My husband was just diagnosed with high blood pressure.  In addition, some blood work apparently came back alarmingly high, which requires a return trip to the doctor this Friday.  This morning, as I bent to lift Dom from his crib, I pulled a muscle in my back – before I even got my hands on the boy.  My ankle hurts in the cold, and my knee buckles if I stand too long.

All of this adds up to one fact…we are getting old.  There are some things about which we can do nothing.  My old ankle injury (actually, three breaks to the same ankle.  Just call me Grace) falls into that category, and I have resigned myself to future arthritis.  But there are other things we can do to halt those annoying illnesses that come with age.  Our Scarlett O’Hara mentality has to end – tomorrow is here, and the day after tomorrow will be really ugly if we don’t make some changes.

So, I have banished salt from our house.  Okay, not altogether.  The saltshaker is still here, but Dom can no longer lick the top of it – it is in a cabinet.  Instead of salt in my cooking, I am using a salt-free seasoning blend.  Instead of butter, I am using some sort of congealed, rubbery orangish stuff that is supposed to taste like butter (it doesn’t).

I am still working on cutting refined starches from our diets.  It is really, really hard to bake a healthy cookie that tastes good.  But I have made positive changes in this direction, too:  I Freecycled all the junk food and I have a huge bag of boxed items to donate to the food bank. 

The thing is, I have always been ultra-paranoid about Dom’s diet.  He eats organic candy-covered sunflower seeds instead of M&Ms, for heck’s sake.  I puree veggies and hide them in foods he will eat.  If only I were half as paranoid about our health as I am his, we probably could have headed off the situation we are now facing. 

My main concern, though, is Dom, even now.  If he grows up watching us eat Big Macs and Soft Taco Supremes, he will end up eating them himself.  And then, someday, his wife will be writing something like this in her diary.  So, new day, new leaf turned over. 

Just for the record, though, I miss M&Ms.

These days, Dom likes to hang with the big kids.  We just spent the weekend in Delaware visiting my brother, his fiancée, and her two children, four or five years older than Dom.  They are the most polite, well-behaved children I have ever met, and I have no idea how their mother has raised such perfect kids…I need to take lessons, I think.  But I am off track, once again.

Dom met the kids about four months ago.  Apparently, they made a huge impression.  Once he found out that we were going to visit Uncle John, he asked whether he would see “the babies” (Anyone under age 10 is a baby, according to Dom).  We told him he would see them when we got there, and he spent the rest of the car ride talking about his friends and the fun stuff they were going to do together.

Once we arrived at their house, it was as though I didn’t exist.  My future niece and nephew ran to meet our car, and from that point forward, Dom was theirs.  They immediately ran into the backyard, where they ran in circles and played with the zillions of toys scattered across the yard in preparation for our arrival.  Dom happily went from one activity to the next, watching his friends adoringly.

At night, when they were confined to the house, they had roving pillow fights, chasing each other all over the house.  They wrestled and played hide and seek (Dom is still playing hide and seek…he doesn’t understand that it takes two players). 

The only bad moment of the weekend occurred when Dom realized that he would sleep in his playpen while the big kids slept in their big boy and big girl beds.  He crawled out of it three times before I gave up and crawled into bed with him.  I am afraid we will soon be converting his bed. 

When it was time to leave, Dom said, “Bye-bye, Ray-Ray; Bye-bye, Riah,” but he didn’t quite get that we were leaving.  Once he was buckled into his carseat and he realized what was happening, he screamed, “My friends!  No!  Want friends!”  After 45 minutes of sobbing and whining, he finally collapsed.

As exhausting as that finale was, we can’t wait for our next trip.  It was heavenly to let Dom run off to play, knowing that the older kids would keep things under control.  Big kids rock!

If you have never visited a Build-a-Bear Workshop, consider yourself lucky.  Then avoid malls whenever you have a munchkin in tow.  For if they see a Build-a-Bear Workshop while you are out shopping, it is all over.

You will be dragged over to the display window, where a little nose will press to the glass while Ahs of pleasure fog it up.  Then you will hear it – that tiny little voice that says, “I need it.  Please, Daddy/Mommy/Grandma/Great Aunt Gertrude?  It is so pretty!”

Yesterday, as Dom and I ran a few errands at Fair Oaks Mall, I lived this experience.  I already knew it would be an expensive experience – I had been warned.  Luckily, though, I had a $50 gift card in my wallet, courtesy of a friend on Dom’s last birthday. 

