You don’t know who Pingu is?

He’s Carissa’s bestest friend, of course.

Between you and me, he’s actually “Tux,” Linux’s mascot penguin. But Carissa named him after one of her favorite Netflix instant-stream kids’ shows, a claymation series from Sweden called “Pingu.”

Pingu goes many places with Carissa, such as the parade.

Sometimes she falls asleep with him.

She has a great sense of imagination. This is a wonderful and somewhat refreshing quality that Wesley lacks. Carissa is always inviting me to “go to Pingu’s house.” When I ask her where it is, she looks around and points where she’s standing: “Right here!” And then we play. When it’s time for chores and I ask Carissa to pick up toys sometimes she’ll ask, “Can Pingu help?” She’ll guide his little penguin arms to help pick up Legos from the floor and laboriously deposit them in the Lego box. It takes longer, but I figure if Pingu is a good helper, he’s a good friend for Carissa.

Since John’s birthday party earlier this month, and my mom’s birthday party in June, Carissa has been really into the idea of having birthday parties for Pingu. Like, frequent parties. DAILY parties.

It’s a big to-do. She gathers her favorite group of stuffed animals (which is a very elite and select group to be part of) and arranges them near her play kitchen. The usual invitees are Giraffe, Elephant, Cow, Pingu, and of course Carissa and me, and sometimes Wes. More recently Hello Kitty has made the cut into this prestigious club.

Carissa makes a cake and serves the guests. We sing “Happy Birthday” and Pingu blows out candles. We used to use an electric decorative candle I had on display (the kids thought it was pretty cool when they blew on it and it turned off–thanks to my thumb and the handy “off” switch), but one day Wes took the candle outside and now the batteries won’t stay inside the candle and we can’t use it anymore. Thankfully Carissa has imagination and we can use pretend candles instead.

If you’d like a glimpse of such a prestigious birthday event, here you go.

(In this one, at the end you can see why Wes isn’t a regularly invited guest.)

When we went to the library a few weeks ago the only book Carissa picked out was this one:

We read it many times in the ensuing week, and even I learned a lot, such as how there are “hot penguins” and “cold penguins.” A surprising number of penguins live in New Zealand, including the world’s smallest breed known as Little Blue. Then Wesley ripped the front cover and we had to return it and pay a fine. I’m not so keen on checking out more books.

Another great feature about Carissa is that she likes to color and is getting remarkably better at it. This is new to us since Wes doesn’t have interest in drawing. I’m so proud of her adorable artwork. It’s like seeing a part of her personality and the inner workings of her head displayed on paper for all who pass by our refrigerator to see.

This is a picture she drew of Pingu. She told John she wanted to draw Pingu, and asked him to do it for her, but he guided her instead. He said, “Look at Pingu’s head. What shape is it like?” She drew a circle. Next, “Look at his body. See how it’s a little bigger.” She added the body. Then he pointed out his eyes and mouth, and she drew them. The arms and legs came next.

Pingu is the orange one in the middle, and the red one to the right is “Pingu’s friend.” I attempted the igloo at the top, and then she did her own version in red on the left. (I tried showing her how to make the ice blocks.)

I think it’s a terrific rendition!

If you asked Carissa what she’s doing here, she’d tell you, “I doing MAIL.”

She’s decorating the envelope for grandpa’s Father’s Day card. Coloring is her specialty.

Lately Carissa has been kind of fascinated by skating. I’m not sure, but I think it may be because she watches “Pingu,” a Swedish claymation TV show about penguins who do things like go skating. It’s a little ironic because we took her roller skating once and she was miserable (and a few hours later was throwing up because of the stomach flu–so it wasn’t her fault).

In any case, she’s into skating. She wanted to go skating in our kitchen on a couple of wooden building blocks, but I told her I thought that was a bad idea. But I remembered how in my old aerobics class sometimes we’d use paper plates like skates to work our inner thighs. And voila–Carissa’s skates are born.

Caught outside with the baby chair and binkie.

Our small city recently opened a splash park downtown. I used to bemoan our downtown area, because it wasn’t much. I always thought that the corner of Main Street and Center Street ought to have something of importance, but it didn’t. But things are looking up. There is a new library on one corner, and this splash park is in the park across the street.

Today I ventured out with my three kids to check it out. We spent 20 minutes slathering on sunscreen and finding swimsuits, sunglasses, and hats.

I set Elizabeth in the shade while I waded in the water with the kids. She was a good baby and didn’t fuss the whole hour and a half we were there. After a few minutes of arriving I saw some friends who happened to be there with their kids, and Elizabeth hung out in her car seat near them while I held Carissa’s hand and kept an eye on Wes.

The splash park has a winding river area with water zero to about three inches deep. There are big rocks kids can climb on, water shooting up like geysers, a small waterfall, and a separate splash pad where the water shoots up from the cement. It was really nice and was apparently designed by someone who’s won awards in various states and countries for his work.

Wes was fearless–running into the water, jumping off rocks, and never looking back to see if Mom was anywhere near. This is normal.

Carissa was timid and wanted to hold my hand and try to keep up with her brother, but she made it very clear she did not want to get wet. This is also normal.

After about 45 minutes she started to warm up and was starting to climb and jump off the rocks. After about an hour she got really brave and lay down in the water with Wes.

Then she and I headed to the splash pad, where she really enjoyed giggling as the water geysers turned on and off. She even started putting her hands and feet in the water and laughing. It was fun to see my kids having so much fun.

After the splash park we went to the grocery store and spent $1.07 on two giant ice cream cones for Wes and Carissa. A perfect day.

I really enjoyed being out in the sun. Even with SPF 30 on I got a slight tan. Being outside lifts the spirits, so I am happy summer is practically here. Tomorrow is Wesley’s final day of preschool. In the fall, he starts transitional kindergarten and Carissa will go to preschool. But this summer I plan to do summery things with my kids, to soak up the time and savor experiencing fun things with my little people.

…Now if only we would tell ourselves that every day, with such conviction as she has.