise. ;)

kindergarten screening

It was Binbin's "audition" for kindergarten, and he was a bundle of nerves. The idea of interacting with complete strangers, possibly or quite probably apart from Mama and Baba, was terrifying. I coaxed him out of the car and into the hallway of the community K-5 school, but that was as far as I could get him for about 10 minutes. He occasionally forgot his fear as curiosity led him a few feet down one hallway, but we returned to our "nest" the bench. Fortunately, an experienced administrator gently suggested entering through a door adjacent to the kindergarten wing. I wasn't at all sure it would work...Binbin had even rejected a trip to Target as I desperately thought of ways to entice him (forcing him to go would have doomed the whole kindergarten thing). But, it did! Hurrah! An expert kindergarten teacher nudged him into the P.E. "testing room" (the tests consisted of throwing and catching a spongy ball, running and jumping), and once he had an activity (like a dog sighting a squirrel), he was as right as rain. As I spoke with teacher and nurse, Binbin was led through his paces: hearing test, eye test, small motor coordination, basic knowledge of colors, shapes, letters. Afterward, he denied all hesitation ("I was brave!"), but remembered the Target offer.

15 minutes later, we were finally on our way to preschool, with Space Police vehicle and Squidman in hand. Victory is ours.

My report

The following is the report dictated by Binbin yesterday morning, first thing in the morning:

a. wear glasses

b. wear stones

c. eat healthy

d. grow strong

e. wear clothes

f. eat fish

That's my report!

[now it's up to you to follow through!]

what we'll miss

About a year ago or so, when Binbin's Lego obsession first bloomed, he was still a little young. His little fingers could work the bigger pieces with ease, but he called on Baba for help with the smaller ones. He sometimes needed additional guidance following the instructions, too. Like any little kid with a new toy, Binbin was impatient to complete the Lego projects. He would say, come on Baba, no, not that one, that one. Or he would say, emphatically, I know! But of course Jack loved putting things together with Binbin. Jack would observe, proudly, that with every project, Binbin got better and quicker. He also observed that he would be sad the day that Binbin no longer needed his help.

The day has come. Binbin can do Lego projects for the 8, 11, even 14 year olds with little or no input! It came sooner than we expected.

Today was a fine day. Blue skies, a few clouds, lots of sunshine. We basked in the warmth. We dragged out green, blow-up, frog pool down from the above garage storage. Binbin and I scrubbed away last year's grime; Jack connected the air compressor and filled it. Binbin stripped down and unabashedly jumped in. He got out a couple of spray bottles, and proceeded to spend the next hour stalking his parents around the yard.

I'm going to be sad when the the day comes when Binbin has grown up and ceases to run around buck naked.

Holger, Claire, Julian, and Adrian

Jack's buddy from college, Holger, and his fam are visiting us for a couple of days, and Binbin has been having the time of his life. Before their arrival on Monday evening, he confided to me that he "can't wait until Holger, Claire, Julian, and Adrian come." Since then, Binbin has been following Adrian around like a puppy, and from time to time, we hear updates about how he can't find the "other brother." We've been treated to much drumming by the the boys, and Holger and Claire treated us to a sushi feast last night.

The boys all went to the indoor climbing gym yesterday afternoon. Julian climbed on and off between reading; Adrian muscled his way to the top of many a rope; and prodded on my Adrian's heights, Binbin pushed himself higher. Binbin also thrilled to be the Adrian's photographer: love the camera, baby!

We played "old buttermaid" (i.e., old maid) last night; and Binbin's not-so-poker-face kept everyone in stitches laughing.

hobbies

Binbin has been demonstrating more active engagement in his drum lessons and in practicing (at least over the past 3 days), and so he has earned a much coveted reward: a tank model of his very own. And, it's not a snap together kind, but one that must be painstakingly painted and glued together with care. He has devoted much of his weekend time to working on it, with Baba supervising at the kitchen table.

We took a short break on Sunday afternoon to hear a concert by Whiffletree over at Two Echo. A pair of farming brothers from Maine. Check these guys out. You can say that you were a fan well before their big Hollywood break.

what we're reading

Jack:
Shop Class as Soulcraft
Thinking Institutionally
Xunzi

De-nin:
Davis' translation of Ouyang Xiu's History of the Five Dynasties
When China Rules the World
Topophilia
Fup (again)

Binbin:
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
Lego magazine

Also, last night we went to see the local performance of the Woodside One Wheelers, who will be performing the DC Cherry Blossom Festival. Check them out: http://www.woodsideonewheelers.org/

poem and variation #1 (or is #2 more apropos?)

Binbin is a fan of "Flamingos on the Roof," a collection of poems by Calef Brown who writes and paints in Brunswick. He's memorized the following:

Peas peek out of the pod
They ponder, they whisper, they nod
Everything is new
The sky is a dazzling blue
The wind is in the willow trees
The sun is on the sod
Peas peek out of the pod

The variation, inspired by his obsession with potty language, is:

Peas peek out of the poop
They poop, they pee, they fart
Everything is poop
The sky is a dazzling poop
The wind is in the potty
The sun in on the toilet
Peas peek out of the poop

[They say this stage will "pass," right?]

favorite things

Binbin has settled into the whole being a five-year-old thing, which means he's got a hold of physical and communication skills, but raring to get to the next new thing. Usually that involves testing boundaries, and something tells me that this is the brave new world that we'll be in until 2025.

Onto the favorite things:

new nicknames: bobbi for baba; mommy for mama
Harry Potter: finished reading books 1 and 2; cruised through movies 1, 2, and 3 in a weekend
addition flashcards (the anti-favorite is subtraction, "too hard")
"I don't like you" and "I hate you" to express frustration and anger (we all need to vent sometimes, right?)
playing star wars, ambushing parents with his light saber
playdates with Amy, Cameron, Ian, Coco
"battle" (world war ii reenactments on the computer, it's Americans against the Germans, this time let's be the Germans, disc 2 has the Russians against the Germans)
Being right (some things never change)
Eating candy
Sleeping in the buff
Sleeping in his new North Face sleeping bag
black, white, silver, and brown

Not so favorite and "I'm over it" things:

the color lime green
drum lessons
leaving the house on the weekends (playdates are an exception)


Just discovered:

images projected from a slide projector -- hey! it's like a movie!

Jedi Binbin in training

Binbin has been working hard at his jedi training. Here is just a taste of his new moves. (Sometimes jedi drop their light sabers during training.)