Robert and James have fought less over the last couple of days. Don't know exactly why, or how, or for how long, but they have somehow found a couple things to play together that don't end in nuclear war. At first, it was naughty stuff:
*James writing in ballpoint pen on the walls, the bed sheets, and his
wooden rocking horse while Robert just watches all the fun.
*James
throwing every piece of clothing out of both dressers and Robert
helping him all toss them all over their room, some ending up on the
ceiling fan.
*Robert leaping from the top bunk across the room onto James' bed.
*Robert hooking socks and underwear to the ceiling and hanging from them until he tears a hole in them.
Grrrrr...but last night, after bedtime, they traded pajama shirts and thought it was hilarious. They even went to the bathroom together, kinda like Alice and Robert used to do when they were roommates.
I remain cautiously hopeful :)
Analog "Photo Booth" at the dinner table!
This is a selfie on our 14th wedding anniversary, attending the Yahoo! Champaign Year-End Party.
And Matthew discovered something fun with his straw cup the other day:
Robert and James have started to physically tussle a bit. It starts out as a little passive-aggressive invasion of the other person's space, then grows into a kind of smooshy wrestling match with laughing and a little more aggression (which both of them seem to be enjoying thoroughly), then somehow it escalates into someone getting a little bit hurt and telling on the other one.
I see it as progress, oddly enough, because both boys are enjoying the tussle (common interest) and both boys stop immediately when the other gets hurt (sympathetic/empathetic impulse control).
Also, we were outside this afternoon and the boys were exploring a big pile of sticks. They wanted to play fight with them. You should have seen the wicked grin on James' face. I said they could play fight with the sticks as long as they were on the same team fighting bad guys in other places. Gleefully, they ran off together and whacked stuff for a good five minutes before James started pointing his stick at Robert in a sneaky sort of menacing way. Long story short, I ended up yanking Robert's stick from him and breaking it over my knee into several pieces. Gah!
But they had a good five minutes of cooperative, creative play before then. I'll take that.
James asks about packages at least 5 times a day. He keeps asking to check the porch for more packages. He leaves letters and pictures out front for the mailman and the delivery guy in the hopes that they will be pleased and bring us more packages. James' current superhero is a mail carrier.
I've got half a mind to scrounge the house for empty boxes and leave him some homemade packages on the porch during quiet time...bubble wrap, balloons, tic-tacs...doesn't take much to put this kid over the moon.
After the bedtime routine tonight, James came out by himself with one of his stalling questions...but this one wasn't just about stalling...
"For Christmas, I want Santa to come and leave us packages to open...I know he's not real *pause to suppress swelling emotion and rub his eyes*...but I want him to come."
James found himself in timeout three times today for calling someone "Boo boo butt." On the spectrum of horrible name calling, this falls on the mild side, but hearing it angrily flung from my own son's mouth toward another son...sheesh...just sent a zing of horror up my spine. James was in timeout before I had even fully registered the situation. It was a knee-jerk reaction.
Later, I overheard him talking himself down from saying it again: "Wobuht jus' a boo-...uh...me no like time outs."
So, here's the thing. At some point, they will find names to call each other that don't bother me as much as this one. Or maybe they'll discover worse ones. And they'll yell them at each other with all the passionate fury of a child been wronged. I remember a few moments like that from my own childhood, actually. Then what? I will probably look back and laugh at how uptight I was about something so minor as "boo boo butt."
Just gotta figure out where the enforceable boundary is here and my reasoning for that boundary.
I asked him to open his eyes REALLY wide so I could get a picture of those crazy-cool irises.
A real smile from my James-y
Bed head Mass-uh-you before his haircut.
Good things come in little packages. The primary kids performed a little song at our church Christmas dinner on Friday.
Still adjusting to the reality of a cell phone for me. That thing is really helpful and super distracting. Also, with free access to texting, I find myself sharing little bits of personal news and pictures with individuals. That's great for my relationship with those individuals, but terrible for my blogging presence.
So here I play catch-up a bit.
