Whoa!! That was a fast month.

Another Christmas come and gone. Maybe I'm a scrooge, but it wasn't really all that, know what I mean?

I mean it was cool, and the kids got nice presents, and we had a nice time with Pam's family and all, but in the final analysis, I wasn't that impressed. Maybe it's an indicator of my spiritual state, and I need to do something to maintain that.

While reading one of "The Magic School Bus" books the other night, Berit pointed to a picture of an open door and asked me how the illustrator drew it so that it looked open. So we got out some paper and pens and launched into a fun lesson on perspective. Examples I used included (but were not limited to) the old "Kids in the Hall" routine where you squeeze the other person's head with your thumb and forefinger. Berit dug it, though, and she did a pretty good job with the whole perspective thing. It lasted a few minutes before we moved on to writing "bubble letters."

Griffin got a haircut today. Now he looks like a boy. His 2nd birthday is in two days.

Berit and Rowan hung at home with me. I don't feel well, so we just drew pictures and made paper airplanes. They liked that. Berit showed me how she draws a brick house. I showed her how I did. She was trying to draw butterflies like Mommy does this morning - she frustrates easily... wonder where she gets that from?

It's my 38th Birthday, and I get off early to go to the Y to see Berit's dance recital. I'm kind of grumpy but Berit's dance lifts my spirits. She's amazing - tap, jazz, ballet - out there with older girls. She keeps the rhythm quite well and memorizes dance steps that would befuddle her old man.

Even during the ballet part, when she is the only one without slippers, she proudly keeps stride with the rest. She is full of joy in this, and likes to show me her dance numbers at home.

Berit was officially drummed into Brownies this evening. I missed the ceremony, but I will attend her Dance (tap, jazz, ballet) recital on Wednesday.

Griffin hit Berit in the head with the stick end of a mop tonight. He's problematic that way.

Rowan was dressed as a princess when I came home, and she sometimes mimics Berit in an attempt at an English accent while claiming to be the Queen of England.

Rowan says she wants to be a teenager when she grows up. Me too.

Berit brings home these little reader books that are just way too simple for how she's been doing, and the other night I asked her about it.

"You should get Ms. Cohen to give you the next level of books... these are too easy."

"I can't... these are green... I'm in green, which is the easiest."

I pretty much stressed out about my daughter being mistakenly pigeon-holed into the low-reader group - a type-A parent's nightmare - until I was able to go to school today and learn from Ms. Cohen that Berit simply picks the books out of the green basket. She is perfectly capable of picking the pink basket books, and now she will.

As an added bonus, I was leaving the classroom when Berit was coming in with her class from lunch. She was pretty psyched to see me, and asked that I stay and read a book to her class (which I've done in the past). I was pretty bowled over by her excitement to have me do that and weighing it against the benefits of returning promptly to work, I decided to read the story. It turned out to be a little story called "Charlie Parker Played Be Bop," which I thought was just spectacular! The kids had a lot of fun with it, too.

Tonight, while Pam is out and I am reading in bed to Berit and Rowan, someone tooted. Berit and I both denied having done it and turned to Rowan, who gives a big grin and states, "It must have been Mommy!"

The two of them just laughed and laughed and laughed about this until there was no tomorrow, and I just looked back and forth between the two conspirators marvelling at the weird and wonderous ways in which their relationship with each other grows and changes when I'm not paying attention.

So we're reading "Snowie Rolie," a book in which the sun in Rolie Polie Olie's typically winter-less world blows a bulb, causing the snow to fall. Rolie Polie Olie and his sister do all sorts of fun, winterish things, including sledding. That's where Berit (and not me) questions, "Daddy, why did they have a sled if they never had winter?"

And I'm the one writing literary reviews??

The kids and I are in the TV room watching "The Lion King," Griffin and I are tussling off to the side, and all of a sudden he just bends down and nearly bites my nipple off! My reaction was none too contained, and I'm sure I scared everyone as I screamed and pinned his head to the wall with my arm.

Two things: I have no idea how he so accurately found my nipple beneath my t-shirt. And secondly, I view this as the official onset of Griffin's terrible twos.

The really cool thing the kids have learned to do is apologize when they know they've wronged one another. We've taught them to apologize and then to ask how they can make it better. Usually, the other's response is that a kiss and a hug would make it better.

