While Erin’s Been Away

Good morning, little giraffe. Apologies for the grain. Bad light + iPhone front cam.

Erin’s been way far away for the past week—as in other side of the Atlantic far away—doing all kinds of indescribably awesome things. Alice and I have been up to a few adventures of our own. Much smaller, Alice-sized adventures.

The teary goodbyes by the stars

Before Erin left, I made up a list of all of the things Alice and I could do to keep ourselves busy throughout the days. Because I’d be the solo parent for multiple days on end, I wanted a deep bullpen of activities we could look forward to, and not have to think things up on the fly, or when Alice was melting down. And hey, it really did the trick. We’ve had a remarkably easy, and very fun week together. I was pretty sure we’d be fine here on our own, but you just never know how a toddler will be this week...or next.

The first couple of days were spent near home, running things as usual, and preparing for my parents to arrive to give me a break. They were here helping for a few days and got some quality, uninterrupted Alice time, and didn’t have to share her with anyone else. That’s rare the way we usually all get together.

I looked after this guy while the grandparents took Alice on a little walk. The bed in this house is a bit smaller than the ones at his home.

When the grandparents loaded up the RV and left the driveway Monday, it was just me and Alice again. By this point, I had more things on my list than days left, so we just started ticking them off.

My list:

• The zoo
• Our music class on Wednesdays
• Make cookies (we both enjoy cookies to an unhealthy level...I can keep her at bay, but I’m a lost cause)
• Travel Town
• Bike rides
• The park
• Bubbles in the back yard

Tuesday morning, we loaded up and went to the zoo. But first we made a stop at Snookie’s Cookies. I’d conceded we probably wouldn’t have time to make the cookies, so this would have to do. We saw all of our favorites—the neeks, tigers, giraffes, snow leopards (my fav.), and all the monkeys we could find! We attempted a ride on the carousel, well I bought three carousel tokens in anticipation. Alice kept saying leh-perd, leh-perd as shopped the selection of animal saddles. Just as last time, when she instantly regretted her giraffe selection, she could not have been more displeased with her snow leopard choice.

Eating a little cookie by the water fountain at the zoo, up close with Billy the elephant, studying this rattle snake, and one crocodile sleeping with his snack!

Days were tricky to juggle. Our activities were bite sized and we timed them to fit between meals, naps, and the Skype-ing we did with Erin every day at noon. It’s been a mad dash to get home to answer the video phone every day, but neither of us would miss it for the world, it just took a little bit of planning and hustling.

Wednesday was an even bigger day. We went to our rec. center music class in the morning. Alice is really into drumming and these colored squares of silk right now. It’s practically the only thing she talks about all week in between. She remembers which color she had at the last class, and even what color I had. She’s starting to pick up on the little songs and games quite a bit now. I sing her little cues during the day and she knows what happens next. That’s just the coolest thing to see happen. 

We rushed home to talk with mama after class, had lunch, and then hopped back into the car to go and visit my coworkers in the office. I don’t seem to make it out there very often (can’t imagine why?!), but this time there was another reason to visit: the Van Nuys airport public observation/play area. My company’s offices are directly adjacent to the Van Nuys airport—something that was never wasted on me when I made that daily commute. I’d spend breaks and lunches out at the fence watching the activity. It was pretty great. 

The Van Nuys airport is the busiest general aviation airport in the world, and the 25th busiest airport in the world by number of takeoffs and landings. The quantity and variety of aircraft at this airport is really unmatched any place. Sit in this park for ten minutes, and you’ll see ten different airplanes, helicopters, or corporate jets moving in a nearly endless parade. This airport is one of the few remaining that really appreciates its heritage and fosters good will toward the next generation. Enter, the public observation area. Complete with covered picnic areas, benches, an accurate airport diagram painted on the ground for the kiddies to run on, and for the big kids to see just where taxiway bravo is, historical displays, and they pipe in the live air traffic control communications so you can follow along with what you’re seeing, or about to see if you pay attention to it all closely enough.