Matthew's cold turned into a double ear infection withOUT a fever. We were all amazed, even the doc, to discover his eardrums bulging with infection and yet his temperature remaining solidly normal. Half a day on antibiotics and we could see our sweet little baby coming back. The poor kid would play just a couple minutes before stopping to lay on the floor. His personality is peeking out more. He plays simple games (high five, gonna gitcha), grunts and points with focus, and has wailing tantrums on the floor when misunderstood. Yay! A real little kid in there!
We spent a blissful few days with friends for Thanksgiving. Our kids played with their kids just enough that neither one of us had to intervene that often. Everyone got a little break. A fantastic family that I've missed, a beautiful home with plenty of space, excellent weather, and oodles of quality time with people I love: perfect.
Matthew mastered the stairs!
These 3-year-olds didn't seem to mind the freezy cold rain.
My girly
It was a little hard to come home and get back into regular life again.
I continue to make progress in learning Spanish. It's too much fun. I don't remember being this motivated to learn French in high school. I find myself wanting worksheets and exams, though, to motivate me to study more diligently. Or maybe I could start a conversational Spanish club...
Robert and James in the same bedroom: I want to split them up. It's only been 2 months. I knew I would want to split them up about now...it's starting to get gritty. But I don't dare do it until we've had a chance to develop a few new social/communication/cooperative tools. Their relationship is something I work and pray and burn energy on every single day. We've tried all sorts of things. Today, I toyed with the idea of giving them candy every time they fight. Then maybe when the candy ran out, they wouldn't find it worthwhile to bother each other every. stinking. minute. I didn't do it, but I'm not completely throwing the idea away. Yet.
Can you find Robert at the top?
Robert and James displaying their recycle bin creatures.
James and another James in front of James' Hardware Store.
Alice's current big project is putting on a play with all her best friends. We found a kit at the library that was made for 8-year-olds to put on a play together...scripts, director's guide, costume and set suggestions, the works. They meet this Saturday to pick parts and begin rehearsing. Stay tuned.
I'm sooooo tired today. Matthew didn't sleep well last night and we're both dragging today. Don't want to get off the couch. Should be taking a nap, but it's too close to pick-up time (Robert) and there are four men working very noisily in the crawlspace right now (Radon mitigation).
I had a dream last night that I was applying for some sort of permit and my chances of securing said permit would increase greatly if I could apply as a "native" Spanish-speaker. Foolishly, I decided to attempt it. I had to "prove" my Spanish fluency in a conversational interview. It was a disaster, but I remember keeping my cool and asking "una vez, por favor?"...once again, please?
I'm really enjoying this new adventure into another language. Duolingo is fun, but its approach to conjugation and grammar isn't quite my style. I've been supplementing with textbooks and other language resources. Duolingo lacks a verbal/conversational component. I crave conversation that will force me to work through the language in "real time". Right now, I'm afraid to speak it because I don't want to make a mistake...and I feel like I don't know enough to sustain any sort of conversation. But I must, right? Even if I sound like a 3-year-old, I should be able to communicate a little. Maybe I could write it instead. Maybe even here on the blog? If I can just figure out a quick way to put accented letters into the text...
Hoy, yo estoy muy fatigue. Mi hijo, Matéo, durmió con un recién nacido. Argh! Los trabajadores están ruidosos, pero yo estoy agradecido por sus trabajo. También, mi amiga se marchar de Illinois a la Alemania y yo recordaro todos mis amigos quienes marchen de aquí. Estoy un poco triste, pero el peor cosa es la sensación de la pérdida.
How they calculated my language proficiency with TWO significant digits, I'll never know.
I'm learning through the DuoLingo app on my new cell phone. It's fun to apply my brain to something like school again. It feels more like a game than school, though, so I find myself wanting to pull it out whenever I have a couple minutes to spare. So much temptation!
It's fun to bounce my rudimentary concept of the language with Bobby's knowledge of Brazilian Portugese. Alice is a fan, but Robert and James kinda groan and ask for "English only, please."
