Science!

I’ve been watching the new Cosmos show, and they’ve been talking about the speed of light.  In a related sort of way, I told Allison about the speed of sound.  How it’s not instantaneous, but actually takes some time to get from here to there.  If we were standing far apart, you can actually see the delay.  I told her this over dinner one night.

The next day, we were driving somewhere, and she remembered our conversation.  She said “That doesn’t seem right.”  I was so proud of her skepticism.  I told her we’d do an experiment after dinner.

So, that night, we got out my binoculars and tripod.  We went out on our street, and I set up the binoc’s pointing as far as they could see down the street.  Then I ran down there (around 100 yards away), next to some trashcans.  I waved at Allison, and she waved back.  I saw her looking through the binoculars.  I banged on the trashcans a few times with exaggerated movement, so that she could see exactly when I hit them.  I waved again, and she waved back.  Then I jogged back to where she was, and I could see her jumping up and down with excitement.  “It worked!  It worked!” she yelled.  She explained how she SAW me hit the trashcans, but didn’t hear the sound until about a second later.

She wanted to switch positions, so we did, and I was able to see what she saw.  About a 3/4 second delay between sight and sound.

It was really fun and rewarding for me, and I hope the lessons learned (not only about sound, but about skepticism and testing ideas and gaining knowledge through evidence and experimentation) stick with her.

Samantha Jane turns 1!

Today is Samantha Jane’s first birthday.

I’ll admit, I was worried about her, ever since before she was born.  Diana was (barely) diagnosed with gestational diabetes, but it turned out to be nothing.  Then there was something where the umbilical cord wasn’t exactly in the center of the placenta, like it should be.  Then the C-section birth less-than-perfect Apgar scores.  Then her sleepiness and lack of weight gain in the first few days of her life.  She was given some tests and even an ultrasound of her brain to check for bleeding, but all came back normal.  She was just a sleepy baby.

But I worried.  I didn’t worry much about Allison, but mostly just out of ignorance, I guess.

I read that babies typically have their first social smile somewhere around 4-7 weeks.  When Sam’s 7 week birthday rolled around without any smiles, I worried.  Then her 8 week birthday.  It was the day after that when Allison and I went to Disneyland.  I remember thinking to myself “It’s going to be a great day...  Allison and I will have a fun day at Disneyland, and Diana will send word that Samantha smiled for the first time.”  And that’s exactly what happened.  And the best part is that she hasn’t stopped smiling since then.

The last two months have really been a huge change for her.  She wasn’t much of a roller, but somewhere around 10 months she started crawling.  And in just a matter of a day or two, she went from totally immobile to cruising all around the house.  Now, she cruises all over everything, and can now easily pull herself to standing.  She’s taken a few wobbly steps, but I wouldn’t really call it walking by herself yet.  More like falling forward with a few steps.  However, with just a couple of fingers for support, she loves to walk everywhere.  One of my favorite things is coming home from work, where she sees me and squeals and crawls over to my leg and tries to climb up them.

She sleeps well.  She recently had a bit of a hunger strike, but is now eating well.  Diana does a fabulous job making and freezing healthy baby food, and she’s starting to drink cow’s milk.  She’s starting to point at things, and seems to be able to respond when we ask her to point at various pictures (as in, “Where’s the dog?”  *point*)  Diana said today that Samantha was very interested in the face on the mug she was using.  Diana showed it to her, and then put it away.  Sam clapped her hands (for “more”) and then pointed at the mug.  Her first sentence (kind of).

All in all, she’s the happiest, calmest, most easy-going baby I’ve ever known. Likewise, Diana and I are much more calm and relaxed as parents the second time around.  In spite of my worries above, with a bit of experience under our belt, we no longer stress out so much about how much she’s eating or how well she’s napping.

She’s a good little baby, and we love her.

Time travel, chain reactions, and the Butterfly Effect

I just had the most amazing conversation with Allison since... perhaps ever.

She was about to leave on a playdate.  On occasions on playdates, she's really had a hard time getting along with the other kid.  She wants to be the on in charge, and wants to be the one saying "Look what *I* can do!" but doesn't reciprocate, and gets mad or frustrated when the other kid has a mind of their own and doesn't march to her orders.

Anyways, I was saying that if her friend suggests an activity that isn't her favorite thing to do, she should do it anyways, and then suggest the next activity, take turns, etc.  She then started talking about how if you do something nice for someone, it makes them feel good, and they they'll be happy, and they might do something nice for someone else, and so on and so forth.  Likewise, if you are mean to someone, or do something that makes them feel bad, they in turn might feel bad about themselves, and then might say or do something mean to the next person, and so on and so forth.

