Afternoon snack

I love Dylan's school except for one little thing - they find a reason to close at the drop of a hat! In the six weeks since he has been in school, they've been closed once for a teachers' strike and two times for "teachers' assemblies" (whatever those are). And the thing is that they usually notify us the day before! Yesterday when I went to pick Dylan up, I thought the moms were going to riot when the teachers mentioned "Oh, by the way, tomorrow we have an assembly so no school." Now he has six days off for Easter, and since I don't have all those days off, I'm scrambling to try to work from home while he takes his brief 90-minute afternoon nap. Tomorrow I'm breaking down and asking Cristiano's aunt if she can take him at least for half a day.

Today for his afternoon snack he wanted "juice and Philadelphia" with bread sticks. Italians call "cream cheese" by the brand name and Dylan has picked up on that. In the video below, he totally flubs the pronunciation and has to repeat it several times. He always chokes or stutters when the camera is on him!

Juice and Philadelphia from Michelle Marie on Vimeo.

Saturday with mommy

Yesterday, Cristiano had a cantina visit for his sommelier course so Dylan and I were on our own for the day. Fortunately, we had great spring weather. I decided to go to the big park in Monza, which is nearby (anyone who came to my wedding may remember that everyone stayed in Monza one night and we did an aperatif in front of the beautiful Duomo there) but, for some odd reason, we rarely go there. It's one of the largest walled parks in Europe, and is three times the size of Central Park in New York City. My friend Cathy met us there for a while and she's the one who took pictures of us. We had a great day. First we went to pet the horses in the stables in the park. Then we found a cool playground. After the park, we went out to eat pizza and Dylan ordered his favorite: pizza margherita!

Attempt one at having our picture taken with the horse. This guy didn't want to move out of the way....

Attempt two at having our picture taken with the horses. The horse on the left began furiously eating the hood off of Dylan's jacket and I had to wrest him away.

Learning the ropes
Riding the cow at the park

Speaking of cows, there's a cute Dylan quote of the week: "Mommy, the cow goes 'moo' not the 'moose,' right?" This was said as we put on pajamas from Grandma Mimi with a large glow-in-the-dark moose.

Nonno's birthday

Dylan running wild in his new Ferrari shirt

Blowing out the candle with nonno

After dinner, a discussion ensued about Dylan's sleeping habits (or lack thereof). He still wakes up after a couple of hours in his own bed to come into our bed. Below a video of the discussion at the table as to why he doesn't sleep in his own bed. His papi told him that if he sleeps through the night in his own bed, he will get him the "green Ford," which is the only car Dylan doesn't have in his collection of real model cars that they give you at the gas station if you fill up your tank. He turns to the table and says where he thinks he'll be sleeping that night: "with mommy and papi..."

Where are you sleeping tonight? from Michelle Marie on Vimeo.

So what's the big deal?

There is no doubt that Dylan is all boy, but he does like to get in touch with his feminine side. For example, he occasionally likes to put a clippy in his hair, and he has a weakness for Hello Kitty. Every time he sees something with Hello Kitty on it, he says "Mommy, let's buy it!" I have no problem with it, but Cristiano really doesn't like Dylan wearing a clippy in his hair around the house. Dads are so weird (today is San Giuseppe - St. Joseph - and thus Italian Father's Day. Dylan insisted he wanted a cake because he couldn't understand that he was supposed to be extra nice to papi for "Father's Day" not his birthday so Cristiano brought a cake home after work). As you can see in the picture above, Dylan is wearing a clippy while playing with his beloved cars. He is obsessed with cars and knows the make and model of pretty much every car he sees on the street or on TV. Walking down the street with him, he has to point out every "Renault," "Ford," "Chevrolet," "BMW," "Mercedes," "Subaru," "Citroen," "Mommy's car" (the Lancia), etc. etc.. As he is (half) Italian, his absolute favorite car is, of course, the Ferrari, and though we don't see a lot of those on the street, when he does see one, he says "Mommy, let's buy it!"

Weekend

Watering flowers on a sunny afternoon in nonna's garden

Making pizza. I made him wear an "art shirt" as he'd just had a bath

I think he ate more dough than actual pizza

Friday night with Dylan

School talk from Michelle Marie on Vimeo.

Cristiano has been working a lot and has his sommelier course two nights a week, so Dylan and I have had lots of bonding time in the evenings. We sit around and make silly videos. His favorite new thing is to call everyone "ugly." In this video he says his teacher Eugenia is "brutta/ugy."

We like preschool

It's such a relief! He really loves going now, and has made some good buddies (shout outs to Giovanni, Sebastian and Ninna!). I was worried that he'd really freak out and refuse to go while we were in Naples earlier in the week, but my mother-in-law said he woke up every morning raring to go. We now have our little ritual, which is that I pick him up at 3:30 p.m. and we go to eat gelato in the park if it is warm. If it isn't warm, we go ride rides (Dylan is on one of the motorcycle rides above) at this indoor carnival or to the children's library, which I only recently discovered. This schedule works really well for me, and because it is a consistent schedule every single day, I seem to have more time to work than I did before.

On Friday his teacher told me that he has integrated really well, that he's very sweet and that his verbal skills are off the charts, but that we all need to help him work on some behavioral issues. She said that he plays very rough with the toys and, as a result, with the other kids. He's always played rough with toys, but I thought that was just normal for his age. He's always smashing things on the ground, overturning tubs of blocks or running his cars into things, which would sort of be OK if he were playing alone at home but these behaviors are dangerous when he's playing in a room with other kids. I love, love, love his teachers. They are incredibly sweet and really know their stuff. One teacher gave me a 20-minute description of how Dylan is a child who "plays with his entire body" and what that means in terms of motor skills and development. Another teacher kept me after school showing me a Powerpoint presentation on the importance of finger painting, playing with Play-Doh and polenta flour. I guess I'm glad they are so enthusiastic!

Before Dylan started school, everyone told me that he'd come home so tired, he'd fall into bed by 8 p.m. No such luck. If anything, he seems to be so stimulated that he has even more energy. Even though he naps earlier than he did with Cristiano's aunt, he is wide awake at his normal (already late) bedtime, and it's a struggle to get him into bed each night. Oh well. I'll take sleep deprivation over him crying every day before school!