Anyway, learning a new language has finally become one of the things filling up that sliver of space that I gained when Robert started Kindergarten...10 weeks ago. Regular exercise is another one, weather permitting. Let's hope I find a new balance for the last portion of that space before the school year ends ;)
Matthew is one! A whole year! It kills me to think that it's been that long and that short. He's a fun guy to have around: curious, easy-going, sociable. Some of his favorite hobbies include eating crud off the floor and unwinding toilet paper. He's sooooooo good at unwinding toilet paper. Those little pincer fingers just keep creeping around the roll until he catches the end of it. Brilliant little man.
Matthew started his birthday bright and early this morning at 4:30am...45 minutes earlier than his usual unbelievably early wake time. Thanks, dude.
Snotty nose and a black eye. Being one is AWESOME!
Matthew had his check-up at the doctor today and appears to be healthy and growing on his own curve (15th percentile for length, 50th for weight, 85th for head circumference). He's sooooooo small compared to his brothers at this age. Matthew was 22 pounds 13 ounces today on his first birthday. Robert and James hit that weight when they were only 6-8 months old. Part of my reluctance to celebrate his first birthday stems from the fact that he's just too small to be 12 months old. Well, he's just not as large as I'm accustomed to my 1-year-olds being.
The doctor noted Matthew's precocious social skills. He points, makes eye contact, and vocalizes to direct your attention. Yeah, that's 18-month-old work. Add that to the fact that he's quick to warm up to new people and...I sense another extrovert in the making. Sigh. In other news, I detect a slight preference for his left hand, so I haven't completely given up hope on generating a lefty.
Matthew, like James, also has extra fluid on his ears. We're taking him back in 6 weeks for a follow-up. I get the feeling this doctor worries a lot about fluid on eardrums. My last doctor kinda fixated on another small potential problem and brought it up every visit, too.
Matthew has been walking almost exclusively, so we bought him his first pair of shoes this week:
Itty bitty shoes, just big enough to fit a couple of golf balls in. Can someone that small really need shoes?
The first day he wore them, he acted like I had cut off his feet...moaning and whining as he drag-crawled on the floor. Poor guy. But now he has the hang of them and can go pretty much anywhere he likes:
Check out my artsy-fartsy camera angle. I totally did that on purpose.
After a few immunizations, we came home to start on Matthew's birthday cake. I let James choose the design. He suggested a pool cake:
Bobby took a video, but I'm too tired to post it tonight (I got up at 4:30 this morning, remember?). Matthew didn't believe his cake was worth eating until he had smooshed it to crumbs with his bare hands. Then he tasted it and loved it and pointed/vocalized at the rest of the cake on the table. Yep, no problem telling what he wants.
Love that boy, snot and all. I wish he would let me sleep until 7am, but no one is perfect :)
A friend of ours is developing her photography skills and she offered us a mini photo package for the family. I was excited to accept! It was FREEZING that morning, unfortunately, so we stayed in our coats, thus rendering all of my color scheme planning pointless. Oh well. I didn't spend that much time on it :)
She touched up the photos afterwards, so you don't see as many red, runny noses as you should. Here are a few of my favorites (in addition to the ones now adorning our blog page):
This was the year of James' "magic" birthday...when he would turn three on the third. He's the first of the kids to have his magic birthday, so I was interested in setting up some sort of tradition. Something a 7-year-old boy and a 14-year-old-girl and a 28-year-old man could all enjoy on their magic birthdays in the future.
I finally settled on three wishes.
James' three wishes for his magic birthday were:
1. Lots of little kids running around.
2. A game where we throw candy at each other and then eat it.
3. um, um, uhhhhhhhhhhhh
I filled in the third wish with a surprise trip to our local gymnastics training center for Open Gym. The kids ran and jumped and balanced on all the equipment for an hour. It's one of their favorite places to go.
He also got to choose his birthday dinner and a cake (hot dogs and a strawberry cake with a rainbow on top, respectively).
The party with lots of little kids running around was easy. He insisted on NO big kids. I named every single kid his age that he could possibly be talking about and he settled on three girls: his cousin Sara and two girls from his church Nursery class. It was a free form play date with singing and cake:
Then right before the girls had to go home, we played a candy throwing game. Each kid threw a few pieces of candy at the backs of the other kids and got to keep the pieces that hit someone. For some reason, they all aimed at me. Every piece. And they were pretty good shots.
