Say It Enough, You'll Start to Believe It
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Beautiful
Sweet
Silly
Sassy
Athletic
Fearless
Mine
Her daddy thinks we ought to ship her off to a convent in northern Iceland. I would tend to agree.
We might be in trouble with this one.
On her third birthday I told her everything I wanted her to know as she grew.
For her fifth birthday I made a video celebrating her.
Oh how she deserves to be celebrated.
The lone female, sandwiched between all that male.
And today she is six.
Happy Birthday, Katya Rose.
When I gave birth to my first child, more than one person commented how calm and natural I was with him. I wasn’t stressed or worried about people holding him or coming to visit. I didn’t ask people to wash their hands before picking up the baby and I didn’t fuss over his every sound and movement.
Part of that stems from the fact that I am an anti-germaphobe. Seriously, I kind of have to make myself worry about germs because honestly, that stuff just doesn’t bother me. (But I draw the line at my child licking ketchup off of a McDonald’s PlayWorld floor – which has happened. I’ll give you one guess as to which child it was.)
Part of it, though, came from the fact that motherhood did come naturally. I wasn’t fussy and worried about every little thing with my first child. From the moment he was born I felt completely at ease with being his Mom.
At least that’s what I thought, anyway.
Now that I look back on those early parenting years, I have to shake my head and chuckle at my obvious insanity.Was it obvious to every one else?
Don’t answer that.
I was Nazi Mom when it came to eating and sleeping. I had that child on such a rigid schedule that nothing was permitted to penetrate the iron walls of my control. I planned our entire day around Sloan’s eating and sleeping schedule and I refused to let anything interrupt that.
And today I have a first born who thrives on predictability. Coincidence? Doubt it.
Poor kid.
The problem with my tight little ship (yes, I know – there’s more than one problem with it) was that I was totally closed to spontaneity. I was completely uninterruptible.
If someone called and asked if I could watch their child while they ran an errand or went to the doctor, many times I hesitated. Having someone over would mess up the routine. Sweet Jesus, NOT THE ROUTINE!
As Sloan got older, and more babies came along, I loosened up a little, but I still did not love having our routine interrupted. I was also terrible about inviting other children into my home. I didn’t like it. Having to parent my child with others around made me crazy, so I avoided it.
I was so terribly selfish about my routine and schedule back then. While I often claimed to have a welcoming home, I did little to live that.
Until I met my friend Suzanne.
Suzanne was always willing to have my kids over – all three of them. Despite the fact that Tia and Landon were very young and required more time and attention, Suzanne would constantly offer to have them in her home. She picked them up for me. She fed them and played with them and loved on them. And I watched in awe at the way she allowed her day and her time to be interrupted without complaint.
My friend Bethany was equally amazing. If I had anywhere to be, she was always the first to offer to keep my kids. Even if they were sick, despite the fact that she had little ones herself, she’d wave her hand and say, “Who cares?” and urge me to bring them anyway.
Tia met her best friend, Noelle, on her first day of preschool two years ago. And I had yet another amazing example of someone willing to have their day and schedule interrupted. Noelle’s mom, Jennifer, had such a desire to foster good, healthy relationships between her children and their friends and she was rarely alone with her children. She constantly had someone else’s child with her, and Tia was one of the kids privileged to experience Jennifer’s love and grace.
Those three women weren’t the only ones who modeled to me what it meant to be interruptible. I had many, many friends show me how to be a true servant in this role called Motherhood and with each example, I found myself slowly but surely loosening the grip on my rigid schedule.
I’m still learning to be interruptible. I want my kids to know that they can invite people into our home and that I will welcome others with a warm greeting and not a frustrated sigh. I want to be willing to drop what I want to do so that I can foster and build healthy relationships for my children. I want to be Mom, Interrupted and to fill that role with a smile on my face and, every once in awhile, a plate of cookies in my hand.
I want to bless other parents and other children the way those women blessed me.
What about you? Are you interruptible?
