Happy Thanksgiving
Happy Thanksgiving everyone. To celebrate, Nate drew this turkey and wrote his name (!!)
preschool
Nate started preschool back on September 9th and he's been going two days a week in the morning. Near as I can tell, everything is going really well.
It started off with a few tears, mostly because the week before, we all had visited the school in the evening, and he thought we'd be staying again. On his first day, after he started to cry a bit, his teacher quickly shepherded him off to a distraction. I understand it is important for her to maintain some semblance of order on the first day and I understand that getting any child into the routine can be good for everyone, but I didn't get to say goodbye to him before he was hauled away. It's silly to be bothered by this, I know, and yet I still am.
But there were no problems after the first day, and now he can barely be contained in his drive to get into the classroom to begin his day.
I said "near as I can tell" before, only because I'm pretty sure he's being trained by CIA agents in proper techniques to resist divulging sensitive information if captured. I don't really know what he is actually doing at school. Questions about his day, his activities, etc either go unanswered or are returned with a very teenage-sounding "nothin'." I realize this is fairly common for preschoolers and so I just roll with it. I'm grateful that the teachers send home a little newsletter at the end of the week so we have some idea of what has been going on.
Every once in a while little snippets make their way out: he'll start singing a song we've never heard before or he'll say some series of sentences that we've never uttered. 
helloheather and I will just look at each other and smile.
Today is class picture day for Nate. And that by itself is something that amazes me.
Nathan at Three
I've been struggling with what to say to describe Nate at three years of age. I read through "Nathan at Two" and was intimidated by my own post. I really like it; it was written from the heart and with very little editing. The words swept onto the page.
We've had a busy late spring/summer. It's been difficult to sit down for a bit and contemplate his 3rd year.
Nate is three years-old now. When I think about his first few weeks after his birth I can't help but think of the blooming of the hostas in our yard. I think about, of all things, the All Star Game and the night I sat watching the tv with him, fast asleep, on a pillow on my lap, the sun setting behind our linden tree and the warm air skittering in through the open patio door. He was so small...so fragile...and I was so afraid.
And now, as the hostas again are blooming, he sits and reads books with us. Now he asks question after question after question to the point where he has so much momentum going that he'll ask us things like "what's 'milk' means?" even though he has been drinking milk for two years. He is amazingly curious and perceptive. He knows, right away, when helloheather and I are starting to have an argument and does everything he can to stop it or distract us. It's sobering and sometimes frightens me to think of what else he has absorbed and is absorbing.
As most children his age, he pushes the boundaries. We try very hard to respond appropriately to these forays into freedom. We try to be firm but fair and we try to be instructive throughout. It's tough though and sometimes we fail. If nothing else, Nate keeps us on our toes.
His love for books continues unabated. We seem to run through these phases where I forget how much he loves to read and we end up playing cars or pirates or "chase me" or whatever game he wants and then have only time for a single book in the evening. So the pendulum will swing back and we'll end up reading a dozen books together and he'll ask questions the whole time through. He doesn't just sit there and have a book read to him...he participates and he is engaged.
He's figuring out the rules of this universe, and we're trying to figure him out as well. He's so enthusiastic that sometimes it takes my breath away. Happy Birthday, Nate.
summer solstice
Yesterday was the summer solstice and so we will receive one second less light than the day before. Tomorrow: 9 seconds. The march to the maximum rate of change at the equinox has begun.
Length of Day - 15h 16m - Tomorrow will be 0m 9s shorter
Source: http://www.wunderground.com/US/IL/Crystal_Lake.html
I always get a little melancholy around the summer solstice because it seems like I'm just getting into a summer stride when our evenings begin to peel away like that of the skin of an apple. Slowly as we revolve and rotate, the length of our day is stripped and discarded. And so I have striven to celebrate our summer solstice each year. I want to revel in the maximum amount of light afforded us on this day.
Sunday I was awake close to, but not at, sunrise in order to view (and photograph) the last event of this years Great Galena Balloon Race. The weather did not afford us much sunlight, however, and we had to make due.
After arriving home in the early afternoon, we hatched a plan to eat an early dinner and headed out to a CL institution: The Freeze. Nate had his very first ice cream cone last night and I think that is celebration enough. He enjoyed the ice cream and was amazed when I took a BITE of my cone. (He actually said "wow!" when I showed him what I had done.)
We followed up ice cream with a visit to Veteran's Acres for swings and playground equipment and a pond with various bull frogs, turtles, fish, ducks, and one confused goose (who seemed to treat a mated pair of ducks as friends, if not parents).
While we missed the actual sunset of solstice, this was a very successful solstice celebration.
swing low, sweet chariot
A couple weeks ago, I completed my one really big task for this summer.
It feels really good to have it done. I, of course, couldn't have completed this without lots of help from my father and the fathers-in-law. They were all quite patient with my "measure ten times, cut once" assembly procedure.
It was completed in time for the Big Visit of 8 adults and 8 kids. We had fine weather and even a little rain didn't keep us from the back yard for too long.
