Day +701: Trucking Along

Things have been going along swimmingly here in the Olsen-Olson household. We've been busy busy, doing this, that and the other thing. The kids (and adults) have had another round of colds -- runny noses and coughs, but no fevers or throwing up, thank goodness. The other day Mina, as she's done before, said with an exaggerated tone of exasperation, "When am I going to not have a cold?" It does seem like she's had an endless string of colds and coughs, but they've not been anythings that's set her back at all. She even avoided catching the nasty stomach flu that Isaac and so many of her schoolmates had. I'm stunned, but also really hopeful that this all means that her new immune system is strong. We weren't sure what to expect with Mina entering school -- in the back of my mind I think I was expecting her to miss a lot of days of school and to catch every litttle thing that somebody brought to school. But she's barely been ill at all, and she seems strong as a horse.

This is all terrific of course, especially with her fourth birthday and the two-year anniversary of her transplant coming up. Keri spent today writing invitations and planning Mina's birthday. Mina is so excited about it. She really wants to have it at our house, and she wants to invite all of her school friends, along with Bliss, Nikola, Devon, and Mikaela. That's goingn to mean about 15 kids and at least 20 adults, crammed into our little 2-bedroom flat. I have no idea how that's going to work, but there is a large playground a block away that we can use as a safety valve if we need to. I think I'm going to suggest that we have the cake early so there's nothing stopping us from all walking up there if we need to. Mina was screeching about it today just from planning it. She doesn't want to wait for three weeks, she wants it to be tomorrow.

The kids' games with the beds and couch have gotten much more elaborate over the months. The other day when I came home from work, and Mina and Isaac were so excited to show me the "car". They had taken the bottom cushion off the couch and put it behind the couch. That was the back seat. Then they had taken one of the two back cushions and set it down lengthwise, and several babies were propped up on it, neatly covered with blankets. The other back cushion was standing upright, leaning against the armrest. That was the driver's place. The footstool from the rocker was set up next to the cushion, and the driver would stand on the footstool and steer using the upright back cushion. The rest of the couch was packed full of stuff. Little toy animals, boxes of books, blankets, blocks, tools, you name it. They had packed the car really well because they were going on a long, long, long, long drive to ... Hawaii. You see, Hawaii is a long drive, so they had to bring lots of stuff. And they really wanted Keri and me to cram ourselves into the space between the couch and the windows and sit on the cushion which they had stuffed there. We did that for about five minutes, but neither of us was limber enough to last any longer.

Isaac is so into his driving games, that he frequently now says "I'm not Isaac. I'm the garbage man." Or the fireman. Or the bus driver or truck drive. His latest one is the mailman. With the couch cushion off the couch so much these days, I noticed how dirty the couch was underneath, so I wanted to vacuum it. Then I figured, Isaac loves the vacuum cleaner. In fact, he's always trying to get it out of the closet, except it has a base with a hose attached, and he can't quite get it to do what he wants, so he always gets frustrated and starts to cry. Anyway, I set Isaac up with the vacuum cleaner and had him vacuum the couch. He was *so* happy. He vacuumed the couch for half an hour, and would have gone longer if I hadn't made him stop. The only thing I had to do was dig deeply into the corners. He looked up at me one time and said "I'm cleaning my garbage truck!"

I've noticed with Mina that there are little rituals that she does, little things that she says or does over and over again at the same time. I think I noticed it first with her vitamins. She had three pills every morning at breakfast for a long, long time: a multivitamin, a gummy calcium vitamin, and a children's aspirin (now she only has two, since we stopped the aspirin). And every day she would say "Which vitam am I gonna take first?" So I would suggest she take the aspirin, and sometimes she would say "But that's the next one!" "How about the gummy one?" "But that's the next one." "How about the multivitamin?" "OK." and she would eat it. One day, after at least a year like that, I for some reason decided to do "eenie meenie minie moe" to decide which one to take first. Well, that instantly became the new ritual. Not exactly what I intended, but now every day Mina says "Can you do eenie meenie minie moe?" And I have to do it for her, even though she's fully capable of doing it herself.

She has other ones. When we read the "Mommie" book, which is a very elaborate popup book by Maurice Sendak, which is about a boy searching for his Mommie in Frankenstein's castle. He has to elude Dr. Frankestein, the vampire, Frankenstein's monster, the mummy and the warewolf, and when he finally finds his Mommie on the last page, it's the Bride of Frankenstein. And every time we get to the last page, and I mean *every time*, Mina says "She looks kinda scary herself!"

The latest one I've noticed is when she goes off to school in the morning. I'm usually just getting in the shower, so every day as she's walking down the stairs she turns and says to me "You won't be lonely because all the babies will be here to keep you company!" Or sometimes if she knows I'm going straight to work, she'll say "You won't be lonely at your work because all your people will be there!" It's very endearing, and I'm sure it says something about her personality, but darned if I know what.

The latest endearing thing she's been doing is telling me how much she loves me. She'll give me a big hug and say "I love you *so* much!" Or sometimes she'll say she loves me as high as the ceiling, or say what Auntie Teri tells her about to the moon and stars and back again. Of course it melts Daddy's heart every time. And best of all, today Isaac said to me "Daddy, I love you *so* much!"