I gave him a goal to start the year. A goal for my first born with a natural bent for learning, but not a love for the process. “If you finish two books before the month is over, I will take you some place extra special – just you and me.”
That’s all he needed. Motivated by encouragement and a promise, he zipped through two books in less than two weeks. Perhaps the goal was too easy, but I wanted it to be attainable. I wanted him to succeed because I wanted to reward him. And today, the reward comes to be.
Sloan and I are headed to Busch Gardens today, just the two of us. Wendy wrote a whole series of posts on dating our sons (and daughters) and every post was precious, but I was particularly fond of this one. One of our Christmas gifts from my parents was season passes to Busch Gardens and I am so excited to break in those passes with Sloan.
Of my three children, fostering a relationship with Sloan has been the most difficult journey, mainly because he and I are so very much alike in a lot of ways and so very different in other ways. Add to that the fact that he is simply getting older and he needs to be fusing more to his Dad at this time in his life, and you have a recipe for hard moments in our sometimes long days.
Sloan and I need to have some uninterrupted, do what we want, no-one-pulling-my-attention-away fun and tomorrow will be that day. The weather is going to be beautiful (seriously, I totally get why people come to Florida for the winter – it’s freaky awesome), and we are going to ride rides, play games and simply enjoy one another with no set schedule.
It’s been way too long since I dated my son.
So that’s where I am today. I’m building an altar with my cherished first born; an altar of remembrance to look back on with grace and fondness and, hopefully, a few secretive giggles. A lifetime’s worth of memories awaits us.
*happy dance*
Happy Tuesday, everyone.
BRAG ALERT! BRAG ALERT! BRAG ALERT! BRAG ALERT! BRAG ALERT! BRAG ALERT!
My husband is a freakishly good athlete. It’s actually annoying, really, how good he is a sports. He can play pretty much any sport well and when I say well, I mean better than the average population.
In college, one of my favorite past times was rollerblading. Oftentimes, I went out with a bunch of guy friends and I prided myself in being able to at least keep up with them as we buzzed around the Baylor campus, leaping down flights of stairs and doing various tricks without helmets…
So when Lee and I were dating and he told me he had never been on roller blades, I jumped at the chance to take him because I figured finally something I could do better.
Within fifteen minutes on his roller blades he was jumping, turning circles, skating backwards and doing tricks I would never even dare to try.
Punk.
It is with a small ridiculously large amount of glee that I tell you, however, that my husband can’t water ski to save his life. Image Gumby trying to get up on skis and that is about what Lee looks like. It is like a balm to my wounded pride to watch him water ski because I can do that better!
Anyway, the point is, my husband is an amazing athlete. He was a full ride scholarship collegiate basketball player. He was asked to play basketball professionally in Germany just before we got married. And we declined. It is our greatest regret to this day.
So it’s no surprise that I have three kids who are all good little athletes, with the youngest being so much like his Dad it’s a little eery. Landon is a natural with a ball. He always has been. Remember this video?
If you can get past my husband’s glaring hotness you’ll see a then 18 month old Landon dribbling the ball beautifully. Today, he can dribble with both hands while walking. Lee has him dribbling to the beat of music and many days, when he’s decided he’s had enough of the school thing, I can hear the basketball rhythmically bouncing outside…or inside.
And this Saturday, Landon’s four year old dreams came true when he got to start basketball. It was just a YMCA league so we could start slow, but Landon didn’t care. As we headed out Saturday morning, he confidently told us he was headed to the NBA finals.
Tell me, is there anything cuter than a four year old playing basketball?
Defense!
He scored four out of the five baskets his team made.
Landon isn’t the only Stuart child to get their father’s athleticism, though. Sloan is also a pretty amazing little athlete. While he enjoys basketball, the agression of that sport doesn’t match his personality, but baseball and golf are right up his alley.