Yay! 
mixed media
Nate was given a gift recently: a big book of Thomas the Tank Engine stories. It has little illustrations around which the text flows. Nate doesn't recognize any of the engines though and keeps asking again and again what their names are. Having only experienced Thomas on the TV I can imagine the images on the page are off just enough to cause confusion.
-----
The other night he was asking in a very earnest (and not whining) way to watch "Lightning McQueen" and specifically "the race and the lady singing and Lightning McQueen comes out of Mack." (By which he means the beginning of the movie which features a Sheryl Crow song.) But we were eating dinner and were not going to be watching tv any time soon. So I thought I would offer a treat/compromise. I grabbed the soundtrack (a recently acquired item that he had not heard) and started to play the Sheryl Crow track.
Poor guy, he was so confused. He was looking around and around for a TV thinking I had put the DVD in somewhere and he just couldn't quite find it. When I explained to him it was just the music he wanted none of it. And I can't blame him. I should have know that it was not a good substitute. It would be like asking for ice cream and instead being shown pictures of someone else eating ice cream.
taking advantage of what we have
Nate and I went to Moraine Hills State Park on Saturday for a morning of outdoor exploration.
Every visit to the state park makes me want to go back for more. We are rather lucky in McHenry County to have a rather large number of conservation areas and three state parks. These are areas we need to take advantage of more often.
On Saturday, Nate ran ahead to the end of a wooden walkway (one that extends over the bog/wetlands area at Moraine Hills) and sat down. When I caught up with him a small snake was wiggling by and into the grass below. We also saw a Great Blue Heron take flight from its nest on the edge of the waterway. (Actually, I missed the take-off because I was busy shooting a macro photo of what looks like part of a jawbone from a critter.)
I discovered today, on the website FreeSound.org, user Tom Haigh (aka audible-edge) made a recent (March 14th) recording of the ambient sounds of Moraine Hills.
http://www.freesound.org/samplesViewSingle.php?id=69252
I think it captures the park quite well.
big river
I put Johnny Cash's "Live at San Quentin" album (the 2000 re-issue) in the CD player tonight while Nate and I were hanging out and playing.
After the first track, "Big River" finished, Nate, who had been quiet, (as he often is when listening to music new to him) suddenly said "He's real real happy."
That boy amazes me almost every day.
saying cheese
Packing up after the end of our Cousin's Camp-out weekend in July.
Nate saying "cheese!" in the most earnest way!
I know, I should be fixing cetan.org and posting all these wonderful (to me) archive finds there, but I'm lazy and this works...
holding on
The other day, Nate fell asleep clutching my hand to his body as if it were a stuffed toy. I marvel at the simplicity of this act and power that it has over my psyche.
He is so full of energy and of life. His joy seems limitless and his innocence is infectious. I want so much to write down and preserve all that he's doing right now...it is the source of so much amazement in my life... I can feel it all slipping away so very quickly.
....
It will not be long before affection from his father will be looked upon as a burden...something to suffer through... I will love him and He will, God willing, love me, but not as a boy...as a man. I know it's absurd, but I lament this change already, if only because I cherish it so much right now.
This is a rambling mess of an entry, I apologize. The words are just not coming together.
Audra Mae's cover of "Forever Young."
May God bless and keep you always,
May your wishes all come true,
May you always do for others
And let others do for you.
May you build a ladder to the stars
And climb on every rung,
May you stay forever young,
Forever young, forever young,
May you stay forever young.May you grow up to be righteous,
May you grow up to be true,
May you always know the truth
And see the lights surrounding you.
May you always be courageous,
Stand upright and be strong,
May you stay forever young,
Forever young, forever young,
May you stay forever young.May your hands always be busy,
May your feet always be swift,
May you have a strong foundation
When the winds of changes shift.
May your heart always be joyful,
May your song always be sung,
May you stay forever young,
Forever young, forever young,
May you stay forever young."Forever Young" - Bob Dylan
Where’s Jupiter?
A lot of children's books that feature a night sky include illustrations of various planets. Of course, these are exaggerated views and often the objects are "planet-like" variations of objects from our own solar system.
One planet, however, stands out: Saturn. Saturn (or a Saturn-like planet) is in almost every illustration of the night sky I've seen in a children's book. Of course, its distinctive rings make it an easy visual target.
Every once in a while, a book renders Saturn fairly well, and even manages to include other fairly-accurate representations of other planets. In our house, this book is "Where is Coco Going?" by Sloane Tanen.
This is a popular bed-time book in our house, and since before he was 2, Nate has known that the illustrations on a particular page are of Saturn and Jupiter (which he pronounces "Jupiper").
But if we're reading another book that also features some sort of night-sky illustration, inevitably there is a Saturn-like object but no clear Jupiter (if there's another planet at all). And Nate immediately asks: "Where's Jupiper?"
I cannot fully express to you how much joy it brings to my heart to hear him ask this question. Watching his development and growth has been (and continues to be) nothing short of astonishing.
it is not a slight thing
"I love these little people; and it is not a slight thing when they, who are so fresh from God, love us." - Charles Dickens
Exploration
We went to a wedding this evening and there was a nearby educational wetlands area. Small but perfect for a two year-old.