After her Soccer game, Berit told me she liked it. She told me she definitely wanted to sign up for Soccer again. I thought that was cool, that it was progress.

We all had a nice time going up to Neeraj's Diwali party. The kids mostly ate from the desert table. They particularly liked the coconut balls. We walked around Eldora a bit as well, the kids running and laughing with each other. Pam led, while Berit grabbed at her her coat tails, and Rowan at Berit's and Griffin at Rowan's... like baby ducks waddling after the mother.

Sometimes parenting is frustrating and hard. I just sent Berit to her room because she was teasing Rowan, holding something out of her reach and giggling, while Rowan cried.

Pam's asleep. The kids are playing. I'm going to make pancakes.

We had a blast with my folks here for 4 days. The kids really enjoyed hanging out with them. But when we had to say goodbye to them Friday night, Berit (who was very tired to begin with) cried all the way home in the car.

"It's sad to have to miss people, huh Berit?" I tried to console her, and so did Rowan: "Berit, sometimes I miss my friend Sophia, and then I'm sad."

Berit: Was incredible hiking in Chautauqua, yesterday. Post-Brownie hike change rendered Berit a leader of the family hike we took. Not only did she not complain about the hike, she led us and pointed out Bear scat and useful plant whose flower's center you can chew like gum and use to alleviate poison ivy.

Rowan: In Border's Books ladies room with Berit, could not reach the sink to wash her hands so she approached a woman entering the bathroom and asked , "Please could you lift me up?"

Griffin: At Dan's house, Jenelle had left an iron on (!!??!!), and Griffin found it, burning his hand. After much pain, ice, and crying - he seems to be alright. Yesterday, on the hike, he insisted on running and falling much of the way. He's pretty tough.

At breakfast, Rowan is sticking her tongue out at Griffin, Berit is tattling, "Mommy, Rowan is sticking her tongue out at Griffin," and Griffin is scowling at Rowan and distinctly saying, "No... Rowie... I.. don't.. like.. that..."

Berit is great! She asks me if we can do more math problems. Rowan, similarly this morning, asked me to help her write her name. The girls are gracious in overlooking my sometimes lack of patience in these endeavors.

Griffin gets up at 5 am and demands to watch Winnie - a - Pooh.

Berit sang that hit song by Smashmouth about a hundred times yesterday:

"Somebody once told me the world was gonna role me
I ain't the sharpest tool in the sheddddd...."

Except she sings

"Somebody once told me the world was gonna role me
I pudda lotta too in the sheddddd...."

Parental angst over whether to actually teach her the right lyrics, or let it slide, on the basis that singing the correct lyrics will subconciously affect her self-esteem... hopefully, she'll stop watching Shrek at Aunt Cathy's house so much, and soon forget about the song.

Oh yeah... last night, Berit comes upstairs wearing her Hogswarts robe and a red-haired wig with a tiara, and in a 6 year old's idea of an English accent, informs us that she is the Queen of England. Rowan follows shortly in a poodle skirt and pointy fairy-godmother hat. She is (of course) the princess. They greet us by saying Hola! and leave us with Adios!, Berit insisting that the Queen of England speaks Spanish.

I had knee surgery last week, and have been out of work. On Monday, I volunteered in Berit's first grade classroom.

There's a part of me that wants Berit to be the smartest kid in her class, which she's not. See those 3 kids in the table in the corner? Yeah, those ones. They are the smart ones. Ridiculously smart. They're over there challenging each other with multiplication problems while the rest of the kids draw pictures of animals that add up to 12.

That's cool. Berit is SMART. I know she is. Last night she wanted to practice word problems, read two books to me, and wrote in her journal. In between, we stretched. She has often memorized entire Dr. Seuss books, and she was reading, speaking writing at an early age. And I am going to let go of this competitive idea that she needs to be the best. :)

On Wednesday morning, Griffin and I are having a bath. He gathers up all the yellow rubber ducks, one at a time.
"My ducky," he says as he picks up each one. He's hoarding duckies.

I had my ACL surgery yesterday, and so I'm going to be doing a lot of lying around the house. I think Berit's psyched about it, and has proferred her help in keeping Griffin off of my knee.