Alice holding short of the world famous runway one six right, on her takeoff roll, and playing with the airport vehicle cutouts.

This is how close the action is. Here’s the fence, then a service road, then the main eastern taxiway toward the runway. Alice got to learn just how loud corporate jets are up close. I was afraid this might have freaked her out to the point of meltdown, but she was easily redirected to the play areas, and happy as a clam again. We’ll bring hearing protection next time!

And finally, this morning I learned the Play Me, I’m Yours public piano installation all around LA was in its final day before they pick them all up again. I’ve been meaning to make it out to at least one of the thirty painted pianos while they were on display, but like many things, time slipped away. But this was our chance. We were on a adventure hot streak this week, so I found one we could bike to this morning. And since we went early in the morning, we had the whole thing to ourselves! Alice had a look of confusion about it. Like, “why is this outside?” and “I can just go up to it and play it?” Alice is a pretty shy girl out in public and generally respects obvious boundaries, like of course dad would tell me not to touch that. I urged and helped her up onto the bench and off she went. Plink, plink, plink.

We only made it to one piano, but this guy did something really cool. Here’s the Promenade from Pictures at an Exhibition on all thirty of them and cut it together.

So that’s been our week so far. We’re in the homestretch of Erin’s trip and the grandparents are back to help us to the finish line. It’s been a fun time just me and her. While I think Erin would half way like to hear that we’re lost without her, I’m sure she’s so much happier to hear that we’re fully functioning people having and actually pretty good time here passing the time until she returns.

Final score:

• The zoo
• Our music class on Wednesdays
• Make cookies (kinda)
• Travel Town (maybe next time)
• Bike rides
• The park
• Bubbles in the back yard

P.S. Alice loves Simon’s Cat’s new kitten friend.

Where’s Mama? (Video)

Be more adventurous...

"I read with every broken heart we should become more adventurous..."

Rilo Kiley, More Adventurous (Let Me Be Loved)

Alice & I say goodbye before I get in the car to the airport. And before I cry a bunch.

Dear Alice,

I'm writing this from seat 29C, on a plane (an Airbus 346) somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean, just East of Greenland. I am en route to Munich, and then on to Oslo to spend eight amazing days traveling through Norway on a business trip. I found out I was going on Wednesday morning, the plane left on Thursday night. This is truly an opportunity of a lifetime, one I may never get again.

I've been planning this trip for my team for six weeks or so, never expecting that I would be one of the travelers. Some of them asked if I would accompany them, and we all joked about it, but the reality is that this is not something I would get to do under normal circumstances. But circumstances are hardly ever normal.

If I were childless - and definitely if I were single - I would have thrown my hat into the ring when I began planning this trip, offering my services to guide the group from place to place. But I knew it was unlikely I would get to go, and I couldn't volunteer myself to fly so far away from you and your dad, for so many days. I think that the circumstances under which I find myself on this plane are probably the only way I could have convinced myself to do this and having such a short amount of time to pack and prepare was probably the only way I could have managed it, emotionally. It was so much easier to say I couldn't go when I didn't think that it was even an option for me to go.

I want you to know that this decision was hard for me to make. Probably harder than it should have been or needed to be. I cried about it, a lot. I'm not afraid of missing you, nor you missing me, though both break my heart a little bit. I'm afraid of voluntarily choosing to do something that keeps me from you if and when you need me - or worse, forever. I want you to know what an agonizing decision that was for me, especially when you are still so very, very young. If I don't return home safely to you, you won't even remember me. And that really breaks my heart.

But I also want you to be braver than I am, and more adventurous. I want you to know in your heart, like I do not (though everyone reminds me), that you can't live your life making decisions based on the worst case scenario. You must always judge the risks and the benefits, but I want you to choose adventure and opportunity without having to cry and agonize over it. 

This trip will be an amazing adventure and I have absolutely no reason to think that I won't return safely. But if I don't, I want you to know that you and your dad were my first priority, my only reservation about leaving. Because the more you have, the more you have to lose, and you both are my whole world. 