I spent a lot of time outside with Nate, which was fine by me, fine by him, and gave helloheather a chance to relax inside and chat with people. Win-win!
Edit/update:
This is not to say that we didn't have fun at the wedding. It was a blast and very relaxed. It was just nice to have a place to visit with Nate and not have to keep him inside where he could have become bored and disrupted things.
Nathan at Two
Nate turned two years old on June 30th. Two years since he changed our lives forever. Two years of growth for him and two years of excitement and fear for me.
He is an amazing child, of course, being the son of helloheather. He knows nearly every letter of the alphabet and only occasionally mixes one letter for another. He's been able to count to ten for a while now and he can count to twenty with some prompting. There's no way for me to catalog the number of words he can say...he picks them up with the same ease he picks up sticks in our yard. The other morning (while on vacation actually) I showed him a picture of an avocado and told him the word once. That night he pointed to it and said "abbecaado." I was stunned.
He's patient and polite and he wants to be everyones friend. It crushes me when he greets a slightly older child (3, 4 years) with enthusiasm and a big smile on his face and receives nothing but a disinterested look in return (if he gets a look at all). I want to say to the other child's parents: "what's wrong with you that you can't teach your kid some manners?" Not once has the parent of the other child asked them to return the basic kindness. I worry that Nate will soon pick up on this and be discouraged.
Nathan rarely walks: he runs and runs with gusto. He explores and explores again. "Leave no stone unturned" is a mantra that he keeps close to his heart. He greets me every night with babbles of joy and tales of his day. I wish I knew what he was saying but then I think how wonderful it is to have that little bit of mystery.
I could go on and on about him...he is such a source of both happiness and stress in my life. He daily pushes me into new experiences and new struggles. My heart is torn by thoughts of him growing up and shocked by how much growing-up has already happened. I look back at photos of him from a year ago and struggle to remember how things were before. His second year has been a whirlwind of development in every way possible.
I've uploaded a selection of photos from the past year of Nate. They are sorted in reverse chronological order. Some of the photographs have context and others do not. The album can be seen here:
http://www.bernhard.us/photos/nathan-age1
Perhaps a better way to view these images would be to view the gallery in slide show mode:
http://www.bernhard.us/photos/slideshow.php?set_albumName=nathan-age1
Does my name sting your tongue?
This is going to be a selfish post. If you cannot stand that sort of thing, I would encourage you to not read any further.
Nate has been diagnosed with a peanut allergy. His body's frightening, but not life-threatening, reaction a couple weeks ago was confirmed with a standard "scratch" test at an allergists'.
Let me just say that this really, really sucks. And I don't mean it sucks because of how much of a lifestyle upheaval it is for us as a family...I mean it sucks because I won't be able to do a huge swath of things that I didn't even realize I wanted to do...
That's sort of confusing, so some examples:
- I was walking through the store and realized that he and I won't ever be able to take a hike in the park or along the bike trail and share a bag of trail mix.
- Very little dried fruit, in fact, can be consumed. It's almost all tainted.
- We can never again go to, or order from, Nick's Pizza. Ever.
- Almost all ice cream and custard shops are out too. I can't ever go and sit outside Tasty Freeze or Diary Queen at the end of a warm summer day and eat ice cream with Nate.
- We will never be able to pack him a pb&j in a lunch box for when his class goes to a park or a zoo or something.
- I will never be able to share a bag of M&M's (or almost any chocolate candy) with him at the movie theater
What is most frustrating to me about this whole endeavor is that he HAS eaten peanuts before. He's had M&M's and he's had crackers with peanut butter. One of the few meats he will eat is chicken from a chinese restaurant cooked in, you guessed it, peanut oil. And he's never had any sort of reaction to anything he's eaten. So, what changed?
...
And now, I read things like:
The AAP recommends delaying introduction of peanuts until three years of age for children with a family history of allergies in both parents or in a parent and sibling. The group also suggests that mothers in such families avoid peanuts while they are breastfeeding and possibly during pregnancy.
and I wonder how much of this is our fault. I'm not allergic to peanuts but I'm allergic to dusts, molds, pollen, smoke and, as a child, I was allergic to milk. So, was Nate set up to fail because we didn't follow (or even know about) these AAP guidelines? The more I read, the more it looks like we completely fucked up on this. No peanuts of any quantity until 3 years of age is the recommendation? Weren't we told that after age 1 things are ok? I don't even remember any more. We certainly didn't give him any substantial peanut butter until recently, but he had the chicken in peanut oil back in December.
It's just so damn frustrating. And the more I read the worse it gets. The scratch test said peanuts-only and the allergist said that other types of nuts are fine, but most all peanut-allergy websites say things like "...most experts recommend peanut-allergic patients avoid tree nuts as well." Well now what?
As usual, I end up floundering at the end of my post. I'm just tired of being stressed and frustrated with this whole thing. I want him tested again by a different doctor because I don't want it to be true. I don't want this bullshit allergy shoved in my face every single day...I don't want to be "that parent" that has to talk to all the other parents in the school or at the church function or any other of a million fucking common events that we want to go to where food will be served asking about peanut content.
Oh, and Nate also tested positive for a salmon allergy. So there's that too, just less so.