At James' 3-year checkup, the doctor declared him perfectly healthy except for some fluid in his eardrums that hasn't drained since his ear infection 6 weeks ago. The doc wants to see James in a couple months to check again. If there's still fluid, then James will be referred to a specialist for hearing tests and consultation. James was the slowest of our kids to speak, and the clarity of his speech lags significantly behind his peers at church, but he's recently cleared up some phoneme substitutions and refined his grammar a bit, so I'm not too terribly concerned about hearing problems.
He's still large (90th percentile for height and weight). He's still shy around adults. He's still a curious and confident kid who doesn't mind wandering off alone to follow an interesting idea. He really wants to go fishing and cut up a fish and eat it all gone. He remembers promises and holds you to them. He loves candy. And just in the last couple of weeks he's started playing with friends...one-on-one cooperative play lasting longer than a couple minutes with kids he knows well. We often wait outside with a few other parents while the kids line up waiting for the school day to begin. One morning, James left my side to go stand next to a 2-year-old and smile at him. They ended up chasing each other around a tree trunk.
I took James to meet the new preschool teacher this week. He was shy around her, but managed to answer a few of her questions anyway. James is SO excited to go to preschool. I was telling him everything I could think of about it and he sort of latched on to the idea of getting notes with candy inside them (Valentine's Day). I have conflicting feelings about sending him to preschool a semester early, but meeting the teacher and seeing James bounce off the walls with giddy excitement in that room has tipped the scales in favor of it.
During our visit, unfortunately, Matthew tripped and smacked his face on the doll house. He has an impressive black eye now :(
I love this little James (though he insists that he's BIG, BIG, BIG). That grin of his just gets me every time. I love being his favorite person. I love time with him while the older kids are at school. He's a totally different guy one-on-one. Sweet boy. So glad he's mine, er, uh, ours.
While working on another one of his symmetrical creature pictures, Robert stacked up a few crayons according to length. There was a long one on the bottom, three medium ones in the middle, and a short one on top.
Musing to himself, he pointed at the bottom crayon and sang a low note, then sang three identical medium notes as he moved his finger up the stack, and finished with a high note on the short crayon at the top. He kinda chuckled at his discovery and showed it to me.
Crayon length/position translates to music? Buddy, you're so cool! And kinda freaking me out.
Robert has long enjoyed drawing abstract, symmetrical, highly colorful things. I don't remember how many I've posted to the blog. He's very prolific, so perhaps I haven't taken the time to point it out. Anyway, a while ago, he learned how to cut shapes along a fold to get perfectly symmetrical creatures. I love how much time and detail he adds to each creation. I love the colors, too. And I'm always blown away by how symmetrical he remains in every detail.
Today, though, was a new development. He made a series of creatures for his Kindergarten teacher and decided to write his name symmetrically, too:
The front of his bunny-eared smiley man with red fingertips.
The back with his name written symmetrically...twice. You may have to click on it to see it larger. He put "RobertreboR" at the top and his full name on the ears. He was so tickled for figuring out how to do it on his own.
Here is the trellis now that the fencing panels have been added and the brambles are tied up to it. Yes, the brambles are especially roughed-up. Nothing a good leaf drop and spring regrowth won't fix...I'm hoping. I laid down a soaker hose under the mulch, too. Love it! I'm so pleased with how it came out.
With the plants up off the ground, there's now room for a path and something else. I'm leaning towards hardy kiwi vines on the fence, but I will need to ask the neighbor about it. She probably would prefer grapes :( James is in the background here for scale.
An unexpected benefit to this addition has been an added measure of privacy. The driveway feels so cozy now (if driveways can be cozy) and it's fun to work behind the trellis on the mulch path. I think that's the part I like best. The privacy. But it comes at a cost...lower visibility of the intersection and street for all the bike riders in this family.
After school, Robert and James are playing on the playground. A boy from Robert's class walks up to me and smiles, "Robert is my friend," before running off to the monkey bars.
I haven't had half a second lately to reflect on any of the things going on around here. Haven't taken many photos, either. I feel like we've been going through some real milestones and I'm afraid this period of my life my be lost from record indefinitely if I don't put things on the blog, however haphazardly...