Allison can get super frustrated when it's time to turn off the video game we're playing or turn off the TV.  She can start crying pretty good, get frustrated, throw toys, etc.  This, of course, leads to frustrated parents, time outs, trouble, etc.  It was a great opportunity to talk about how one person's behavior affects those around them, both positively and negatively.

I brought up the idea of someone at her school saying something mean to her.  Maybe this makes her feel bad, so then when Diana picks her up, she is mean to her.  Then Diana tells me, and I get disappointed, etc, and how one persons comment can really make a difference.  Then we talked about the opposite... how someone says something nice that makes her feel good.  That means she greets Diana with a smile and a hug after school.  Diana calls me and tells me what a good day Allison had, and therefore I'm feeling happy, and we play well together at night, etc.

Through all this conversation, both of us are talking and saying the same thing, finishing each others sentences.  It was really her bringing up the major point of how our feelings affect other people, and me just building on that foundation with examples and stuff.

I told her about the Butterfly effect.  Somehow we started talking about time travel and causality, and how if you could go back in time and change some event in the past, it would cause the whole future to change.  It was really quite an incredible conversation, and I really hope the ideas stick with her.

I haven't written in a while, so I will include an update about Samantha.  She is the happiest, calmest, most easy-going baby I have ever known.  She's about 10.5 months, and has been crawling for a couple weeks now, and as a result, she's just a completely different baby than she used to be.  She has nailed the trifecta of going from sitting to crawling, crawling around, and then going from crawling back to sitting.  She loves exploring.  She loves scratching at any little dot she finds on the ground, or putting mysterious things in her mouth.  She *loves* her big sister, and laughs and squeals when Allison does various antics to make her laugh.  Allison, likewise, loves to try to make her smile and laugh, sometimes a little too vigorously, but always with good intentions.

Games

Diana sat down with me at the table for some Twilight Struggle the other night.  It's a pretty overwhelming game to look at for a newb, but (as you know) once you get the hang of it, there's not too much you need to remember.  I explained the rules and we got through a couple turns before it started getting too late.  I hope we can give it another shot at some point.  She seemed interested, but I think is mostly put off by the length of time required to play.

I bought Allison "Fairies Rule, Goblins Drool" for Christmas.  It's a silly little game built around one mechanic, but she likes it, and it's not totally dumb.

I also brought out Bohnanza! and played with Diana and Allison together.  The box says ages 13+ on it, but I figured Allison could figure it out.  Turns out I was right!  We played with our hands face up on the table, and played through the entire deck once.  Allison picked up the rules quickly and easily.  It was super cute when she would say in mock anguish "Ugh, no one wants my Blue Beans!" or whatever.  We didn't play a very cutthroat game... there was lots of donating and friendly trading, but everyone had a good time.  That's a fun little game.

One month...

Well, we’re a little over one month in to the whole “second child” thing, and it’s going ok.  I think Diana and I would both agree that it has been and is easier than we anticipated. 

When we left the hospital, the main concern was making sure that Samantha was eating enough and gaining weight.  She has gained well over the average weight per week of her life, so that is no longer a concern.  Diana has had a number of breastfeeding issues (overproduction, fast let-down, clogged ducts, mastitis), which has made things challenging on her end, for sure.  Mastitis, particularly, leads to antibiotics, which then affects Samantha’s digestion, etc.  So it’s been a little bit of a mess, but I think we (really mostly Diana) have risen and overcome the challenges as they’ve presented themselves.

Sam had her one-month doctor’s appointment today.  They verified that she’s tracking objects with her eyes, reacts to light, etc.  Upon further discussion, the doctor agreed with our suspicion that she has a certain amount of reflux, and prescribed some medicine for that.  Samantha is a very loud sleeper, always growling and hiccupping and very restless, so we’re hoping that will be relieved with some anti-reflux medicine.

In general, though, she sleeps well, eats well, and is doing fine.  She’s 90th percentile in both weight and height.  Her doctor seemed happy about that.  In spite of her initial slow start and sleepiness, and now reflux, she certainly isn’t having any problems growing.

Allison is getting over a cold and an ineffective run of antibiotics.  She missed a day of school, but is on the mend now.  She continues to dominate kindergarten, and it’s crazy to think that the school year is almost over.  It goes so fast.

