We love FALL!

*** NOTE: while we are keeping up Zoë's blog still, we have expanded the Zych blog with the impending expanding family. Please bookmark our main blog and check here often. You can see the latest (ha ha... that means, whenever I manage to write anything) about Zoë and Bugaboo #2 (check soon for info about our ultrasound this week... Boy??? Girl???). The top tabs separate their separate blogs. ***

There are few times that we really enjoy living in Maryland and Fall is such a time. Almost every weekend there's something wonderful to experience-- apple picking, pumpkin patch complete with hayrides, lots of baking... and the sounds of music.

Many months ago, when we were in California, I introduced Zoë to one of my favorite movies of all time: The Sound of Music. Happily, Zoë also loved it and many of the songs stuck in her head... on repeat and only about five given words. It was first adorable, then made me cringe slightly, then... well, it was downright painful. But, I know that someday we will miss hearing this particular rendition. Enjoy the video!



Here's our album of Fall pictures, including Matt's birthday dinner where Zoë was the beautiful Indian waitress (and I was the Chef). Check back here soon, we will add the Halloween photos from this week, at least!

Zoe Town

Come visit Zoë Town, a magical world created by Miss Zoë Zych. In this exclusive video, she shares her vision for her special town. Come ride the trains! Shop at the one and only J-store! Meet the mayor-police-officer-chef! We welcome all visitors.

Fine print: Must bring your imagination. Food is available, but often takes days to arrive via Peapod--  a Giant Food Store food distribution vehicle. Town is liable to vanish at the end of play time, when we ALWAYS clean up our toys...

My Big Girl

Ten days ago, Zoë turned four, as predicted. So, as she, herself, proclaimed -- Zoë's now a "big girl".

Days leading up to this big deal, she started dressing herself and putting her dishes in the sink, and all these other big girl things. I think the biggest excitement for us was that this was the first birthday where she was fully excited and aware of the big day. The other years, the birthday was more about our excitement and marking her milestones, she probably barely noticed. But this time... she noticed! (and we benefitted -- mornings are so much easier when she can brush her teeth, get clothes on and put her own shoes on!)

Sure, I miss cute, cuddly, diapered baby Zoë with the giggles and wobbly steps, but there are plenty of rewards when I realize that she can be independent and do things by her "own self". It is hard not to get sentimental about her cute outfits that don't fit anymore, or see her cloth-bottomed shoes and finger-sized booties and remember her nearly featherweight snoozing warmth swaddled in my arms. But then, it is so much more satisfying to be needed these days for fun and play than for food, diaper-changing, and those basic needs. "Mommy, I NEED you! Come play with me."

Of course, such a momentous age as "4" needed to be celebrated in as many ways as possible. Zoë had a class party. Actually, it was a Valentine's Day party, but most of the kids now associate V-day with Zoë Day (true story: one of the kids went home and told their mother that they weren't allowed to say "Happy Valentine's Day" because Zoë wasn't there and it was her special day). They sang to her like 3 times, before Mommy finally appeared with the obligatory payesh (rice pudding).

Then there was the celebration at Frosting, the cupcake cafe. (In case you are concerned about the number of cupcakes consumed in these celebrations, please refer to the earlier posting about that impossibility of "too many cupcakes" because of the theory of Tummy Chambers.)

We opened presents and Zoë sported her new backpack around the apartment and we soon got started making the dollhouse sent by her grandparents (that's her screwing together the walls all by herself)! Other presents were also read, played with, and worn within 24 hours of being opened. She loved everything and got settled making her Thank you cards, which now are beautifully signed by her own signature. On her birthday, I received a beautiful present of her impressive artwork!
 

Then we celebrated with all her friends at BounceU, a giant warehouse of inflatable slides, gym and climbing, and ate pizza and cake. I think even Zoë was then all birthday'ed out... until she began discussing her plans for her NEXT birthday. That's it -- she's hooked. It's official now: she's a BIG girl. Our little big girl :)

Little Froggies Preschool

By majority consensus (2 out of 2), this is the name of our at-home pseudo-school. I am hoping that naptime is enough time to cram in a blog entry, clean up and get in a little work work. P.S. I'm tired... to anyone out there who thinks taking care of a kid is easy work read this.

This week I decided to work on spelling/reading a bit because Zoë seems very comfortable with her letters but still doesn't realize that the order and placement of letters have any relation to each other or spell words uniquely. She does write in a neat line when mimicking writing. On Tuesday, after nap, Zoë made her own sandwiches and cut some peaches. Then we worked on some spelling games (sorting magnetic letters and numbers and using a magnetic board to spell out some words, etc.). That was fun and she's sounding things out a bit more now.