In fact, we had a pro golf player pull us aside last week and tell us to start getting Sloan lessons and enrolling him in tournaments because he’s a natural with the golf club. “He could be great,” the instructor told us and I believe it. I’ve always known Sloan was gifted in golf, but it was so nice to hear it affirmed by someone else.
I don’t know much about golf, but apparently this is a great swing. I have pictures of him doing this when he was three. The first time we took Sloan to the driving range, he had just turned three. Lee set down a golf and we watched as he hit ball after ball anywhere from 25 to 50 yards.
College ticket?
And of course, Tia loves gymnastics and while she isn’t quite as coordinated with a ball, I could see her being a great soccer player. Mainly because I think she’ll bowl over anyone who tries to take the ball from her. She may have inherited the full brunt of her Daddy’s competitiveness.
Honestly, all three of my kids could grow up to be just average athletes. It doesn’t matter to me whether they’re great at sports or not. I want them to play what they love and love what they play. Sports are secondary. More than anything, though, I love the relationship that is growing between us and the kids as we bond over athletics. It’s fun. We love to go out in the yard as a family and just play.
And this picture is worth far more than any word I’ve typed today. It communicates wholly and fully the love and admiration that my kids have for their Dad and there’s a reason for that.
As good as Lee is as an athlete, he far more excels at being a father.
My children are blessed. (I might be, too).
update: We attended a different gym yesterday where Tia was evaluated by a new coach. It was a wonderful experience for me and for her. This coach was extremely encouraging and kind. He actually smiled and praised Tia. Thank you for your encouragement and prayers. Now I have to have the unpleasant conversation with her current gym about why we will be leaving.
Good times…
“You want a job?” he asked in his thick accent and I blinked in surprise. I had only stopped by to meet some local Russians so I could have contacts that would help me practice my language skills. I hadn’t even been thinking of asking for a job, but as I looked around the building I could see something special there so without missing a beat, I answered.
“Da.”
It was August of 2000 and I had been married all of one month. Neither Lee nor I had jobs when we got married. It was very exciting then. Or stressful.
Depends on who you ask.
We moved to Dallas after marriage because we thought Lee had a job lined up there, but it fell through on our honeymoon. I had just graduated from Baylor with a degree in English Professional Writing so it only seemed natural that I should work as a gymnastics coach.
The plan was for me to work at the World Olympic Gymnastics Academy for a little while until I found a full time job, but unexpectedly, coaching at WOGA wound up being the best job I’ve ever had. I loved it so much, in fact, that I continued to work there for two years. While I interviewed for some real, big girl office jobs, I just couldn’t leave the gym.
The environment was so electric that many days I went into work early just to watch the girls train. I watched Carly Patterson learn her famous Arabian dismount and and marveled at a teeny tiny Nastia Liukin flipping up and over the vault.
You never knew who else would be at WOGA, either. Some days you might walk in to see the cast of the Cirque Du Soleil warming up and practicing. Other times I came face to face with five time Olympian Oksana Chusivitania. It was always a surprise coming to work and I loved it.
One of the saddest things about moving away from Dallas was having to leave WOGA. It wasn’t just my work place. The coaches all became dear friends. Because I spoke Russian, Lee and I spent a lot of time with Evgeny Marchenko, Valeryi Liukin and the many, many other wonderful Russian coaches. For me, working there was like a dream. I was paid well and I got to speak Russian every single day.
Having grown up around gymnastics and working in that environment, I have a pretty good understanding of what good coaching is. I watched two All Round Gold Medalists train in their early years and I was mentored and guided as a coach myself. I know what good coaching looks like.
Unfortunately, for the last few months I have had my daughter in a bad coaching environment.
Tia is very good at gymnastics, but I’m a realist. Her daddy is six foot two and I’m five six so math tells me that she is probably going to outgrow gymnastics pretty quickly. I’m not looking to create a champion, but I do want to give her the chance to succeed in a sport she loves for as long as she loves it.
Sadly, the coaches at the gym we’ve had her at have almost killed her love of gymnastics.
