cat named pig

Last year I posted Siena’s letter to Santa and then I also posted her letter from the previous year (2006) for purposes of comparison. (Also so I have a record of it in case the letters get lost, or colored on, or cut into tiny pieces by unsupervised scissors-users.)

In keeping with tradition, here is this year’s letter to Santa, written as a collaborative effort between Siena and me. (Me: “So, what do you want me to write?” Siena: “NO, I’m going to write it. How do you spell fishing pole?” Me: “Huh?” and so on.) 

Dear Santa, 

I have been a very good girl, and this would be the nicest thing ever: I like your reindeer.* I would like a fishing pole and my own paper cutter. And my own glitter pens that work.

Merry Christmas!

SIENA  

…..

*This is what she said, although I might have misunderstood and the “nicest thing ever part” was maybe more Siena’s commentary than what she actually intended for me to write. Who knows?

Also, isn’t it interesting that we had just finished a project involving a paper cutter, some holiday paper, and some glitter pens from last year that had mostly dried up? And now she wants her own paper cutter (presumably to cut important documents of Matt’s and mine) and her “own glitter pens that work.” Next year, I’m  going to have her help me scrub the bathtub right before we write her Santa letter — maybe she’ll ask him to bring her some of that good-smelling Method shower spray. 

If it was “Red Day” at your school, what would be the ideal thing to wear? 

A) A red shirt and some pants. Any pants. 

B) A red shirt and a skirt over red tights, because skirts and tights are more beautiful than pants. 

C) A red and white jumper/dress over a long-sleeved white shirt. Plus red tights.

D) A red and white jumper/dress over a bright turquoise long-sleeved shirt with little rhinestone buttons near the neckline. Plus bright green and white tights, because they have flowers on them and flowered tights are more beautiful than red tights.  

If you said anything but D), you are correct. I award you full credit and congratulate you on your perfectly reasonable answer. If you said D), you are Siena.  

If I’m being totally honest, I would have to say that one of the reasons I haven’t been posting as much lately (in addition to writing deadlines and shorter naptimes and a general deterioration of sanity that may or may not be related to the weather) is because it seems like things haven’t been as funny around here. The kids are goofy, sure, but lately they don’t always need an audience — they goof around together and I take advantage of the opportunity to stir the chili or load the dishwasher. So maybe I’ve just been out of the room for all the really funny stuff — who knows? In any case, I haven’t been leaving myself as many cryptic voicemails* with stories I want to post about later.  

Still, there were a few things in the last twenty-four hours that made me laugh out loud:

1. Elliot ate a piece of cat chow. Actually, I didn’t so much laugh out loud at this as yell “NO!” and try to get him to spit it out in my hand. To which he responded “Mmm!” and crunched and swallowed. Seriously. 

2. Avery was over last night and hurt herself at some point; when Sara asked her where it hurt, she said, “Right here, on this butt loaf.” I cracked up even more when Sara explained that Avery had said it once and now they commonly refer to the cheeks as “butt loafs” at their house.  

3. I went downstairs to check on the clothes in the dryer, and when I came back up Siena told me I couldn’t look in the living room for a minute. Expecting the worst when I heard those words (based on historical precedent), you can imagine my amazement when she finally let me see the room: she had cleaned it. She and Elliot had picked up all the toys that were out, invented totally new places to put them away (but still, they were picked up) and moved a small table across the floor. She had also lined up all the shoes in the entryway and stacked Matt’s and my slippers on top of each other on the staircase. Elliot appeared to just be following her around the room, but she graciously credited him as having “helped.” 

Well, this’ll have to be a short list because Matt just got a new cell phone with a free month of mobile TV, which I am positive would be Number One on his list of things that have been awesome recently, but I can’t type very well when I’m looking over every two seconds to see what funny thing he’s watching now.

….. 

*Actual Example of Voicemail to Self: “Knife eyes. Harmonic butterfly.” “Knife eyes” having been uttered by Siena in reference to the expression “sharp eyes,” and “harmonic butterfly” being the name she used all summer whenever she saw a monarch butterfly. (Perhaps my favorite malapropism of hers so far.) 

The kids love getting bundled up in their outerwear (seriously — Elliot especially is crazy about his hat and mittens, and Siena loves her brown “furry bear coat.” We’ll see how they feel about these things in, say, mid-February when we still have three months of wearing them and we’re all tired of how long it takes us to get out the door). 

