more atlanta pix

Courtesy of Aunt Carol and her magic camera...


Taken before the Torah signing ceremony. Kenny tragically got caught in a fake smile snafu. It happens.

GG and his favorite grandsons. What? Do you see Eric or Mitch here? I rest my case.

Adam bonds with the birthday boy. On a side note, does this man look 96? I think not.

Adam then helped him blow out the candles.

Everyone gathers round the table for Grandma's world famous tenderloin. Seriously, this stuff would make a PETA rep think twice about eating meat. Also, you can see Mitch in the picture, thus proving he was there and not just the subject of my baseless accusations of rampant absenteeism.* Not that I would ever do that. Or that I would ever write a caption the length of a small paragraph.

This was a highly popular move.


*I kid because I love. I owe my cousins a great debt of gratitude for rescuing my wife from her day of airline hell by meeting her at the gate as she deplaned in Atlanta. I still like giving them grief tho.

daddy doesn't like to be peed on

No, really.

The other day, Kenny got all squirmy and yelly on the potty. Instead of sitting still and pointing his lil' junk down (like Daddy asked him to), he reared back and screamed. Thus, his lil' junk was aimed up. And then it went off. And then Daddy got peed on before he could help re-target the weapon.

So lemme just say it again for emphasis: Daddy doesn't like to be peed on. Okay then.

fish n' chip shots

The other weekend we trekked on down to Atlanta to celebrate a few key events. In brief: GG turned 96, Hannah had an official Jewish naming ceremony, and we each got to help the official scribe write a letter in the new Torah for the synagogue I grew up in. Of course, when I say "we" that didn't end up including Overboard. You see...

The original plan was for Kenny, Overboard and I to fly into Atlanta on Thursday night. Due to work timing and cheap pricing, we were booked to fly on a 6:19pm flight on AirTran out of Midway. Midway is on the south side of Chicago, and we live on the north side. This will become important in the next paragraph.

On Thursday afternoon, I left work a bit early and took the Orange line train to Midway. Overboard picked up Kenny from daycare and drove down. Or tried to. The traffic was so bad, that a trip which normally takes an hour or so, took over two. So we missed our flight. The last flight out to Atlanta for the night. After some serious finagling, I got us standby for the 6am flight Friday morning.

We woke up bright and early (like 3am early) and got down to Midway to find out that the kind folks at AirTran were making sure we were on the standby list. The bottom of the standby list. See, since we missed our flight the night before, they put anyone and everyone else ahead of us in line.

At the final second, the ticket agent at the gate told me that she had two seats on the flight. Since Kenny had his own seat booked, they wouldn't let him sit in my lap. Thus, Overboard and I did a quick bag swap and I went on the flight with Kenny. In a cruel twist, I discovered that Overboard had stored both her cell phone and Blackberry in Kenny's backpack. Do you remember life before cell phones? Yeah? It sucked. Overboard found this out the hard way over the next six and half hours.

Yes, I said six and a half hours. After being denied entry on the next two flights, Overboard finally ended up shelling out more money for a one-way ticket on the 12:47pm flight. Wanna know how much we love AirTran? This much.

While Overboard was raging against the airline machine in Midway, Kenny and I joined the family in Atlanta for the Torah signing and naming ceremony at the house. Due to my trying to keep Mr. K in check (and his underwear dry and clean), I didn't take any pictures. But it was pretty cool to watch him sit in the scribe's lap and actually help write a letter in the Torah. Very cool, actually.

After getting a hold of my cousins Mitch and Eric, who luckily had their cell phones with them, I arranged for them to meet Overboard at the gate in Atlanta and bring her to the house. They all rolled in around 5:30pm. Not a fun day, but Kenny and I were both very excited to see Mommy, and I think that initial "MOMMY!" and big hug from Mr. K helped alleviate some of Overboard's stress. Well, that and a nice big glass of champagne, courtesy of Grandpa Alan.

The other upside was that Kenny had a lot of fun reconnecting with his cousins Adam and Hannah. And cousin Hannah had fun making a big fuss over her "Unkle Geg" - by yelling my name and wrapping her arms around my legs at any given opportunity. I did little to discourage my new acolyte. Would you? Look at that punim!


A picture from the grandkid/grandparent lovefest.

While there were two big family dinners that were a lot of fun, the highlights of the weekend (or at least the ones I have pictures of) were the acorn gold action on the back porch and the trip to the amazing Georgia Aquarium. [insert snarky, funny comment here about fish and nuts]


Kenny takes Uncle Mike's putter out for a stroll.

Cousin Eric took lots of pix for his photography class. Here he is looking artistic.

Uncle Mike gets his workout in by deadlifting Adam using only a putter and a smidge of elbow grease.

California Rolnicks family portrait.

And here are some shots from the aquarium...

In my best Bruce the Shark voice, I informed this whale shark that, "Fish are our friends. Not food!"