Never in my life have I witnessed coaching like this, particularly from a head coach in charge of running the team program. I should have pulled Tia out of this program months ago, but I kept talking to other parents who would assure me this woman wasn’t that bad and she really was good with the kids and everyone who gives her a chance ends up loving her.
I gave her a chance for three months. It’s not working. Every time we need to leave for gymnastics, Tia develops a stomach ache and gets very weepy. She is terrified of this coach – and this woman doesn’t even coach Tia’s team. But she’s in close proximity screaming and shouting at other girls. I’ve honestly never seen anything like it and I worried it was just me.
Maybe I’m too judgemental? Maybe my experience at WOGA turned me into a coaching snob. Nobody else seemed as offended by this coach’s cruelty, so what is my problem?
Saturday I volunteered at a meet at the girl’s gym where I watched the little ones, levels two and three, compete. They didn’t do great, but it was their first meet and good grief they were cute in their little leotards and sparkly hair. As this coach walked by, I remarked, “The girls are doing great.” She cut her eyes at me and shrugged. “Your job is to be encouraging and tell them they’re great,” she said. “My job is to tell them they are never good enough. Unless they make it to State. Then I can tell them they’re good.”
And then I scraped my jaw off the floor, picked up my things and began researching new programs.
Yesterday I called another gym to talk to them about their team program. I wanted to be sensitive to the situation. While I find the coach’s methods at our current gym just short of abusive, I am not going to bad mouth her around town. So I delicately asked, “Do you all make gymnastics fun? Because my daughter is five and I just want her to enjoy it, not spend an hour and a half doing sit ups and pull ups and being barked at to suck in her stomach.”
“Aaahhh…” said the coach on the other end of the phone, “You must be coming from —. We have 2-3 new gymnasts enrolling in our gym every week who are coming from that gym and I can promise you, we do things differently here.”
So it turns out I’m NOT the only one appalled by bad coaching.
If you feel so led, please say a prayer for my sweet daughter’s heart as we try out this new gym. At this point, I think she may be slightly traumatized and we’ve already decided that if we need to pull her out of gymnastics for awhile (or forever) we will. While good coaching can take little girls to the gold medal platform, bad coaching has the power to kill their dreams altogether.
I’m kicking myself for waiting this long.
I read The Help this summer as we made our long and exhausting move from St. Louis to Florida. I was emotionally vulnerable and the book was the perfect escape during that first week we were here. I got lost in the story, the rich development of the characters taking me out of my momentary troubles and giving me someone to root for.
I was most struck by the relationship between Aibileen and Mae Mobly, the little girl she watched and loved. Aibileen took it upon herself to make sure that little girl knew and understood her value and her worth.
“You is good. You is kind. You is important,” Aibileen crooned to Mae Mobley over and over in an attempt to undo the emotional harm and pressure the child received from her young, inexperienced and judgemental mother. This relationship was precious and I bawled, both in the book and in the movie, as Aibileen walked away from Mae Mobly after giving her one last reminder.
“You is good. You is kind. You is important.
I’ve thought about this a lot as I’ve parented my children these last few months – particularly as I have schooled them at home. I will be the first to admit my weaknesses as a mother. While I am constantly challenging my children to be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry I myself am not always following that.
I am slow to listen, quick to speak harshly and even quicker to become angry. And in so doing, I tear my children down. I. Hate. That.
Sloan takes the brunt of my quick to become angryness. Mostly because he is equally quick, and perhaps even quicker, to become angry and I react. It’s not that I don’t try to stay calm and patient. I try and I try and I try. And he pushes and he pushes and he pushes.
Round and round we go until one of us snaps. On the precious few days when I manage to not be the one to snap I collapse into bed exhausted and depleted of all sense of myself. Most days, however, I crawl into bed heavy hearted at once again losing control of my own emotions. And I wonder…
Does he know that he is good and kind and important? If I think back on the days events have I given him any reason to believe that I see him as good…and kind…and important?