So here they are in their hats and mittens. Elliot wasn’t even going anywhere; he just didn’t want to be left out. He’s in his pj’s, so I’m not sure what he thought was going on, but I’m guessing he ended up mad that he had to take off the hat and mittens to go to bed. 

It was just about a year ago (the day before Thanksgiving, I believe) that Siena gave herself a little haircut lopped off about seven inches of perfectly good hair and I had to trim the rest into something approximating a bob. A bob with a few random inch-long chunks of hair that stood straight up every time she got out of bed or took off a hat.

She’s had a couple of professional haircuts in the last year, and those short uneven pieces have finally started to blend in to the rest of her layers. And her hair overall has grown out to almost the same length it was pre-butchering last fall. 

Well, I must be feeling nostalgic, or that cold medicine should have more warning labels on the box, or something, because this morning I decided it would be a really good idea to give Siena another haircut. (I’ll spare you any suspense you may be feeling: it was not a really good idea.)

It came about because she hates having her hair combed or styled. Lately, she won’t let me do anything more to it than run a comb through (while she tests my commitment to the process by SCREAMING. IN MY FACE.) and put a barrette in the pieces that get in her eyes. And then the hair escapes the barrette and falls in her face anyway, so she mostly looks like this:

(Elliot mostly looks like he does here too, just watching his crazy sister and grinning.)

So I’ve been telling her for a few weeks that we either need to get a haircut or SUCK IT UP ALREADY and let me style her hair. Don’t worry, I’ve been phrasing it slightly differently to her. And she’s been telling me that she wants long hair, that long hair is beautiful, and that she will good, she promises. And then she proceeds to break that promise the second I pick up the comb most mornings.

Today, I had had enough. Thinking back to the fairly decent (given what I had to work with) bob I managed to give her last year, I decided to cut it myself again today. You can buy a lot of cheap wine for the $17-plus-tip a Kids’ Hair appointment would cost. And who wants to deal with chasing Elliot around a room full of scissors, hair product displays, and five hundred other people while Siena gets her hair cut? Not me. I’d rather stay home and drink cheap wine. So I told myself it would be fine, was even a good idea, for me to give her a haircut. I was wrong. Asymmetrical bobs only look good on celebrities, when cut by celebrity stylists.

Siena got bored of standing still about three seconds into the process, and was left with a jagged mess that is clearly longer on one side than the other.

When I pick her up from preschool today, we’re heading straight to Kids’ Hair. And after that appointment, I’ll definitely be drinking some cheap wine.  

Or at least, that was how Matt explained to Siena this morning that we started this site one year ago. The resulting conversation was no less than what I expected:

Siena: You mean it’s Piggy’s birthday?!?

Matt: No, not Pig, our website catnamedpig. Our website is one year old today. On the computer. Where we post pictures and stories.

Siena: When is Piggy’s birthday?

Matt: Sometime in May, we think.

Siena [counts on fingers]: January, February, Ma-arch, April, May — MAY!

Matt: Yep, Piggy’s birthday is in May. And today is our website’s anniversary.

Siena: What’s an anniversary?

It was at this point that my head exploded and I could not listen any longer, but you get the idea. One year ago today, I posted a picture of Matt with the cat on his back (a self-portrait, no less — he is truly talented) and a greeting to the one person who knew of this site’s existence at the time.

And now, catnamedpig.com would like to officially celebrate its first anniversary by thanking some of the people who have contributed to its continued existence: 

• Siena, who has dictated plenty (much more than we’ve been able to record, but if you look at her page, you get a glimpse of it). 
• 
• Elliot, who finally has a few words of his own to add to the conversation.  Plus plenty of adorable photo opportunities.
• 
• Lisa, recipient of the greeting in this site’s very first post – her unwavering encouragement, nay, demands that I start a blog provided the motivation to actually go ahead and do it already.
• Sara, mother of Avery and basically a member of the catnamedpig family – not only did her daughter contribute to some of the most memorable stories posted here, but Sara also assumed the unofficial role of Catnamedpig PR Director, forwarding the link to so many friends, relatives, and employees of a certain downtown law firm that I felt justified in continuing to spew my ramblings into the internet, because people outside my immediate family were actually reading it.
• Anyone who babysat for us in the last year, allowing us to maintain our tenuous hold on sanity when merely blogging about the kids was not enough of an outlet. Sometimes we have to actually go out to dinner and drink three bottles a perfectly reasonable amount of wine to get enough distance from all the crazy. 
• Pig herself, for being fat and for inspiring our domain name. Also, for being surprisingly patient with the rather intense manner in which Elliot expresses affection.
• And most of all, everyone who reads regularly or occasionally, everyone who leaves comments (even when we don’t agree, we enjoy the discussion), and everyone who has gone out of their way to say a kind word about this site when we run into you at parties. You don’t have to, really. But it’s very nice of you. 

