Author grimholtz

The big event happened two nights ago on Saturday, November 17, 2019! The crib was in our bedroom. He’s got a new sleeping suit and a new bed, all in the same week. Previously he was sleeping in a foldable box of some sort. I dont know how to describe it, but it’s not really a box. It lays on the bed or next to us on a table.

He also recently started putting his pacifier (“boote“) into his mouth on his own! He can’t always do it, and sometimes misses his mouth or misses grabbing the pacifier, but he has done it again and again.

He is also imitating the kissing sound we make when we kiss him.

The Ferocious Feline

Max read this to me in the book Kat Kong while practicing reading.

Aki: “Do you know what a feline is?”

Max: “Someone who eats meat?”

On Sleeping With Me

Max is finally sleeping alone all of the time now. It’s been that way for about two weeks. Occasionally, he’ll ask me to sit in the hallway outside his room just like my mother did for me. “I like sleeping alone because it’s comfortable, but I miss talking to you.”

On Driving Max To School

“I don’t like when I get out of the car [to go into school] because I can’t talk to you anymore.”

Max was trying to say immune system but could only say maroon system instead.

Tonight he asked me why there were so many teenagers at Terror in the Corn Maze at Anderson Farm. Then he asked me if teenage years are the best years of someone’s life. When I said it can be for some people, he asked if it was for me. I said no.

“What were your best years?”

Me: “Now”

Max “Why?”

Me: “Because I have you and mama and Elliot, I have my new family.”

I then said how fun teenage years were for me, except for the first two years of high school.

“Why?”

He asked if I was a good kid.

“Yes, except for the egg incident and the hacking incident. I didn’t get into trouble and got  decent grades.”

I think he is looking forward to being a teenager.

We then had a long discussion about my teenage years, why some were good and bad. And I told him the good parts were being with my family (not all together at once), and how I went exploring mysteries with my father all the time and to the beach and traveling with my mother. I told him about 3 trips to the Pine Barrens: the abandoned electronics factory that was later an EPA clean-up site, the abandoned blueberry/cranberry packaging buildings, the mysterious abandoned buildings near the old train tracks that my father was scared of — two men talking (but only one seen) and a baseball bat removed from a trunk. Being very quiet. Getting out of there very quickly. My father’s sense of urgency and his fear.

“Do they have a lot of pencils in Pennsylvania?”

Last week, Elliot’s hair started getting a tad darker. And he has more of it.

Last night, we went to Glow at the Gardens at the Denver Botanical Gardens.

Today, a hot-air balloon flew over the house and set down at the playground. Elliott was sleeping. Max at school. Karolina at the doctor. I called Suzy out to see it. She took photos and went inside with the new glass (not plastic) baby bottles. I chased the balloon to the park.

First, entrepreneurship.

Max really wants to make money. REALLY wants to make money. He won’t let up. So, following on his idea of the lemonade stand (with my suggestion about doing it at a soccer field), he now wants to start a Star Wars after-school camp in the neighborhood.

We would go door-to-door, handing out flyers about the camp. It would be held by the pond/playground up the street in Trailmark. It would cost $10 every 30 days; that’s quite a bargain.

Every day after school, kids would work on a Ray Harryhausen-style armature and eventually coat it in rubber. In between, we’d have light saber fights.

Max wants to know how much he’ll earn if he signs up 50 kids. What about 500? What about 1000? I tell him at a certain point, he’ll have to hire other people to entertain the kids. That doesn’t bother him.

….and Karolina and Max. Stayed in an adobe house last night in Taos. Leonhardt’s birthday, age 55. Celebrated at a restaurant called Martyr’s. Walking around Santa Fe today. Meow Wolf too crowded.

Max called Las Vegas “Lost Vegas”.

“I hate to say it, but that place is way cooler than Toys ‘R Us.”

Visit to the 80s store on Broadway

He loved it. We got a gremlin, king kong cup, star wars glass, smurfette, jabba palace.  Why max likes toys from the 80s more than toys of today:  there were a lot of brands than now. Now there are a lot of toys but not a lot of brands.

Everyone loved Elliot at the Rabbi and Doba’s “Sushi In the Sukkah”. Max ran with the other children. Elliot laughed and smiled at anyone and everyone who looked his way. If they got close to him, as many people did, he reached out with his arms to hold them. That got him a lot of attention.

So many comments about his happiness and how engaged and social he is.

When he saw Doba’s new baby, Hannah or Chava, who was drinking a bottle of milk, he reached out to take her bottle!

“Do you think it’s cool to work at Area 51?”

“Yese. You get to work on really interesting things.”

“And you get to know if there are aliens. When I grow up, I want to work at Area 51. After I’m rich.

“After you’re rich?”

“Yeah, I told you this before. I want to work at a company for a while so I can see what it’s like [before I start my own companies].”

“And to learn?”

“Yes, and to learn.”

Max after his 3rd day in 4th grade: “I thought it would take forever to get here, but here I am. And next year, I’ll be in 5th grade.”

The other day, Newey held a toy for the first time and manipulated it. It does not sound like a big deal, and he still hurts his limbs around uncontrollably, but it was a big deal. He held onto the toy while spazzing out with his hands, looking at it, engaging with it for minutes. They we showed him a hand-held mirror. He took it and was fascinated, although I’m sure he couldn’t have known who was in the mirror. He may just have been fascinated with holding something?

Enthralling to watch him develop!