"Papai, mamãe did a bagunça all over!" (Daddy, mommy did a mess all over)

"É, isso mesmo. Espero que você não seja igual mamãe." (Yes, that's right. I hope you don't turn out like mommy)

Oh, and I forgot to add - Turkey, Cookies, and Chocolate sound like the same word in Ju speak. Had a hard time figuring out what he wanted to eat for breakfast this morning.

Actual conversation this afternoon -

Ju - "Mommy, I wanna piranya." (referring to the hair clip)

Me - "Okay honey, you can play with one."

Ju - "Mommy, I wanna see a enwins."

Me - "The what?"

Ju - "I wanna see a enwins, in there." (pointing to the closet area)

Me - "You wanna see an engine? I don't think there is an engine in there."

Ju - "No, a enwins. There's enwints in there. I wanna see."

Me - "Ants? There are ants in there? I don't see any ants."

Ju - "No, a enwints. In there! The enwints. Enwings! I wanna see!"

Me - "Ju, I can't figure out what you are talking about. I don't see an engine and I don't see ants."

Ju - "Enwings! Enwingts! Da ... eawings. eawings!"

Me - "Oh! You want to see the earings in the box? Okay, now I understand..."

Ju says "You don wanna eat a my bala!" Like a subliminal message - it's not that he doesn't want you to eat it, it's that YOU don't want to eat it. Not sure if it's a confusion based on English chunks or if he really means to say that.

Getting ready for the big number three here. I've been making trains out of poster board and puffy paint for the decorations, and have gotten small blisters on my fingers from stuffing balloons with candies and small toys for the balloon pop game. This year we opted to have a feijoada instead of a churrasco to save some money and feed more people, but since it's a four day weekend, a lot of them are traveling anyway and won't come. I am thinking for good karma, we will have to take some of the left overs and give them out on the street.

The big present this year comes from the grandparents - a real bed. Sure will beat sleeping on the crib mattress on the floor. At the moment, he wiggles around so much, he is usually on the floor by morning.

A conversation with Ju at 10 pm last night (he napped from 1-about 7, so he went to bed very late):

"mommy, what's this?"

"It's a shell."

"A shell. It's a snail?"

"Well, there was a snail in it, but it's dead now. It left."

"It's a snail there. See the antena? It's not dead anymore."

"No, it's gone. That is the point on the shell, not an antena."

"It's a point on the shell. The snail is gone."

"Yes, it's gone. Put it to your ear. Do you hear the ocean?"

(he puts it up to his ear)

"I hear it. I hear the ocean in the shell. I hear a car."

"I think you heard the car pass by on the street. But do you hear the ocean?"

"Yes, I hear it. The ocean's in there."

"The ocean is in there?"

"Yes, the ocean is coming out. The ocean's coming out of the shell. It's in there."




Kids are so cute! This comment goes right along side the day he saw the window open and the rain was coming in on the floor and said "It's raining, mommy. It's raining in my house."

I try to put Ju to bed on time every night - on time being somewhere between 7 and 8 pm, clean, teeth brushed, etc. Some nights he gets in bed and stays there and goes to sleep after some in the dark play time. Other nights he gets all the books off the bookshelf, plays with trains in the dark, or otherwise makes messes and gets out to ask me something repeatedly. I have started to have to ignore these constant "MOMMY!.... MOOOOOMMMMY?!" calls, otherwise he just keeps thinking up things to ask for or about and never goes to sleep. Last night was another one of those nights.

"Mommy? Mooooooommmy!"

"What?"

"Mommy, I wanna water."

(getting water) "Okay, here's your water. Now go to sleep."

- about 5 minutes later -

"Mommy! Moooooooomy!"

"Go to sleep Ju!"

"Mooooooomy! Mommy?"

"What?"

"Mommy, I wanna another pano" (pano is a cloth diaper - he has slept with them since he was a baby)

"Then get one. It's time for sleeping. Get your pano and go to sleep."

- another 5 minutes or so passes and the garbage truck goes by, making lots of noise as it always does -

"Mommy! Moooooooomy! Moommyyyyyyyyy! I wanna see a garbage truck!"

"Ju, it's time for sleeping. Lay down and go to sleep! No garbage truck!"

"Mommy! Mommyyyyyyy!? Mommmmmy!" (at this point, I start ignoring his calls and don't answer any more)

He continues to call for the next 5 minutes or so, then he starts to sound kind of like he's going to cry.

"Mommy! Mooommmyyyyyyyy! Help me! Help me, Mommy! Mommmy!"

So I got upstairs and see he has some how climbed on top of the dresser and cannot figure out how to get back down.