Diana is surviving, still getting up in the middle of the night to nurse and help Samantha.  She really has been super-mom in that regard, facing the challenges of a newborn without complaint.  Our house is being invaded by ants, and there’s clutter and the washing machine broke, so that’s driving her a little crazy, but between you and me, if those are the worst problems we’re having, I think we’re doing pretty ok.

The Ballad of Samantha Jane, cont'd

Today is Samantha's one week birthday.

We came home on Friday, and did our best to figure out how the dynamics were going to work.  It was great to see and live with Allison again.  She visited us once in the hospital, but didn't want to come back after that.  I don't blame her, it's an uncomfortable environment.  But it was great to see her again.

The first night wasn't too bad, but just difficult.  We were feeding everything three hours.  That doesn't sound so bad, but when you take into account that a feeding would take an hour or more, that's not a whole lot of sleep.  But we made it through OK (my memory is a little foggy, obviously).

The next morning, we were figuring out what we were going to do for the day, and a friend called and offered to take Allison to Balboa Park.  Allison was pumped on that idea, and we thought it was just perfect.  So while Allison was gone, we had a leisurely day of settling in.  Just having that time was a really nice gift that came at the perfect time.

Samantha still was a groggy baby.  She rarely opened her eyes, but was eating regularly.  Without a whole lot to do, we just let her sleep and woke her up every so often to eat.

Diana, though all this, has been a trooper.  She's a better patient than I could ever be.  She's been in a certain amount of discomfort, but has been certainly able to get up and around, take a shower, go to the bathroom, walk around the house.  She's not speedy, but she's healing well.  Aside from her incision, she has a nice rash on her stomach, which we suspect is an allergic reaction to the cleaning solution from the surgery.  She takes her pain medicine as needed, and is really just doing better than I would have hoped.

Allison has been just wonderful through the weekend.  With Diana in the captain's chair for the baby, it really falls on me to keep Allison satisfied.  No complaints here.  We headed to Legoland on Sunday and had a good time cruising around.  In general, though, Allison has really better than I would have expected.  She is used to a certain level of attention, but has been patient and understanding that we can no longer always be at her beck and call.  And when Diana was in pain or feeling a little emotional, she's very compassionate, offering helpful suggestions or just a little snuggling.

Monday was the first day of school after spring break.  We had a quiet morning, but the day goes quickly, and I picked her up, then to the library for homework and books, then to gym class, then home where I got some dinner on the table (Diana had already made it, bless her), bath time, etc.  It's kind of a whirlwind time of the day, as I'm sure it is in any family.

Part of yesterday morning was Samantha's first doctors appointment.  We were very curious to hear how her weight was going.  She weighed in at 7 lbs, 4 oz.  I think we were both hoping for a little more weight gain, but she's on a definite upward trajectory.

Today is one week.  We had some nice family time in the morning, and little Sam actually had an hour of good awake time after feeding.  Eyes open and looking around, and even some tummy time on a beautiful custom quilt from Yaya Carole.  That was really encouraging.  I will feel better when she gets into a little more of a wake/sleep rhythm, instead of sleeping all the time.  Again, remind of this when I'm trying to get her to stop wailing in the middle of the night.

Speaking of the middle of the night, I've pretty much been removed from active service.  Diana doesn't need my help anymore, and I've been sleeping alone in bed while she sleeps on the couch and takes care of the feedings.  I do keep my phone by my bed, though, and she says she'll call me if she needs any help.  I feel a little guilty, but she assures me is doing just fine.

I did hear a little commotion last night.  Samantha was crying, and Allison woke up and was crying because she was awake too.  This was all at around 2:30am.  I was about to get up and see if I could be helpful, but everything quieted down.  But we're going to encourage Allison to sleep with her door closed, I guess.

There also was some carpet cleaner out on the counter this morning.  Apparently there was a true poop fountain as Diana was changing her in the middle of the night.  That sounded pretty exciting.  Glad I wasn't around for that one.

At the moment, Allison is at school, and Diana is nursing.  I really don't think there is a more peaceful, serene, beautiful sight than a mom and a baby all wrapped up and making happy little nursing sounds.  Just wonderful.

The Ballad of Samantha Jane

On Tuesday, April 9th, Samantha Jane S. was born into the world.

Unlike her older sister, Samantha was born via C-section.  I won't go into details, but just say that it was a decision made with the support of Diana's doctor.  As a result of this, the birth experience was quite different than previously.

For one thing, there was no labor.  The birth was scheduled a week before the due date, and while Diana had a few cramps and false labor pains, there was no "this is it" kind of moment.  No water breaking, no frantic drive to the hospital.  Just an 8am appointment.

