Thoughts and Words Ill-Sorted

Thus far I’ve not been able to establish a clear evening routine at our place.  Mom says she gave me a bath every night.  And she and my dad probably even read to me every night.  Things in our house are much more fluid.  Although I’m the “routine” advocate, I will chuck everything out the window for an evening walk in the parks with the kids.  I was probably the only parent in all of Oxford out with the kids in the parks at 8:45pm the other day.  We tend to arrive at the playground just when other parents are starting to head home with their families.  But who can resist daylight when it comes that late in the evening??  I guess I’d better never move farther north, since I would likely have the kids out in the sun past midnight in the summer months.

So baths happen when most convenient (particularly after a big mess!), books are read when opportunity and Katherine’s happy states coincide (otherwise she tries to eat or tear the books), dinner is eaten when Sydney finishes it up (since we like Katherine to eat what we eat, when we eat it) and bedtime–well, we’re working on that.  Sometimes I would like to have a clearer sense that we’re covering our bases, but at other times I absolutely refuse to haul Katherine off from perfectly happy play with her father just so that she will get her teeth brushed.

Mornings are a bit more stable.  I get Katherine and Nathaniel changed and dressed while Sydney makes muesli (with oats, rye, millet, flax, sunflower seeds, raisins, berries, and banana) in the kitchen.  We sit down as a family to eat.  And then all bets are off.  This morning I jumped up to get Nathaniel’s seat in place so that he could watch us eat, since he was clearly feeling lonely in his crib.  Then Katherine refused to take food from Sydney (having decided that I was the preferred parent for the morning), so we spent the rest of the time keeping her off my lap and indicating that food would come only from her father.  Much screaming ensued.  But then she calmed down, opened her mouth for Sydney’s spoon, and we ate together just like a nice, normal (!) family.

Erin

Somebody happened to have a video camera handy when the stork came by on Monday. Here’s some of the footage:

Video footage of the stork in flight (c) Jeff Pursey.

We’ve been surprised at all the many gorgeous warm, sunny days we’ve had recently. After all, England is supposed to be wet and cool, right? It turns out that this year’s spring was unusual. This April was the warmest April on record for the UK and our part of England got a tenth of the normal rainfall. Maybe we just haven’t experienced real English weather yet.

Erin

I’m having fun dressing Nathaniel in leggings.  Apparently the deal is that boys’ colors are more limited than girls’, so you get your kicks in patterns:

Erin

I was told, when calling the UK government (it also happens with banks, employers, and other businesses), “You’ll need to have your husband call back.”  Do they have any idea how galling it is to be told such a thing?

Erin

Katherine is happiest outside and I like birdwatching so the two of us quite often head across town to Port Meadow in the morning. It’s been blustery for a few days now and Port Meadow is about as exposed a spot as you can find around here, but I decided we needed to get out this morning anyway. Besides, the wind has been from the east, i.e., good for bringing birds out here from the continent.

The wind was rather fierce and Katherine thought it of dubious merit at first. But then I think she picked up the word for it (though I never heard her say ‘wind’ in a quite intelligible way) and then, of course, the wind was a wonderful thing. Her love for the latest name seems to bleed over into love for the named. So she was happy.

I, too, was quite pleased with the morning. The flooded portion of the meadow held 27 Bar-tailed Godwits and a Black-bellied Plover (or a Grey Plover, as the English call them). It’s the first time I’ve seen a Black-bellied Plover around here and it was nice to witness part of the amazing passage of Bar-tailed Godwits that’s been taking place the last few days. Thousands of them have been reported moving along the coasts and numerous small flocks have found their way inland. Usually, they stay on the coasts — long-time local birdwatchers tell me that in most years the total annual count for the county stays in the single digits. So 27 at a time is quite amazing. And a number of flocks like that have come through in the last few days. Another pleasing feature was that both the godwits and plover were in their more colourful breeding plumage. Most waders — the group of birds to which these two species belong — frequent England in the winter and then fly to colder climes for the summer, which means that we usually only get to see them in their rather dull winter plumage.

After enjoying the birds on the floods, I headed into a treed area next to the Meadow to look for Whitethroats. They’re a perfectly common bird around here, but they have only just arrived from their wintering grounds farther south and so I hadn’t yet seen one. I saw eight of them today, so now I’ve definitely seen them.

Feeling very satisfied with the morning out, I then started to head back. Just as I neared the floods again, I noticed the resident birdwatcher, i.e., the chap who maintains the Port Meadow birding blog, practically flying off his bicycle in his haste to get his binoculars on a bird. Naturally, I paused to check out what he was looking at. A White Stork!! This is what in birding lingo is called a ‘mega’. Not because of its size, although it was a strikingly large bird, but because of its rarity. White Storks aren’t resident in the UK, let alone in Oxfordshire. Word has it that it’s the first stork ever seen at Port Meadow. After a couple of minutes of watching it on the ground, we watched as it took off, flew over our heads, and off to the east. I don’t think Katherine quite understood why the half dozen adults around here were quite so excited all of a sudden.

This being England, home of hordes of crazed ‘twitchers’, the bird was immediately reported to several birding hotlines. It left too quickly for any additional twitchers to make it to Port Meadow, but, if you follow the relevant services, you’ll now see periodic reports of someone seeing a White Stork flying over as it is making its way east across the country.

To think that if I’d left a minute or two earlier, I would have missed one of the best birds of the year. As it was, I was merely a bit sweaty and out-of-breath for lunch in Merton College.

Sydney

About a week ago Nathaniel stopped sleeping well.  I thought I could handle it until he got over his cold, but apparently my reserves are all used up.  I have, thus far, washed a Pyrex pan and then placed it where it promptly slid off and shattered on the floor, completely forgotten that I said I would bake this or that, and by last night I had even lost my appetite (quite a feat for me!).  Not to mention a time or two of staring dumbly at my son, wondering what I could do to help his crying, only to have Sydney suggest “Feeding, perhaps?”  So, for now, life consists of putting one foot in front of another.  Then we’ll resume a more expansive life.

Erin

Nathaniel has big blue eyes, an open expression, and long, curved eyelashes.  He makes cute cooing sounds, and his cries make Katherine look concerned and say, “Baby nooooo.”  He also has big hands and feet, and is within ten pounds or so of his sister.  She is a sturdy girl, but I hope she realizes soon that it would be a good idea to be on Nathaniel’s good side as they grow up together.  Otherwise she will lose a lot of fights!  When Katherine takes her nap Nathaniel and I head upstairs with my lunch and I can frequently get him to take a nap, too, by putting him on a pillow on the dresser in front of the window, bathed in sunshine.

Erin