As we walked through the entrance, Dom’s eyes widened.  He pulled away from me and started running around the store screaming, “This one!  This one!”  Finally, he settled on one bear.  A basic white teddy bear with slight blue spots in his fur.   

After we picked the bear, we had to choose the sound for his paw.  This is where we had our first glitch.  Dom wanted it to bark like a dog.  Finally, I talked him into a basic sound that plays five different boy-type phrases.  “Want to play ball?  Want to scratch yourself while we sit on the sofa?  Pull my finger.” 

Then Dom got to choose the bear’s heart…but he seemed to think the bear needed ten of them.  He counted three times, but finally the wonderful Workshop Elf-lady had him kiss one special heart to go inside of the bear. 

The bear was stuffed and washed…then it was time to choose his clothes.  My son chose the most expensive outfit in the store.  Then he chose the second most expensive outfit in the store.  Then he refused to choose between the two.  I did quick math, and I realized that the gift card was large enough that we could get both outfits.  Whew!  Crisis averted. 

I threw several names at Dom while we dressed the bear, and he seemed to love the name “Al.”  I figured it was a manly, belching-during-the-game type of name, so I put it on the bear’s birth certificate.  The second we left the store, though, Dom started calling him “Berry.  Like Strawberry.  Like Blueberry.” 

So, manly Al wears the Redskins football uniform by day, and Berry wears the pirate costume by night.  Hmm…2-in-1 for $56.

When I was a kid, there were several games that I liked – Chutes and Ladders, Candyland, Connect Four, and Memory are the games that immediately come to mind.  But the game that I loved most of all – the one that I immediately went for when game night was my choice – was Hungry, Hungry Hippos.

I have been eagerly awaiting the day when Dom is old enough to play this game with me.  He recently got a Walmart gift card, and tonight we went to cash it in…for Hungry, Hungry Hippos.  I know the age range is age 4 and up.  But it has been a long, long time since Dom put something into his mouth that wasn’t actual food.  I also figured that this would be a family game, and we would all play it together.  So Daddy or I could quickly remove any marbles that ended up in Dom’s mouth.  Yes, I am an idiot.  How could you tell?

We came home and I set up the game.  Daddy, Dom and I settled around the board on the living room floor and each selected our hippos.  It took Dom a few seconds to get the hang of helping his hippo eat the marbles.  I urged him on by saying, “That’s it – eat some food.”  Being two, Dom misunderstood me.  He thought I meant that he should eat the marbles.  Obedient for the first time in months, he popped one into his mouth. 

I asked him to spit it out and he did.  We continued with the game, and Dom loved every second of it.  He didn’t try to eat another marble, so we were in the clear. 

When we were done playing (or, rather, when Dom wandered away to play with something else), I packed the marbles away into a Ziploc bag and counted them.  I was one short.  I recounted, and there was still one missing.  Then I counted again, just in case the missing marble had rematerialized while I was counting others.  Nope. 

I didn’t panic.  I figured the marble was round, so even if Dom had swallowed it, it obviously went right down, so it would come out easily in a few days.  I even confirmed that online.  But I decided to keep him awake a little longer so I could keep an eye on him.  He took a massive poop, and as I was changing it, I found the marble.  No, he hadn’t pooped it (if swallowed objects passed through that quickly, parents would have nothing to worry about).  Instead, he had tucked it into the waistband of his diaper…I guess so he could snack on it later. 

I immediately packed it away with the other marbles, and I looked sadly at the Hungry, Hungry Hippos game.  Dom loved it so much that I hated to give up on it.  Then I had a brainstorm.  I went to the kitchen and grabbed a handful of Kix and we started another game.  This time, we both ate the Hippos’ food. 

I already have future plans to try the game with mini marshmallows, M&Ms, skittles, and blueberries.  The moral of this story is that, once you find your lost marbles, you are pretty smart.

Dom is a loving, curious, outgoing boy who runs up to strangers, chattering away.  Since I am a paranoid Mommy, that makes me more than a little nervous, but anyway…  He loves to meet people, talk to them, and ask them questions. 

So, imagine my surprise today.  My mother-in-law and Russell’s Great Aunt (Dom’s Great-Great Aunt) came over for a visit.  When Dom first saw his Grandma, his face lit up.  He happily started yelling, “Grandma!  Grandma!”  Then he looked at the person quietly standing next to her – Aunt Lilla. 

