Malcolm as Dinosaur Dentist

His First Ski lesson

Debra Lynn loves snow, and when we had this snow fall she started asking to have Malcolm over to play in the snow. For Christmas she gave him her old pair of skis that she and her brother used to use when they were growing up. Malcolm had not been very happy with the snow either since mostly it has meant that he has not been able to get to see his friends and his community, but he was thrilled to spend time with Debra Lynn, and she did seem open a whole new world to him with the skis. He loved skiing down the little hill between out houses, and it did rescue Christmas to me in a way. After getting stuck trying to get to a Christmas gathering and not making it, it was quite beautiful to see them skiing as the sun set and the moon rose on our quiet, snow-laden street.

Opening Presents

We had a sweet little Christmas overall, although I really do have to say that has been too white. We are all tired of getting stuck trying to get where we are going, and did not make the Christmas party later that day, but Malcolm did enjoy opening his gifts. Most of his gifts were made of natural wood.

Overall, Santa brought him wooden trains, and wooden food for his kitchen. The veggies that you can cut are a great hit with him. However; Santa did also bring him a rather odd green dinosaur that he can rde on and that makes strange noises etc. I am not quite sure about this dinosaur perhaps an errant elf snuck her in.

Snow Storm

Here is a picture of the snow storm, but I will add more because the snow got deep enough the cover the little orange wagon, and my legs up to my knees.

'Tis the Season

Here are pictures of Malcolm decorating the Christmas tree and making gingerbread cookies at home.

Malcolm and the Chickens

Malcolm loves his chickens, and he has gotten really good at helping me take care of them. However; things on the chicken front have really taken a bad turn as Portland faced the worst snowstorm, or really set of snow storms in the last 40 years. Chloe, my favorite little red hen was killed by a raccoon who also tried to get in the coop to finish the job with the last two yesterday, but I brought them into the house and safety. When are not covered in a ton of snow, Malcolm always checks their water and likes to stay outside playing with the chickens, watching them eat, and imitating the way their beaks move.

Ms. Sophie's Party

I was going to write about our blissful day after Thanksgiving at the beach before posting these pictures, but did not find the time to do it justice, and now of course I am sick again. In the days of sickness in the winter months, I think that it is best for me to just get the pics up as fast as I can, last year sickness kept me from posting for months and I still feel bad about that.

We did have a wonderful time at the beach though. We just went because Boo wanted to see the ocean. We went with Uncle Nathaniel( boo calls him Uncle Nanyel), we ate wonderful seafood, chased the tide, and flew kites until we were exhausted and cold. Malcolm loved like at the sea life including a visiting heron and jellyfish, but alas I left my camera behind that day.

Here are the pics from Ms. Sophie's b-day party. He is still talking about taking the max train through the tunnel with the light on and then getting out to see Sophie. Ok, I am going to get these pics posted so I can get back to taking care of my cold.

Thanksgiving kids

We had a lovely Thanksgiving this year, although of course we are still missing the Daddy who is in Kenya and very quiet.

In the morning Uncle Curtis came over with his parents for brunch. Nathaniel, Malcolm and I made a fritata, coffee cake, sausage and coffee. The chickens helped too by providing us with some nice fresh eggs for the fritata. Truth be told Uncle Nathaniel did more of the cooking and I did more of the talking, but no one should really be surprised by that.

Later we went over to Ms. Willie's for dinner with our church family. It was a lot of fun. Here is a picture of the children who were over for Thanksgiving dinner.

Grandma' House

We went to Grandma's house right after the election. Grandma was retiring and we went as part of a big surprise party. Then when we returned we celebrated Baba's birthday and then he flew to Kenya. We still have not heard much from Kenya and we miss him. Here are some pictures from our time in Colorado.