I'm so thankful that video phones are no longer a Jetsons/sci-fi fantasy, and the miracle of modern technology will let me see your sweet face every day that I'm gone. I hope you don't miss me too much while I'm away. I promise to bring you back something really, really nice. And if I break your heart, promise me that instead of letting it cripple you with fear, you will become more adventurous. Because you should do as much as you can with your one precious life, even if your decisions scare you sometimes. 

Dreaming of...

Spring has arrived and I'm dreaming of a few things to sweeten up my wardrobe and my morning cup of tea.

fig. 1 - this juicy pink j.crew summer scarf
fig. 2 - morse code bracelets and necklaces from COATT
fig. 3 - butter LONDON non-toxic nail lacquer in Snog
fig. 4 - Kelly Moore "2 Sues" camera purse in raspberry
fig. 5 & 6 - Bensimon ballerine flats in Violine and tennis elastique in Rose Vif
fig. 7 - Fortnum & Mason Jubilee tea and caddy
fig. 8 - Harney & Sons SoHo tea blend: chocolate and coconut - yum!
fig. 9 - Aquaovo Therm-O double-walled glass vessel with tea/flavor strainer
fig. 10 - 'lette macarons. I'll take salted caramel, caribbean chocolate, coconut, colombian coffee, madagascar vanilla, sicilian pistachio, sweet wedding almond, earl grey tea, and rose. thanks!

Easter Egg Hunting (Video)

Easter Egg Hunting from Growing Up Senge on Vimeo.

Easter

We had a nice, low-key Easter weekend this year with not much more than a dozen prettily dyed eggs, one small egg hunt, and a nice breakfast of blueberry scones and grapefruit. Alice tried her hand at dyeing eggs for the first time. I think she enjoyed dropping the eggs in the cups more than anything else...

On Easter morning, we had to have our hunt nice and early so we could have some eggs for breakfast. I would have let Alice hunt in her jammies, but the grass was still wet and shoes over jammies just looks silly. But Alice is always happy to get dressed up, which always makes for egg-stra cute photos! Sorry, I couldn't resist a good yoke. Ah! Somebody stop me!!

We posed for a quick photo and then she was off to find her first egg. She definitely didn't get the concept of looking for "hidden" eggs, so it's a good thing the Easter Bunny laid them all in pretty obvious spots! And without further ado, here are one million photos of our egg hunt. Because I have neither the time, nor the fortitude to edit them down. But really, which one would YOU omit???

Look, there's one!

Look out, don't step on it!

Where? Oh, here?

I got it!

I think might be my favorite shot.

Yeh-woah.

pretty, pretty.

even the aftermath is pretty.

And this guy had to make sure everything passed the sniff-test.

Yep, these eggs check out.

I hope your weekend was full of prettiness and cute kids and traditions and family and all the sweet things that make our holidays special and meaningful.

P.S. Jon would like to point out that we have a lawn now. Which came in pretty handy, since our town canceled their usual Easter Egg Hunt apparently due to parental aggression, along with a bunch of other towns across the country. Bummer. 

Senge Family Reunion Weekend 2012: Tucson

Last weekend, we headed out to Tucson for a Senge Family Reunion weekend. We were anticipating dreading eight hours of total driving time with Alice so we planned to stop about every two hours to give her a break, if necessary. The best part of that plan was that our first stop was a magical place I have dreamed of visiting ever since I saw The Wizard when I was nine? ten? I watched that masterpiece on Netflix a while ago (maybe on maternity leave, I can't remember), and it really is a great relic of the '80s cinema of my youth.

Behold. The dinosaurs.

Seeing their imposing visages rising majestically out of the desert made me ridiculously excited. Seriously, I was squealing with glee. I'm glad that Alice won't have any memory of this visit so I can have an excuse to go back someday, specifically to spend more time with these dinos. And maybe outlet shopping...

