Thankful

Thanksgiving Day could not have been nicer, so we headed, yet again, to the Arnold Arboretum, for which I am very thankful.

A few things Frances is thankful for:

• helping hands,

• swishing,

• necklaces and watches, and the grandmothers who give them,

• running,

• and a daddy who runs with her (she's given up asking her slow mother)!

I'm thankful for friends who do most of the cooking for us!  A lovely Thanksgiving was had by all.

Veterans' Day Wanderings

Veterans' Day was just beautiful in these parts, so we headed out to the Minute Man National Park.  Seemed appropriate for Veterans' Day.  In case you start to forget that the Revolutionary War happened all over this area, about every 100 feet you'll find a rock with a plaque reading "Near here lies the body of a British soldier."  Sobering, to those of us who can read.

For those of us who can't read, it was a great place to frolic.  Here's Frances frolicking in front of the Jacob Whittemore House.

"Swishing," as she calls it, is still one of Frances's favorite things.  This is Frances and me preparing to swish:

This is Mark and Frances mid-swish.  Mark gets her a little higher than I do.

And here's Frances resting angelically on a rock, right before running all the way back to the car.

Hiding in a Fort!

Frances has moved on from hiding under a blanket.  Now she hides under a blanket suspended over chairs!

Mark secretly loves this game because he gets to play with Frances, keeping me happy, and lie down, keeping himself happy.

Thirty-Six Months of Preschooler Frances

And now, for the last monthly update of Frances Elliott Upton!  Almost three years of these things seems like plenty, no?  My plan (no derisive laughter, please) is to keep up with the monthly photos, but maybe not the monthly blow-by-blow.

So here she is, in all her glory at thirty-six months old! (And, yes, I forgot to take photos until moments before bedtime.)

Cheese ball.

Thirty-Six Months Fun Facts

• Firsts: Frances went to her first Lightning Show at the Museum of Science!  I remember going to these shows as a little kid when my sisters and I visited our grandparents.  The shows are very loud and I did not think Frances would enjoy it at all, but she was determined to go once she heard that there would be a "show."  She loved it.  I covered her ears and she covered her baby doll's ears.  Worked perfectly.
• Frances-isms: Frances switches "air port" and "tennis court" so sometimes she'll say "I want to go to the airport and play ball."  She's also latched on to "sounds like a plan" so she'll say things like "We go to store for pepperoni and then library.  Sounds like a plan?"
• Food: Pepperoni, pepperoni, pepperoni.  I wish I hadn't just heard that it gives you cancer.  Sometimes she'll eat rice.  When I try to introduce new foods, she cries and pushes the new food off her plate.  Excellent.
• New skill: Frances is very keen to write letters and numbers all of a sudden.  Her favorites are F, E and 4, but she's thrown in a 5, a v, and an r.  Complete surprise to us.  Her teacher wants her to be focusing more on big gestures than fine motor skills, but it's hard not to be excited.
• Favorite reads:  She's really been enjoying the No, David! series by David Shannon, but Thomas and George hold steady.  The other day, I let her pick a little item for herself from our local toy store for her birthday.  I thought she might choose a ballerina sticker book, but Happy Birthday, Thomas! won hands down.  All on her own, she got interested in The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick, which was exciting but the book is really beyond her right now.
• Worst moment of the month:  It was more than a moment, really.  There was one night Frances could not fall asleep until 11 p.m.  And this wasn't happy not-falling-asleep-because-I'm-not-tired.  This was weeping, tantrumming not-falling-asleep-because-I'm-out-of-my-gourd.  She started the melt down about 8. Mark drove to a job site about 45 minutes from us, did his work and drove home.  She was still in melt down mode when he got home at about 10:45.  There was no joy in Whoville, let me tell you.
• Second worst moment of the month: Again, more than a moment.  Frances, dear, woke up at 3 a.m. and wasn't interested in going back to sleep until 4:30 a.m.  Unlike the previous episode, she was perfectly happy to be awake from 3 a.m. until 4:30 a.m.  I was not.  She ended up sleeping with us, first with her head next to ours, then with her head on my belly and her feet on Mark's hips and then with her head down by our feet.  Even weeks later, I don't know what to say.
• Best moment of the month:  This was right around one of the terrible nights when nerves were frayed pretty thin.  After dinner, I turned on Pandora's Family Folk radio station.  The first song to pop up: "Obvious Child" by Paul Simon.  Hallelujah!  All three of us danced around the kitchen and had a grand old time. Just what we needed. Thank you, thank you Paul Simon and the folks down at Pandora's Family Folk radio station!