The thought that perhaps my child is going to sleep unsure of these things can be paralyzing. He knows I love him. He knows this because I tell him all the time. A hundred times a day he hears me say I love him and I sincerely mean it when I say it. I love that child fiercely.
But does he know how good I think he is? Does he know that I think him to be one of the kindest young boys I’ve ever known? Does he know how important he is not only to me, but to so many others? Does he know?
Today found Sloan and me locked in yet another battle of the wills. Each day is new and yet each day is the same. It’s a battle and a war and some days I feel like I am losing. I’m at battle with all three children, of course. You’re at battle with your kids, too, if you think about it. We’re all fighting the war against their sinful natures and desires. We all wake up each morning and walk into the battle zone and it’s a war we must win when they are young and their hearts are pliable and easily molded.
As I felt the frustration bubble up inside of me, I looked into his challenging eyes and saw so much anger. So much confusion. You see, Sloan isn’t the only child needing correction in our home, but he receives it more than the others. This is partly his fault and partly mine. He tries to parent the other two kids and gets in my way and so I have to deal with him before I can deal with them. But many times I deal only with him and forget to correct the other two for pestering and nagging him in the first place. And Sloan feels worn down – I can see it.
So after a particularly grueling hour of back and forth, I stopped and grabbed his hand. I was angry and he could tell, but I was fighting against the anger with every fiber. Looking deep into his baby blues, I spoke softly.
“Do you know that you’re good?” I asked. He blinked, surprised by my reaction.
“Do you know that I think you’re amazing? I think you are kind and gentle and humble. Do you know how good you are?”
Slowly, he nodded his head yes.
“Do you know that I think you’re important? You’re important to me and you’re important to God. Do you know that?”
Again he nodded, his eyes welling up with tears.
“Good,” I said, the anger melting away. “I want you to know that.”
I’d like to say his behavior changed and that he was immediately kinder and gentler with me and his brother and sister. It didn’t exactly work that way, but as the day went on, when he lost control I would look him in the eye and raise my eyebrows and he would stop and nod.
He knows.
He does know. And my prayer tonight is that he would embrace those things and bury them deep. Tomorrow is another day of battle and I feel more prepared now that I’ve added another weapon to my arsenal. We’re going to win this war, he and I. He’s too good and too kind and too important for me to give up on.
Losing is not an option.
As the smells of dinner waft through the house and the sounds of love eminate from my iPad, I have to smile. Because Michael Buble singing “Fever” makes me smile. And melt a little. And sigh a lot.
And day dream.
Seriously sexy voice…
…
I’m sorry – where were we?
I walk to the sink with the intention of cleaning the dishes when he grabs me and spins me around into his arms. “Dance with me,” he whispers and so I do. You don’t say no to six foot two of pure brawn. Am I right?
Sorry. I just had to take a moment to stop laughing at the pure brawn remark. Sometimes I really crack myself up. It’s terrible…
Seriously, though. I love it when he dances with me after dinner. And secretly, I think the three pairs of little eyes that watch us glide across the tile floor love it, too. I mean, I know they gag and roll their eyes and giggle uncontrollably, but mostly I know that they love to see him sweep me off my feet.
(I am refering to my husband when I say ‘he.’ You know that right? That was clear? Just wanted to make sure.)
“Dip her and kiss her,” the oldest and wisest usually yells and we are always willing to comply as they clap their hands over their eyes and squeal in mock horror.
“Dat’s soooooo gwoss!” the four year likes to yell just before he leaps off his chair and tries to steal me away from the man of my dreams by latching himself to my leg and grovelling for a dance. And what can I say…I agree. I’m a sucker for his freckles.
So I dance with Landon, and he gives me a twirl, then a dip and, if I’m lucky, a kiss. I catch the eye of my first partner and an unspoken message crosses between us. This is kind of awesome.