I wish I'd thought to rewatch the movie, or at least that pivotal scene, before we headed out there and maybe even taken "then and now POV" photos but in retrospect, I'm kind of glad I didn't. The vision in my head was definitely straight out of the movie, with giant dinos surrounded by desert scrub. The reality is that today, you pass a huge outlet mall on your way from the freeway exit to the dinos and then a Burger King and park and parking lot surrounding them. They no longer have that aura of iconic roadside attraction, nor the photographic appeal. We'd hoped to arrive around sunrise (for awesome photos) but left an hour later than originally planned, which turned out ok because the photo ops weren't that great (and I forgot my wide angle lens). We'll definitely have to go back though, because the "attractions" weren't open for business and I wasn't able to live out my dream of walking inside a dinosaur. 

We let Alice run around for a little bit, while I kept my eye out for like, used needles and condoms (no evidence of such, it just kind of seemed like that kind of place...), and then hopped back in the car for the next two-hour stretch to Blythe. We had a quick snack/potty/stretch break and then it was back in the car. And in case you weren't yet convinced that we are crazy people, I present Exhibit A:

Yes. Those are the miniature effigies of our cats that travel with us. I originally bought them to include in the bag of new toys we brought to entertain Alice en route to Orlando, and she took quite a liking to them. They now live in my purse, because ... I can't even answer that. Anyway, they ended up on our dashboard for the rest of the drive. 

We brought Alice's toy tote and it actually kept her entertained the longest when she had it on her lap. She spent a good long time putting things in and out, and she was more interested when she could pull out an item than if I tried to hand things to her. So we let her do that. For miles and miles and miles. And she was great. She'd start to fuss a bit just as we were approaching our next planned stop, and we were usually able to explain that we were just a few minutes away, etc. And then, in true Alice fashion, she fell asleep JUST as we were about to exit the freeway for our Tucson destination. We had to stop by the grocery store before heading to the hotel and I hoped that she'd sleep while Jon ran in to shop, but no. Of course she woke up as soon as he got out of the car. So I entertained a painfully sleepy child for a good twenty minutes by making her giraffe dance on her head and pop out from behind her car seat. I am skilled in the ways of distracting/entertaining a toddler.

So we got to Tucson in about eight hours of driving time, about ten hours door-to-door, counting our stops. Which is about exactly what we'd planned. And it wasn't miserable! Success!!

We got settled into our hotel room right away and met up with the other early-arrival Senges for a casual dinner. The next day was a planned "travel/arrival" day, with no scheduled activities, so we took advantage of the lovely weather and the hotel pool to take Alice's new swimsuit on a maiden voyage.

 

I didn't get any shots of her walking to the pool, but man alive, she is just too cute. I mean, the grin! The bangs and ponytail!! The cheeks and thighs! The hat and sunglasses!! It's all just too much.

There was a CVS in the same plaza as our hotel, so we toddled on over there first thing in the morning to stock up on a few items we I forgot to pack (deodorant, duh!) and Alice refused to leave without that ball. And I refused to leave without the chocolate Cadbury eggs, which are amazingly delicious and amazingly rare, and were on sale 2 for $1. 

After the pool, we walked down the street a ways to have a nice happy hour lunch at Blanco in the lovely La Encantada mall. The pool and the sun and the stroll really tuckered Alice out and she surprised us all by drifting off to sleep just as we were walking up to the mall (but as I type that, it makes perfect sense). So we parked her at our table and let her snooze while we enjoyed some amazing blood orange margaritas. Yummmmm. 

The rest of the weekend was a lot of hanging out with family (and a lot of eating, of course!) with some fun field trips. Jon's "My-Cousin-Dana" arranged for us to tour her office at the National Park Service's Western Archaelogical and Conservation Center where she is a conservator. It was totally fascinating, but I had to spend most of the tour entertaining Alice and keeping her hands far, far away from the priceless and delicate historical objects. I was able to keep Alice quite mainly by letting engage in one of her favorite beauty rituals: smearing chapstick all over her face. The WACC doesn't usually allow kids under 12 (16?) on the tours, but kindly made an exception for Auntie-My-Cousin-Dana's youngest family member. There was one fairly hilarious moment when the director of the repository was talking about a collection of shells and she mentioned a particular shell from a bi-valve and Alice shouted out "byeeeee." I had no idea she was paying such close attention, I thought she was totally engrossed her chapstick. 