I think Berit felt bad about it, but she is emotionally mature in the telling.
"Maggie has turned Katelyn into a monster."
Pam and I pressed her for more details - what exactly does she mean by that?
"Here... I'll show you," she holds up each hand's index figure bent at the middle knuckle, the universal finger puppet. She bends each to make them talk.
"Hi Maggie.
"Hi Katelyn.
"You want to play?
"Sure, but let's not play with the others."

Berit is obviously upset about the situation. Pam and I advise her to play with the nice girls. Pam goes further than I to advise that she give Maggie and Katelyn a chance. I am of the opinion that she dismiss them utterly, but I don't say this. I don't imagine I've any skill at elementary school aged female politics.

Berit's been doing great at soccer. No, she hasn't scored a goal in either game so far, but neither have her teammates. She has run the ball all the way down the field a couple times - one time ended in a face-plant, but I felt that she recovered rather quickly from that. Now, I play the proud father out there shouting for her to kill the 6 year old girls on the other team.

Rowan did a face-plant of her own last night. While running through the house, she tripped and bit it into the floor. This morning she had a nasty little fat lip. Poor girl.

I've been less and less patient when Griffin hits Rowan... because he hits her all the time. It's like there's a magnet in his hand and one in her head, so that anytime he even comes near her, it's BAP! Yesterday, I grabbed him and yelled at him not to do that anymore. Pam doesn't agree, but I think it would be good if we taught Rowan to just hit him back. I think he'd stop, then.

Then there are days like today when the first few hours with my three children in their various stages of meltdown about drive me over the edge.

However, in this case, I send them off, pray for patience, regroup, and rejoin them at Berit's soccer game. And boy am I glad I did that, instead of going to yoga. Because you know what? Her team didn't score a single goal out there - but man, she looked good, tearing down the field with the ball in front of her! Like the other girls, she always seemed to stop just shy of the goal... progress not perfection. And then there was the one bad face-plant as she was taking it down... ouch! But she recovered.

Rowan started at her new preschool yesterday - easing into it slowly, so they were just there for an hour or so. It sounded like she did just fine.

Griffin parrots everything now so I have to watch my mouth. This morning I greeted him by saying, "Hello Mr. Babaloo!" and he said it right back to me in his primitive little toddler way.

I surprised Berit by showing up at her school today. She sat with some other 1st grade girls at the back of the cafeteria. I thought that she looked quiet and alone - not her usually social self. We spent a while chit-chatting about school and about the HUGE monkey-bars blister on her hand before the bell rang. I casually commented that we wouldn't be able to play on the playground before she had to go back to class, and Berit broke down in tears. I felt terrible. She was sad because I was leaving, and I consoled her, promising that I would go to class with her for a short while.

As it turned out, we had a few minutes to hang out on the playground together before we went back to her class. Once there, I was asked by Ms. Cohen to read a book to the class, which I did. Berit seemed all in good spirits again when I finally left.

I am the luckiest Daddy ever.

Lounging in the early morning quiet of our living room, Rowan impishly declares that Griffin is Mr. Crazy Pants and that I am Mr. Mad Pants. Meanwhile, Griffin is trying to get the ball behind the couch that Pam is stretched out on. "Move Mommy!" he admonishes.

When it's finally time to go, I am able bid a brief and quiet goodbye to my daughters while remaining unnoticed by Griffin (who goes into a desperate plea of "Wait!" whenever I try to leave for work). I get in the car and start it. The house door opens, and Berit comes flying down the yard and around to the driver's side window.

"Bye bye, Daddy. Have a good day at work." She gives me a kiss and a big bear hug.

Rowan and I went to little Catherine's pool party yesterday. Row was pretty shy with the kids... really wanted me to swim with her. So we swam around a while. She declared that she wanted to take swimming lessons.

She was a kick at Jeff and Bev's Western Swing wedding party last night!! She just danced and danced nonstop. Until the end of the night, when Jeff and Bev brought out their wedding cake, which was a pyramid of doughnuts. Then, Berit and Rowan just sat under the buffet table eating donuts. When Pam told Berit no more, she quickly shoved what she had into her mouth and backed away from her.