Today, we made flashcards! I gave Z some old magazines and she cut out her favorite things and we glued them on cards and then on the other side I wrote out the word with her. Now it's part of our game to use the cards to spell. The bad part is that she chose some pretty tricky pictures! Still, it was a fun and great activity that practiced her fine motor skills (cutting and pasting) and hopefully is building her spelling skills too. Afterward, we relaxed and let loose with some wild toddler dancing to Pandora's assortment of kiddie tunes. Z showed me some of her yoga moves and we did a few partner yoga moves. We even managed a 10 minute meditation (surprised I didn't fall asleep!)

p.s. The dresser behind Zoë will be highlighted in a coming attraction... once we put the finishing touches on her new space and post pictures then! Stay tuned ...

Come and visit Zoetown

We have been playing at home more and more these days. It isn't even that cold, but I guess the dark days of Winter are upon us... or maybe it's the potty training practice that keeps us here. Anyway, today we make a city, complete with train system (Brio!) and tall buildings... even a small suburban neighborhood for fun. And that's all I have to report for now :)

Our Little Ballerina

Zoë is taking ballet classes. Okay, it is really interpretative-dance-with-your-adult class, complete with story reading, costumes and musical instruments and some demonstration of "plié" or "jeté"-- perfect for a toddler. As much as I love that my girl likes planes, trains, balls, science ("boy" things) too, I am really loving that the class has some girly magic too: "fairy dust", glitter, and lots of imagination-- poor boys! They also should have some of this, no? And plenty of brothers look into the class looking a little sad and left out. Several months ago I read this mother's blog and it really touched me. I hope that more parents feel this way about their children -- boys or girls. But I digress...

Zoë absolutely LOVES ballet. And in her leotard and tutu, even she can't resist "chassé"-ing away from the route to stare at herself in the mirror: "Mama, that's Zoë!" she says proudly. Then, her Didun sent her a multicolor tutu and I might never get this off her! She poses here with her bunny ears (made in school): our little Easter Ballerina. Poor thing, there will be no ballet this Sunday and she's already asking ... I guess we'll have to hide more eggs to keep her mind off ballet. Here are some more pictures from our adventures of late.

an Acorn.

Rather than apologizing for the long gap, I will try to share a sampling of evidence that Zoë has grown in the meantime ... One big update is that she is now an Acorn. She has been promoted from "Dragonfly" to "Acorn" and managed to adjust to the new class, teachers, and buddies. She is a TWO-YEAR OLD! No longer a baby... and yet, always my baby :)

Here are some vignettes highlighting other gems of Zoë's "growth":

• "I want Buddha": This may be an old story, but worth documenting in her blog. At the young age of 20 months, she has shown an uncanny affinity to Buddha. I was away at the Swift proposal review, when Matt took her to a Vietnamese restaurant for dinner and she pointed to the statue in the corner and clearly showed interest and said "Buddha". This was interesting, since her only other introduction was 4 months prior at an Indian restaurant where a huge, wall-sized gold Buddha apparently made quite an impression on her. But after coming home, Matt gave Zoë a tour of Buddhism (courtesy of Wikipedia). They also (re-)discovered our Buddha on a bookshelf. At this time, Zoë had only recently shown minimal interest in dolls and stuffed toys, but this Buddha became her security object. Especially during meals, she wanted Buddha close by. (Keep in mind, our Buddha statuette is made of heavy rock and almost acts like a paperweight... it isn't cuddly nor easy to manipulate.) One day, Zoë and Matt were on the way to the store, but Zoë adamantly refused to go because "I want Buddha. I WANT BUDDHA!!!" This sparked a long religious lesson about how Buddhism is about suffering and about detachment and if she were a real Buddhist she would carry Buddha in her heart and this statue is only an illusion, etc. etc. etc... Zoë listened respectfully. But... "I WANT BUDDHA!" (Update: in the following several months, she has made significant headway into embracing the purer Buddhism philosophy and has practiced detachment with the "Buddha" statue more and more.)
• "A Dose of Sympathy": In the mornings, while combing her hair and getting her ready, Zoë and I play the game of "Faces" -- "show me a happy face... now, Zoë's sad... " etc. Mainly this is to entertain her while I get her ready... but this day in January, Mommy bumped her head and I pretended that I really got very hurt and I pretended to cry and cry and cry. For a while Zoë seemed to think it was funny, but when I didn't stop she looked very shocked and horrified. Then all of a sudden, she began to cry. I think she was so forlorn to see Mommy in such a state that she felt helpless and maybe even empathetic. I told her that a hug and some gentle patting would make me feel better and we soothed each other -- me for my head "boo-boo" and her for her sympathetic nerve "boo-boo". Then we played.
  