We showed up and got checked in and waited.  And waited.  Hospitals in general make me a little anxious, and of course major happenings like this even more so.  So I was already feeling a little woozy, but trying to keep hydrated and get some food into my stomach.  Diana was on a bed, all gowned up, and we just kind of waited.

Around 11am, we were told that it was go-time.  Diana got wheeled back to the operating room, and I put on my haz-mat suit over my clothes, and waited some more.  After about twenty minutes, I was called back. I found my way to the head-side of the table.  I could see Diana's head, and her arms straight out to her side, and a big curtain in front of me.  The surgery didn't last too long.  Maybe half-an-hour total?  I just tried to talk to Diana and reassure her.  She was great, and I didn't feel like I was going to pass out or anything.  I was pretty surprised by the amount of tugging and pulling.  I could feel the table moving a little, or at least feel Diana's body being pulled in various directions.  It was pretty intense.  She felt a lot of various pressure and stuff, but no pain.

Then, the kid was born.  Her birthweight was 7 pounds and 11 ounces, and she measured around 19 inches long.  Her official time of birth was 11:43am.  There were many comments about how big she was.  She was brought to a small side table, and I was invited over to check her out while the pediatric team checked her out.  My first impressions were how purple she was, and how floppy she seemed to be.  Granted it's been a long time since I've been around a newborn, but it kind of shocked me.  They spent a good bit of time suctioning all the fluid out of her, and she turned from blue to pink quick enough.  I think they may have used a little oxygen gas-mask briefly.

At this point, I started feeling a little faint.  I headed back to Diana and reported the news to her.  I kind of broke out in a sweat, and decided it might be a good time to take a quick break.  I went outside, and sat down and was given some juice, which helped.  In just a minute or two I headed back inside, and was able to my my new daughter for the first time, and show her to Diana.  Diana was pretty ok during the surgery, but got kind of shaky/shivery at the end.  Once everything was over, they transferred her over to a rolling bed, and we went back to the waiting room for two hours of observation and making sure nothing bad happened.  Diana was able to try to nurse for the first time.

Eventually, we were transferred upstairs to the recovery room.  It was a quiet day, and we got a private room, which was nice.  I can't imagine sharing a room with another new family.  The day was a blur of various doctors and nurses coming and checking on Diana and Samantha, taking vitals, etc.  We tried to nurse, but Samantha was so sleepy all the time, if was difficult.  They weighed her Tuesday night, and she had lost a little weight, which is normal.

Wednesday was more of the same.  Just trying to rest, get checked out by doctors, and feed the kid.  Again, she was super sleepy all the time, and it was really hard to know how much she was eating.  At her Wednesday midnight official weigh-in, she was down to 6 pounds, 14 ounces, and had lost about 10% of her body weight.  This was official Cause for Concern, and a Plan was put into place.  After Diana would nurse, she was then pump extra milk.  During the next feeding, we used a small tube on a syringe and stuck that into her mouth, right alongside the nipple, and injected extra milk in there.

That plans strikes me as a good one for two reasons.  First, it obviously got extra food into the kid.  Second, it helped Diana get her milk going.  Soon enough, it was apparent that Diana's supply was not an issue.  She was pumping more and more milk each session.  The bigger deal was that Samantha was just so sleepy all the time.  It really took us 10 or 15 minutes of poking and prodding and wet towels and blowing to get her awake enough to eat.

At mid-morning, the pediatricians came by, and expressed some official concern at her sleepiness.  Until this point in time, it was just "oh, she'll probably come around after a day", but now they decided it was time to start "doing a few things".  I asked, and they wanted to do some blood tests to rule out possible infections or metabolic problems, as well as an ultrasound on her brain to check for bleeding.

Dude.

We agreed to all the tests, as they were non-invasive and seemed harmless enough, and would give us a much better picture if anything was going on.  It turns out that (the ped. said) 40% of babies born have some bleeding in their brain, which they don't normally test for and normally resolves on its own.  So they took some blood from her heel, and we waited for the ultrasound room to be ready.

The blood test came back in two parts.  The first part was done very quickly, and everything was normal.  She was slightly dehydrated, but otherwise things were good.  A while later, I went downstairs with her to have her tiny little head ultra-sounded.  I sat in a corner while the ultrasound guy took a bunch of cross section images and measurements (of tumors and aneurysms, I was sure), while a nurse-tech kept Samantha calm (not too hard).

