our little comedian

At dinner, Juma decided to do an impersonation of his friend, Elizabeth. He spouted off something about not wanting to play basketball, and laughed his head off at his own cleverness. Wanting to keep it going, I asked him if he could talk like Baba. I guess he had nothing specifically Baba-esque to imitate, and just resorted to his "I'm being silly now" game where he makes up words like "ookey-bookey!" and "oggie boggie!"

Then I asked him if he could talk like me. He paused, and said in a stern, disciplining voice, "Juma Benjamin!"

vocabulary and a little bribe

I had to take a 40 minute drive yesterday to a diving shop to pick out snorkel, mask, and fins. And I had to bring Juma with me, but he was determined not to go.

Sarah: Come on Juma, we're going now.
Juma: [passionately] I certainly am not going!
Sarah: (Well, that's going on the blog.) I have a quarter for the gumball machine there.
Juma: [pleasantly]: Okay, let's go!

Today, Justin wanted Juma to come to an art museum with him. Juma didn't want to, and preferred the dinosaur museum.

Juma: [whining] Mom! Baba wants me to go to his museum.
Sarah: Which museum is Baba's museum?
Juma: The one that I cry at.

I think they settled on a women's ice hockey game.

congratulations are in order

Since Sarah is way too modest to mention this herself, I'll let you all know that she got a perfect 4.0 last semester in her five classes. She worked very hard and I am very proud of her (especially since one of her classes was statistics--wow!).

I am TAing a class again this semester, but this time I actually know what I'm talking about. I can't tell you how happy I am to be teaching a class on Africa and not India. Last semester almost did me in....

uh, busy, anyone?

creative movement

For the next few weeks we have Juma in a Yale children's creative movement class. Dance, in other words. The class is made for 3-4 year olds, and gets them to move imaginatively. Yesterday, they were butterflies, trains, and various zoo animals, and ran, skipped, and leapt over a crocodile-infested river. Several girls were dressed up in pink ballerina outfits, but most were in sweats. There were a few boys there, too.

Before the few weeks before the class, we had been prepping Juma on it. He adamantly refused to go every time we brought it up. "No! I don't like dance!" (Even though he loves to turn on the radio and dance his energy away.) But we went anyway. We thought we made a bad investment, that our money would be wasted because Juma would go and do nothing but sit on my lap, refusing to dance.

We were pleasantly suprised to find that he thoroughly enjoyed it afterall. He stretched, flew like a butterfly, ran around waving a ribbon, and jumped like his new favorite TV character, Sporticus. The only thing he refused to do was jump over the crocodiles. A bit too scary for him.

new semester, new insanity

A new semester is under way. I'm taking five classes, TAing an HIV/AIDS course, and still working (a little) on my old job at CIRA. Oh, and I'm taking the scuba diving course that Justin took last semester.

Am I insane?

Every second year student I've talked to say the second semester is way easier than the first. I'm sure hoping that is true.

giddy-up, pardner

Juma had fun at G'pa and G'ma Wilson's house pretending he was Woody (from Toy Story) with his trusty steed, Bullseye.

home at last

Two weeks of being away from home is a long time, especially for a three-year-old. Juma was just darn sick of not sleeping in his own bed. When we got home (at 2am, because of a delayed flight), I pulled him out of the car and into his room. He was quite grumpy about that.

But when I got close to his bed, he practially dove out of my arms and onto his pillow, where he proceeded to do a "I'm home!" victory dance with his new teddy bear, Kiki. It was the most hilarious sight I'd seen for a while, that kid dancing and snuggling his pillow, just as happy as could be to be home.

buzz lightyear to the rescue!

In addition to his new Buzz Lightyear running suit and his new Buzz Lightyear pen and his two Buzz Lightyear action figures at home, Juma's been watching Toy Story ("Woody meets Buzz") and Toy Story 2 ("the one with the scary bad guy") as often as he can get away with at Grandma's house.

To keep up the theme, his new game is playing out the scene where Buzz shows Woody and the other toys he can fly:

Juma: Tell me I can't fly.
Playmate: You can't fly; you're a toy!
Juma: Yes, I can! It's me! [mechanical click sound for his wings popping out] To infinny and beyond! [specacular jump from the couch] [a very proud, defiant look back at playmate] [points finger at playmate] CAN!...Okay, tell me I can't fly.

And he repeats it for half an hour straight.