Kenny and Hannah test the strength of the fish tank glass. Lucky for us, the tank is stronger than the combined brute force of two toddlers. Whew.

I'm happy to report that we made it back to Chicago sans incident. Also, Kenny was an awesome traveler (again) and that I have a new love for airport family bathrooms. But that's a story for another time.

You can see all of the weekend's pictures by clicking here. Tada.

are you all done!

Please note the lack of a question mark in the title of this post. When Kenny says, "Are you all done" he doesn't say it as a question (most of the time). Instead, he uses it as a statement.

After a session on the potty, Overboard and I will ask Kenny, "are you all done?" This is to see if he's done his business and is ready to get off the potty. Kenny has taken this to mean that the statement "are you all done" (not the question) is the proper response/announcement for being, in fact, all done on the potty.

Furthermore, Kenny generally starts off by announcing, "are you all done." If he is not immediately offered assistance in dismounting from the potty, he raises his voice and again announces, "are you all done." Subsequent statements are made at increasing decibels until he is angrily shouting, "ARE YOU ALL DONE! ARE YOU ALL DONE! ARE YOU ALL DONE!"

It'd be cute if he wasn't so agitated. Okay, it's still pretty cute. But no one likes to be yelled at, whether it's grammatically correct or not.

cruel and unusual

I don't usually "live blog" around here, but Overboard and Kenny had a doctor's appointment at 11:30am this morning. They're still waiting to see the doctor and it's 12:52pm. That's f-d up.

Mr. K had a cold a little while back, and while he's healthy again, he still has a stuffy, and occasionally runny, nose. In the past, this has meant he has a sinus infection, and we're pretty sure that's the case now. So what we need is for the doctor to take a quick peek up his nostrils, say "Yup," and give us a prescription. And this has taken waaaaaaay longer than it should.

Part of me wants Kenny to show the doctor what happens when he's cooped up and contained in a room past lunch and nap time. The other part of me doesn't want Overboard to deal with that. Overboard, on the other hand, doesn't want Kenny hanging out in a waiting room with other sick kids, so he can reacquire his cold, or something more aggravating. Oh, happy day!

On the plus side, they went to a swim lesson this morning, and my understanding is that it went...swimmingly.

Thank you for allowing me to vent. Overboard may take her turn later, and at some point in the near future I promise updates that involve happy stories and cute pictures. Really.

Now if you'll just step into the waiting room, the blogger will be with you shortly...

friendly neighborhood teeth cleaner

We stumbled upon an interesting new way to get Kenny to let us brush his teeth (since his preferred method of tooth brushing is to suck the toothpaste off of the brush and then wiggle the toothpaste-less brush around like a conductor's baton). While we got a fair amount of mileage (and still occasionally do) from, Dr. Prof. Silverman's tooth brushing song, now we use the old 1960's Spiderman theme song.

Yes, apparently the lyrical ode to ol' "Webhead" makes Kenny smile, thus making it easier to brush the teeth in question.

Kenny has a new found love of Spidey due to his Spiderman jacket and a toy or two at daycare. I'm cool with this, so long as he doesn't try to literally climb the walls or develop a love for actual arachnids (of which I am not so much a fan).

So picture this if you will: Kenny standing at the sink, seated on the potty, or running amok in his room, while Overboard and I try to brush his molars, all to the tune of, "Is he strong? Listen, Bud, he's got radioactive blood!"

Whatever works, right? Right.

a my gym birthday

Happiness is a ball pit.

Yesterday, Kenny attended his first real off-campus birthday party. By that, I mean that while he has been to a few parties (including his own) at people's homes, this was the first one at a real birthday destination. In this case, a "My Gym," which was chock full of things to climb on, in and around. And they had a ball pit. And two awesome "party directors" who led the kids through songs and games. So basically, Kenny was in heaven. Sensory overload heaven.

To our amazement, he was very good about taking periodic potty breaks, even when that meant leaving the action for a few minutes. For us, this was an adventure in performing our potty routines in a new bathroom. Of course, the bathroom was geared towards kids and had everything we could need at our disposal, so it was a great midway point between home and, let's say, a public airport restroom.

And now, on to the photos...


The Nisers. The birthday boy, Ethan, is front and center. And ready to party. Really.

Mild happiness is sharing your ball pit.

Kenny knows that the best dancers are supposed move to the middle of the group to strut their stuff.

The puppet show kept Kenny on the edge of his feet.

Lumberjack Competition Champ 2026!

"This trampoline seems to have lost its bounce. I shall now spend a few minutes trying to find it."

Giddiness is being buried in the ball pit.

Kenny's buddy Molly and her mommy share a few yuks.

Puppet show number 2 kept Kenny on the edge of his feet as well.

But the best thing of all...BUBBLES!

the elephant man

Maybe it's me, but that elephant looks short a head...