Still with me?  I'm impressed!

And so ends three years with Frances Elliott.

Happy Birthday, Frances!

For Frances's third birthday, we wandered into the land of Birthday Parties and survived!  We kept it very small, just Frances's friends Sophia and Tyler and their entourages.  Here's most of the gang, everyone except me.

Here are the big kiddos gearing up for the cake. The cake really got their attention.  Frances was sure we were supposed to have birthday hats.

It took us a couple tries, but we did get the candles out.

After cake, we opened gifts.  This is Frances examining a new flashlight.  It has proved to be very popular.  We used it to go on a bear hunt later that day and now the flashlight sleeps with her.

Mark and Frances thought baby Cobi was pretty nifty.

Later that day, Mark said something along the lines of  "I think I could handle a boy baby after all."  Good thing, since there's a 50 per cent chance he'll be getting one.

More presents.  Frances and Sophia examine a floor puzzle which has been very popular.  Frances is really enjoying puzzles lately.

And then we did this for a couple hours.  I cannot explain why having a few friends over for the afternoon is so exhausting; it's got something to do with calling it a "Birthday Party."  You'll notice that Frances is still holding the flashlight.

This makes Frances officially Three!!  I think I'm supposed to say something here like "My, how the time has flown!" but I think I'll stick with "My, how much Frances has accomplished!"  We've come a long way - from a baby who couldn't be bothered to wake up to eat to a three year-old who runs her parents ragged.  We wouldn't trade her for the world.

The Weekend That Wouldn't End

I am painfully aware that I should not be glib, but for us, Hurricane Sandy boiled down to The Weekend That Wouldn't End.  Saturday was perfectly comfortable.  Sunday was too rainy to go outside.  Monday, Hurricane Sandy hit and school was cancelled.  The house shuddered, the lights flickered and we moved our car out from under a huge tree.  Other than that, we were left to entertain ourselves, like so:

Very hard to grasp that people were dying a mere five hour drive from here.  We were very, very lucky.

Zoo Howl

As part of our campaign to get Frances out of the house and run her ragged, Mark and I took her to the Franklin Park Zoo's Zoo Howl.  We thought it was trick-or-treating set at a zoo.  We were right in the letter but not in the spirit, but I'll get to that.

Here's Frances all dressed up for Halloween at the gorilla display.  What costume, you say?  She was supposed to be a runner, but was not interested in wearing her headband or running bib, so this is what we got.

Not sure what she's doing with her leg there.

One of the benefits of having Mark Upton for a dad: you get a bird's eye view of everything.

Frances pointing out the lion:

This is Frances's favorite activity at the zoo: sit in the big box while not looking at animals.  Frances's mom liked this activity a lot more before she grew a huge belly.

After several hours at the zoo, we headed for home.  See that pink and white dot at the top of the hill?  That's Frances dancing.  She did it for a good 10 minutes.  We, the parents, were amused enough to take the picture, then we were ready to go home.

What about the trick-or-treating, you ask?  That was a bit of a ruse.  The trick-or-treating turned out to be walking around six card tables and picking up these healthy snacks.  My sister Jocelyn might have been pleased.  Mark was not.

And that was the extent of Mark's candy haul for the year.  When Halloween finally rolled around, Frances wasn't interested in going out, so Mark couldn't raid her candy.  Poor Mark.

Fall in the Arboretum

Welcome to the new blog!  

When we left the old, beloved blog, our lives had been disordered somewhat by Frances completely giving up on her old reliable sleeping schedule.  This was very painful for all of us.  Over several months, the pieces have started to fall back into place and life is regaining some sense of order.  (This may sound dramatic, but a two year-old without a predictable sleeping schedule is not a pretty sight.)  One strategy we used up until the time change was to run Frances ragged after school, in hopes that she would finally relax and sleep at night.  Very useful strategy, and it got us all out and about.  The Arnold Arboretum came in very handy.

Ooh, she is so cool on her bike.

I know Mark and I picked this spot for a photo because of the beautiful leaves; I'm fairly certain Frances was hunting bears.

Hello, from the pond!

Mark says these are some of the nicest photos I've ever taken of Frances and him together.

They are nice photos, but that makes me think I need to take more nice photos of them and less shots of them hiding under blankets.  We'll see.

And then the time changed.  The sun now goes down at about 4, and trips to the Arboretum seem grim to this cold-averse mother.  Plus, Frances refuses to wear jackets.  Plus, she doesn't seem to need to be run ragged to get to bed anymore, thank goodness.