Lee then grabs his one and only daughter and sets her on his toes and together they twirl – Cinderella and her Prince. I, being always in high demand (ahem), have a dance request from yet another partner, the dashing eight year old with eyes as blue as the ocean. We spin and dance to the soft music of Harry Connick Jr. crooning through the media, dinner cooling on the plates but joy warming our hearts.
And in a flash, Sloan spins me back in his arms. The arms of the one who swept me off my feet twelve years ago. The one I’ve been dancing with for more than a decade. The one who shares these small people with me. Together we dance as they watch.
They who are our love song.
And I look in his eyes and know that we have a lot of dancing left to do. May it be that we are still dancing fifty years from now, together and with them. And maybe there will be more young eyes watching?
I can’t think of anyone else with whom I’d rather dance through life.
As we head into our second semester of homeschooling, I thought it might be fun to give a little update on how things are going so far. Fun for me, anyway. This has the potential to be wildly boring for you.
I’m kidding!
Please keep reading…
So after four months of homeschooling, we’ve got a few things solidly under our belts. Those things are, in no particular order:
- The kids can all read Latin fluently.
- I churn butter every night before bed.
- Tia knits daily. Yesterday she made me a sweater.
- Landon is reading Socrates.
- Sloan split an atom just before Christmas.
- We survived.
…….
Okay, so maybe only one of the above statements is true. Although Sloan did receive a microscope for Christmas and I’m quite certain he’s on the path to atom splitting. Or, you know, he may just continue to look at boogers under the contraption. Hard to say at this point.
There are many, many aspects of the homeschooling journey that I have really loved, the largest one being freedom. I really, really love the freedom we have to follow our own schedule. I love that we are still on break this week simply because we can be. I love that I can stop lessons for the day at 1:00 in the afternoon and we can just read books the rest of the day. I love that I don’t have to have them all up, dressed and ready to go for the school bus that comes rolling through here at 7:15.
Lawdy that’s early…
On the other side of that coin, the freedom sometimes freaks me out. For example, many times we are through with all our lessons by 1:00-1:30 and I find myself twiddling my thumbs and worrying that maybe I missed something. That leads to a whole train of thought that eventually has me picturing Sloan sorting trash at a local dump someday because he couldn’t get into college because I failed him in the second grade.
It’s a vicious train of thought.
I have to constantly remind myself that I’m not likely going to destroy their education. We are learning every day and we’re doing it at a pace that works for them, so that has to be a good thing, right? Not knowing the standards for what they should be learning is what has given me greatest cause for stress, though. Am I doing too much? Am I doing too little? Sometimes it overwhelms me.
Then my four year old labels all fifty States on a map and names more than half of their capitals and I think, We’re doing just fine.
Or Sloan walks by and, just for fun, speaks to me in alliteration. Then there was the time he reenacted the entire sinking of the Titanic at the lunch table with two apple slices and a piece of bread. He is such a kid after my own heart.
Tia is still not reading fluently, but she gets a little better every day. As I mentioned earlier, though, she’s a bit of a whiz with the evil numbers and is well on her way to needing first grade math curriculum.
The hardest part of homeschooling, for me, has been the lack of alone time. There are so many things that I want to do and not having the children home all day would make accomplishing those things a frillion times easier. There are some days when I daydream about packing it all in and marching them to the local school so I can have two minutes of peace and quiet to think.
But in the end, I still know this is right for us and that it will be worth it. I will not regret this time I have them home. The kids may regret it but I will not.
The jury’s out on whether or not we continue homeschooling. At this point I would like to do it for a couple more years, maybe, but I don’t see this as a long term thing. I don’t know why that is, it’s just a feeling I get. We have joined a homeschool co-op for this semester, which I am excited about so I won’t be going it alone anymore.
I’ve felt like Ma Ingalls quarantined on the prairie these last few months as I’ve journeyed down this path all by myself. And yes, Little House on the Prairie analogies are totally apropos if you’re a homeschooler.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I hear my little budding scientist in the kitchen now turning on the stove and cracking eggs. Um…yikes.
