Decker

Me! That’s what! (Or should I say, that’s WHO). Anyway, you may or may not know that this really awesome movie came out last summer about a rat who cooks. It’s one of my very favorites and ever since I saw it I have been getting into helping my mom and dad cook at our house. I got an awesome Sesame Street cookbook for Christmas and have made almost every recipe in it (my favorite is “Bert’s Tutti-Frutti Chicken Salad…man, I would have that EVERY night if mom would let me!) and my folks say I am becoming quite the chef! I even have my own puffy white hat and striped apron, that the Easter Bunny brought me this year. I wear it every time I cook, and then I totally look the part!

Up till now, the cooking has been mostly with my folks helping me out with the measuring and stuff. (They like to feel involved, who am I to stop them? I’m sure I could totally wield Dad’s blowtorch and roast some peppers quite easily all by myself, but then they’d feel left out, so I humor them - parents are so funny). But recently I saw a show about this 4 year old boy (like me!) who got up early and made breakfast for his mom and dad while they slept in, by pouring cereal in bowls for them and putting them out on the table. I thought, hey - that would be easy and fun, so I wanna try it! I talked to my mom, and she agreed to leave out the cereal boxes and some bowls and spoons that night, so the next morning I could get breakfast ready all on my own. And it worked out great! I went downstairs super quietly the next morning, so my little brother could go back to sleep. I knew that my parents would need to get up when “Word World” came on the tv (they had the channel the night before so I could just turn the tv on, and “Clifford’s Puppy Days” would be ready to go. I poured the cereal really carefully (I only spilled a little bit, and I cleaned it up!); my dad gets raisin bran and my mom and I got regular Cheerios and honey nut Cheerios mixed together. Then at 7 am (Word World time!) I woke them up and they were very surprised and happy! They liked it so much that I’ve did the same thing for them the next 2 mornings! (Not today, though - today was Saturday and weekends are different).

Cooking is pretty fun - I hope to get to try more stuff as I get older. Mom says I can light matches when I turn 12, so that should add some excitement to the experience! I think I’m ready for my own show on Food Network!

Hi everyone! Yesterday was my last day of swim school, and guess what? I jumped off the diving board!!! At first I was pretty scared, and I stood out on the diving board for a long time, and no one could convince me that jumping off the board would be a very sensible or sane idea. Then my mom called out from across the pool, “You can do it, Decker!”. While this maternal encouragement still didn’t convince me, it did get some of the other instructors and lifeguards to start chanting, “Dec-ker! Deck-ker!”. I STILL didn’t want to jump, so a nice lifeguard came up and helped me climb back down. Then the other boy in my class jumped and came up with a big smile on his face! Wait, diving is FUN? So…another instructor came back up on the board with me, walked me out to the edge, helped me count to 3, and then helped me jump into the pool, where my teacher Jim was waiting to catch me! And … it really was FUN! So now I can’t wait to do it again! I am really brave!

Hi everyone! Who here likes the movie “Mary Poppins”? Show of hands? Well, I’m raising my hand, so I’ll tell you one of my favorite parts  in that movie is when they sing “Let’s Go Fly a Kite”! And a couple of weekends ago, I got to go fly a kite for real, at the Berkeley Kite Festival! It was so cool - it was held in this huge park by the water, called the Berkeley Marina. We had to park super far from the park and walk for like 10 hours to get there, because a lot of other people wanted to go fly kites, too. But it was worth it when we got there, because the sky was FULL of kites! Giant squid kites, little kites with Elmo on them, and lots of neat colors and shapes! I even saw a space shuttle kite with a tail that spun like a flame! There were Japanese ceremonial kites, and a kite with a camera attached to its string! But best of all was MY kite! We got it as a present to our family from my preschool teacher, and it’s shaped like a friendly dragon. When we first set it up, my daddy, Cappy, and my mom all tried to get the kite up in the air, and it didn’t work. So then, my dad took the kite up onto another hill and handed the string to me, and it went SWOOSH right up into the sky right away! Cappy started laughing really hard, and said the kite must have been waiting for it’s master to take the string. Guess that makes me the kitemaster! Sutter seemed to like the giant kites best, and then he tried to wander away a lot, but I think he had fun too. And then before we went home, we stopped to watch these awesome ‘fighting kites’, where the strings had sharp edges (the people who flew them had to wear really thick gloves), and then they tried to get tangled with each others’ strings and cut down the other person’s kite! I was sad for the kites that got cut down, but it was still very exciting to watch.  We really want to go back again next year - thank you Cappy, for inviting us!

Hi everyone! Guess who’s in swim school again this summer? That’s right - Decker J! For the second year in a row, mom signed me up to go learn how to swim and be safe in the water, and it’s actually pretty fun! I have a different teacher this year - his name is Jim, and he is very funny. There is also one other boy in my class, and we both are learning all sorts of cool stuff. So far I have been practicing moving my arms like an octopus, and kicking my legs super straight, and playing ‘green light red light’ and I EVEN have been brave and tried to put my head/face in the water a few times! Mom and Sutter always keep me company hanging out in the shade by the pool, and my aunt Katil came along last week too! (I got a little nervous having an audience, and she reassured me that she wouldn’t watch, that she just came along to keep Sutter company so my mom could videotape me (aw Mom!). I don’t know, I think Katil may have peeked a little, but that’s ok!). Anyway - it’s a nice way to get cool on a hot summer morning! Swimming is hecka neat!