• "Curiosity never potty-trained the cat (or the girl, for that matter)": In the last few weeks, Zoë has shown more and more curiosity in the potty. She seems to have a "love-hate" relationship with it (also the vacuum -- she runs away and hides when we vacuum, but always wants us to vacuum ... we will call this curiosity). She has coined several unique phrases, encapsulating her love for the potty, like "Giggle giggle POT-ttteeee" (you have to say it just right, or she will correct you!) or "Pretty pretty POOP!" She likes to walk around the toilet and investigate it, to see if it bites. It doesn't. We got her a "Zoë" potty and it was like Christmas, again! She was so excited to open it and set it up, but ... screamed bloody murder when we suggested that she sit on it. She does like to have Pinky Baby sit there all day. It's been a few weeks and we are getting used to it for now... reading Potty books and toilet training her doll (except more recently, Zoë put a diaper on Pinky Baby).
• "Happy to you!": We had a birthday party for Zoë the weekend before her birthday. There were 10 kids (!) and their parents(!!) and we all survived. There were balloons, balls, bubbles, bubble wrap (we only play with things starting with "B". Just kidding...), also stickers and pasta necklaces, and ... food! CUPCAKES, naturally. Payesh, very important. And snacks and pasta salad, and ... good times were had by all. Instead of presents, we asked people to donate to a Children's Homelessness organization (Project Night Night), and this idea was very appreciated and we got very nice cards! We bought Zoë a nice train tent (pictures forthcoming!) where she likes to play hide and seek, and especially climb around in with her friend Mary, who also lives in our building and is the same age. Here are some pictures and a video from the celebrations (that's right-- plural! We also had our small family party).
  
  
  
  Also noteworthy... on Zoë's birthday, a sneaky fox (we hear his name's "Swiper" and he makes mischief on Dora the Explorer) stole all of Zoë's bottles ("Oh No!") and so we can only do sippy cups and regular cups now. Swiper is a known bottle thief in our building, Mary also suffers from his acts.
• "A sense of immediacy": In case anyone was unsure about the cleverness of our girl, we have proof. For awhile, Zoë would ask for something and we would say "ok", hoping she would forget, and then when she became more insistent we would modify her request to satisfy our time constraints, like: "Yes, yes... Of course, you can eat chocolate. Tomorrow." So she adapted. She learned the word... "NOW". "I want chocolate NOW!" So now, we are working on understanding the meaning of "No" and "wait".
  
• "Is she at the stage where she throws tantrums in public places? Yet?": We have had one such incident and ... I'm too traumatized to write about it. But this was the question that someone asked me awhile ago. I thought it was funny then. Now I think it is mean. (The nice gentleman had two sons -- 12 and 10, so I guess his wounds have not healed. Yet.)
• "Mommy's Competent" and other verbal gems: We are in the stage where Zoë throws out what she hears. (BEWARE!) On this one occasion, we were reading her report card and we were telling her that we were proud that the school found that she was competent in her growth milestones. Then Daddy said "You will have lots of report cards. Why, even Daddy got a report card from work - Zoë's competent and Daddy's competent". Zoë counters with "No. Mommy's competent." Well, my job's done. Whew. :)
  
• More pictures: Fall in Shenandoah
  
  
  
  Christmas (Caveat Emptor: I did not take many pictures on our trip to CA, so please donate to this album!)
  
  
  
  Thunder Snow event
  
  
  
  Random Winter photos...
  
  
• Videos! :
  
  Food critic-in-training
  
  
  
  Video within a video
  
  

July Part 3 -- Life is Art!

Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up. ~Pablo Picasso

Oh! the calendar did it again... another month managed to race by before I could keep up! But fear not! I am two days late, but here's the last of our July trilogy and so as to be fair, I am even going to add a few highlights fresh from August.

From the title and first quote, I bet you can guess that we spent a nice part of July in museums! yay :) We are making an effort to actually enjoy D.C. since it has so much to offer. Over a couple of weekends we headed to three museums:

1. National Portrait Gallery -- we LOVED the courtyard! They also had several neat American impressionists like Mary Cassat and I found I also liked Childe Hassam.
2. Building museum -- this is a great space! They also have some interactive play. Zoë liked helping to build the arch with giant (as big as her!) blocks. Also, the building itself is pretty awesome.
3. The Phillips Gallery -- this is not a free collection. I know!
What were we thinking when we are in D.C. surrounded by free museums... ? but it was sooooooo worth it! The museum is located near Dupont Circle in what appears to be a lavish home. Many rooms have furniture from the same time period as the corresponding art. The pieces ranged from Monet's Luncheon of the Boating Party to more modern Rothco, with some Goya and Matisse's thrown in. I was impressed by the unique Van Gogh selection-- many I have never seen or heard of! We bought a cool boardbook for Zoë with Van Gogh paintings and a simple story to go with it. Feel free to check out all the pics in this slideshow...