I was pretty anxious seeing my newborn daughters brain being scanned, but I'll never forget how it ended.  The ultrasound tech turned to the nurse and said simply:  "Unremarkable."  He then excused himself to the back room, and came back a minute later and said that "they concur".  I made some crack about "Did you just call my daughter unremarkable?!" with mock indignation.  We headed upstairs, and I texted Diana the results.  At the same time, she texted back that the extended bloodwork (CBC) came back all normal.  So, everything was good, we just apparently have a super-calm, super sleepy baby, and we'll just see how things develop.

That as Thursday afternoon/evening, and given all of the above, it was a pretty roller-coaster day, emotionally.  We continued with our feeding Plan, and it was determined that if that went well and she starting gaining weight, we would probably go home tomorrow.  And the midnight weighing showed that she had gained back a few ounces of weight.  More good news.

As my dad put it, we probably just spent six or eight thousand dollar to find out we have a perfectly healthy baby.

Today, Friday, was release day.  We got all our stuff together and met with a couple of lactation consultants.  It appears there are two big issues at hand.  The first is our sleepy baby.  We really need to work hard to wake her enough to eat.  I do think, though, that she is coming around on her own.  I could come up with all sorts of theories about slightly premature babies, or C-section babies not being ready to be born yet, and being slower to wake up.  Who knows.

The second issue is that Diana's breasts are absolutely enormous when filled with milk.  There's simply no delicate way to put it.  As a result, it's hard for little Samantha to latch on.  It's like trying to take a bite out of a whole watermelon.

So, our current plan for each feeding is that I take Samantha and shake her around a bit and try to get her eyes open and awake.  At the same time, Diana is pumping so that her boobs deflate a bit.  This takes a little while, and there are usually some false starts, but eventually works.  It a good bit of effort, though.  We have an appointment on Monday, and it will be interesting to see how her weight is when we go there.

We came home in the afternoon, and had some time to ourselves before the grandparents brought Allison home from art camp.  I'll talk more about their budding relationship in another post, but it was great to see her again after so long.  She came to visit us in the hospital on Tuesday, but wasn't interested in coming down again after that.

I'm pretty calm and think things are going well, but I'll be a little happier when our baby is a little more awake.  It makes me a little nervous that she's so quiet and sleepy all the time.  I'm probably crazy for saying that, but it's true.

Gotta run.  More later.  I just wanted to get some details out while I remembered.

The Calm...

Well, this is it.  The bags are packed, and plan is in motion.  Tomorrow is the big day.

I just spent some time reading some of the posts from this blog after Allison was born, and let's just say I was overcome with emotion.

I'm not anxious, but I just want everything to go well and for everyone to be healthy.  Nothing to do but wait.

Fingers crossed!

Chapter 2

Hello blog…

Long time no see.  Sorry about that.  I see that I’ve only posted a few times in the past month?!  That’s unfortunate.

As it happens, quite a bit has happened in those past months.  Allison is officially rocking kindergarten.  She’s had a couple official parent/teacher reviews and gets good marks on all aspects.  Her self-confidence has really increased.  Where in the past she may have stood quietly and let others go before her, now she runs to be the first in line.  She actually got in trouble at school for the first time (had to “pull her tag”), and was appropriately guilty and upset about that.  We’re really lucky to have such a great kid.

She’s in a phase now where she has a difficult time accepting no for an answer.  She’ll ask to watch TV, or have a treat, or generally do something, and if we say “no”, she wants to know why.  Always why.  And sometimes we don’t have a good answer for “why not”.  Why shouldn’t we let her watch TV at that moment?  It’s hard to explain that too much TV in the long run isn’t good for little bodies.  But she doesn’t have a concept of the long run.  That’s the latest challenge.  It’s not a big deal, but it’s something.  She just got a small load of Easter candy (after a really fun and successful treasure hunt at my parents house!), and she was constantly asking if she could have some of her candy.  We finally realized that the reason she asks “why” all the time was that we weren’t giving consistent answers.  Sometimes she can watch TV, and sometimes now.  Sometimes she can have candy, and sometimes now.  We finally had the bright idea to portion out her candy into separate baggies, and she could have one baggie per day, whenever she wanted.  So now it’s very clear when she can have a treat and when she can’t, and she can answer her own question.

In other news, Diana is knocked up and ready to burst.  The official due date is 4/16, but we’re going in on 4/9 for a scheduled c-section.  The ultrasounds seem to indicate a pretty big baby, combined with some complications during Allison’s birth, a c-section seemed like a prudent choice.  So it will be interesting to compare this birth experience with the last one.