And he lost it.  I have never seen my boy so freaked out.  He buried his face in Daddy’s leg and wrapped himself around him.  Daddy had to hold him for several minutes while Dom sobbed into his shoulder.

Aunt Lilla is a normal-looking elderly person.  She doesn’t use an oxygen tank.  She isn’t in a wheelchair.  She doesn’t smell bad or talk loudly.  She adores Dominici, and she spoils him every chance she gets.  There is absolutely no reason that I can find for Dom to be afraid of her.  But he is.

He spent their entire visit pointedly ignoring Aunt Lilla.  He played with his Grandma, and he chatted to all of us except Aunt Lilla.  I was horrified, and I kept asking him to show things to her.  With each request, he would throw down whatever he was holding and jump into Daddy’s arms for comfort, screaming “No!  No!”

After a few hours of poor Aunt Lilla sitting on the sofa by herself, it was time for her and Grandma to leave.  As they went out the door, Dom said, “Bye-Bye, Aunt Lilla” with a huge smile on his face.  I think he was glad to see her go.

“Not faya!”  Or, in adult language, “Not fair!”  However you spell or pronounce it, that phrase has entered our once-peaceful home with a vengeance.  I don’t know for sure where Dom learned it, but I blame the usual suspects. 

He recently began watching Noggin…before then, he only watched a few prerecorded shows (over and over and over again, but I digress).  So, my guess is that one of the Noggin cartoons stars a really annoying, bratty, whiny kid. 

Or a bunny or two, since I suspect Max & Ruby are the culprits.  After all, I have tried to change the channel whenever their show starts…one episode was more than enough for me.  I think Daddy may not be nannying the TV properly when I am not around.

So, thanks to the long-eared vermin, Dom’s response to any direction is to stomp his feet and scream, “Not faya!”  If asked to pick up one puzzle before pulling out another, he shrieks, “Not faya!”  If told to stop throwing a ball against the front door, he yells, “Not faya!”  If put to bed before he thinks he is ready, he sobs, “Not faya!” 

Tonight, as I was trying to find some privacy in the bathtub, Dom and Elmo came to visit.  They sat on the bathmat, and Dom chattered away.  Finally, I could take no more and I ordered him to go sit on the sofa.  His response?  A puzzled “Why is Mommy not faya now?”  I said again that he was to go sit on the sofa.  He ran to the sofa and flung himself onto it dramatically, crying, “Not faya!  Not faya!  Not faya!” repeatedly. 

My alone time was ruined.  Alas, my bath time solitude was over.  Back to Mommy mode.  Not fair!

Dom and I love to read together.  Rather, I read while he flips the pages so quickly that I can’t keep up.  Same difference.

We check anywhere from 5 – 15 children’s books out of the library each week.  We also have an extensive children’s collection on our own bookshelves.  There are some books that Dom and I love so much that I want to share them with other parents.  So I figure that I’ll do that once a week or so.  Here is this week’s book corner…

Anything by Dr. Seuss

Yes, I am lumping them all together.  We could have a lively debate on the merits of individual Dr. Seuss books, but it would be kind of one-sided, since I am the writer.  Feel free to yell out your favorites to your computer screen, though. 

Honestly, I couldn’t choose just one Dr. Seuss book, so I chose them all.  They are all so full of rollicking rhythms and fantastic landscapes that I can’t pick a favorite.  Rereading them as an adult has made me fall even more in love with the stories, as the simplistic messages ring ever more true to my life today.

Perhaps my favorite part of reading to Dom is experiencing again books that I loved as a child.  Not only do I view the books from an adult perspective now, but I am also able to see the wonder in Dom’s eyes when he hears a story for the first time.

Did I giggle that way the first time I heard the silly rhymes in Green Eggs and Ham?  Like Dom, did I worry that Horton would accidentally crush that precious egg?  Did I repeat my favorite parts of One Fish, Two Fish to everyone I met for the rest of the day?  I must have - Dom is so like me at his age (according to my mother, who often gets her children confused and yells every wrong name before finding the right one…). 

All I know is that my boy lights up when we pull a Dr. Seuss book off of the shelf to read.  He grabs Elmo and jumps onto the sofa, leaning against me as I read the story.  There aren’t many things for which Dom will sit still these days.  Dr. Seuss is one of the few.