Yes We Did

I can not believe that it has taken me so long to write this post, but I want to take a moment to reflect on how incredible it was to see Barack Obama elected. Geoffrey and I had made plans to go out that night to the convention center and watch the results come in. We were going to make a date of it. Despite the fact that Obama was ahead in the polls, I was sure that it would be a long night. I didn't trust the polls after the last election. Nathaniel brought us dinner and we all ate and watched the early results then Nathaniel put Malcolm to bed and Geoffrey and I went out to a coffee shop where I knew the results would be on TV. We had hardly settled into our mochas at 8:00pm Pacific time when the electoral count went to 284 and the coffee shop erupted in joyful screams. I was so shocked! I could not believe that it could be over so early! That it was real, and that unlike the election of 2000 where the initial results were later reversed, that it would not be taken away. Geoffrey started screaming in the streets nad the neighbors around the coffee shop joined him. As we drove to the convention center we heard John McCain's concession speech on the radio and called my mom on Geoffrey's cell phone. When we entered the convention center there was amazing drumming playing and Geoffrey stopped and had his picture taken with the drummers who were also protesting the war in Iraq. When we finally settled into a room to watch the acceptance speech, the enormity of the event came over me. Malcolm, you will never know what it is to grow up in a world where a Black man like you can not be president. You will hear stories that I tell you about the experiences I had growing up, or that your grandmother tells you about the freedom rides, and how you and I and Sequoia and your Godmother and many others all worked hard organizing for Obama to make a change, but now you will grow up with so many more possibilities! The next day I saw Jesse Jackson interviewed. He had the sort of after glow that follows only momentous occasions like the birth of your child or great political achievements. His face reflected his years, his relief, and his many exposed spiritual and emotional wounds. He said that he could not sleep the night before. The cameras showed the video footage watching Barack Obama's acceptance speech at Grant Park the night before, tears were streaming down his face. He talked about what this meant for him and how he remembered his grandfather a Black man that could not even read, and now a Black man could be president. Later I saw an interview with Andrew Jackson who said that Martin Luther King did not even believe that Black people would make into Congress until Malcolm's generation. He talked about the pain of the civil rights movement and for the first time, I really came to understand and appreciate how much my parents' generation suffered. I began to understand why my mother still will not tell me what happened to her on the freedom rides. I began to understand why Jesse Jackson made inappropriate remarks under his breath. I know my own pain from racism, but I have never seen a whites only bathroom or drinking fountain. To me that reality lies only in stories and story books and for Malcolm a time when race or gender alone determines your ability to take public office will lie only in stories and story books. For so long I have felt outside of the US, but suddenly I feel completely a part of it. For the first time I feel that this is my country too, I am excited to make phone calls to decision makers and to participate in my government and to make it work for my children and the world. For the first time in a long time, I feel that we as a people can come together look at the reality of what divides us and overcome it. We have a long way to go, but I must thank this Senator from Illinois for giving hope back to me, so that I can also bare the burden of working so hard to make this world better for my son. Thank you Mr. President-Elect for showing me that yes we shall overcome. In fact Yes, we did!

Happy Halloween

Most of you know that Malcolm is really, REALLY into trains so this year he wanted to be a MAX train which is the light rail train that runs through Portland, specifically he wanted to be the yellow line which runs closest to our neighborhood. However; it seems that by Halloween he had changed his mind to the blue line, but I had already painted the yellow line. Anyway, the Max train costume required quite a bit of preparation and that kept us all quite busy. Jessica painted the driver, I painted most of the train and wrapped the white paper around the cardboard box and rain-proofed it, and Nathaniel added the final touch-the headlights. Here are few of our Halloween pics.

The first one is from school it is Malcolm with his friend Lulu. The pictures below include Curtis, Jessica, Sequoia, Malcolm and myself.

Salmon Festival 2008

Learning a Little Bit About Community Service

On Tuesday, the last day of our weekend, Malcolm and I uprooted the collards and kale that had been planted in the spring, and took three big garbage bags full to the Oregon Food Bank, and one big garbage bag full to Mountain Valley. You all should have seen the size of the worms that came up in our little plot. We still have lots of yummy collards and broccoli in our back yard, but it was definitely time to rejuvenate our side garden bed.

We donated 31 lbs of produce to the Oregon Food Bank, and the children at the school got to have collards in all their lunches for the rest of the week at Mountain Valley. I am so excited that he loves eating things that he sees growing all the time.

Sometimes, I hear doubts from other parents that Malcolm can understand all the things that I explain to him, but I think that children understand far more than we give them credit for and I can tell by our conversations that he gets most of it. We are entering an age where we are beginning to have really exciting conversations, on a simple levels, but about an amazing range of topics about our world.

On the trip to the Food Bank, I explained to him that our family had some really hard times when it was very difficult for us to afford food, especially good food and that many people helped us so, now when we have extra food we want to share with others who need help like we did. I left it at that. We dropped off the food and went home for nap.

Here is a picture of the inside of the food bank where we dropped stuff off.

