Monday, February 28, 2000 - Victoria Turns Three, and New Kittens

Last Monday, we got little video camera and a mic for our computer.  The new little video camera is the niftiest little thing you ever did see…it’s only the size of my palm, and it plugs into the computer, and we can take videos, snapshots, audio clips--and then make a cute little postcard with any of those, or a combination of all, and mail it, email. Now we can actually see each other and talk to people over the Internet, imagine that!

I have finished Lydia’s dress, which took longer than usual, on account of the many ruffles and yards and yards of lace. Now I have begun altering a dress for Hester. Soon…soon, I shall start on wedding clothes.

Lawrence and Norma, and Keith and Esther, came visiting on Keith’s 20^th birthday, the 22^nd. It’s hard to believe we have a son who is 20. I made ten dozen--that’s one hundred and twenty--chocolate chip/Heath brickle cookies for the occasion--and there was nary a one left by the end of the evening. The boys went outside to play football for a little while; Hester asked if she could go out and “watch”. Sure. Uh-huh. Her?! Watch?! Haha!

The next time I looked out the window, Hester had the football, and was loping swiftly down the avenue, with several siblings in hot pursuit. They didn’t catch her; she made a touch-down.

Victoria’s third birthday was Thursday. Hannah took her to the Mexican store uptown, where they sell children’s clothes at very reasonable prices, and got her an adorable black and white and silver dress with a couple of pink flowers on the front. She got her a pink flowered headband to match it, too. We also gave her colors, a Noah’s Ark coloring book, a little electronic piano, and three Winnie-the-Pooh notebooks. Later, Hannah went to Wal-Mart and got a Winnie-the-Pooh Lego set for us to give her. A friend of ours gave her a beautiful Barbie doll with long auburn curls. I took several videos with the neat little Intel camera…and then sent quite a few, email. Unfortunately, not all of our friends’ computers will support video clips. Too bad.

Later in the evening, Lawrence and Norma, and Keith and Esther came. Lawrence and Norma gave Victoria a musical carousel with drawers underneath for jewelry; Keith and Esther gave her socks, and a little doll with accessories. Victoria immediately set about trying on socks, until she had eight socks on each foot. After trotting around looking like a miniature Clydesdale for a while, she sat down and carefully peeled off the whole works all at once, leaving all the socks one inside the other. She then sat them neatly in the corner, and suddenly gave a great yelp of laughter when she saw how funny they looked--just as if a small foot was still inside them.

My mother gave Victoria a gold-plated coin set, a tiny doll house with several small dolls, a nightgown, and some money.

That night, Teddy left Larry’s shop on his bike, coming home. But after Larry got here an hour later, there was still no Teddy. I said, “He is probably just down the alley playing with the Rottweilers.” A couple of the children went through the garage and outside to look for him, and I thought they were going down to the end of the alley to see if Teddy was there. It wasn’t long before Larry went out looking for him. He came back after a time, his quest fruitless.

Just about the time we were ready to call up everyone we knew and arrange a search party, there was Teddy in the garage, nonchalantly putting his bike away. When he entered the kitchen, he was promptly accosted by his father: “Where in the world have you been?!”

Teddy looked amazed at the tone, and at the way everyone was staring at him. He waved a hand toward the north. “Just petting the Rottweilers,” he answered.

Larry was incredulous. “For an hour?” he asked.

Teddy looked even more amazed. “An hour?!” he parroted. He stepped around where he could see the clock. “An hour!” he confirmed rather quietly to himself, taken aback. “Well,” he explained, “every time I started to go, the dogs whined for me to come back… But I didn’t know I was there an hour.”

Nobody had looked for him in the alley, because his bike was not in the garage, and they didn’t really think he would be there on his bike; he usually walks down the alley to see those dogs. Lawrence thought this quite curious, because he had just been telling a story about when my mother and father first moved to Columbus, and Loren was a bit late coming home from somewhere. Daddy stopped what he was doing and went off to see where Loren had gotten to. He didn’t find him, because he was looking too far afield: Loren was on their very own block, playing with their dog, Spot.

We spent part of the evening watching a video Keith and Esther gave Victoria, and she spent the first five minutes of the video telling everybody in great delight, "It's mine! It's my very own video, all by myself!"

The first part of it was all about big fire trucks and what to do in a fire; the next part was all about oranges, how they are grown, and how juice is made. The video proceeded on to the workings of a dairy farm, (the cow sings a little song); and after that is a story about an apple orchard.

Friday was an extraordinarily windy day. The kids played outside for a little while. After coming back inside, Caleb, sitting on the loveseat, removed his shoe and dumped the gravel in it onto the floor.

Upon hearing all that racket, I said, “What in the world!” and Hannah informed me, “Caleb just let his sandbox out,” which gave Caleb a severe case of the giggles. He was promptly sent off for a broom and dustpan, and made to sweep the floor before he did another thing.

Friday night, Larry and I went to mail some film. We came upon an accident that had just happened. I called the police on our cell phone and then we let a lady involved in the wreck use our cell phone to call a relative…and she contaminated our poor phone by spewing filthy language into it. Anyway, now we know what sort of words you should use when you have an accident. Good grief.

As we were approaching the scene, we saw the man, who’d gone through the blinking red light and hit the other car, standing beside the lady’s car, madder’n all get out, shaking his finger at her and yelling. Dorcas, at home listening to the scanner, heard the dispatcher tell one of the police officers that somebody had told her the people involved in the accident were scurrying around hiding their alcohol. We didn’t smell any; the cigarette smell seemed to be obliterating all other odors.

Early Saturday morning, Teddy heard quite a bit of noise in the little girls’ room. He went to check it out--and there he found Caleb, sitting high on the top shelf in their closet. When Caleb spotted Teddy, he hurriedly and sheepishly began clambering back down. Little dumb bunny!

Sunday afternoon, while we were attempting to eat our dinner, Kitty kept going up and down the stairs, informing us, “Mrrooww!” when she arrived at the top, in noisy tones of anxiety. Hannah followed her down the stairs--and then rushed back up the stairs to tell Larry he needed to collect Kitty from the basement, fast, and install her in the box we had prepared in the living room. Larry ran down the stairs, gently picked up Kitty, and carried her back upstairs. By the time he got to the box, a kitten was in the crook of his arm.

Before the night was over, three baby kittens had been added to the household. There are two grey striped males, and one black female, and they are altogetherly cute and adorable. There is usually a quiet little audience outside that big box, consisting of several children on their knees, peering intently through the opening. Kitty is very trusting, and purrs loudly when we look at mother and infants. As is often the case, the littlest kitten is indeed the loudest--and the pushiest, too. He sent his poor sister rolling out of the way when he couldn’t seem to find his bottle, and he stepped in his brother’s face with abandon on his way to his dinner plate.

One evening, Hannah went into the kitchen and found Victoria putting on a pair of oven mitts. “What are you doing?” she asked.

“I needed a drink,” came Victoria’s inscrutable answer.

Hannah tried valiantly to keep from laughing at her serious little sister. “Why do you need the mitts on?” queried Hannah further.

Victoria waved an arm vaguely in the direction of the dishwasher, which had just finished its drying cycle. “Because it’s hot over there,” she replied.

Light finally dawned. Since Victoria couldn’t reach the cupboard to get a glass out, she’d tried to get one out of the dishwasher, but they were too hot to touch--hence, the oven mitts. Hannah got the child a glass of water.

Now…I must get back to the kittens.

Well, actually, we are having a birthday party for Hannah. She is 19 years old. My children are all growing up!