Social Interaction, Toddler Style

The past two weekends we have had a bunch of outing activities, with varying levels of success.

Last Saturday, we went to Beth and Brian's house to celebrate Australia Day with traditional chicken and champagne.  The Salvateenies attended last year, in their car seats.  This year was a little more active an affair, as we ran interference to keep them from pitching down the stairs to the first floor, but they were a charming welcoming committee as guests arrived and were adventurous with their diet, sampling every type of fruit and vegetable offered - including beets!

We tried to get a picture of all three of them together, but Caroline had other plans

After enjoying the party, we made our apologies and headed across town to meet Tamara and Jonah at Sherith Israel, a beautiful synagogue, for a PJ Havdallah.  Havdallah is the ceremony that ends the sabbath on Saturday evenings, and this is an activity that Sherith Israel puts on for its children's groups, which this month was being co-sponsored by the PJ Library, a great group that sends free Jewish kids groups to children.   Amazingly, we got there just as Tamara and Jonah were walking in, so we all navigated our way to the activity room together.  When we got there, we were amazed.  There were A TON of kids - mostly older than the 'Teenies - and lots of parents, too.  Everything was just about to get started, so we scooted into the room.  There were toys for the kids to play on, and the kids were all supposed to be watching a story about how the bear learned about shabbat, or something like that, but there were just too many people in the room and it was a little chaotic (or, as Tamara said, "intense").

We tried keeping the kids hydrated with their water bottles, but they kept throwing them on the floor, which meant we had to go retrieve them, and keeping an eye on all three was a challenge.

All three of the kids enjoyed trying out the ride-on toys and the little car, until an older kid named Ike (that's right, I'm outing a 4 year old on my blog) pushed each of them down or out of his way at different times.

I could tell a bad Mommy  moment was coming on.  All I could think was, "Alright, where are Ike's parents and why aren't they doing anything about him knocking my children over?"  He did it right in front of me, and in front of Uncle Kelly, but we were on his turf, so we focused on rescuing the fallen Teenie, rather than scolding the offender.

After the story there was a brief musical interlude and then everyone was invited to get food - cheese pizza and lemonade.  I figured we should take this opportunity to slip out, especially since none of the other parents had made any effort to say hello to us and seemed to be turning their noses up at us at every turn.  There was also the matter of Ike's parents - now that feeding time had begun, he had settled down to eat with them and it was taking every ounce of will power I had not to march over and inform them that their son was a bully.  Instead, we snagged five pieces of pizza and headed out to eat in the van.

Hmmm...I wonder if Uncle Kelly's German Military Jacket is to blame for our reception?

So, you can imagine the apprehension I felt as Grandma and I packed the babies up to take them to Family Story Time at the library on Saturday morning.  I am happy to say, however, that it was a success!  The babies wandered and interacted with the other kids, but the parents were all calm and comfortable and friendly.  Caroline didn't even get in trouble when she walked up at the end of story time and emptied the librarians box of all her books and started turning the pages herself!  

On Sunday, we loaded the van back up and headed to the East Bay to see Sam and Junior.  Sam had been planning a holiday gift exchange with the members of her Mommies group that kept getting postponed, and this was finally the day it was going to happen!  There were only two other mommies who could make it, but that still gave us a total of six babies - and Caroline the only girl among them.  She was in heaven!  Of course, most of her attention was reserved for Junior, whom she adores, but she took the opportunity to meet Isaac and Prithvi as well.

Junior, preparing to share all his toys

Max, showing everyone the new tooth he's growing 

It doesn't matter whose couch it is - that's where they want to play!

Junior has an infectious laugh

Caroline was constantly in motion!

Prithvi smiled BIG when I aimed the camera at him

Elizabeth and Isaac in the background as Prithvi snuck up on Daniel

I think he saw Caroline massaging Junior's head and thought it would be fun to try

This is the ONLY time Junior cried the whole day

Daniel climbed in one box of toys and proceeded to toss every item from the other box on the floor

Caroline climbed up to figure out how to turn the TV on

And as if that wasn't enough, Sam and I piled all four kids into the minivan (because we can do that now that we have a minivan) and drove 20 minutes to San Leandro so I could pop in on the Bay Area Triplets (and one Twins) Mommies group's get together.  It was supposed to be sort of a Mommies' Day Out, so it was a little awkward with the babies there, but a couple of the moms of older triplets stepped right up and grabbed a baby to hold and I was able to stay for about forty-five minutes and at least meet a few of the other mommies before packing everyone back into the car and heading home.

Oh! And let's not forget Friday!  Joe and I took the boys down to Gymboree HQ for a "go see" and they were proclaimed the perfect size for 12-18 month fit modeling.  Fit modeling is what it sounds like - they bring the babies in to try on a handful of outfits and see if they're cut right for a 12-18 month old sized baby, then pay you a small amount.  It's not glamorous, but if the babies do it well, it's possible the folks at Gymboree will keep them in mind for print ads they may do along the way, so it's good for their "career" in the long run.  

The cutest thing about the whole encounter was watching Max interact with his reflection in the full-wall mirror.

He's looking for the Max in the Mirror....

What you're missing here is the next scene - so cute we missed a picture of it - as Max walked right up and kissed himself in the mirror.