Thank you, and please keep reading. Some days, my sanity depends on it. 

To be posted under Free: 

Two children, great condition! One is four years old, one is 18 months — practically new! Both children come with all parts and accessories, including outerwear for winter. Willing to deliver within Metro Area. Please contact Laura at (612) 111-1111.

• Location: Minneapolis
• it’s NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests 

Siena came out of her room this morning and informed us that she was wearing “double underwear, because it’s so cold out.” I would’ve just gone for an extra pair of socks, myself.

Elliot has a sprained ankle. Or something. The diagnosis was not super-precise, because there was none of the swelling that usually accompanies a sprain, and also because he would not let the doctor come anywhere near any part of his leg south of the knee. So when the x-ray showed no sign of fracture, she guessed sprain and sent us home to wait for it to get better.

That was on Friday. When we brought him back in Monday morning (he did not take one single step all weekend, and cried when we put shoes and socks on him), she watched him play, crawling around with his left foot in the air, or scooting on his behind, but never standing up. She tried to examine him again, and he refused to let her touch his foot or ankle. So again, we went home with instructions to watch him closely and bring him back on Friday if he still won’t walk on it. It seems a little better today; he’s taken a few steps, but the whole thing has been sort of sad for him. It’s strange to see him crawling around like he’s an infant again.

Since it happened when he and Siena were rough-housing, it’s been a good reminder that he is not quite as sturdy as we think he is. He usually instigates the skirmishes these days, and I usually permit it, figuring it’s ok since he obviously wants to wrestle. So Siena and I have been feeling somewhat guilty these last few days. Unfortunately, she expresses this by being grumpy at everyone, rather than just blogging about it. Which is kind of a bummer if you live with her.  

Also kind of a bummer is the fact that Elliot weighs quite a bit more now than he did as an infant, and my back is starting to do weird spasm-y things from carrying him all the time. And that, in turn, is kind of a bummer for anyone who lives with me. (Sorry, hon. Hopefully after yoga tonight I won’t be as grumpy as I was last night.) 

On the bright side, my response to the weather has been to put flannel sheets on our bed, which are incredibly cozy and the only reason I’m not crying about the snow outside. Here is my new “office,” where all blogging, article writing, and internet-related wasting of time will take place, at least until April:

The cat, currently burrowed under the comforter next to my legs, does not seem interested in leaving Flannel Heaven until April either. (Except for the four hours out of every day that she feels compelled to spend standing directly behind me in the kitchen, in the hope that when I step on her and drop whatever I’m trying to cook, I will just give up on it and feed her instead.)

Yep, it’s a slow news week now that the election is over. We’re all just waiting: for the conclusion of the Senate recount, for Elliot’s ankle (or foot, or whatever) to heal, or in Pig’s case, waiting for someone to trip over her, sprain their ankle, and somehow interpret that as a sign that she needs some cat chow in between meal times.

This is the sad tale of Elliot’s evil parents, who forced him into a dragon costume that made him scream, in front of a room full of people who were laughing at the whole thing. 

By the time we got him into it and headed outside, he had started to accept his fate. 

And once he realized that what we were doing outside was going house to house (trying to keep up with Siena and Avery), ringing the doorbell and asking for candy, having neighbors ooh and aah over how cute his costume was, well, then he actually started to like Halloween. Except neither of his evil parents took a decent picture of him enjoying the evening; the closest we came was this one, where no one looks normal:

And by the time he had traversed the neighborhood, clutching a piece of wrapped candy in each hand, Halloween was clearly his favorite holiday. 

Until trick-or-treating turned into a forced march, where tired princesses clutched heavy pillowcases as they trudged glumly along the sidewalk. (I’m hoping this picture was taken toward the end of trick-or-treating, and that the kids didn’t look this morose the whole time they were out with the dads):