Last year's Halloween was derailed by disease in our house. Consequently, Kenny wasn't able to wear his awesome elephant costume. Since he's (thankfully) grown a bit in the past year, the costume doesn't quite fit like it should. Luckily, our personal clothiers have provided another elephant costume, so we may get elephantine around here after all. However, this didn't stop us from trying on the old one the other night to interesting results. See for yourself...


"Hey! There's my head!"

Kenny's not sure, but he thinks that elephant looks familiar.

"Yeah! Headless elephants! Wooooo!"

mr. pumpkin head

Mr. Pumpkin Head is the one on the left. I'm just sayin'.

Overboard created a new toy the other day when she added three of Kenny's Spud Buds faces to a small pumpkin. We call it...Mr. Pumpkin Head. Original, no?

Kenny finds Mr. Pumpkin Head terribly amusing. What he really loves is when Overboard turns the pumpkin to each new face with a cry of, "Now where did she go?" This is because one of the faces is female. It's also fun to yell. Loudly. A lot. But that's okay, since he follows it with much giggling. When he yells a lot and follows it up with much screaming, well, that's not as much fun. But that's also another story.


"Yo, Mom. Did we get a copyright on this? I wanna go to college someday."

a breakthrough on the potty front

I know it seems like potty news all the time these days, but that's kind of where we're at. Potty, potty, potty. This 8-week program (of which we're now starting week 5) has been intense, but I'm happy to announce that it is working.

Kenny pitched another perfect game on Friday, with zero accidents at either daycare or home. He then parlayed that success into a weekend where he only had one accident each day, and both were partly a result of poor parental time management (i.e. we stretched the 30 min rule to allow for some extra playtime outside). Plus, on several occasions, he indicated to us that he needed to go. PLUS, on several occasions, the histrionics were either at a minimum or non-existent. This is big, people.

This morning, while I lay in a NyQuil haze under the sheets, trying desperately (and unsuccessfully) to combat this cold I picked up, Overboard and Kenny breezed through the morning routine. Mr. K went to the potty, and even got dressed on his own when Overboard asked him to.

So, you're saying this is all swell, but not terribly comedic - and really, not quite up to the standards we've set around here. I would agree. So I do have this for you:

Yesterday morning, Overboard was trying to get Kenny to sit still on the potty and take care of business. He was putting up a major fuss and wasn't interested in reading a book or a magazine. Overboard then asked, with the slightest touch of sarcasm, if Kenny wanted to read her grocery list. He did. So she read it to him with some wonderful flourishes.

"Some milk. Skim for Mommy and whole for you. Cause you could use a little fat, my boy. I'm not sayin'. I"m just sayin'. Let's see, snacky smores for Daddy - since he seems incapable of eating fruit on a regular basis, unlike his son..."

And so on.

Okay, back to bed.

what we do in between potty breaks

Sometimes we actually get outside! No, really!


Overboard and Kenny drew a series of roads and construction sites for his cars and crew.

"That's the biggest superball I've ever seen!"

Kenny is disappointed that, unlike snowballs, the giant blue ball does not gain in size when rolled across the yard.

Bubbles!

Overboard shows off her bubble skills.

"Hmmm...I know I'm supposed to go in and go potty, but I think I'd much rather stay out here."

welcome vassar alumni

How's Glenview? It's "O-tay!"

My Aunt Elizabeth came to town last weekend for a theatre teacher's conference and got to spend some fun time at the house during our weekend potty training tribulations. She also managed to squeeze in a little sightseeing and a dinner out with me at Ted's Montana Grill for some buffalo. Mmmm...buffalo.


Overboard and Elizabeth show off their fake Kenny smiles.

And then their real ones. Not as interesting, but still nice.

Elizabeth got some quality time in with Ms. Sadie as well.

Watching YouTube is FUN!

ride 'em cowboy

"A pony! A pony! I totally got a wooden, non-lifelike, can't take it out for a ride, but I also don't have to clean up it's poopy, PONY! Score."

Uncle Henry sent Kenny a gift a little while back - a rocking horse that used to be Overboard's. He reupholstered the shag carpeting with a nicer velvety material, but it's still got extra eyelashes, courtesy of a young, artistic Overboard. It's fun to watch Kenny scoot the horse towards the living room window and ride as the cars go past.


Kenny works on some of his equestrian tricks.

breaking potty news

Yesterday at daycare, Kenny told the daycare provider that he needed to go potty. Then he went to the bathroom and did his thing.

This may sound inconsequential to some of you, but this is what we in the potty training business call a "major breakthrough." Of course, now we need him to do that at home. But one small victory at a time, I suppose.

happy new year

So, it's the new year...5769, to be exact. Hope you had fun celebrating. My co-worker sent me an awesome Rosh Hashanah card, eloquently summing up what we Chosen People go through each year when the lunar calendar moves a major holiday to a work day:



Brilliant. It's funny because it's true.