Da Keiki Blog

I was tired of the daily battle. “I don’t wanna brush my teeth!” Force just resulted in hysterical crying, and entertainmant (Brush-brush-brush your teeth keep them clean each day… sang to the tune of “Row, row, row your boat”) was working pretty limited. I interviewed parents and got techniques that didn’t work for Leilani at all.

Then I resorted to “Remember the diver-dentist in Nemo? Darls’s uncle? Remember how people screamed when he did the root canal?” Bad Mommy! That was not a great idea, because then I had to explain a lot about dentists – Leilani had no idea what was going on there and why. After all, what kind of parents would bring a little girl to a man who punishes her by hurting her mouth, just for not brushing teeth.

We went back to fighting about the brushing for a few day. 2 days ago in the middle of the preparation – squeezing out toothpaste, while holding back Leilani who screamed “Let me free, let go, let go!” at the top of her lungs. So I grabed Leilani, dragged her in front of my Mac and googled “rotten teeth”. I did an image search and Leilani’s eyes grew bigger and bigger.* While showing her the gross photos I explained to her that food, especially sweet food destroys our teeth if we don’t brush them. That it doesn’t just look disgusting, but also hurts a lot. And that the only one who can fix it is the dentist, and that going to the dentist with good teeth, that have been brushed often usually didn’t hurt, but the less one takes care of their teeth, the more work the dentist has to do, and the more it hurts.

We went back to the bathroom, and it was the best toothbrushing in 1/2 a year. Every time since then (4 times so far) brushing teeth went smoothly. I was even able to look and feel into her mouth and realized one of the last pair of molars had just broken through, and the other one is probably not far behind, so that’s probably why the battles gotten so bad, and makes the change even more remarkable, because right now at the height of teething it’s quite painful.

I so often underestimate her ability to understand cause and effect, and complex situations, and this is usually a mistake.

Yesterday we started talking about germs and hand washing, and 3 or 4 times since then she came up to me and asked for me to help her wash her hands.

*Had I done it before dinner it would have helped me to loose weight as well, there were nauseating images among those. See for yourself at Google Images

The ocean has been incredible gentle all week, and the whales were out. Even I can spot them now, without needing Leilani to point them out to me. Friday after work we brought Leilani to our friends for a playdate, took the kayak and paddled straight out into the Wailua bay.

When we returned shortly after sunset we noticed there was another kayak that had just pulled in – getting closer we recognized our friend Randy and his son Ronnie. We started talking and decided to try to go together to Kipu Kai, the forbidden beach, the next day.

We tried to get an early start from Kalapaki beach, but by the time we left it was probably 9:15 or so:

Leilani was exceptionally good and frighteningly quiet. I asked whether she was sleeping and she answered yes. She seemed to really enjoy the gentle waves, but whenever I tried to paddle she protested. I did not get a workout that day, but Andy got a double one. After 45 minutes or so Leilani did really fall asleep, she missed most of the whales we saw.

Unfortunately we did not get closer to a whale than shown in this zoomed and cropped photo, but it was still cool. One of them was obviously young and very playful, and a lot of fun to watch as it breached several times in a row.

Ronnie in the front and his father, Randy, in the back:

We arrived at an almost empty and perfect beach. The surrounding land is privately owned with ridges on all sides and a single private dirt road for access. So, except for with a kayak, there is no legal way to get there, and you have to stay on the beach. Maybe it should be KAPU Kai :-) (Kapu means Taboo in Hawaiian). Andy adds: The people retreated to the house before we saw them up close, they must be members or guests of the family who own the land. I’m not sure if anyone lives in the house permanently or wether it’s just a weekend retreat. The land will revert to the county sometime around 2030, and then it will be opened up to the public in some way. But until then, it is more difficult to access than Kalalau, and nearly as spectacular.

There were sections of the beach that appeared green – from Olivine, a green crystal found in some volcanic rocks that wash down gullies from the ridges:

Leilani really enjoyed the beach, and she was mostly good about putting on sunscreen and covering up against the hot sun.

But she really wanted to go swimming naked, so we let her run around for a little while, which she thought it was great. At one side of this beach, there was an elevated reef that made a nice calm lagoon for her to splash in the water.

Further along, there is a large expanse of flat reef barely covered with water. We walked through carefully, stepping around the sea cucumbers. In the little pools, the corals were untrampled.

Going home was uneventful, Leilani fell asleep even faster and we only saw one whale. The return trip took 2/3 as much time because the wind and currents were with us, although they had picked up and there were some pretty big swells. Leilani sometimes got splashed, but not enough to wake her up. We ended the day with a snack at the Kalapaki park, while Leilani played at the playground.

Said Leilani as we walked to the car. Oh, I said. Why? “He saved a life!” was her reply. Before I could think I said “No he didn’t…[then thinking caught up with the mouth]… which life did he save?” “The Spider’s life – Yea Daddy!” Then she started to sing “The itsi bitsi spider climbed up the waterspout…”

Andy had caught a (not so itsi bitsi, but not as big as the one in the photo) cane or huntsman spider alive at our friends house and set him free, after our friends had already sentenced the spider to death and attempted to execute the sentence (and the spider).

Leilani is really aware of life and death for her age, we noticed that too on a beautiful starfish, that we had found outside the water – to us it looked dead or almost dead, so we examined it and even briefly thought about taking it home and drying it, but to her it was clear that it needed to go back into the ocean she whined, yelled and screamed that it was still alive and needed to go into the ocean until I thew it back (45 seconds after we found it).

I try hard to steer her away from dead animals and roadkill, but when I don’t succeed she will discuss endlessly where the animal went, (“Did he go to cat heaven?”) and whether it will come back. I hid the Bambi book because it took more than 15 minutes the last time I read it to go past the page where the hunter shoots Bambi’s mother. It seems she repeats just 4 or 5 questions over and over and my answers don’t give her what she is looking for. (And yes I know that I am the parent and could cut short discussions if I wanted to, but I feel it is important to let them run their course to a natural finish, or stop from exhaustion).

After almost a year she still occasionally brings flowers to Kiko’s grave or goes there to greet him or say goodbye, or sing him the healing song.

When she wants to try sausage or meat and I tell her thats made from dead pigs or cows she doesn’t ever give eating it a second thought, no matter how much her friends seem to enjoy it. (And yes, she is 2 years old and loves to try new foods :-) I also change the topic when it comes to why we eat fish.

Today, when taking the last 3 loads of laundry from the cloth line I pre-sorted it. One basket for Andy’s and my stuff, one basket for linens and one for Leilani’s. I always knew she’d win by the number of pieces, but she also beat us by volume. I estimate she is responsible for 55%, I for 30% and Andy 15%… Just thought it was an interesting bit of laundry trivia.

Raya turned three! She had a beautiful princess themed party, and as a funny coincidence we noted that at least 4 of the moms wore black T-shirts – maybe as a subconscious answer to too much princess stuff in our daughters lives…

Raya blew all candles out at once!

Leilani started out nicely, eating like a big girl with a spoon.

The cake was really tasty.

“I’m all done with my spoon…” When she was all done with the cake too it was time to change her dress.

The birthday girl, in a Snow White dress.

Raya went first, then everybody got a turn with the piñata. To my surprise Leilani was happy to hit it (after seeing the other girls do it too)—I suppose the reason was that it was a heart with printed princesses, and not in the shape of a princess, unlike the Elmo piñata a long time ago. The sad irony is that this was a “violence-free” piñata: the children are supposed to pull the ribbons to open it up, and hitting it did nothing.

Loot!

Opening presents:

A Bye-Bye hug for Zen!