Swapping Recipes with a 6 year old

Is there anything better than a six year old view of the world? I don't think so. At six they are old enough to be smart and clever, but young enough to be innocent and sweet.

Maggie's school nurse has six year old twins, K & B, and they are such fun. They adore Maggie and love to ask her question to get her to say yes or no and marvel every time she does. The "no" sends them into peals of laughter, and Maggie laughs right along with them.

K & B are in the first grade and have discovered the wonders of Junie B. Jones, Maggie's favorite fictional heroine. B told his mom that he liked those books and she told him Maggie has the entire collection. I offered to let him use any he wanted and he neatly wrote out a list of five books he wanted to borrow. Maggie and I went through the collection, pulled out those five and several others. If Maggie had more than one copy of a book, she just gave the duplicates to K & B. Three of the five were duplicates and we had about five additional duplicates. We actually had three copies of Aloha-ha-ha so Maggie could give a copy each to K & B.

I sent those books home with Nurse Janice along with a recipe she requested for Apple Hill cake. B was delighted with the books but also fascinated by the recipe. He was amazed that his mom was going to make this cake that I told her about. He wrote a thank you note for the books and, unbeknownst to his mother,  copied a recipe for pumpkin bread that he brought home from school. She could not figure out why the note was taking him so long until he asked for help finishing it. It seems recipes have lots of words and fitting it all on the page in his six year old printing was difficult. Seems he never considered the photocopy option.

You may be able to tell from the scanned picture of the note where his mom took over.

I think my heart grew three sizes when I saw this note. 

I am going to try his Pumpkin bread tonight. How can I not?

______________________________

And here's the Apple Hill cake recipe. It is simple and delicious. (If you use sweeter apples like Fuji's (I do) cut the sugar a bit). 

2 cups sugar

1/2 cup oil
2 eggs
4 cups granny smith apples, peeled, cored and diced
2 cups flour 
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon nutmeg
2 teaspoons baking soda
Directions:
Combine: Sugar, oil, eggs and apples. Sift in flour, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, baking soda. Mix until combined. Pour into a 9x13 greased pan and bake for 1 hour in a preheated 350 degree oven. Serve hot or cold with vanilla ice cream or whipped cream.

Thank you. You're NOT welcome

Today I have so many things to share. There's the story of Batkid and how he saved San Francisco! There's Maggie' great visit to the zoo yesterday and the wild video we shot at the Grizzly Bear exhibit! There's Maggie baking with mom!  Lots of stories for a Monday.

I was trying to decide where to start when I saw something last night that made me switch gears completely. Barbara Park, author of the Junie B. Jones series of books passed away on Friday after a long battle with cancer. She was only 66 years old. I did not know Barbara Park, but I felt immediate sadness when I read that. Steve looked just as sad when I told him. I said, "That woman made our daughter's life so much richer." Steve said, "Without a doubt."

Maggie absolutely adored the Junie B Jones books. We own every single one of them and each was read aloud hundreds and hundreds of times. All of us read them to Maggie, but Steve really owned it. He had voices for each of the characters and Maggie would roar her approval.  Maggie's many lengthy hospitalizations were made more bearable because of Junie B. Jones and  Steve's voices became something of a legend in the Pediatric ICU. There is very little doubt in my mind that Maggie and Junie B. Jones share a personality and an irascible spirit.

Junie B. Jones has been featured in this blog quite often. Sometimes it's overt as in Maggie World: Manners/Greetings but mostly she's there in the attitude and sayings. Maggie has a few of them on her dynavox and uses them regularly. And responding to a Thank you with "You're NOT welcome" is done in this house quite often. It sends Maggie into peals of laughter every time.

We were talking about Barbara Park just this weekend because "Make A Wish" was in the news. Maggie's Make a Wish was in 2005 when Maggie was 11. She was not able to articulate what her wish would be, so it was up to us to come up with something. Eddie thought she would want a new bike and Tim thought season tickets to the Giants games were a good idea. We were trying to do right by Maggie when Steve came up with the idea of having her meet Barbara Park, the woman who had brought so much laughter to Maggie.  It was the perfect Maggie wish.

Sadly, that wish could not be granted because Ms. Park was ill. She was undergoing treatment for cancer. That was 8 years ago. I hate to think of anyone being ill for so long. I can only hope she had some of her books to get her through the roughest times. They are a wonderful tonic.

Rest well, Ms. Park. You have certainly earned it. You made an enormous difference in the lives of millions of children and you could never imagine what a difference you made in the life of Maggie.

Thank you.
(Insert response here)

Manners/Greetings

Maggie loves the Junie B. Jones series of books. LOVES them. We own every single one of them; in fact, we have duplicates of a couple. Of course, the books are far too young for Maggie. They are beginning chapter books for first or second graders, or the precocious kindergartner. Who cares? Those books have amused her for years.

The main character, Junie B. Jones, (pictured) is an active little girl who gets herself into jams with her curiosity, and her mouth. The books are told from her viewpoint. She is a good kid but something we mothers euphemistically refer to as a “handful.” She says what she thinks, and does what she wants. The books are hilarious, the writing is funny, the stories are clever and the characters are very endearing. All of this is magnified when my husband reads those books to Maggie. He has a voice for each character and uses them with reckless abandon. Maggie howls with laughter through the entire book every single time.

Some people do not like these books because Junie B. does not set a good example. I disagree completely. She sets an excellent example of what a kid really does and why. The author seems to get inside the head of a 6-year-old girl. Her interpretations and reactions are spot on.

As you may be able to tell from the above, we read these books a lot. I mean A LOT. We have tried to introduce other, more mature series. She tolerates Harry Potter but only in small does, and just to appease Dad. Anything else, Maggie just signs NO! NO! She, like Junie B., is a girl who knows what she wants. If Maggie were able bodied, she would BE Junie B. Jones. I am sure of it. And that makes me love this character even more.

At school, the teacher decided to read one to the students. Maggie anticipated every line and laughed before anyone else. She knows them by heart. Her teacher noted her love for this character and Maggie now has some Junie B Jones sayings on her communication device. Ironically, you can find them on the page entitled “Manners/Greetings”

Imagine my surprise when I walked by Maggie yesterday and she hit buttons to say,

“I’m gonna knock you on your can!”

I did a pivot and looked right at her, nose to nose, and said in an exaggerated way,

“Excuse me?”

She laughed and hit it again.

I smirked. I tried not to, but I couldn’t help it. Once she gets a reaction from me, that’s it. We heard that all night. Finally, her nurse, whose first language is not English said, what does that mean? What is a can? I pointed to my butt and she clucked disapprovingly, but laughed at the same time.

I feel sorry for the next doctor to mess with Maggie. She is now armed with an appropriate, if impolite, comeback. She just has to navigate to her "manners/greetings" page. Hmmm. Might have to rethink the placement of that.