Dom has too much crap.  I have known that for a while.  I have even sorted through and given away a ton of it.  I have abandoned all non-musical noise-making toys.  I have split his Megablocks and Little People collections in half.  Somehow, though, it all keeps multiplying.  There is apparently a breeding ground for blocks and Matchbox cars under his bed.  Thomas wooden railway tracks travel under there to spawn, too.

There are many toys with which he no longer plays…that I just can’t bring myself to let go.  They are reminders of his developmental stages.  The Megablocks, the stuffed Backyardigans, the plastic dinosaurs – they all hold memories of my baby being, well, a baby.  So I know that this entire “Dom has too much crap” thing is all me.  As long as he has his Thomas trains and a few books, I don’t think he would really miss the rest.

Over the past few days, I have been watching Dom as he plays.  When left to his own devices, he is creative.  He colors, he makes up games, and he dances around with his musical instruments.  Tonight, though, I saw two excellent examples of his imagination at work. 

He has a Trader Joe’s balloon that has lost its oomph and now just rolls around on the floor.  He spent over an hour batting it into the air, playing the traditional “keep-away” game I remember from my own childhood. 

A few minutes ago, he crawled past me, blowing a fluffy orange feather across the floor.  He giggled whenever it traveled an especially long distance.  He was also gibbering a story about an orange bird. 

It is obvious that a kid doesn’t need much stuff in order to be a kid.  However, a Mommy needs to trip over toys to remind herself that her kid is still a kid.  Does that make any sense to anyone else? 

As I mentioned before, I was supposed to be working as an election judge during this historic election day.  Instead, I am being puked on by a sick kid.  But there is good news.  By tonight (I hope this doesn’t drag on longer than that), we will have elected either our first African-American president or our first female vice president.  Exciting times!

So I sit here, eagerly awaiting the results of today's voting...ticked that Alan Keyes wasn't on the ballot here as anything other than a write-in candidate on a long list of write-in candidates...angry that the Republican Party can't get its head out of its butt long enough to select a candidate that I can really, 100% get behind…and anxious for the election and its divisive politics to be over.  I am sure that everyone has one or two friends they have been avoiding during the past few months because every word out of their mouths has been political.  Enough already!

I am eating my free donut from Krispy Kreme, washing it down with my free coffee from Starbucks.  After dinner, we will head to Ben & Jerry's for a free scoop of ice cream.  In the meantime, I am cruising a wide variety of news websites, looking for evidence of voter fraud or rigged voting that may cause the same issues we had in 2000.

Dom was very into the process while Daddy voted…I already voted absentee ballot since I was supposed to be working the election.  He yelled, "Daddy's voting!" to everyone he saw outside and inside of our polling place.  He even tried to make selections in the voting booth.  He got his own "I voted" sticker, which Starbucks and Krispy Kreme both honored (Starbucks gave him a free kid's cocoa). 

And now we wait.

Once again, my plans have been derailed by a sick toddler.  I am/was an election judge for the election tomorrow.  I went through a four-hour training exercise, and then through another two hours of practice at election headquarters.  I have read my approximately 150-page Election Judge Handbook twice. 

Tonight, I was supposed to go to my assigned polling place and help with setup.  This is the night when the booths are assembled, things are sorted, and stations are assigned.  Then, when the judges show up at 6 a.m. tomorrow morning, there is not too much left to do.  On my way out of the door, though, Dom puked on me.  It was a beautiful projectile puke, an 11 on a scale of 1-10.  I changed my clothes, still determined not to miss setup.  And he did it again.  This time, he wrapped his arms around me and whined, “Hold me, Mommy.” 

How could I leave?  How could I put working during an historic election above my son’s need for me?  So I changed yet again and I called my Chief Election Judge to explain the situation.  I went ahead and told her that working Election Day is off the table, too, since even a 24-hour bug can’t clear up that fast.  She called the Board of Elections and got a replacement.

I feel guilty because I promised to help and can’t.  At the same time, I know that someone who was merely a standby judge now has a chance to work during the election.  It is not that I am irreplaceable…it is that I broke a promise.  I don’t do that.  But, since this is just my first such decision as a Mommy, I am sure that there will be times that I have to break promises in the future.  I just hope it gets easier!

Tomorrow, while others are working this historic election, I will be at home cleaning up puke.  And someday, I will tell Dom that this was all his fault that Mommy was not able to be part of the biggest election of her voting lifetime.  That should rate me jewelry, right?

Dom and I love to read together.  Rather, I read while he flips the pages so quickly that I can’t keep up.  Same difference.