Some other fun that we have had around town:

• Zoë's favorite park has the usual playground stuff, but also lots of toys to share. Here she is driving a police car!
• We've been exploring neighborhoods. U Street is a little like Telegraph in Berkeley. It has a long history of African American activism and is where the poet and activist, Langston Hughes, worked as a busboy. In his honor, a wonderful cafe/bookstore/restaurant/brunch locale named "Busboys and Poets" was founded. It was yummy and fun! (Thanks to Nina for the recommendation, ages ago!)
  
• Nearby in Adams Morgan, we also found a fun cafe/lounge/restaurant called Tryst. How awesome that a bar also has a large number of kids toddling around and has bookshelves stocked with books, boardbooks (for kids) and toys. Zoë loved the Etch-a-sketch and shapes matching toy-- which was high quality, made of wood and everything. AND the coffee is good! We are going to live @ Tryst. Matt doesn't know yet... but it's sort of a must. Zoë rocked the milk drinking with a straw-- we were duly impressed. Rather, relieved since it was our fault for not bringing an extra bottle. When will we learn? Apparently now it is unimportant! Ha.
  
• Zoë loves her Box. She loves "baby" (her doll) too and the two of them live inside Box. Box once housed Mom's new printer, but now it is where Zoë brushes her teeth, hides, plays, ... etc. We like Box.
  
• The weather has been nuts! The heat and humidity have caused crazy storms that no one could have predicted... well, except for the global warming experts. We had a tornado watch. The hurricane level winds took out most of the power in our county (luckily not ours but Zoë's school was closed for 3 days). On the plus side, when the storm cleared, we had pretty sunsets. Talk about a silver lining!
  
• We all went on a bike ride! Zoë liked it enough in the end to subject herself to more helmet wearing, even for fun. Plus, the helmet has ducks on it. She can practically form a story, with WORDS. It goes: "helmet ... bike? oh no! Bye bye ducks (these would be the ducks on her helmet) ...". Translation: "If I wear helmet, can we go on bike ride? No? Ok, then bye bye ducks (since not wearing helmet requires a polite goodbye to her good friends!)" We rode to the Farmer's Market and got vegetables and yummy bread, including these french morsels of delight called "Canèles" -- they are chewy, custardy, crispy and AMAZING! Zoë, with her cuteness, scored herself (and us) the sweetest, juiciest donut peach (tiny peach shaped approximately like a donut).
  
• Check out the pics here for more fun! Like: Zoë eating messy foods all by herself and Mommy making castles for Zoë to demolish (the prettier the stack, the better it falls, I tell you!)...
  
  

chopin is her middle name (not really)

We are snowed in on a Monday... so what better thing to do than upload more pics and videos. It's pretty much the only way we have now to connect to the outside world. We tried going out yesterday in a car, and let me tell you... that's an adventure. See our pictures of the "Snowmegeddon". Seriously though, things are at a standstill here. We are lucky to have a plowed street, power, an uncovered car, food and cancelled work/school. There are others who really have to brave the snow!

So we've been home-- cooking lasagne, baking cookies, healing from our respective illnesses (ear infection, bronchitis, flu, etc.) ... staying busy and playing! Oh! and Zoë is learning to feed herself! The slimy bananas were a bit tricky. But makes for good viewing :) Enjoy!


Here is a video that illustrate Zoë's piano abilities (we apologize for the darkness... the piano is in a dark corner).

playing around

So besides two new teeth(!!), the big new thing is that Zoë plays much more. She can sit and she can interact (communicate and understand-- or at least she seems to!). She chatters, she plays, she waves and claps. Everyday it seems there is a new and exciting action that she has picked up. Then sometimes she forgets the last new thing... she has forgotten waving, now. But she does the "Indian call" (horribly stereotypical and probably incorrect, but don't know how else to describe the call when you tap your hand on your mouth while make the "ahhhhh" sound so it sounds like "owowowowowow"), only Zoë has found her own method using the back of her arm to swipe across her mouth. I haven't been able to capture this on video yet, but maybe soon.

Here is a video showing her concentratedly playing with her toys, sitting up! Also, in preparation of her running wild... (aka: child-proofing) we have made her a play area. See?


This is a photo that Dadu (my father) took to resemble one of me and Ma... the circle of life and so forth.



Then we had a few other funny shots as we tried to take our family photos (courtesy of the timer option on the camera!) Enjoy!

I do apologize for merely glossing over Zoë's very busy life-- Thanksgiving was lovely. She ate mostly what we did... in her own version. Then there was the trip to Tennessee and visit from the Basu grandparents (Didun and Dadu). There are loads of photos from that-- we encourage you to visit the Picasa Album:

Halloween with Didun and Dadu

By the way, if you do visit the blog, please leave a comment. Sometimes it feels like I am talking to the computer. Which is not always a bad thing... but it is much less fun. And thereby, less motivating to keep up-to-date. Thanks :)