Last night we went out while our 23 year old houseguests babysat. It occurred to me that Rebecca and Matias might not have heartless single-mindedness it often takes to overcome the girls' protestations. And I was right. The girls were to be put to bed at 8 pm. When we came back at 10:45 pm, they were still up, with Matias throwing up his hands in a plea of innocence declaring, "We tried to get them to go to bed. We really did."

Evidenty Berit and Rowan (Berit as the spokesperson, no doubt) told the young couple that they weren't leaving the guestroom to head up to their bedroom, no matter what they said. Not psyched to hear this, Pam and I told Berit that her consequences would be not going to Bridey's party OR not playing with friends in the neighborhood this weekend. She opted to be able to attend the party.

On the plus side, she did great at her 1st day in the new 1st grade. A bit nervous, but composed, nonetheless. Her only complaint was that Maggie was annoying her by following her everywhere she went. She even seemed to enjoy soccer, and eagerly did some kicks with me, and showed me around Douglass Elementary's playground.

I was in the garage with Griffin the other day, and he leapt into a gallop while exclaiming, "I'm running! I'm running!"

At the playground, he definitively tells me, "Train! A choo-choo train!" meaning that he wants to do a train on the slide.

His use of the language is blossoming. I think I read somewhere that between 18 months and two years of age, children acquire something like 4,000 words a day (that might be an overestimation). Wehn he comes in the bedroom, he augments his bouncing up and down on my head with throwing his juice cup at me and telling me, "Daddy! Juice! 'Mon! (C'mon)"

He knows how to get what he wants.

My kids are awesome.

I snuck out of the house with Rowan on Friday for a quick bus adventure. We picked up the Dash from Louisville into Boulder, getting off down at the Pearl Street Mall - pizza, coffee-milk, and a ball at the kite store. We took the bus back just in time to miss the massive hailstorm, and I could barely keep Rowan awake on the ride back. The girls love a good bus adventure.

Back in Louisville, we met the others to see Colcannon, a good celtic band, at the downtown street festivus. Rowan and Griffin crazy-danced with me in the front. It's easy to lose your inhibitions when you have extremely beautiful children to dance with.

At the playground, Berit was sitting at the top of the roller-slide, and Rowan really wanted to slide down with her. Berit was having fun with Griffin, though, and I don't think she wanted to go down with Rowan. So when Rowan came up, she acted as though she was going to slide with her, but then slyly let her go down by herself. I was mad about that and spoke in harsh tones (yelled? I don't think I yelled...) to her about it.

My sister commented that I was too intense with her... that, in general, she thought I snapped quickly and too fiercely on the kids. Naturally, I'm hurt, but feel there must be some truth to it, which I have to amend.

We got Berit one of those Razor Scooters for Christmas. I was pretty sure she wanted one. All the older kids had them. But when she got it, she wouldn't ride it. I think she felt scared, unsure of herself on it.

Two days ago, she just started riding it... just like that. Now she won't stop.

I think her success on the bike has opened up an entirely new physical dimension for her. She's wicked good with the hula-hoop, as well.

Rowan while looking at her eyes in the mirror: "I have dark eyes daddy? Do I have black eyes?"

Berit took a bike spill on the open space trail and road-rashed her right cheek up pretty good. That was no fun. Then an hour later, Griffin impales his face on the corner of the kids' table in the dining room. Ouch.

Rowan is looking peculiarly unscathed these days.

Yesterday, I took the girls to Kath's pool. Berit just had to try out the little mermaid goggles, fins, and swim gloves that Rowan gave her for her birthday. She LOVED them! You never know what's going to do it for the kids, but she sure loved this present. She must have thanked Rowan 6 times while we were at the pool.

Then I took them down to Denver where the Gyudmed Tibetan Monks were doing another Sand Mandala. There girls really enjoyed watching, and I tried to explain to them how the monks painted with sand. The young one motioned for the girls to come in close. He took his tools and off to the side so that they could see, he made a mouse, an elephant, and a butterfly. He took the girls' hands in turn (Berit first, otherwise Rowan never would have done it) and pressed them on the caricatures, giving them each sand tatoos. They thought that was pretty cool.

Yesterday was Berit's birthday. It's hard to believe that my baby is 6. I remember when she was 0. Now she rides a two-wheeler bike (no training wheels), she'll be in 1st grade in a month, and she tells me things like, "Girls rule, Boys drool. Except you and Griffin, Daddy. You don't drool."

