High summer in Wisconsin, and the weather is perfect for being outdoors: sunny, not too hot, mild breezes. I was dying to pick up and find some woods to hike through.

Donald, meantime, wanted nothing other than to relax alone with his final volume of the Harry Potter series, which had arrived in its special muggle-proof cardboard box from Amazon.com in yesterday's mail. The publishing event of the decade, at least.

So Ulysses and I ...   more »

New word last night.

Our living room couch is a convertible futon sofa. It folds flat into a futon bed. Last year, U developed the dangerous habit of climbing up to the top of the couch to sit and hang out. We couldn't get him to stop. So we folded the couch flat, into its bed shape, and decided that would be the configuration until he was mature enough to be safer.

On Monday, earlier ...   more »

Ulysses drew this picture on his magnetic doodle pad, then took it to show Donald, saying, "Fish!" So Donald snapped a photo, and sent me Internet chat at work to tell me about it. I was so excited, I told everyone in the room, and I couldn't wait to get home and see my little boy's first picture!
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Ulysses turned three years old on Friday, Feb. 16! We had a party on Saturday. Check out the slideshow, and also the YouTube movies. (Click the "more >>" link to read more and to see more YouTube starter frames.)

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My friend Michelle came over to celebrate Slava with us today, and we cooked and feasted into the late hours. Michelle is fast becoming our Serbian holiday co-celebrant de rigeur -- she's already come for two Serbian Christmases in a row.

November 14 is my family Slava -- a Serbian custom celebrating the patron saint of the family. In my case, we have two, Sveti Kuzman i Damian (Cosmas and Damian). Slava originated way back ...   more »

Ulysses held up a toy T-Rex -- a dark purple, realistically styled, suede-ish critter about 4" high, once merchandise from my street vendor days in Philly -- and said, all throaty and gutteral,   more »

Today is our 14th wedding anniversary! It's been a long road from that June morning in 1992 that we drove to Las Vegas, six days after we met, and got hitched by   more »

Ulysses's latest favorite thing to do is the big sneeze. He tilts his head back, opens his mouth and preps expertly with a series of stacatto inhalation-exhalations: "Ahh-a, ahh-a, ahh-a..." His head bounces and forward and back, just a little, with each one. Then there's the big pause, as he faces the ceiling, his back arched. Then the denoument: "Aaaa-TOO!" He looks up at me with a grin. "Aah-choo!" I echo, and we laugh together at the drama.

"Aaaa-too! Aaa-TOO!" The game continues. Ulysses throws out the faux sneezes, one after the other. It's easy to miss how carefully he's ...   more »

2nd birthday Photo album



Ulysses turned two today. He doesn't know about birthdays -- not as far as we know -- but he has been carrying around a tiny little board book called "The Birthday" for several days. One of his favorite pictures is a closeup of the birthday cake.

U napped (conveniently and miraculously) while   more »

This was our first Thanksgiving at home together as a family. (It was Ulysses's second TG; last year we went to a dinner at James Reeb Unitarian Universalist Congregation.)

Don and I have cooked Thanksgiving dinner at home together plenty of times, and even had people over. But somehow, because of Ulysses, it was a family thing.

Even though all he ate was a ring of canned cranberry jelly at dinner and some of my homemade pumpkin pie later, at dessert.

The food was incredible! The roast turkey with olive oil and fresh marjoram and laurel was the best turkey ...   more »

Today is the first day of my new job. I am so excited. I feel like -- somehow -- it's my first real job out of college. You know, that expression people use: "my first real job out of college."

So what have I been doing for the past twenty-plus years? Good question. Well, let's see, there were several years of unstructured adventure, including that handmade jewelry business that involved street vending and town festivals. And college student unions. And beloved Jazz Fest in dear, magical New Orleans. Also those years at the ashram. Somewhere in there was the performance ...   more »

Ulysses's first Happy Meal. There's a milestone for ya.

On a day where there were many occasions to take him out of the car and put him back in, he was exceedingly miserable with getting in. We'd drive a little and then have some reason to get out, and then putting him in to get to the next place was a screaming, tortured nightmare. It didn't help that his midday nap had been cut short by a soaking wet diaper and he never managed to drift back into it again.

Finally, errands out of the way  -- and    more »

Ulysses was pushing his toy shopping cart across the bumpy lawn towards the sidewalk. Not easy. With about a third of the way yet to go, he backed away from the cart. Then he reached up towards me, a cue for my hand. He grasped my wrist and placed my hand, palm down, on the cart handle. He made little high-pitched grunts of dissatisfaction until I was stationed properly behind the cart, both hands gripping the bar.

Then he walked behind me, placed his hands on the backs of my knees, and pushed. Squeals of delight as I began to ...   more »

Today we all went to the Union Cab picnic at Demetral Field. The candidate's forum was at 1 pm. Don is running for the Board, so he was there for that. He made his statement and answered questions with the other seven candidates. That lasted about an hour and a half. For an hour and a half, I chased Ulysses around the Demetral Field picnic shelter and kept him off the hot grills, out of the dog poop, and away from Don's lap.