Matthew's first haircut...whoosh!
All four of the guys got haircuts the same day.
Love these boy-o's.
The first few minutes of his new 'do felt like I was finally seeing the child I had envisioned since the beginning. It finally fit. But every once in a while I would forget that we had cut his hair and suddenly see a perfect stranger in my house toddling around. No more shaggy locks. All business.
Primary Program in church...whoosh!
Robert actually spoke his part into the microphone. What courage! After their dress rehearsal the week before, Robert told me that he spoke his whole part to the empty chapel even though he was feeling shy in front of so many people he didn't know (meaning the kids and Primary teachers behind him). I wondered if he would pull it through on the actual day with 50+ more people staring right at him from the pews. He did it! And he was proud of himself for doing it!
Alice's sewing party...whoosh!
I taught Alice how to hand sew a simple pillow. Since she's always looking for a reason to gather friends around her, she suggested throwing a sewing party where she could teach all her friends the same thing...with finger sandwiches and a treat (*batting her eyes at me*). Well, I liked this party idea better than the last half dozen, so I finally consented. We invited 5 of her closest best friends and every single one accepted. Even the one currently living an hour and a half away. Erk. It was one loud girlfest, and they actually did some sewing. I eavesdropped on their chit chat, which was more like a series of loud interruptions, until the sewing broke down and the girls got into the dress up box. By the end of the party, they had used bricks and 2x4s and small sheets of fabric in the backyard to frame out a simple house for their imaginary play.
James also had his third birthday, but I don't want to post about that until I've figured out how to get the photos from Bobby's phone :(
And I discovered our shower is leaking into the crawlspace :( The plumber came out today and said the source of the water wasn't obvious. He's coming back in a couple days with a partner to do more sleuthing. Deep down inside, I'm hoping they also discover the source of that horrible moldy smell coming from the bathroom :)
And I broke, and then fixed, and then broke again, and then made-do with the power button on the clothes dryer. I felt super handy, then totally dumb, then just plain okay with things.
The blackberry trellis is just about done. I ended up strapping the 16-foot fence panels to the top of our van like so:
The tail end is being pulled down by a string that is looped under the car. It was a pretty snug fit. The front part flapped a little crazy if I went over 30 mph, so I stuck to the residential streets and school zones on my way home :) I spent a couple hours this morning installing the first panel on the posts, then tying half of the raspberry canes to it. I like it. I love it, actually, even if the plants look a little roughed up from all the messing around, and even if Matthew ended up playing in (and eating) a little too much dirt/mulch today. James found plenty of sticks to turn into swords, then tools to turn into toys, and a fence to turn into a jungle gym. For three minutes, the boys even played peek-a-boo through the fence. Priceless. Still more work to do before posting a photo up here.
Robert has grudgingly worked on phonics and reading with me, but never really tried it on his own unless it was expressly assigned. Until today. We are walking home and he's staring off at something. I hear him whisper, "Sssss-t-op." Then he turns to me and smiles, "That sign says 'stop'." Later, Matthew walks by and Robert points at his shirt, "That says 'mom'." He's not asking. He's not showing off. He's just stating a fact. I playfully scold him for learning to read, and I moan loudly about how I will never be able to hide another secret from Robert because now he can READ! That makes Robert smile. He wants an example. I say, "What if I tell Alice to hide something behind d-a-d?"
"Dad!"
"Argh! You would know where to find it! See? No more secrets."
Then I spell other "secret" words and places and he loooooves figuring them out, too.
***************
We're walking home from school and we take a new route. It's a fun little side trail that meets up with our usual route about halfway. We turn onto our usual route and Robert suddenly recognizes where we are. Delighted. He wonders out loud if the new route is shorter than the usual route. A shortcut. I mention that maybe I could use my pedometer to compare distances next time. The next thing I know, he's explaining to me how I could take larger steps on the longer route to make it so the two routes would appear to be the same number of steps.
Seriously, Dude? You're 5 years old...and totally right.
I don't naturally think about the world that way. Alice doesn't seem to, either. Surprise! Robert's different (again). Moments like these are a thrilling peek into his perspective and a terrifying reminder that this mom thing is way more complex than I like to admit.