Up at Mary's Lake campground in Estes Park with friends. On Saturday morning we hiked over to the actual lake. Berit was a big swimmer, diving from the shoreside rocks with abandon into the cold water and swimming out to me. When we went to the pool, Rowan was very impressive also. Her swimming skills seemed to have doubled overnight as she did twists and turns and movements that even resembled swimming while throwing herself under water. Griffin just really likes it when I throw him up into the air over the water. "Den!" ("Again"), he tells me.

I really enjoy camping with the kids.

Rowan had fallen asleep and Griffin was being resonably mellow, so Pam and I went into the leasing office with Berit supervising in the car. Really, it was just a few paces away, and we could see her from the window. Please don't call social services.

What was funny was that, when I walked back out to check on her, she had found the package of rice cakes and opened them up for Griffin and her.

"Griffin wanted a snack," she told me.

The next time I came out, she told me that Peter, our Realtor had called. "He's on his way here, and says he'll be here in 5 minutes. I think you should call him back, Daddy."

Berit is so helpful. Peter comments when he arrives how well she handled playing phone secretary for us.

Today, Griffin handed me a bottle of Bubbles and said, "Daddy open." A two word sentence! Genius.

Both girls are very creative when it comes to reasons why they are out of their bedroom after bedtime. Last night, Rowan stood at the threshold and whispered to me across the living room where I was reading my book.

"Daddy..."

"Dadddy..."

"Yes, Rowan," I flipped my head backwards over the couch's arm to respond.

"Daddy... can I give you a kiss?"

Wow. What a saint I must have been in a previous life to deserve such sweet children.

Last night was from hell. We had just finished watching “The Good Girl,” when i heard someone moaning upstairs. There, I found Griffin in his crib, feverish and unhappy. I immediately got him up, got him some fluids, and brought him into bed with me. I thought he might go directly to sleep, but instead he rolled around feverishly for some time, until it struck me to give him some fever reducer. This was probably after midnight, and within an hour he was sleeping. I brought him back into his crib, and was finally able to grab a few z’s, myself.

It wasn't until around 2:30 or 3 that the coughing twins appeared in my bed. As my kids know, Daddy awakened in the middle of the night closely resembles one of the seven dwarves, and it's not Happy. I gruffly admonished the girls to “stop all that coughing,” before realizing that this was a harsh, insensitive and unreasonable thing to say to your 3 and 5 year old daughters, who are probably just suffering because you forgot to change out the furnace filter. So I got them both some organic (honey-based) cough syrup, told them I love them, and went back to sleep.

Fortunately, Pam took Griffin in the morning, and I slept until I was late for work.

Pam says that Griffin is "imperious." Is that a word? If it is, then he certainly is... tyrannically imperious. He's found his voice and a number of words that go with it. If he's feeling cross, he'll throw me a sideways scowl and reprimand me: "No." He'll do that repeatedly, until he feels I've gotten a clear message. He's learned the word, "juice." Now he won't even drink milk anymore. All of a sudden, he'll come up to one of us and shout at the top of his lungs, "DA DA!" JUICE!"

I don't want to put Griffin in a negative light. He can be awfully cute and endearing at times. He laid on a blanket between Pam and I, hours past his bedtime, out on the golf course while we watched the July 4 fireworks. While awaiting the show, he took turns kissing Pam and then kissing me. He's awfully sweet.

I think Rowan had already decided that the fireworks were going to be too scary. Even though she assured me, "I'll try it, Daddy. I'll calm down." Moments after they started though, Grammy was escorting her back to the house.

She was a kick at the block party. Our friend, Betsy asked if I was a middle child because I'm so protective of her. Not overly protective I don't think. I just always am very consoling when she breaks down over something or another. I think I feel responsible for her sensitive nature. I think perhaps I caused it by being too fierce at times, and for that I feel guilty. Anyway, she broke down over not having the football to herself at the block party. She really liked that little football, and I'm going to get her one. I'm also shopping for red converse hi-tops to match hers.

