Twist the arm

I'm behind on posting and am feeling the crunch to get one out before we go on vacation. Starting this post near midnight is going to be fun, but David's not home yet and I haven't passed out, so here I go.

Dress up fun:

Iris had fun tooClaire's new extra-safe scooter get-up. She really wanted a princess helmet, but only Abby Cadabby was available. She was pacified when I suggested that Abby is a fairy and quite possibly could be a princess too.
We have started a new tradition of stopping at a small park on our way home from school. As always, Elijah finds every opportunity to talk to everyone, teaching them French, asking for food, recruiting them to help him find sticks to make dinner. His new thing is challenging everyone he meets to races. He usually wins, even grown ups. This is because he's fast, but also b/c his little bike takes the corners a lot better than others. He's beaten grown ups on roller blades, bikes, and teenagers on skateboards. Last week I also found him doing at least 20 "cartwheels" in a row in front of a group of teenagers whom I sure had just gotten his "black lung" lecture on smoking (PS, he also tells smokers and coffee-drinkers that they are sinners). Below he recruited a little girl to make a store with him. They sold her mom delicacies such as popsicles.

Action shots:

Action leads me to the next point. Active children get sick and hurt. Here's the problem:
I am 100% medically rebellious. I refused to go to the doctor as a child and my dad had to sign off on any required school, sports, camp medical forms. I didn’t like doctors lifting my shirt, prodding and poking in private areas. I didn’t want to pee in a cup, which inevitably resulted in yellowed hands. I never took drugs, nor do I now. When I was a kid, one of my favorite words (mostly for the impressive power) was "psychosomatic" and I'd go off on the psychosomatic effect of medication. Now, I never give my kids drugs. Doctors, especially Mexican doctors (because I am already highly expert in the area, enough to make broad generalizations), prescribe overmedication. Elijah twisted his wrist last week. I was supposed to medicate him for swelling which did not occur and leave this splint on for 7-10 days. It lasted all of 3.5 days. The thing got gross and I just couldn’t make him wear something so nasty when his arm didn’t hurt as much anymore. Call me a good mother, call me a bad mother, call me a psychosomatic mother.
Behold the splint:

We went to the zoo after spending all morning in the doc's office. Good news is that the zoo is free. Bad news is that a man followed us throughout the zoo and offered to walk us home b/c it was so "dangerous."He was nice, just a little bit creepy. I finally figured out how to ditch him a few blocks before our building.