An "Exercise" in Communication

So, today was the last day of the base exercise. . . . and it has clearly taken its toll in the Young household. Communication is quite difficult between a pregnant wife and a 3am wake-up husband. It's been going a little something like this:

Tyler: Ok, it's 1:53
Anna: What?
Tyler: It's 1:53
Anna: What?
Tyler: IT"S ONE FIFTY THREE!
Anna: ONE FIFTY THREE WHAT? WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?
Tyler: THE TIME!!! IT"S ONE FIFTY THREE!!!
Anna: oh
(he was making pasta and wanted to make sure he kept track of boil time and just happened to say the current time out loud and I clearly got super confused)


Anna: So how were your flights today?
Tyler: Eh, ok. I got shot down by triple A.
Anna: . . . . . . . triple A?
Tyler: Yeah
Anna: . . . . . what, like a tow truck?
Tyler: confused look
Anna: just as confused back AAA? What's that? Like a tow truck shot you down?
Tyler: Oh, I forgot you didn't know what triple A was--Anti Aircraft Artillery. I got shot down by that.
(obviously, triple A in 'pilot speak' does NOT mean Automobile Association of America, which is clearly the only triple A I've ever had to deal with)


Anna: Ok, I have to leave for mutual soon.
Tyler: what time?
Anna: Well, I'd like to leave by :45
Tyler: 5:45?
Anna: By :45
Tyler: FIVE forty five?
Anna: BY FORTY FIVE!
Tyler: I KNOW! FIVE FORTY FIVE?
Anna: I"D LIKE TO LEAVE BYYYYYYYYYYY FORTY FIVE!!
Tyler: I KNOW!! WHICH ONE?!?! FIVE or SIX?!
Anna: looking at the clock and realizing it's only 5:35 Oh! Oh. . . . um, no, Six forty five I guess. So I've got some time.
(I clearly have difficulty with the concept of "time" and it passing)

It's been a difficult week. . . . . . >sigh<

On the upside, you should check out the space jammies post again in the next few days because he actually let me take a picture of him in both the poopy suit AND the silver awesomeness! (Apparently, there was this black nylon-ish thing that they used to wear instead of the silver ones that kept tyler more warm and was called, get this, the Cat Suit. No it wasn't form fitting like the standard female catsuit--still fit like the space jammies, but still. I laughed pretty good at that one. I guess they came back from Komatsu and all the life support stuff was a little different--namely the catsuit was replaced with space jammies).

Tyler Has Space Jammies?

So, the base is in the middle of a big exercise where they pretend they were attacked and we're at war right here in Japan. It lasts about a week--Wednesday to Wednesday (but they were nice enough to pause it for Sunday). All the guys in the squadron have crazy schedules and night shifts and early shifts and everything. Tyler's show time yesterday was 3:30am so he woke up at 2am. Today's was 4am so he woke up around 3am. Eeesh.

But becuase it's an exercise he has to pull out all this gear that I normally don't see and he has to wear it all the time or most of the time so new stuff is showing up all the time at home. Like his chem gear bag, his g suit, his poopy suit and best of all--his space jammies!

They're really, I guess, just a thermal jumpsuit he wears under his poopy suit (A dry suit in case he ejects over the ocean becuase the water is so so cold) but they're this silvery grey with a diamond waffle-print thing going on.

I laughed when I saw them becuase I just wasn't used to that being under his flight suit! Then this morning around 3:15am I saw a silvery being walk across the room and sort of chuckled to myself again : )

It made me think of the Seinfeld where he wonders how everyone in the future picked out the 'uniform'. Was it just a fashion show where you come out, Silver jumpsuit, v-stripe on the chest, and everyone claps and says "Yeah, I could wear that."

So even though the excercise is sort of crappy becuase of the schedules and everything, I guess it does have some perks.  Although, to be honest, I was more than a little ticked that the exercise started literally one week after I had FINALLY put his chem gear AWAY from when he was TDY at Komatsu in December. It has a space now though, so hopefully it won't take so long to get put AWAY (stupid A-bag. So big and bulky and in my way!)