Berit had a good time at the block party also. Ate lots of sugar, rode her bike around. By the time the fireworks were over, she was a mess. She broke down upon seeing that there were pictures of Griffin and Rowan both as babies, both painting, on our refrigerator (they've been there for a year). Suddenly, it seemed very unjust to her that there were no pictures of her as a baby painting. Ok, Berit, time for bed.

When I come home from work, all three of my kids rush to greet me with a hug. It's just about the coolest thing on the planet. Berit reaches me first, as usual, and I want to give her a big squeeze but I have to save an arm for Rowan, too. Don't want to leaver her out. I squeeze my two girls as generously as I can, before I have to scoop Mr. Griffin up into my arms.

Looks like Griffin's had a particularly nasty encounter with the concrete, today. The right side of his face beneath his eye is a big red abrasion. Apparently, he was doing his "Look at me - I'm Anti-Gravity Man!" impression on top of the picnic table and took a big woofer straight into the porch. What doesn't kill him will only make him stronger.

This is, of course, the wrong Daddy attitude, as I later learn from Pam's scowling when I don't give Griffin enough sympathy for another face plant later on this evening.

I lounge in the front yard, while Berit and Rowan perform a circus for me. Berit is doing tricks on her bike: riding one-handed, riding side-saddle, riding with no feet, etc... while Rowan is swooping about and menacing with a Samurai sword on the sidewalk.

"Wiya! Wiya! Wiya!" She swings the sword through the air, killing imaginary bad guys.

For books tonight, Berit read four of the beginning reader books I got her just brilliantly!! And Rowan is doing great at recognizing letters.

Rowan's been out of pull-ups, the night-time diapers for older kids, for a few days now. I'd say her dry/wet percentage is about 50%. It's usually a good idea for me to pick her up in the middle of the night and put her on the toilet. I didn't do that last night.

She came out of my bedroom this morning. (she had crawled into bed with me in the middle of the night as usual) with a look of controlled fear on her face and came straight to me.

"I will get a big towel, Daddy. I will get a big towel and clean up your bed."

I guess I haven't been very restrained sometimes when she's had an accident, and it was evident that she was afraid that I was going to get really mad at her for peeing in my bed. I felt horrible, and vowed to myself to control myself better, so that my children wouldn't have to fear my response in the future.

I love Rowan very much. I hugged her and told her it was ok, and that we'd find a towel to clean it up.

Everybody's cheerful in the morning. Griffin is like Pan, a mischevious little smirk pasted upon his angelic face. Berit wakes me to tell me that he's up.

Berit, Pam, Griffin and I hunker into the futon in the guest room... chillin. Griffin looks at me expectantly and declares, "Poo."

"Poo?" I ask. "Pee pee?" I inquire, using Griffin speak to refer to the product of defecation.

"Poo." He repeats, and then I recall that Griffin has just recently begun an infatuation with Winnie the Pooh. He loves it when I sing it to him, and when I read him the books, and when I don the Pooh hand puppet. He evidently is making a video request.

"Pooh... Winnie the Pooh?" I probe.

"Yah." That's a big 10-4, Daddy.

I'm all for early morning videos, as we've long since given up on making Griffin the pure child, the TV-free child. If anything, Griffin will only degenerate faster into television worship, with two older sisters as personal TV guides.

So we watch Poo.

Friday night, after reading "The Magic School Bus in the Solar System," Berit asked if she and Rowan and i could be the Earth, the Moon and the Sun. So we took turns in the living room - one of us would stand in the center as the Sun, while another would walk around that person as the Earth. The third person would hurry around the Earth as it rotated around the sun. It was a kick – good idea, Berit!

Different children have different names for the process and the product of defacation. Griffin, who is now 18 months old, refers to this as "pee-pee." Confused as this may seem, he gladly notifies us of it's presence as "pee pee." It could be in the diaper, or on those free-wheelin occasions when we let him run around the backyard naked, he might come running in the house with a hand full of goodies outstretched and announce rather obviously, "pee pee!"

Sometimes he is more enthused about this, adding an exclamatory modifier to his announcement, as in, "Pee pee, Yay!!"

We are certain that someday the content and the emotion of his exclamations will take a drastic turn, for better or worse, and we currently revel in Griffin's appreciation of life's more mundane aspects.