The Obama Post

Today I woke up early for a Saturday to drop off the goodies Nathaniel and I had made at the "Bake Sale for Change" for Barack Obama's campaign. I still ended up running late so Nathaniel cooked breakfast from Malcolm while I dropped stuff off, and then came back to get Malcolm dressed we could go canvassing, and be back in time to see his little friend Sophie when she came over. I have tried to do as much as I could for Obama. I figure I have done most of the major campaign activities at least once. I absolutely do not want my son to believe that it impossible for a Black man to be president. I want him to believe and keep saying "Yes, we can!" I feel that it is imperative for his cultural identity, and self-esteem. So my dear little freedom fighter, here is mama's list of what I have done so far to make sure that we turn this country and world around so that when you inherit the earth it will be inhabitable. Your mama's Obama list

1. We went to Obama's largest rally in the country that took place prior to his nomination acceptance speech, and waited for two hours on the hottest day of the year in Portland. I nursed you in the grass while spoke and then you sat on your Baba's shoulders and shouted "Yes, we can!" with 75,000 others.
2. Mama donated to the campaign (her first time ever donating to a political candidate's campaign).
3. Mama and Malcolm registered voters at the Farmers' Market.
4. Mama phonebanked for the campaign (once so far)
5. Mama canvassed in our old neighborhood in East Portland which is full of undecided voters, many of whom are new immigrants. We educated some of these immigrants on Obama's stand on issues important to them.
6. Attended a concert fundrasier
7. Bought lots of Obama shirts and stuff
   

Now, I do not know how I will fit it into the schedule, but I am also going to try to canvass or phone bank for the Portland Children's Initiative too so I can make sure that we maintain our early childhood fund in the city. Beyond that baby I am just trying to community building, justice, nonviolent communication and love at your school, and raise you to be the best person that you can be. I am including pictures of some of the goodies that we ended up with from the bake sale and Aunty Jessica picking blackberries for Malcolm and Sequoia on our way home from canvassing.

Today Sophie, Malcolm's long-lost love from Mountain Valley, came over for a playdate after all of our morning Obama-oriented activities were over. It was great to see her after a few months away. I am continually astonished by how much young children develop in just a few months. After a few minutes of adjustment she was ordering Malcolm around and he was accommodating her. They were just the little pair. Sophie would fill Malcolm's wagon with blocks and then tell him when to dump it out, and they would squeal with joy. Then they would give each other turns pushing the other in the wagon, they played dress up and ate goodies from the Obama bake-sale for snack. It was all a great hit. Then we went into the yard to chase the chickens. Sophie did not want to leave, so Malcolm blew her a kiss. Then was the magical moment. Sophie bent over and give him a sweet little kiss right on the mouth! His first one! It was one of those little aaah! moments for both of the mamas. It was very sweet, and they both blew each other kisses and Sophie was strapped in her car seat to go take her nap.

I have to admit, I was very relieved Malcolm had missed her so much. I know that he is going to have to grieve people coming and going, but I really don't want him to have to yet. I really want him to have deep roots and people that he grows with. Maybe this is so important to me because I felt like I never really had roots. We moved around a lot, and it was hard even to keep up with family. I didn't have those long last friendships from early childhood, and I didn't have a sense of a cultural community either once my dad stopped being around. I really want Malcolm to have a strong sense of community and who he is, and all the people that love him.

Here are pictures of him with Sophie.

malcolm waiting for the max train

Unschooling malcolm

So today was one of those days when I realize how much he is learning, and how integrated that learning is into everything. First, he is counting everything. Today we counted birds in English and Swahili, and then some of the birds flew away then we counted again and realized they were less.

We worked on colors by naming the colors of each and every car of the freight train that went pass. We have been talking about when events take place by where they fall in our routine. Here is an example, "Malcolm, we are going to see Benjamin tomorrow." (Benjamin is one of his best friends-they are like cousins) "Benjamin! Get dressed, see Benjamin!" "No, Benjamin is sleeping. We are going to take a bath, brush teeth, read a story, sleep, wake up, eat breakfast, get dressed, play, and then see Benjamin." Then Malcolm rattles off that order of events. We have also been talking about days by when the moon and the sun sleep. It has really been amazing to how he is growing, and is really working on becoming a three year old.

He is also really interested in reading now. He is asking me to read a lot of things to him. Oh, and one more thing he still loves Obama. Tonight when he was resisting going to bed, I had to reassure him that Barack Obama was also sleeping.

On Spiders, Caterpillars, Being two, and Trains

Malcolm has had a bit of challenging time adjusting to me being a teacher at his school, and he has been going through some challenges. All of these are very appropriate challenges for being two. He has been going through a hitting and pulling hair phase that has driven me crazy, but I think that we are getting through it. We have been doing a lot of talking about all the fun and positive ways we can get our friends' attention if we want to play with them. That seems to be working, but it is still a process.

Yesterday, I wasn't feeling well. I had a bladder infection so when my bubbly boy woke up at 6:30, I handed him to Uncle Nathaniel. Then they went out to the garden. Since the beginning of September I have noticed that spiders are everywhere in the garden, and yesterday was no exception. Nathaniel and Malcolm counted spiders and then apparently took note of their patterns and went to the computer to look up what type of spider they were.

This train of thought really excited Malcolm. I think that he loved the idea that something he could find in our garden would also appear in the computer.