We had a lovely dinner at Tavolino, and Alice got to wear her new dress and headband. The hotel offered a complimentary "manager's happy hour" and morning breakfasts, where Alice discovered the wonders of ice water with lemon, and a straw. She talks about it all the time and if we say we're going somewhere to eat, it's the first thing she mentions. She often asks for ice in her cup at home, and a lemon, and I have to tell her that we have none. Maybe I should fix that...

Grandpa has his lap full!

On the last proper reunion day, we all headed out of town to the Sonora Desert Museum right in the Saguaro National Park. The drive offered a really impressive view, especially coming over the hill from Tucson and winding your way down into the saguaros. 

Though technically a museum, the mostly outdoor botanical and zoological gardens were really beautiful and well-presented. We arrived just in time for the "Raptor Free Flight" and gathered along a pathway while ravens, raptors and owls swooped overhead. Alice was pretty into it, even extending her hand just like the trainer, offering the birds another place to land. She seemed kind of disappointed that none of them obliged, which was really for the best! We had promised her that there would be "gubs" and "neeks" at the museum, which was all she could talk about if you mentioned the museum. We actually told her we were going to the zoo, so after she talked about gubs and neeks, so started naming all the other animals we normally visit at the L.A. Zoo. But I was pretty sure we weren't going to see giraffes and elephants in this desert... Anyway, part way through the raptor flight, she gave me the "all done" hands and asked for the gubs and neeks. So after the show, we made straight for the snakes.  I didn't get a good shot, but she totally charmed a giant rattle snake and made him dance. Maybe she's a parselmouth? 

Alice peers at some rock-dwelling reptile.

Here are a few of the better shots I got of the birds in the show. If you scroll through these, there is one more anecdote and photo from the tail end of our trip...

The raven.

it's hard to focus on an owl diving straight for your head, but it's a cool shot anyway.

So beautfiul.

Look at those gorgeous wings and feathers.

Who-hoo-hoo-WHO, hoo-hoo-WHO.

This isn't what they are DOING when they are making their distinctive screech, but doesn't this just LOOK like a screech??

comin ATCHA!

So by the end of our Tucson weekend, Alice was exhausted as you are now, after looking through all of those photos. She woke up crying in the middle of the night on Saturday, only two hours after Jon and I had gone to bed, and she was essentially inconsolable. We tried a diaper change, a snack, potty, etc., she was just totally uncooperative and kept screaming and crying, and saying "go?" "go?" while trying to open the door. Jon finally managed to get her back to sleep, so WE could go back to bed. We were lucky to squeeze in another four hours of sleep before we had to get up and hit the road. That next day, during the looong drive back, we admitted to each other that we'd both been considering just packing up the car and leaving in the middle of the night. The only thing that stopped me was knowing that I wouldn't be able to stay awake for a ten-hour drive without more than the two hours of sleep we'd gotten at that point. Jon didn't want to be driving through deserted stretches of the desert in the middle of the night. And then he admitted that he'd been afraid Alice was seeing ghosts or something, and that's why she was so upset and trying to leave the room. I'm pretty sure that wasn't the case (I don't even think it was a nightmare), but I'm glad he didn't bring it up at the time...

Anyway, we were on the road before the sun rose and Alice conked out after our 10am lunch stop. Jon and Alice took a good couple hour nap while I listened to This American Life's original Mike Daisey episode. I know I've said several times that Alice doesn't sleep in the car, or her stroller, or the plane, or anywhere that's not her bed. I know the photo evidence makes it appear that I'm lying, but that's only because we make sure to take a photo every time she falls asleep outside of her bed just because it's so rare. And cute.