It's too late at night for me to start a blog post, so I will keep this brief. Or not. I just had to share a major gardening DIY victory with you. I'm building a trellis for my brambles (finally!) and it's hard work. My body is soooooo tired.
I borrowed our neighbor's post hole digger, which the boys loved to see in action. Robert kept sticking his leg down into the hole as far as it would go. James tried it, too, but somehow accidentally got both legs into the hole, and Robert went crazy wanting to cram both of his legs down a three-foot-deep rabbit hole, too. Once he was in up to his hips, he asked me to step on his head to shove him in deeper.
Seriously, dude?
James was happy to step on him, by the way, and Robert tells me it worked well.
That was the first hole. It was the easy one. The second hole ran into some random brick/concrete/metal debris that my neighbor muscled through for me. Such a nice guy. Thanks, Wayne. We'll be delivering some cookies to him tomorrow when I return the post hole digger.
The third hole was a real doozy. That's the hole that put me in this world of hurt. In order to line up the three posts juuuuuust so, I had to put the final post in the middle of a buried tree stump. Not just any tree stump, either. A seriously tough hardwood stump from a tree that used to stand 20-30 feet tall. Ouch. I purchased a hatchet and hacked out part of the stump. Robert and James found the idea of me wielding a freakishly sharp ax fascinating. They tussled over who would get to stand closest to me while I hacked away.
Matthew napped through much of this, but spent a good amount of time in the front yard, too, today. He ate some mulch, shimmied over cobblestone borders, and whacked sticks on stuff. He even attempted to stand unassisted in the middle of our sloped driveway. He almost succeeded. I did not allow him anywhere near the ax :)
The hatchet wasn't enough, however, so I pulled out my cordless reciprocating saw. The boys liked that, too. Alice came out to play and begged Robert to join her in a "stranded pioneer" imaginary game. He just couldn't pull himself away from watching the saw...or the ax...or crawling through the thorny maze of raspberry canes...again and again. I chipped and sawed and pounded and dug around that silly stump for hours. Finally, finally, the hole was just right and I put the third post in place.
Ahhhh. So pretty.
The trellis is not done, but I already love it. I topped the 4x4 posts with some nifty caps I found in the DIY deck section at Home Depot. They're a nice touch. Very classy. Now to find a way to transport a 16-foot length of livestock fencing to my house...hmmmmm.
So, um, I forgot to celebrate James' 1000th day on the blog. Or at all :( For shame! Fortunately, I did happen to take a picture of him on that glorious day, June 30th, 2015:
He's enjoying a couple grapes in this photo, so his cheeks are bulging and his eye dimples are deeper than ever. I love those eye dimples. I've written a lot about James recently on this blog so I don't have any more data to expound or explicate. His developing personality intrigues me, though, and I'm interested to see where he takes his strengths in life. His major strength right now is independence. He just up and does what he wants to do and he's so dang proud of himself for it.
And just for cuteness, I'm posting this quick peek at Robert and James in one of their more cooperatively playful moments. Bob and Loretta might recognize the tricycle...
Alice did 83 push ups in a row this week. She had the highest number of push ups for the girls and the boys. She was stinkin' proud of herself and every adult she ran into after that moment learned about her amazing feat and rewarded her with the appropriate jaw-dropping gasp and verbal kudos.
Well, last night at bed time, Alice starts complaining that her arms hurt a little. We send her to bed anyway.
This morning at breakfast, she cannot bend her elbows. Either of them. She's sobbing and wailing at the pain. Sore muscles! She does eventually feed herself breakfast and get herself dressed, but she doesn't give me a real hug goodbye because it hurts too much.
Alice does not tolerate the slightest bit of pain. Zero pain threshold, this one. Knowing this, we send her to school anyway.
The neighbor friend that we walk with is also enrolled in the FitKids study and will be taking her push up test today. She's intent on beating Alice's record, even after Alice bemoaned her sore arms all the way to school. I find it interesting to see Alice wail about the pain but never once wish she had done fewer push ups. She wished quite often that the pain wasn't there, and she wished that there could be some other physical disability instead of the pain (weak, wibbly arms was one of her suggestions), but she did not regret accomplishing 83 push ups. I find that notable. And I look forward to seeing her after FitKids today...