Later, after I had been to the doctor and he had played for a while at Aunty Diane's and had a nap, we sat outside in the sunshine on the sidewalk. I didn't feel like doing anything too active, but figured we should soak up all the rays that God affords us now because the rains will be here soon enough. So I thought we could just sit there and look at things near where we were sitting and discuss them. At that moment at caterpillar went by so we watched the caterpillar. Malcolm did not want me put anything in the path of the caterpillar or to pick it up.He asked if he could touch it, but I wasn't sure what type of caterpillar it was, and some can cause allergic reactions so I said "No." So we watched the caterpillar walk by.

A little bit later we went into the garden in the back and then counted all the caterpillars we could find. I tried to identify our caterpillar friends with him on the computer later, but all I could figure out is that they are more likely to become moths than butterflies, but I am not sure what kind of moths. The caterpillars too are very recent guests, and I really love that we are learning so much about all the more subtle changes the seasons bring to our area.

The garden really has kept us busy. We have tomatoes growing to an unbeliavable amount. We have made salsa and tomato sauce and cooked with the tomatoes and given some away and we still have more. I am in fact planning on calling the Oregon Food Bank to see if we can donate some of our garden produce. I think that it will be a great civic lesson for Malcolm.

There were many days in which we got food boxes from the food bank when things were tight and he was a baby. I think that it is really wonderful to give back to the same source that gave to us when we have extra so that others who are struggling will be blessed the way we were blessed in the midst of our struggles.

Today was Sunday so we had church. Malcolm now goes to the pre-school class upstairs. It is called the Fish Class. Even though he was not quite three yet, I wanted to make sure tht he moved up with his little church friends that he loves so much, and in that setting he is really thriving. He was so excited to go to Sunday School today that he could not wait throughout the church service that comes before the children go upstairs. He kept shouting "Children go upstairs!" The new teacher up there loves him too, and speaks very highly of how well he does. I am glad that he is starting to get a spirtual education, and we are starting to have wonderful conversations about all kinds of things because he language is developing so fast.

After church Malcolm went on a journey with his Baba. Geoffrey had to take him to the Max, the lightrail that passes through Portland. Geoffrey had planned to take the Max through the tunnel on the way to the zoo, but Malcolm wanted to get off downtown so Geoffrey decided to take the trolley to the Lloyd Center. Geoffrey talked to the driver, and let him know how much Malcolm loves trains and other public transportation vehicles so the driver let Malcolm sit with him upfront and help. He got to pull the trolley bell and tell all the people to get off the train on the loud speaker. Geoffrey said the people really laughed to hear a two year old announce "Get off the train!"

I love that he gets to have all these adventures and learn about all different things in Portland. I do really feel that he is developing a sense of his place here, and in fact I am learning a lot about the Pacific Northwest too. I can't wait until the Salmon Festival!

Malcolm's Cutest Kid in the Universe Pic

I am really going to send this picture into the parenting magazine I get. They have a cutest kid in the universe section every issue, and I have been waiting for just the right picture for my Boo to make his debut, and here it is! You just can't beat this in terms of silliness!

We have been harvesting lately

On top-apple picking with Auggie across the street from our house. Our neighbor said we could take as many as we wanted, and we were dreaming of apple sauce.

The bottom picture-Berry Picking at Sauvie Island just before the naptime crash.

This summer has been all about food, picking berries on Sauvie's Island, making jam and tomato sauce from our harvest, and apple picking. I have fallen in love with hanging out in the sunshine watching my Boo go around naked or half naked munching on whatever he could find growing. It has made Malcolm's body healthier and has been better for my spirit.

We are also going through lots of transitions now. I have taken a job at Mountain Valley, his nursery school that I have mentioned earlier in this blog, and left the African Women's Coalition. Now I get spend a lot more time with Malcolm, and get to teach children in a loving community environment builds community and heals some of the pain of living in such an individualistic society.

I love spending this time with the children and giving Malcolm this opportunity to has such a supportive village experience, but there are a lot of adjustments as he gets used to me in his space and I get used to being an absolutely full time mom.

Obama Pics

I am so glad that we took him to this rally, and that we had the opportunity to participate in history. I was so proud of Portland that day, and Malcolm learned to chant "Yes, we can!

There were 75,000 people in this historic march which was in May just before the primary.

Malcolm's Hospital Photos

On June 5th, 2008 Malcolm had surgery on his teeth. He healed, but we just endured.

Malcolm Before Surgery on His Teeth

This experience was so hard. No breastmilk or food for our Boo from 11:00pm until after his surgery and recovery at around 4:00 the next day. One sad, sore, drugged toddler, one completely worried and nervous mama, one traumatized daddy and one fairly calm uncle.