Rowan has gone to bed without "pull-ups," night-time diapers for older kids (she's 3), for the past 4 nights now and has awoken dry every morning. Since we neglected to go the rubber-sheet route, I'm still waiting for that other shoe to fall.

I did it again - getting all up in Berit's mug about counting money. It is frustrating, you know. Even her kindergarten teacher says she won't go down certain paths with the kids. After we worked it out, I told Berit we could work on counting the change I have in my pocket when I come home at night, and if she counts it correctly then she gets it. She liked this idea.

Berit comes into our room in the middle of the night and asks me to move over. I'm not very good with being awakened in the night and groggily try to explain that, if she's going to be joining us at this hour, the best policy is to quietly find an empty spot on the bed.

I attempt sleep, but she's got a persistent cough, so that finally (might have been an hour later or five minutes... I don't know) I get up and give her a dose of cough suppressant. I then grab my pillow and kiss her goodnight.

"Where are you going?"

"I'm going into your room so I can get some sleep." I say, rather grouchily.

I do go and lie down in her bed, but I'm feeling too guilty about abandoning her like that. I figure it's probably my job to shower my kids with love, especially when they're not feeling well and even if it's impinging upon my sleep.

So I get back up with my pillow, head back to bed and lie down next to Berit. I kiss her again, hold her hand, and we quietly fall asleep.

On Friday, we took the kids camping up in the mountains. They did very well with it all, despite some unprepared ness on my part which resulted in not having a working camp stove and having to spend a good deal of time chopping wood with a borrowed hatchet and making a fire to cook turkey dogs on.

They enjoyed running around in the surrounding woods and they definitely enjoyed the somemores we made for desert. Pam coached the girls in the fine science of marshmallow roasting.

Berit seems to me insightful beyond her years at times. As we prepared for a hike the following day, Rowan was throwing herself on the ground for attention. Berit turns to me and quietly remarks, "Rowan falls down on purpose a lot."
"Yes. Why do you think that is?" I reply.

"She wants more love."

I am floored by this adult insight on her sister's behavior.

Our walkabout is a short one - we don't want to spoil their fun by taking them on a long forced march. We're only staying for one night, so we break camp later that day. With three kids, it's just enough time.

By the way, the right reaction to Berit's whininess this morning would have been to stop and breathe and then tell her that it frustrates me that she says she doesn't want to go camping, since we've been excited about it all week long, and I've been working hard this morning to make it happen, and the last time we went she seemed to like it. So can you help me understand why you don't want to go, Berit?

And then I would have found out that she was scared of the Bears.

And again. I don't even work today, but I'm reacting to the kids all over the place. I react to Griffin's fit; I get visibly upset when Berit whines "I don't want to go camping in the woods;" and when Rowan breaks down because contrary to what she wanted a moment ago, now she doesn't want Berit to help her make her bed, I get upset with her.

The common element here is me reacting. And I need to change it. Change it now when Berit is only 5, Rowan is only 3, and Griffin won't even remember me getting upset. I really do want to be the Buddha Dad. But how?

Pause when agitated. Take time out. Breathe. These are all really good things to say but not always as easy to apply. I want to apply them... I really do, but I seem to need more than that. Maybe it really is about prayer. Asking the universe to help me, reinforcing that I need the help. I think just praying and meditating on a regular basis would help me be in the mind frame to pause when agitated, take time out, breathe. I don't think writing about it hurts either, and I'll keep you posted how it goes. I'm going to start... now.

Sometimes my parenting skills are less than what I'm proud of. Going over the names and values of coins with Berit last night proved to be frustrating as usual. It seemed no matter how many times we went over a dime being worth 10 cents, she just couldn't retain it. I kept trying to think of new ways to help her remember, but I was finally doing it in obvious frustration, emitting a negative energy that broke her little spirit. Finally, she wouldn't answer me.

"How much is it worth?"

Silence.

"Don't think, Berit. Just tell me how much it's worth. How many cents?"

More silence. She's scared, and she's sad.

"Berit, you're thinking. I told you not to think. Why aren't you saying anything?" It's as though I am purposely blind to the sadness and fear I am creating with my words and my energy, until finally she speaks.

"I'm having a heart attack."

Now it is me who is silent. Yes, I'm attacking her heart. She's stopped me dead in my tracks by putting words to the way I've been making her feel.