"Ju, what are you doing up there? How did you get up there?"

"Mommy, I see a garbage truck an uh, it was woooooosh, crash, an in a mommy's room an já foi" (já foi means it's gone)

"Ah, you climbed up here to see the garbage truck and it was noisy and then it went past mommy's room and then it went away?"

"Uh-huh! Yes. I see a garbage truck up there, waaaaaay over there."

Ju woke up early one morning this last week and came down to have breakfast with me. I love these little moments we can have in the morning, except when I have to run out the door to the transport van and figure out what to do with him to keep him out of trouble until papai gets up or his nanny arrives. This particular morning, we were eating our bread with cheese and watching Lela who was watching some birds in the garage. Ju started telling a story:

"Ju is up there, waaaaaay up there and throw the rocks, wooooooo, waaaaaaaay over there. And ah, throw the rocks, wooooosh, wooosh, throw the rocks in the 'rua' (street in Portuguese), waaaaaay over there."

"Oh really, you threw the rocks into the street from up there? Well, we don't want to throw rocks into the street because you could hit someone in the head and it would hurt. We don't want to hit people in the head with rocks. People don't like it." I say

"No, I don throw the rocks in the head, no. I throw the rocks at the moon!"

A conversation between Ju and I this morning.


"Mommy, I wanna banana."

"Okay, do you want it squished?"

"Yes, I wanna squished banana with teetee" (tee tee is powdered milk)

"Okay, here you go - Ju-ju has to eat by himself because Ju is a big boy."

"Mommy help you?" (he never says "help me" only "help you" because it is a memorized chunk of language)

"Mommy will help you at the end. Ju has to eat by himself now."

"No, mommy help you at the end, no! Mommy help you ALL the time!"


Of course, this last phrase was too cute for me to take, and I did end up feeding him the banana.

Ju has caught whatever I have - flu, it seems. Last night he got feverish and started crying in his sleep and coughing a lot. My husband spent most of the night sleeping on his floor trying to comfort him and giving him little sips of water. This morning after my shower, I saw he had returned to our bed and was trying to get some real sleep. I went down stairs to make coffee and force myself to eat something (having the flu kills my appetite) and then I started hearing Ju calling me upstairs. I went into his room to find him in a fit of fever nightmare, sweating and crying "Waaahhhhh, Mommy, I want another shoes! Waaaahhh, Mommy, MOMmmy! I want another shoes!" Some kind of nightmare where I wouldn't let him wear the shoes he wanted to wear I guess. I burst out laughing when I heard what he was saying in his sleep. He is now sleeping fitfully in our bed with my husband. Poor thing.

I am sitting here waiting for Ju to finish eating. The extent of his conversation with the kitchen is so interesting, I thought I would type a play by play.

"Is a boo an a [r]ed. Is a boo an a [r]ed in der"

"Rice, come back rice, come back"

"I don like it. I don like a this chikin."

(singing) "Is a rice an a peas, is a rice an a peas."

"Is a pushing buttin. hmmm, ai ai, ai ai."

(I say, "Ju, sit down please. All the way.")

(singing) "All da way, all da way, going going going going going.... going going"

(he drops the spoon on the floor) "Mommy, I wanna spoon."

(I tell him to get down and get it)

"Go get it, go get it. Don fall down, don fall down, don fall down! thank you thank you, thank you mommy, thank you Juju. Whoa, whoa, whoa - haha, whoa - hahaha, whoa - hahaha"


And that concludes this most interesting post.

"mommy is a napkin"

"mommy is a kleenex"


The other night, Ju ate his veggie purre soup by scooping it out with a granny smith apple and eating it as a new fangled dip.




I have to go into work again tomorrow, I have too much I still have to get done and prepped. Ug. It took me three tries to spell tomorrow right. My brain is fried.

The things you learn from television or perhaps parents trying to be funny....

Ju has been obsessed with Cookie Monster since he started watch Sesame Street videos he got for his birthday. This slowly evolved into a Cookie Monster imitation of daddy being "papai monster" and pretending to try to eat him. About a month ago, Ju started tearing all the foam letters and numbers to pieces with his teeth, and recently discovered the joys of doing this to onion skin and spreading it around the house. Today he went one step further and did a cookie monster with his soup for dinner. He seemed to understand that this was not appropriate when I told him I was upset about it, and then proceeded to ask if he could go do it with the onions instead - "a cookie monster widdy uhn-uhn, num num num."

