Last night was a rough one for Peyton. She got up every hour. I’m not even sure what she needed, but we took turns dealing with her. One time she got up, she told me calmly, “Mommy, there’s a jellyfish in my bed.” I got up to bring her back, and I carefully felt her bed (not really knowing what I was getting myself into) and reassured her there were no jellyfishes in her bed. She whined a bit, so I turned on the light and proved to her. No jellyfishes. She got up another time, and Dave dealt with it, but it was much louder. This morning, I woke up first, and both kids were still asleep. After I got ready, Brandon had gotten up. I went in to say good morning, then got him to dress into his swim clothes for his pool field trip. Peyton was wrapped around a tiny stuffed animal, the last that remained of all in her bed. She looked so angelic! I told Dave to come in and see, and he was still upset about the night before, and refused. She, too, finally woke up, and we went to school without breakfast for Peyton at home. She was sad, but I explained it was because she stayed up late, then woke up late, so she missed breakfast. She got over it, and we headed out. After we dropped Brandon off, she said, “I’m not going to Jungle (4 year old class) yet because I am young.” It was funny to hear her refer to herself as “young”. After school, I was reviewing her behavior from last night. She said, “Yeah, I know, I came out like 6 times!” I think she’s accurate in that number! Then she said, “There’s no jellyfish. I was just kidding.” I think if Dave heard her, he would have gone ballistic! She was so sure there was a jellyfish in her bed last night! She was holding a feather in her hand, then came upon another boy, and said, “Leland! Look at what I have!” They compared feathers, then walked together for a bit. The boy is slightly taller, and a happa kid, really mischievous, but cute. He’d taken Peyton’s clips before, and had them hidden in his pocket. That kind of mischievous. Anyway, they walked with each other, while his dad and I just smiled and said hi. We got to our car first, and Peyton said, “Bye” while Leland turned to his dad and said, “That’s my friend.” It was so cute! I told Peyton what Leland said, and she said, “I know, we’re all friends.” Out of the mouths of babes. Dave was headed to ST since he missed out this past weekend, and while we were going up and down the overpasses, Peyton said, “Wee,” while throwing her hands in the air, telling me it was just like Splash Mountain. She also enjoyed listening to the music, and at a red light, pointed to her foot, and said, “Look, it’s dancing!” She had isolated just her foot, tapping it to the beat. We ended the ride with “I Gotta Feelin'” (Black Eyed Peas), and she didn’t want to get out until it was over. She was pumping her fist to the beat and said, “Oh, this is MY song!” I asked her where she heard it. She said, “This is the song from Hawaii!” She heard it at the Aulani luau. We did have a lot of fun that night!!
Truth hurts
Yesterday, while I was ushering Peyton up to bed, she said, “Mommy, you have chubby arms.” I didn’t think I heard her right, so I asked her, “What’d you say?” She repeated herself. “You have chubby arms!” Sheesh! Already being told. Time to hit the gym 
Sharing is Caring
The kids both like a Pooh cup we’ve had since Brandon was a baby. Well, Peyton likes it, and I think Brandon “likes” it because Peyton does. It usually goes to Peyton, since it’s a smaller cup, but today, Brandon got it out of the dishwasher, and poured himself some water before dinner. Peyton saw him, and instead of screaming like she normally does, she said, “You can have it today, and I will have it tomorrow, brother, okay?” He didn’t really agree, but she said, “Okay,” just to confirm. Let’s see if she remembers tomorrow.
Fish update; SCARED
From Monday to Tuesday, we lost one of the goldfish. I was concerned it was Brandon’s fish, but upon closer inspection, it was not. Brandon’s fish has a dark spot on its nose. The rest of the fish don’t have any distinct markings. By this point, we’d had 5 tetra, losing 1. The kids are getting better with their subtraction by watching our fish tank. I got a text from Dave on Tuesday saying he thinks he may have poisoned the fish. I realized that our exterminator sprays the backyard bimonthly, on the even months. Dave said he washed the rocks off, but probably not enough, given fish are pretty fragile. Neither of us put it together before, but as soon as he said it, I knew what he meant. He removed the rocks after work, and the fish have been swimming around aimlessly since. Today, we noticed another tetra swimming closer to the top of the tank. His stripe was fading, and he wasn’t swimming with the other tetras. Dave thinks the bigger goldfish are aggressive and picking on the little ones, who, without the rocks, have nowhere to hide. After dinner, the tetra was already a goner. Dave had turned the night light on, and I watched them in the dark. I saw one of the goldfish pecking away at the lifeless tetra’s body. I turned on the light to confirm my suspicion. It was Brandon’s fish!! He was eating himself a filet-o-fish tonight until the filter took up the tetra. We never found the body of the first dead tetra, so who knows what happened. It’s a circle of life in there. So we now have 4 goldfish and 4 tetra. Each day we go up there not knowing what we are going to find, or not find, for that matter.
