solo with los ninos

husband in la until next monday, sigh.

actually we're doing ok, got lots of stuff going on. parker and i are having a mother/daughter afternoon.

nino is at natasha's russian family daycare out in the avenues. she runs a tight ship over there in the outer sunset. it's the anti-laurel hill nursery school. they have structured activities including gymnastics with mr. alex, the stocky, gruff gym coach with a thick russian accent. it's so cute to see thesee babies and toddlers respond to his commands to walk the balace beam, "throw ball" and do the obstacle course. none of them would dare not obey.

natasha also has a russian music teacher who plasters her face with makeup (kind of a weird eastern bloc thing) and brings her portable keyboard to play for the kids. they have regimented naptime, and the older kids do worksheets to learn the alphabet, colors, numbers, etc.

at laurel hill, the kids play and do art projects all day and often run around completely naked...

i dropped parker off at her hippie preschool yesterday – free love, nudity and art – and stopped at the laurel hill playground next door. i have been hearing for years about a child development program there run by city college and thought i'd check it out.

it's was pretty cool. it's a child observation class to learn about development through play, with professional guidance. it's set up like a preschool, but geared for younger kids. there's an indoor art area and a great playground with tennis courts with lots of little ride in/on vehicles. roman loved it, but kept wanting to run into the bathroom to play hide-and-go-seek. eventually he slipped on the tile floor and split his lip. great parenting. letting the kid run around in the bathroom. i decided to sign us up...

slow food saturday

i got up early with nino and managed to get in a powerwalk up through buena vista park. the morning was still heavy with mist and it was pretty ethereal there, with no one around almost the entire time i meandered through the woods.

i stopped at the panhandle playground to visit with lorna since she returns to london tomorrow. all the 'bean there' mamas crews were there with their broods, it was great to see them all. i'll miss lorna so much and hope we can get together one last time tomorrow.

after, i rallied at home, zannah came over and we took the kids to the slow food marketplace/garden at civic center. nice, but tough with a three-year-old and the little guy in a stroller. parker got interviewed by some woman taping for slow food nation. she was in kind of a snit and didn't show too well on camera.


after well over a year of planning for it, we finally started pre-school this week. i say "we" because we're at laurel hill nursery, a co-op where much parental participation is expected. we had our sites set on getting parker into belvedere motnessori, but that didn't pan out, despite our letter writing and photography efforts. LHNS seems pretty groovy thus far. there are a couple of writers there, including aidin from the chronicle and the big girl with the pink hair who did the blog about her daughter violet for babycenter. parker's first day was wednesday and i worked my shift. it was actually quite fun and i look forward to the work days. the meetings, not so much.

also, this week, i had my corneas lasered and reshaped by the amazing Dr. Ella Faktorovich and now have better than 20/20 vision. it's like a miracle. for the first time in memory, i can open my eyes and see across the room...