Ju is now in a "what's this, mommy?" phase. I hear this question about 50 times a day and always try to answer it (how long do most moms stand this stage before they stop answering?). He is also trying to count "1,2,3,4,6,8,9" and everything is a "1,2,3 fill-in-the-object" And everything has the potential to be a car - a cracker, a shoe, a stick, a ripped up foam number...

Ju is actually forming full sentences, even if they aren't grammatical. I haven't really heard him doing it in Portuguese because he doesn't talk to me in Portuguese anymore, but yesterday he said this: "kitten papaya no want it" which translates into "the kitten doesn't want papaya." This sentences is probably the result of all the times he has thrown food at the cat, trying to see if she will eat it, and my telling him that she doesn't want it or doesn't like it. The interesting thing about this sentence is that he isn't recalling an utterance exactly from memory, because then it would probably be grammatically correct. It doesn't seem to be translated from Portuguese either, because the order would be different. I have no idea how normal it is, having never interacted much with native speakers of English who were less than 5 years old really (not counting baby sitting years - who can remember what happened before high school?), but it's really cool to see him take these sudden spurts of development in his language. He has also started saying "I sorry" when he does something wrong, and comes over and kisses me and says "I love you" if I am angry with him (how do kids know this makes us forget the broken DVD player, just for a moment?) . Which reminds me - today he broke the DVD player, no one is sure how, so getting him over his Thomas and Sesame street addiction should be easier now.

So much is going on, I have no time to post. But just a quick Ju word :

pinto = penis, but also "aipim"

He just ate half of my dinner and asked for more "mais pinto?"

"não não ah-oo gato" = don't put water on the cat

"pum bapeesh" = I farted on the crayons

Ju has begun to draw lines, very nice strait ones, with his crayons. He has been coloring figures for a while, but now he will hand you a crayon and tell you "gato" if he wants you to draw a cat so he can color it. We made a very nice drawing on Thursday night that I took to school on Friday to show off and display. Like all people with kids, or with new-anything-living (this includes puppies, cats, nieces, nephews...) every new development is an amazing step into the world. Actually, having kids makes you want to do a degree in child development, just so you can compare "yes, he did this, no not this...." etc.

The weather here has taken a turn for the "winter-like" a little early this year. Usually this rain/sun/blow/hot/cold all in the same half hour confusion doesn't start until at least April. I don't mind it unless it keeps the kids inside at school and they turn into loud little bouncey monsters because of lack of running space. Also, Ju is watching an absurd amount of TV because I can't take him for a long walk in the rain. His obsession has moved from "Cars" to "The Lion King," until yesterday when I brought home a DVD of "Bear in the Big Blue House" about potty training (innate messages can't hurt, right?) that he seems to be enjoying quite a bit. He likes to watch things that he can identify and say the names of the animals or objects - there is a "mah-oosh"(mouse), a "moon," and he seems to enjoy the shadow puppet part. Even now he is trying to call my attention from the computer to watch the beginning part where the bear sniffs you. So cute.

Adjectives! Today Ju said "bih mesh" - BIG MESS!

boon = balloon (I think this was my word for it too when I was little).

Carnaval has officially begun here Bahia. Actually, it officially begins on Wednesday, and the insanity of traffic around the city has shown it. If one tries to pass by AeroClub, you have to contend with "unofficial" abadá sellers, who are rumoured to steal back the black market shirts they just sold you as you walk back to your car or home or bus stop as the case may be. There a long lines of people selling beer along the Orla where there was no beer before. There are confettie, streamers, and carnaval masks litering the ground and decorating homes and stores. And there is the rain. The ever present rain, which according to the forecast, will be here all the way through the week long insanity, soaking everything, turning the confettie into paper-machê muck all over, mixed with xixi and god knows what else. Not that I was going to go out in it before, but I certainly don't plan to now. Some year I will really experience Carnaval, but it seems this year is out.

"soo-vah" = chuva = rain

"boh-d" = bird

tee tee - leite = milk (the powdered kind) to be eaten by the spoonful and in no other form

eh-peh-een = airplane : just repeated this morning

oh-pee = open

Ju has been testing his limits these days and is learning about "time-out," which seems to be very effective in some cases, but not so much when he can't quite make the connection that what he did was not allowed or not. Most of these cases are with regard to things he has not been punished for doing before - not putting away crayons, not staying out of the kitchen, running around with food in his hands, etc. With things like turning on the computer when told not to, playing with the television buttons when told not to, and wiggling on the lap, it has been pretty effective. Half the time O Maridão thinks I am being too harsh, and Ju knows this and calls "papai" when he doesn't get what he wants from "mamãe." I see it as his training so he's not one of those problem kids in preschool (I have so many).