[LATER]
So, Alice's arms are still sore, but her left one is pretty much functioning
like normal. Alice came home from FitKids today with a prize. Apparently, she was the top female performer in three of the physical tests they had run everyone through: push-ups, curl-ups, and something called "pacer" that sounded a lot like a 50-meter dash. She now has her own FitKids t-shirt and a powerful determination to remain the strongest and fastest girl of the bunch. Who knew she had a competitive streak?
Last week, our family turned 80 gallons of free apples into 14 gallons of applesauce (2 gallons eaten fresh, 12 gallons canned). It was long, hot, sticky work over the course of 3-4 days, and we spent more money on take-out food than we should have, but that's how the cookie crumbled this year. I was surprised to find Alice and Robert were old enough to actually help.
Real help, not "help" help. Imagine that!
Robert cranking and Alice smooshing. They weren't afraid of the steam this year and they insisted that every batch much be sampled for quality control. James flirted with the idea of helping, but found the crank too tough to turn and the smooshing rod WAY more fun as a sword. Maybe you can try again next year, James.
I'm still afraid of junior high boys. There's a small cluster of them waiting for their bus as the kids and I walk to school every morning. I'm afraid they're going to shout out something mean at me. Or laugh at my outfit. Or call my kids stupid. I find myself running these scenarios in my head. Do I shout back? Do I ignore them? Do I find a new route to school?
Ugh.
They probably don't care about me. I'm an old lady with four little kids. But man, I'm terrified of them.
I'm still trying to figure out Robert. Just when I think I understand where he's coming from, he does something completely different.
One thing is for certain: he gets anxious when he's faced with a new task that involves people or routines he doesn't know yet. Anxious in a way completely unknown to Alice. Robert has been turning in daily homework for the last few weeks, but when he wants to enter the poster contest, he brings his entry back home because he doesn't know how or when to hand it to his teacher. Really?! Apparently, entering a contest isn't part of the usual school routine and his teacher doesn't ask for it explicitly, so Robert kinda shoves it back into his bag and figures he won't enter the contest after all.
The painful thing is, I remember doing something almost exactly like that as a kid. Several times. And even once as an adult. I get that sunken-gut feeling again just thinking about it.
So! I know where's he's coming from. Sort of. His motives are still unclear to me. I can't always predict how he will respond in new situations. Like today. It was "Bring a Friend to Lunch Day" at his school. He didn't want to bring anyone, but I kept hassling him and asking him about it and he finally (hesitantly) chose me. His teacher invited us to come a little before lunch so we could see them turn in their homework. Robert smiled every time he saw me in his classroom. I could tell he liked having me there. But when it came time to go to the cafeteria and start eating, he said it felt like any other play date at a friend's house. We moved outside where some classmates sat down by him. I wanted to see him interact with classmates and excitedly show me all the bits of his school life, but he didn't. He wanted a drinking fountain. We found one, read a couple books at the Book Fair, then headed back out to the playground, "That's all I really wanted to do anyway," he said. I asked him if he wanted me to stay and watch him play. "Well, it's just like lunch recess now, so they will watch me. You can go." I left.
I was disappointed in the experience. It wasn't what I had expected. He wasn't who I expected to see. He was his "public" persona, not the Robert I see at home with his siblings. So, I asked him much later if he was glad he had invited me to come to "Bring a Friend to Lunch Day." He said "yes" with a genuine smile, so I believed him. But there was nothing much in the experience itself to show me that. Or maybe there was and I just wasn't seeing it. I have so much to learn about reading this kid.
He's too much like me and nothing like me all at once.
Matthew has taken his first steps...and then some. I was dying to share the good news on the day it happened, but my computer was dead! Here he is walking towards a bunny cage (we were pet-sitting for a friend), then crawling over to see the camera:
I can't get enough of that breathy excitement and big, smiley face. This kid just makes me happy.