We check anywhere from 5 – 15 children’s books out of the library each week.  We also have an extensive children’s collection on our own bookshelves.  There are some books that Dom and I love so much that I want to share them with other parents.  So I figure that I’ll do that once a week or so.  Here is this week’s book corner…

Red Light, Green Light by Margaret Wise Brown

I have covered one or two of her other books in The Book Corner.  I am sure that I will share many, many more with you all in the future.  She is an amazing writer, and she somehow knew exactly how to catch a child’s interest and hold it long enough to finish the story. 

This book is one I enjoyed as a child.  In fact, the copy I have was my father’s before it became mine.  The story focuses on the concept of Red=stop and Green=go.  A variety of characters go about their days, stopping on red and going on green.

The book begins:

 In the morning they all came out of their houses.
 Red Light they can’t go.
 Green Light they can go.

 The truck came out of the truck’s house
 A garage.
 …
 The boy came out of the boy’s house
 A home.
 …
 And the mouse came out of the house of the mouse
 A hole.

As the day goes on, each character (there are others besides the three mentioned above) travels his, her, or its own road.  “Red Light they can’t go.  Green Light they can go.”  Finally, night falls, and the characters all return to their homes.  The illustrations are beautifully sketched but muted, probably to make the red and green lights appear brighter.

I have been trying to teach Dom about crossing streets, since we live right off of a very busy road where people drive far above the speed limit (do I sound like a complaining old lady yet?).  He knows to stop on red/orange, and to go on green.  I honestly think this story helped drum that into his mind.

Around 3 a.m. this morning, I wandered into the bathroom.  While there, I suddenly became very concerned about the broken towel bar.  The towel bar broke more than six months ago, and the two halves have been sitting on the back of the toilet ever since.  We just haven’t gotten around to going to buy a replacement.  And I honestly have no idea why we kept the two halves to begin with.  I also have absolutely no clue why I picked 3 a.m. to start worrying about it.

In my half-asleep state, I had a brilliant idea.  I would just Superglue the two halves together.  Then we wouldn’t need to buy a new towel bar, and we wouldn’t have to go to Home Depot (I hate that place because there are never any employees on the floor.  I have no idea where they all hide). 

I read the back of the Superglue tube carefully.  It said it would bond “most types of plastic” in 15 seconds.  I figured that the towel bar would surely be glueable.  So, I squirted a tiny bit onto one half of the towel bar and held the two pieces together for 20 seconds.  When I let go, they fell to the floor.

This is where I lost it.  Well, you may argue that Supergluing at 3 a.m. in the first place means I had already lost it…and you would have a good point.  But I decided that maybe I hadn’t used enough glue the first time.  So I squirted twice as much on the towel rod.  I held the Superglue tube in one hand while I held the towel bar together, lest the .000001 second it took to put it down would be enough to keep the bond from forming between the two halves of the towel bar. 

I held the towel bar together for one full minute.  When I let go, the two halves fell to the floor.  But the Superglue tube didn’t.  Apparently, I had just glued it to my thumb.

I tried to pull it off, but it didn’t budge.  I tried to shake it off of my hand by vigorously waving it in the air – nothing.  I tried to soak my thumb in nail polish remover, but that didn’t work.  Apparently, I needed acetone nail polish remover.  All we had in the house was non-acetone. 

At this point, I was teetering on the edge.  I alternated between hysterical giggling and a vision of the future – of Dom being a social pariah because his Mom was the weird lady with a Superglue hand.  So, I did what any wife would do if she found herself the victim of a Superglue accident at 3 a.m.  I woke up my husband and sent him to the store for the right kind of nail polish remover.

Thankfully, for once he followed instruction well and he came home with the right remover.  I soaked for an hour, occasionally removing my thumb from the remover to wiggle the Superglue tube.  When I had made what I considered decent progress, I yanked.  And it hurt.  I will be sticking to Elmer’s glue sticks from now on.  I’ll leave the Superglue to the grownups.

On Friday, the world will celebrate Halloween.  Little kids will dress up like Princesses, Pirates, and Obama to beg strangers for food…and adults will drink until they puke. We won’t be celebrating…although Chipotle will be handing out free burritos to anyone who comes in dressed as a burrito (that tempted me for a second).

