hump day nuggets, 10/12/11: Savisms

little bits of the season in words and images from the past week, as inspired by digthischick
 
We inaugurated the sick season over here with a puke fest from Raya today, so these nuggets will be short on my usual half-baked philosophical verbiage, but rich in the sweet wisdom of five-year olds. This week's notes abound in Savisms.
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On our way to school one day this week, Sava unexpectedly broached the subject of life and death. He reiterated musingly what we often say around here, which is that life probably continues after death, and "when you die, you might turn into a seed and then become another thing." I suddenly saw in my mind's eye visions of him pontificating on the subject during science class, and was gripped by a deep anxiety about what his teacher might think or say of his amateur reincarnation ideas. So, to counterbalance the pictures of life in death he seemed to have espoused so cheerfully, I told him, as we have done several times in the past, that some people believe in a Creator, whom they call God, who created earth and all living things; these people, I noted, might not necessarily agree with the idea of life being continued after death on earth. Sava thought for a long second, and then said with the utmost seriousness, Well, the Creator must have been around for a very long time if he created all these things..." I went on to explain about the six-day creation and such, but fortunately, he lost interest.
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During a ride in the car last weekend, Raya was getting tired and whining repeatedly about something that I have already forgotten. She kept saying she wanted this, then she wanted that, to which Sava replied, after he had endured the whining stoically for a few minutes: Raya, you can't change your mind every second!

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While we were giving Raya a bath two nights ago on her birthday, grandpa was trying to make a video of Big Girl Getting Washed. Sava came into the bathroom wanting to pee, but also clearly wanting to get in on the action, and he kept butting in front of or near the camera. When Rado chastised him and asked him to please be careful, Sava replied in unfeigned outrage, I'm just trying to dry my hands! I can't always be out of the way! 

 You're certainly right, son.
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Mommy, a gang is a group of people who think only about themselves.
Where did you learn that?
I didn't learn it! 
Then how do you know?
I just picked it up!

 (a Berenstain Bears book may, apparently, be the fount of wisdom here)
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Sava came back from school today, after a second day of playing "family" with one of the girls in his Kindergarten class (he is the brother, she the sister, and they have an imaginary lizard whom they take for daily walks). He told me that he told one of the boys he had "a girlfriend," to which the boy replied by reporting Sava's news to other boys and then said that playing with a girl was "silly." I told Sava to tell his friend that saying those things to him was even sillier. And I commended him for playing with a girl.

admiring a stranger (photo courtesy of grandpa)

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Raya is getting better at waiting her turn to speak when Sava is talking to one of us, but her insistent competitiveness rarely abates. When Sava had spoken about a book that we were reading one day, she waited for him to finish, then said, I read a book about G and P! She's also developing a nascent interest in the alphabet.

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During dinner one night this week, my dad asked a question about the Wall Street protests that have been taking place lately and that NPR covers every evening. Sava wanted to know what we were discussing, and after a couple of futile What are you guys talking about?, because we will not be interrupted, he said hopefully, Are you talking about engineers and professors?

When his dad then gave him the kiddie version of "some people are rich and thankless, others much less so and angry," Sava assumed we belong to the latter group and needed some financial assistance, so he announced in a most earnest voice, I can give you some coins that I have in the cash register.
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He's really into telling us about his dreams lately. There were a few notable ones, but I wrote down only one.
I had a dream that I had blue wings, so I could fly and people didn't have to pick me from school!

loves playing Big Brother to not one, but TWO little girls

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Sava had an elaborate plan to celebrate his half-birthday this weekend by sticking five full candles in his cupcake, then submerging a sixth one halfway. Then his best buddy came over for an afternoon of play, and since they both celebrate their half-birthday this month, they happily split the candles into two groups of three, then blew as if their life depended on it. Excuse the domestic kitchen scene.

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Speaking of candles, big girl celebrated her Big Two this weekend in the midst of friends. As our dear neighbor Annie noted, Raya's astonishment at having twenty-plus people sing Happy Birthday (after she first blew the candles before anyone had sung) marks the first occasion in her life when our daughter was left literally speechless. Speechlessness is not a condition with which she is otherwise familiar.
I love this photo, taken by grandpa, of Sava trying to reassure her that it is going to be alright.

As indeed it was. After her initial surprise, she blew the candles in one breath, and then requested a second rendition of Happy Birthday, then proceeded to blow the candles again.
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That photo above is of a rare moment in which Sava finds an occasion to comfort his sister, which he loves to do. The photo below, also taken by grandpa, is much more typical of their daily interaction. He leans over and whispers to her some crazy thing that he doesn't dare do, but that he'd love her to do. She listens carefully, then does said thing without a second thought.

And this is what she looks like when she's done it.

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Grandparents are for buying things that parents wouldn't buy, and that children therefore love all the more. Raya got a pink stroller for her birthday.

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We got our first real rain of the season, which brought a welcome change of mood outside.

Raya loves touching "squishy slugs."

She loves finding snails, too.

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In between rainfalls it was sunny and crisp,

 then sunny and hot again.

Sava's little garden of pansies is thriving in this kind of weather, even when sister doesn't water.

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When we go on our nightly after-dinner walks, we almost always stop to marvel at a spider that has built a web spanning the whole sidewalk between a house and a tree bordering the street. The first time we saw him (her?), he seemed to be walking in thin air. Then the next day, in better light, we discerned the web against the backdrop of an empty sky. What he does there and why he went to the trouble of weaving an infinite web over nothing seem like unanswerable questions.

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Who knows about life, death, reincarnation, and all that. The best we can do with what we have is marvel at it and appreciate it.

Happy day after hump day out there.