So A giraffe walks into Daiichi. . . . .

As I was dropping clara off at Daiichi Youchien today I passed a literal giraffe walking towards the building. The japanese snowsuits and buntings here are HILARIOUS! It was yellow with brown spots complete with the hoodie with the little giraffe nubber things (I don't know what they're acutally called. . . but I don't think they're the giraffe's ears). The kid had to have been just barely 18 months judging by how he was walking (or her) of course that could also have been the HUGE puffy GIRAFFE SUIT she was wearing! HAHAHahahahaha!

I've got another one for you:

So, a crow crosses the crosswalk in winter. . . . . . and slips TWICE on the ice!! HAHAHAHAHAHAhaha!!

ON the drive home I was stopped at a light and a big crow started hopping across the street in the crosswalk (I don't think American crows would have done that, but the Japanese ones seem to not believe in "jay walking"--ehh? EHH??! JAY walking?! HA!!. . . ok)

So it's almost to the other side and all of a sudden it's little feet slip forwards and it's tail hits the ground. Hops up, makes one or two more hops and slides again! HAhahahaha! Then it sort of flew the rest of the way to the snow bank. I've just never seen a bird slip on ice before and it was hilarious.

"Undies" Night

Last night I put Clara in undies around 8pm. I went to check on her around 10:30 before I went to bed and, of course, she had peed on TOP of her covers. She was sleeping soundly, however she had soaked her top fouton cover and her crochet blanket was a little wet too.

Fortunately her waterproof pad was bone dry--so I'm glad I went through that effort.

I take her wet undies off and hold her over hte potty. She just has some gas then clearly wants to get back to bed, so I put a pull up on her (baby steps) and she lies back down so I have to finagle her jammie pants on her while she's dead asleep.

I've got a bajillion blankets but lots of htem are downstairs from when I washed them, so I just covered her with her remaining dry blanket and got an extra quilt from her changing table.

I didn't notice any later wake up or anything (which sometimes happens when I change her wet diaper or help her go potty before I go to bed--probably becuase her diaper gets so wet that it wakes her up. It'd wake me up if I was her) but it wasn't an early wake up either. So that's nice.

Maybe we'll try again and I'll check on her a little earlier. . . If she wants. Otherwise I might wait until the baby gets here becuase then I"ll acutally already be up and I don't think it'll be that big a deal to feed the baby then check on clara. Like I said, I'll be up anyway.

Sans nightime diaper?

Clara's been out of diapers for a while now. We've been going out and about and staying home with her in undies all day since at least 18 months (there were still accidents, but mostly becuase ignored her or she couldn't get her pants down on her own).

I guess maybe a few weeks or a month ago I stopped putting her in a pull-up for naptime. Mostly becuase I would go to check on her when she wouldn't fall asleep and she'd have taken it off and either missed her potty or taken it off mid-potty or taken it off and thrown her tangled up diaper/pants combo in the garbage. While I appreciate that she knew where her dirty diapers go, I flush poop and there were two times where she clearly was very close to getting the diaper off but couldn't quite make it--so I had poop cleaning duty which, as many of you know, I am not a fan of.

So once I started putting her in undies she acutally did pretty good. I'd go in to check and there'd either be a #1 or #2 or both in her potty (she'd be sleeping soundly naked from teh waist down--she still has some trouble with getting undies and pants on by herself). Sometimes she'd wake up wet and sometiems she'd come down to me dry. Lately she's been mostly dry on wake ups.

(except for the time I went in and she had taken off her pants and undies, gone potty, then managed to climb up on the changing table and fall asleep--after ransacking her room)

Tonight, however. I put her in her standard pull up, did bed time routine and went to check on her becuase I head noises. It was dark, she was wandering around upstairs (it's not that big) and I say "clara! get in to bed!"

I walk into her room, kneel down by her fouton and straighten her blankets for her (in the dark) and she comes and lies down and I cover her but feel her naked bum.