Diana is doing well.  Aside from some acid reflux, some sciatica, and generally being uncomfortable heaving a big belly around, I don’t get the feeling that this pregnancy has been particularly challenging.  It’s been a little bit of a roller coaster, though.  Early on, there was some suspicion that Diana had gestational diabetes, and was ordered to monitor her blood sugar.  She did that for two weeks, and it was always well within range, so she was told she didn’t need to anymore.  Then there was a possible issue with the umbilical cord perhaps not being centered on the placenta, and we’d have to watch and make sure the baby is growing well, which she has.  The latest is that her proportions are a little uneven.  Short arms/legs and big belly/head, but we’re told that’s not something to worry about.  I’ve been sick with the flu and norovirus stomach flu in the past few months, and thankfully Diana avoided both of those.  I don’t know how, but she did.

For my own part, I’m about as ready as I can be, emotionally, for this next chapter.  I’m clearing up tasks at work and steeling myself as best I can for the upcoming arrival.  I fully realize I’ll never be totally prepared for what’s to come, but I feel like I’m in as good a spot as I could reasonably expect.

What I don’t know how I’ll do is love this new little one as much as I love Allison.  I swear I’d do anything for that kid.  Her nightly routine now is to write love letters to us at bedtime (after we leave her room).  She writes one to me, one to Diana, and one to both of us.  They are just adorable.  My friends with multiple kids assure me it’s possible, but I can’t comprehend that yet.  How do I have room in my heart?

It will also be interesting to see what a five and a half year difference is like.  There are certainly pros and cons, I expect, about having kids close and far in age.  Allison has never been particularly independent.  She rarely disappears for any length of time and plays by herself.  So I suspect and immediately challenge will be dealing with parents who are increasingly busy and having our hands full.  On the other hand, she potentially could be very helpful and sweet, too.  So we’ll see how that works out.

Cross your fingers for us!

Gaming with the Kid

I’ve played two sessions of Catan Junior so far.  The first was a two player game with just Allison, and then a pair of two-player games with Allison on my team, and then Diana’s team.

The game is simple enough.  You basically roll the dice to collect resources, and use the resources to build new towers.  You can also trade resources at the market (one for one, but your item might not be available), or the supply (two for one for any item).  Finally, there is the Ghost Captain, which you can move around if you roll a six.

When we played the first time, Allison was having fun until she realized she was probably going to lose.  Then she wanted to stop playing.  I encouraged her to play, and she indeed did lose and got really upset.  She said she hated the game and wanted to throw it in the trash, which was hilarious and sad at the same time.  :)

Later, when we were driving, I talked to her about the game, and winning and losing.  She said it wasn’t fair, because I’d played the game “a million times before”, and she was just a kid and it was her first time playing.  I didn’t have the heart to tell her it was my first time too, but I told her that it’s ok to lose and that the fun part is playing, not really who wins or loses.  I tried to say it was a “practice game” and that it didn’t matter.

Anyways, the next night we played again, where Allison was on Diana’s team.  They won.  Then she was on my team, and we won.  Although one of the games was close, and she decided she wanted to defect to the winning team.  At the end of the second game, she wanted to play again and be on her own team, but we saved that for next time.

I think it was good for her to be on a team, and see how Diana and I reacted (or didn’t) when we lost.  We also have some co-op games on the way (where everyone wins or loses together), which should help as well.

This started off as an email to Eryn, but I figure this would make a good blog post, so here it is.

Transgressions

Allison and I were playing on the ground with some little sofa throw pillows nearby.

“Look!” she said.  “This pillow is getting kind of old.”

She pointed out a small hole in the pillowcase.  A small, neatly cut hole with clearly defined edges.

“Allison…  did you cut this hole with your scissors?”

She looked at me with pure guilt writ large across her face.  She didn’t say anything, but her wheels were spinning furiously.

“Allison, it’s important that you tell me the truth.  Did you cut these holes?”

Almost inaudibly, she admitted she did.

At that moment, I didn’t really know what to do.  If I got pissed for her cutting the pillow, I’d fear that she’ll learn that lying is a viable strategy for getting away with stuff.  But I also don’t want her to go around cutting up everything without any ramification.

In the end, I thanked her for her honesty, and I told her that those pillows belonged to me, and I didn’t want her to do that again.  Who knows if that was the right response.

But what I do know is that in the long run, I care much more about her trusting me than I care about the pillows.