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My four-year-old grandson Eitan has suddenly started reading, and he wants to know how to Spell All The Things ( Read more... )

This is Eitan in his monkey costume. Eitan is 3 and a half now. He loves monkeys and kitty-cats, and his stuffed triceratops Topsy. But most of all he loves to play with trains.

I watch him three days a week most weeks, sometimes four. (His other grandma and his great-grandma take care of him the other two days.) I take him to the Zoo whenever the ( Read more... )

I wasn't surprised when Woof didn't want much to do with Eitan when he was a baby. Woof isn't really comfortable with babies and small children. His little sister is too close to him in age for him to have taken care of her when she was small, and he never had babies of his own. (His one foray into step-parenting started when his first wife's ( Read more... )

Eitan loves Thomas the Tank Engine and all his anthropomorphic train friends. He told me the other day, "Hi! I'm Eitan! I'm a busy engine!" as he chug-chugged across the living room ( Read more... )

I need a new Eitan icon -- my grandbaby is almost two now, a real little boy, rapidly losing the baby look ( Read more... )

Kinahara is a good Yiddish word, spoken to avert the Evil Eye. The Evil Eye is that bad luck that targets you just because something good has happened, the engine block that cracks two days after the warranty expires, the hammer that pounds the nail that's sticking out.

Whenever I think about my grandbaby, I want to chant kinahara kinahara ( Read more... )

Here's a slightly cheesy video of the Israeli children's song that I sing to my grandbaby as a lullabye -- Pizmon LaYakinton, "Hyacinth Chorus":

Click to view

Translation:Night, night, the moon looks out ( Read more... )

It's been a busy week here at the hobbit hole. But the biggest news is that my adorable genius grandbaby -- not quite 17 months old now, mind you -- has expanded his vocabulary to include "helicopter" and "umbrella" and "purple". Pronounced "ay-cah-coo", "breh-la", and "puh-puh", yes, but used appropriately ( Read more... )

Eitan is not really a baby anymore, but a real, honest to goodness toddler. His personality is coming through loud and clear. He's just 14 months old, and the terrible twos are starting already. I'm sure I'll be tired of it in a few months, but for the moment it's so amusing ( Read more... )