Anna: "What? where are your pants?"
Clara: "Peaaa! Peaaa." (pants, pants)
Anna: (turn on the nightlight and see her jammie pants on the floor, no diaper in them) Where is your diaper?
Clara: Diap! DaiP! (as she points to the garbage can)
Anna: Why is your diaper in the garbage? Was it wet? did you go potty?
Clara: Weh! Weh! (wet, wet)
Anna: (pulling hte diaper out and, noticing she had ripped the side like I do when I take it off her, sees it's wet.) Oh, well then lets get another diap and put your pants back on!
Clara: Nunies! Nunies! ('undies, undies' as she gets a pair of undies and brings them to me to put on)
Anna: Oh, you don't want a diaper? you want undies on?
Clara: (nods) Nunies! Peaa!
Anna: Ok. I guess we'll just see how this works then.

So I put a full sized water proof pad on her fouton and tucked her back in and now I'm just waiting, I guess, for a hopefully dry night? or for her to use her potty up there and not come down at 1am saying "mama! wipe! wipe! Potty!" THat would be AWESOME. . . . but I"m not corssing my fingers. Plus it's not like I won't be up anyways being 35 weeks now.

However, Daddy Still Rocks

I don't want anyone to get a bad impression of Tyler's fathering skills, because he really is quite awesomely talented.

(crap, again, video exhibits a, b and c are not loading!)

Example #1:

The other night I had a baby shower to go to, so he was in charge of bedtime. He was playing with her for about 15 mintues--running around, chasing/being chased, standard fare and all of a sudden Clara stops and says "no'. Apparently the scene went like this:

Clara: No

Tyler: No? I'm gonna get you!!

Clara: NO

Tyler: Oh. . . . you're all done?

Clara: Up

Tyler: Oh! You want to go up! ok! (starts to throw her up in the air)

Clara: No

Tyler: Oh. You don't want that?

Clara: Bed

Tyler: Ok, lets go to bed. Do you want a bath?

Clara: No

Tyler: Ok. Puts her in a diaper and jammies and holds her for a second

Clara: Bed, down

Tyler: Ok. Good night Clara!

Boom. DONE. He walks out and doesn't hear a PEEP out of her!

No bath, no freak out about a lack of bath balls, no teeth burshing requirements of him brushing at hte same time, no ear cleaning, no drink of water, no bed time book, no fifteen blankets and 32 stuffed animals (or not stuffed, plastic planes), no leg warmer requirements or specific jammie requests, no three rounds of prayer--NOTHING.

In case you were wondering, yes, I must satisfy anywhere from one to all of the aforementioned requirements for Clara before she will go to bed for me.

Example #2

Clara: Movie! Movie! (pronnounced "jeeya! jeeya!")

Anna: Ok, what movie do you want?

Clara: Daddy movie (pronnounced "Gaga jeeya")

If I try to put anything other than the Incredibles in, she'll freak out. If I try to persuade her to another movie more to my liking, she's obstinate. The SECOND I put The Incredibles on, she sits on the couch and doesn't move. It's like she's channeling Tyler home through the movie.

I think Tyler watched it with her one time and from then on, only Daddy's movie will satisfy. Fortunately for me it's getting better with repeat viewings, but still.

Example #3

Tyler can make a funny face and Clara will try to imitate it and then laugh out loud hysterically. I tried to make funny faces with her the other day and she stared at me like I was retarded. No imitation, no laugh. Nothing. Just this look of "Um. . . you probably shouldn't make that face in public because you look retarded"

I just hope I can get the videos to load because lots of his parenting can't really be explained, you have to see Clara and her reactions and how she looks at him to understand how great a Dad he really is : )

When Daddy is in Charge Part III

He takes Clara on the slides at the Weasel's Den meant for 5-12 year olds. . . .

(Shoot, my video isn't loading)

She was able to go down all three of the big green slides at least once. She still got knocked around a bit, but nothing too bad until she tried the middle one again and smacked her ear on the side of the slide and started screaming.

FORTUNATELY on her way up the stairs to go down that slide her foot slipped and she smacked her forehead against the plastic slat leaving a nice red mark. . . sooo. . . . . yeah. : )