Well, a week later, Matthew has had a little more practice and we were able to make a game of it tonight. This clip is towards the end when he was already pretty tired. He wanted lots of hugs from me:
I love, love, love how he walks to Alice and Robert. And having him melt backwards onto me was pretty sweet, too. He did not, however, want to walk to James, even when James was in Bobby's lap. We finally coaxed Matthew to lean forward and stumble well enough that James was convinced it was walking. Whew, no hurt feelings.
I don't blame Matthew for his discerning reluctance. James is kinda rough on the little guy. Half the time he's trying to be mean (e.g. squeezing Matthew's hands or tackling his back half so he can't crawl away or yelling in his face to make him cry), and the other half of the time James is just loving too roughly (big, smothering hugs that knock Matthew over, slamming the bathroom door in his face to keep him away from the toilet, or handing/throwing toys to him and accidentally smacking him). Matthew has developed a special warning grunt/squeal just for James. It's a little like the sound you make when you're starting a new exercise routine with long, slow sit-ups. Nnnnnng-uh.
I just love this little man! Now that he's on the verge of toddlerhood, his hair suddenly looks way too shaggy. Time for his first haircut. You can look for that blog post soon ;)
So, um, James is potty trained now. It happened way faster and more completely than I ever could have imagined. He just got it. Right away. It's freaking me out. Shouldn't I still be cleaning human waste from my carpets twice a week at this point?
All the things that I hate about potty training were completely bypassed this time: hourly "potty turns," cleaning solid waste from underwear (and the floor, and his legs, and my hands), accidents on furniture, accidents in the car, accidents out and about, urgent potty emergencies, bedwetting...totally not an issue with James. I'm completely flabbergasted!
Blown away.
He doesn't even ask for treats anymore. It's been 10 days. WHAT?!
My computer has been severely crippled for the last week or so. At first, I enjoyed the excuse to digitally disconnect from everything and spend time working on more analog projects. Four days later, I was feeling deaf and blind...I had no idea what was going on with my friends or extended family. A day after that, I realized I also felt voiceless. Silenced. I couldn't share any of my good news or struggles with anyone because I was digitally mute.
Then I remembered the telephone.
I called my mom and spilled out all my news in a whirlwind conversation that *almost* made me late picking up Robert from school.
That brief conversation was good, but not enough. I'm glad to be back online.
I knew I had become dependent on my computer for gathering information, but I never pegged it as a place where disseminating information was just as (if not more so) important to my happiness. I mean, I'm "me" all the time, right? Why should I feel any less "me" if I can't blog about potty training or making applesauce? Maybe it's composing an email or blog post that solidifies the experience for me? Dunno, but it's important.
The Master Gardener walk this spring inspired me. I decided I was finally ready to commit to a new front yard, but not willing to do all the plant research and back-breaking work myself.
(Yes, I will design a chicken coop and construct it myself in my garage while 7 months pregnant, but please don't make me research ornamental plants and yard design manuals. I find the artistic side of design a little tedious and intimidating and exhausting.)
So, we called in the professionals at Country Arbors Nursery in Urbana to propose a design. I was not initially impressed with their service, but found the design attractive and simple and clean. Just what I wanted. And the price was right, too. They just finished the installation an hour ago:
Hostas, boxwoods, and an "accent boulder" line the front walk. There's an empty swath on the right for planting annuals.
Flagstone path from front porch to lawn, accent boulder, crisp lines around the trees.
Flagstone path from lawn to hose, serviceberry tree (edible berries!), a variety of visually-appealing ground covers, and a few hydrangeas under the cedar. Gotta find a better place for the hose box until these plants grow up and fill in a bit more.
Right side of the front (serviceberry, etc.)
Left side of the front
So, not only did they create new garden beds and select and arrange certain pretty plants just-so, but they managed to connect the new bed to our recent drainage work! It's a seamless and artistic blend of form and function.
They also took out all the river rock and corroded black plastic that had filled in the garden beds until now.
The installation included soaker hoses under the mulch for easy watering. How cool is THAT?!
And the nursery provides a full replacement guarantee for the plants for one year.
I am so, so, so pleased. So happy with the new look. So excited to learn how to care for these plants and keep these garden beds looking great.
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