Every time Don started to talk, U screamed with happiness and ran straight for him. I would ...   more »

Ulysses was working at one his favorite tasks, scrubbing the toilet in the front bathroom. I left him happily at it for a minute or two, but when I came back to see how he was doing, he had added a new element.

He looked joyfully up at me as I approached, glad to show me what he'd done: he'd put his life-sized toy biscuit into the water, and it bobbed gaily in the bowl as he plunged the toilet brush up and down. But his pride quickly dissolved into confusion and shock.  Instead of praising his cleverness, I cried ...   more »

Today around noon at the oak-shaded playgrounds of Lake View Elementary School, Ulysses for the first time showed cognizance of the rungs of the jungle gym. One had curved rungs along a concave arc. He stood both feet on the first rung and looked towards the next, about the same height from the ground. He stepped off onto the ground and walked to the next rung, and slung his legs around it, looking to the next rung, a little higher up.

He spent some minutes contemplating the rungs and threading his body under and around them, sometimes stopping to crouch ...   more »

This is Ulysses's favorite picture. It came from Ocean Meir at James Reeb Unitarian Universalist Congregation in May, along with a thank-you card she sent me for making baklava for the month's International Lunch, Greek theme. You can see where he's affectionately sucked on the edge of it. He carries it around in the seat compartment of his Sesame Street rider. Every now and then he takes it out and holds it up to admire, looking at the faces of the three animals and saying his word that means "animal": a baby-pitched "Woof, woof!"   more »

Hot, hot, hot! This Wisconsin summer has finally begun in earnest. Yesterday evening, Ulysses was desperate for a drink of water, but unfortunately we couldn't figure that out before first offering hot dogs, crackers, the breast, Children's Tylenol (in case it was teethin pain), all the games we could think of, a Teletubbies episodes, play session with the ferrets, etc. Finally I thought to offer a soda bottle of water. When he gulped down half of it, and then instantly quit screaming, we knew it was the right choice! It was a hot and sunny day and we spent most ...   more »

After going out to the Coppertop for breakfast to celebrate our wedding anniversary, we stopped at a playground we noticed on Segoe Road.

A boy of about three ran over to meet us, smiling. He approached Ulysses, who was smiling at him, too. As they neared each other, they slowed down and then stopped, their faces about a foot apart. "Hi, baby! Hi!" said the boy. Both faces were lit with curiosity and eagerness. I marvelled at how naturally adept they each seemed to be at appropriate social interaction, the way the boy had stopped at a distance that was ...   more »

It started with trying to go outside. Oh, how Ulysses wanted to get out that screen door to the yard. I decided to distract with him the package that had just arrived via UPS from LaserMonks. I made a big show of opening the cardboard box, and I succeeded in attracting his interest. Whew.

Then I saw what was in the box. Dozens of styrofoam peanuts were stuffed around the ink cartridges. Looking exactly like snack treats. Uh-oh. I quickly brushed the peanuts into an empty Amazon.com box that was nearby on the floor and brought back the LaserMonks box. ...   more »

It finally happened -- the big milestone! Ulysses took his first unassisted steps this evening. We were sitting around the living room, watching TV and kicking back after a long, rough day (me: the office; Don: an 11-hour lone stretch of childcare) when Don said, "Look! Look! He's walking! By himself!"

Sure enough, U was making his way across the room, one stagger at a time. In one hand he clutched a Medela breast pump bottle, still attached to the 4" wide flared part that fits over the breast while pumping. He was pressing the flared horn against his face ...   more »

Michelle Godwin and I have been trying to get together for weeks. Make that months.  Finally, we got together for a Serbian Christmas celebration. ...   more »

It was Serbian Christmas Eve in 2002 when we first decided ...    more »

To celebrate Don's birthday, we went to Poppa's Gyro's on ...   more »

I came home from work a little after noon. Don said, "Guess who's ...   more »

I posted a new photo to AmmasVisit.
While Janice was in town, we did some research at the State Historical Society and were able to visit the very spot where Ulysses's (and Don's, and his mother's) ancestors settled in Wisconsin in the 1840s.   more »

Today Don's mother, Janice, arrived on the Greyhound from Savannah. She's here for ...   more »

Finally, for the first time since Ulysses was born, I got let out of the house without the baby ...   more »

I posted a new photo to MissouriTrip.
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Our first road trip with Ulysses. His first highway rest stop! On the road at Route 39 going south through Illinois, we were headed to Columbia, Missouri to visit our friend Sharon.

When we drove down to Missouri on Friday, Ulysses was in the rear-facing infant seat. By the time we were on the way back the following Monday, he was in a sit-up chair facing forward.

Our little boy is growing up!


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Check here for lots of pictures and details. You can even view it as a slide show! But be sure to look at the pix separately, too, so you can read the text under each.
Today we celebrated Ulysses at 6 months old with a touching-the-ground ceremony and ...   more »