"You're having a heart attack?"

"Yes?

"I'm making you feel sad with my frustration, aren't I Berit."

"Yes."

"Oh Berit, I am so sorry...come here." I hug her for a while, and she cries a little. I feel horrible, and I know I need to figure out how not to do this in the future.

"Berit, I'm so sorry - this is my fault. I need to be nicer."

"It's ok, Daddy." She's always so forgiving of my glaringly monstrous parental errors. I feel worse than ever.

"Maybe you can help me. If you feel this way again, tell me right away."

We get through it, and she is breathing relieved. I figure a new more passive mneumonic for the coins. I tape a penny, nickel, dime, and quarter to a piece of paper with their names and amounts written on it, and we tape it up on her wall. She'll probably have them all memorized by tomorrow. But if she doesn't, that's ok too.

I came home late last night to find that Berit was still awake. She heard me come in, and came out of her room to give me a kiss and a hug goodnight. However, I see Berit constantly finding excuses to come out of her room at bed time and count this as one more of those. I perfunctorily kiss and hug her goodnight before abruptly ushering her back into her room.

But I'd earlier heard this guy say, "It's my job to treat everyone with love and respect... no mattter how they behave towards me," and i believe that to be true. Especially with the kids. I thought about it afterwards and resolved to try harder to embrace those moments when I can choose to connect with my kids, instead of just playing dad.

Despite an occasional propoensity for biting and kicking, Griffin is just plain cute and adorable. Now it is clear that he understands everything we say, and is equally active about attempting communication with us. This morning he gallops out of the girls' bedroom holding a cassette tape. This he thrusts into my hands, muttering something in Griffin-speak.

"You want me to put a tape on for you buddy?" I ask.

"Yeah." - one of two oft-used stock phrases.

He can be very possessive of our attention. When Rowan climbs into my lap, Griffin will throw a tirade and attempt to physically beat her away from me. I pretty much side with Rowan on this, showing both of them that there's plenty of Daddy to go around.

Rowan is abstract-expressionistic in her use of sidewalk chalk. She first thoroughly soaks a stick of the colored chalk in a puddle of rainwater captured in a construction bucket lid at the side of the house before carrying it back to the driveway. Then she applies the mollified chalk substance to a portion of driveway or sidewalk, until the chalk is completely gone, leaving a singular patch of color on the concrete. Then she repeats the process. I try to get her to draw a picture for me, but she won't. It’s just "blue" o "green" or "pink"...

Berit revels further in her newfound ability on her two-wheeler. She's doing u-turns in the middle o the road now. I don't let her ride in the street without my super vision, and she thankfully dons pads, gloves, and helmet each time before biking.

She's ardent in whatever activity she pursues. Her hand is just now healing from a terrible monkey-bar blister, and she's been very active on the monkey bars, even before it heals. Her new thing is hanging by her legs from a bar and then doing a flip and dropping to her feet. If any athletic pursuit is her "thing" right now, I'd say its gymnastics.

At the playground, Griffin is fearless as he trots around a moon crater structure that other boys his age need their parents' hands for. He can be a little aggressive, though, and Pam saw him push another boy who was also walking on the crater. Is that nature or nurture?

It's official - the training wheels are off! A momentous and proud moment in any parent's life. It may even be a personal victory, but I'm not sure. I've always remembered my parents telling me that I was only 4 years old when I first rode the two-wheeler... remembered it with pride. Berit is 5 and has now cleared that hurdle. She's very excited about it, too.

I was glad that she could go from the initial removal of the training wheels to full on independence without having to meet the asphalt face to face. It just made the transition that much quicker and less painful

My other daughter, Rowan is 3, and just beginning to cruise on the old tricycle. She started taking well to Berit's razor scooter today, so we'll just keep on that and see.

Griffin, my one year old son will be on a skateboard at 2, no doubt, and will certainly be the cause of many nail-bitingly anxiety-ridden parental moments. But I'll keep you posted.

Berit is selling Rowan on the idea of using one doll over another by telling her that one - the one she wants Rowan to choose - is magic and that the other one isn't. Then, when Rowan had chosen, Berit tells her that they are both actually magic.

"If Jesus drinks hot lava, he will die."
- Rowan