We don’t celebrate Halloween.  We only celebrate religious holidays…for Easter, we concentrate on the resurrection (Plastic eggs represent Christ’s tomb, and if a bunny hops through the apartment, I am tossing it out).  For Christmas, we concentrate on Christ’s birth (Santa doesn’t come here, despite my mother’s efforts to the contrary).  On Thanksgiving, we give thanks for our blessings, and on the Fourth of July, we give thanks for our freedom.  I haven’t yet found a way to incorporate God into Halloween, so we don’t participate.

I have no problem with others celebrating.  I love to see pictures of kids in full dress-up.  I like to hear about people’s plans for the evening.  I’ll eat candy from the bowls stores leave next to the registers.

I take full advantage of candy sales, and I like to stock up on the solid-orange housewares that pop up in displays.  Dom loves pumpkins, so we buy a lot of them and puree them for later use (great way to store it up for Thanksgiving pies). 

I have heard of churches that celebrate the “Harvest.”  They have kids from the congregation dress up and give them candy.  To me, that is the same thing as trick or treating.  So, if you as a church have a problem with Halloween (because of its Pagan beginnings and no attempted tie-in to Christianity), why celebrate with the same traditions?  I mean, be consistent – either Halloween violates your beliefs and you don’t participate, or you just trick or treat and stop complaining about how it violates your beliefs.  Isn’t that just common sense?

So, on Friday, our lights will be out.  We won’t answer if anyone knocks, although I may peek out the window to check out the costumes (I mean, who doesn’t love little Princesses and Pirates?  I’ll boo any Obamas that come by, though).  And, in the next few years, I may have an infant come Halloween…and I will take full advantage of that free burrito offer by wrapping him or her in a shiny blanket.  Because free Chipotle is free Chipotle.

The other day, as I was driving home from a visit with my Mom, a commercial came onto the radio.  The overly perky speaker started talking about “Mommy Makeovers.”  Because I could always use a makeover, I listened intently. 

Perhaps I would get tips on easy care hairstyles (besides my normal ponytail).  Maybe there actually was a way to ensure that my shower could happen in the morning, when I prefer to get clean…rather than being pushed back to late afternoon when we have one of those days.  Even if I just learned what color eyeliner can hide bags under my eyes, the 30 seconds spent listening would be well worth it.

This was not any makeover I had experience with, though.  In fact, this was a makeover unlike any of which I had ever heard.  Apparently, this makeover was of a more permanent sort – plastic surgery.  I assume that this surgery includes a tummy tuck and a boob lift.

The speaker didn’t give specifics of the work she’d had done (ladies don’t share such things, after all).  Instead, she focused on the fact that the entire experience took place in a spa-like atmosphere.  She added that all of her friends use this same plastic surgeon.

Really?

There are actually mothers out there with enough free time on their hands to be this focused on their looks?  If so, do any of them teach classes in time management?  I really, really need one.  I barely have time to pick out matching clothes…and sometimes even that doesn’t happen.  Finding time to critique my sagging boobs in a three-way mirror is impossible. 

Besides, I consider my boob problem and never-going-to-be-the-same belly to be battlescars.  I fought the hard battle of pregnancy, labor and delivery.  I got a few wonderful miracles out of it.  Why would I want to erase all outward signs of them?

Dom and I love to read together.  Rather, I read while he flips the pages so quickly that I can’t keep up.  Same difference.

We check anywhere from 5 – 15 children’s books out of the library each week.  We also have an extensive children’s collection on our own bookshelves.  There are some books that Dom and I love so much that I want to share them with other parents.  So I figure that I’ll do that once a week or so.  Here is this week’s book corner…

Tito, the Firefighter
Tito, el Bombero
by Tim Hoppey

This is my last firefighter book review for a long time.  I promise.  This is one of Dom’s current favorite subjects, though, so I am just sharing as we read.  I am sure there will be a series of train book reviews coming soon.

Bilingualism is all the rage these days.  Corporations pay bilingual employees a premium for their language skills, signs are displayed in a variety of languages, and babies can take language classes as young as three months (no, I am not kidding.  Just check your Families Only magazine when it shows up). 

This book is in English, but certain phrases are repeated in Spanish (the font for the Spanish terms is bright red and italicized).  The last page contains a translation vocabulary of the Spanish terms used in the story.

The book is about Tito, a little boy who, through circumstance, becomes a firefighter for a day.  An example of the English/Spanish phrasing:

I could tell something was
Very wrong.  Something
Was muy mal.

An added bonus is that this book got it right – there is a female firefighter, complete with a red ponytail.  Between this book and Dora, Dom will be speaking Spanish in no time.