Last night, after blogging, reading blogs, and doing some “computering”, I went up to bed. Dave was still downstairs watching TV. As I went up the second flight of stairs, I stopped and let out a scream! Peyton, in all her messy hairness, was just at the top of the stairs, and I wasn’t expecting it at all. I shooed her back into bed, gave her a hug, and told her she scared me. I think she chuckled a little. I was afraid I’d woken up Brandon, but luckily, I did not. This morning, Peyton’s diaper was dry, and I told her “Thank you for sleeping in your bed all night long.” She said, “No, but I came out, remember?” I guess. For me, it was all night long. For her, she is right, she did come out. But since the diaper was dry, she got another toe nail painted. That brings it to 3. She is choosing consecutive toes on her right foot, so it’s almost a full set!
Interesting read
Will have to read through this more carefully at home.
Flexible language, Scribble Scrabble
Over the weekend, I asked Peyton to talk to my mom in Chinese, hoping she’d replicate how she was talking around Dave’s family when we last visited them. I wanted my mom to hear what intonations she was using, as they were much more “Mandarin” than “Cantonese”. As soon as she agreed, she said, “Hong Jong, Bak Ban, and Fat Choy,” all the characters she knows from MahJong. Dave’s nephew knows to speak to his mom in Cantonese and his dad in Mandarin. I was thinking Peyton also knows the distinction, even though she really doesn’t know either language. She identifies the difference.
Dave had written Peyton’s name on her spray bottle for share day yesterday. Peyton complained and said, “But it’s not my name, it’s messy-messy. I don’t like Daddy’s scribble scrabble.” I asked her if she liked my handwriting better. She said, “Yes.”
Little Sister
Peyton and I got home while Brandon was in the middle of watching a Ninjago episode that he’d earned. The premise is 4 ninjas made out of Legos, so what’s not to like for Brandon?! Peyton took off her shoes, and ran over to the couch to sit with him. He was peacefully watching, when all of a sudden, she started asking him all kinds of questions. “Brother (she’s now pronouncing the “TH” after some training from my mom this weekend, but we’re sad because both Dave and I preferred the Bruddah), what are you watching?” Brandon: Ninjago. Peyton thought about it for a second, then said, “So, are these fairies, (whispering), are these fairies?” She’s started to repeat herself under her breath like he did when he was about her age. Brandon was annoyed, and said, “No, they’re ninjas!” I mean how can she mistake the two! She then started asking him what they were doing, what was going on, and he just answered as best he could, then said, “Peyton, stop talking!” I was doing the dishes, so the sink water wasn’t helping any either. Finally, she got the hint, and sat there nicely with him, until 5 minutes later, when the episode and my dish-washing was over. Poor kid, can’t enjoy anything when his pesky little sister is around
Vocab
Today, while we were driving home, Peyton suddenly said, “Look at those bangles.” If Brandon said it, I would have been looking for tigers (though I realize the spelling is different). But I was confused as to what Peyton was referring. So I asked her, “Bangles, what do you mean?” She said, “Look at that lady. She has bangles on her wrist. But not on the other one, why not?” Sure enough, the lady in the car next to us had bangles on her right wrist. Big, chunky bangles. Not just bracelets. I can honestly say I have NOT taught her that. Amazing what she learns at school.
Mini Vader; Spelling
Last week, Peyton grabbed Dave’s green toothbrush travel holder and started using it like a lightsaber. She even had some roundhouse kicks thrown in. She was very skilled in its use spinning around. She said, “Like Darth Vader, in the show.” I asked her if she wanted to go up there to the Jedi training next time, but she said, “No, because I’m scared.” I can’t imagine her up there, or the face she’d make if she had to battle Darth Maul!
On our drive home today, Peyton was asking me how to spell everything she could name. She did “stop”, “go”, “no” and “yes” on her own, but asked me about “tree”, “house”, “mouse”, “light”, and she’d ask me for each letter one by one, and then repeat it. I tried to get her to sound each letter out, and she did pretty well with most of the words. Some of them, like house and mouse, are harder to help her sound out. We made it the entire ride just spelling!
Dland recap
Peyton was very chatty this morning. We were talking about her favorite and not-so-favorite rides. We talked about her hits and misses from both types of rides at Dland. She concluded, “I don’t like the scary rides,” and that Small World is her favorite and the favorite part of it is the “hula girls”. She said if you sat at the back of the boat, you get more wet. She likes the Ariel ride, with the “Part of Your World” and “Under the Sea” being her favorite, with Ursula being her least favorite. She liked Carsland, but only Mater’s Jamboree where he spoke “Spanglish.” She thought it was funny, but didn’t understand what he was saying. I told her that Mater was reminding us to keep our “hands, arms, feet and legs in the vehicle at all times.” She added, “And watch your children.” She talked about Haunted Mansion, and that the last part is the worst. She didn’t like the hitch-hiking ghosts, but the rest of the ride is okay. We didn’t have to time to go through all the rides, but those were some of them that we did talk about this morning. She’s making me miss being there again!