It was a beautiful December day here in the Sunshine State. Days like today are why people spend their winters in Florida. We spent much of the day soaking in the warm rays of the sun, while also being delighted with a cool breeze.
For those of you who live somewhere cold, please don’t hate me.
The view from my perch.
Around 1:00, the natives grew restless. I didn’t feel right letting them watch a movie on a day like today, and in return they didn’t feel right about letting me sit poolside and read.
Savages.
So after an hour of hearing about the injustice of such imposed boredom and the true cruelty of expecting them to entertain themselves I packed up the antsy brood and off we went to the park where I planned to continue my lounging while they ran off pent up energy.
Upon arriving at the park, I rejoiced to find a long swinging bench mercifully vacant and I settled in for a bit of relaxation only to discover that the smallest of the children had different plans in mind.
“Hey Mom, wanna play house wif us?” Landon asked. I looked over at Tia who widened her eyes pleadingly, which is a completely unfair tactic. Puppy dog eyes are cruel and unusual.
“What do I have to do to play house?” I asked wearily.
“How about you be the Mom and we’ll be the kids,” Tia answered.
Um…
“Okay,” I said. “Kids, go play and let Mommy rest for a bit!”
“No, Mom! That’s not how you play!” Foot stomp.
Seriously?! Puppy dog eyes and a foot stomp? She’s good, ladies and gentlemen.
“But I’m the Mom so I can tell you what to do, right?”
“No, Mom. You have to get up and come over here and drive us to school. Then you have to take us to the store and then you have to take us to Chuck E Cheese. That’s how you play!”
Funny. I always assumed that playing pretend actually took us out of real life.
“Okay,” I said. “But this swinging bench is my car so hop in.” And away we drove. I dropped them off at school, then picked them up, then we headed to the store.
“C’Mon, let’s go shop.”
“Uumm…” I stalled. “Let’s pretend I broke my leg and I have to ride in one of the motorized carts at the store. This bench will be my cart.”
“Aw, yeah!” they yelled and away we went. Notice that so far, I haven’t had to move from my bench.
Finally the “errands” were done and we arrived home. ”Alright, you guys go play now,” I said waving them on, stepping out of my role as pretend Mom and into my role as real Mom. It’s all very confusing, I know…
“No, Mom! Now you need to make dinner!”
*sigh*
“Tell you what,” I reasoned. “How about you be the Mom now and I will be the long lost Aunt who came for a visit, okay?”
“Alright! What’s your name?”
“Uh…Toto? Oh and hey – let’s pretend that I came from far, far away and I’m super tired so I have to lay down and sleep. How does that sound?”
“Hey, yeah!” they cried. “And this bench can be your bed and we will rock you while you sleep!”
Deal!
So I laid down, closed my eyes and they rocked me back and forth, back and forth until I literally began dozing off.
“Mom. Hey Mom!” They shook me and I squinted up into their displeased eyes.
“This game is boring,” Tia said with a frown. “We don’t want to play anymore.”
“Yeah,” echoed Landon. “It’s bowing.”
“Can we go play on the playground?” Tia asked.
I looked at them for a silent moment then let out a small sigh. “Well, alright. If you really want to go play, I guess I don’t mind.” And off they ran, forgetting all about needing my entertainment. I laid back down then, my swing moving slowly back and forth in the afternoon breeze. Alone.
Seriously. I should get some kind of award for that…
Four.
It all just happened really…
Really…
Really…
Reeeeaaallllyyy…
Fast.
No longer a baby.
Loaded with personality.
“Wiggle your nipples, Dad!” he begged last night.
Different day. Different blog. Definately a story that needs to be told.
Part of me longs for one more day with this baby.
Probably the same part of me that wishes I was still in my twenties…
But mostly, I just really adore this amazing little boy.
This boy who turns FOUR today.
Happy Birthday, Landon.
Visual proof of the personality that keeps us in stiches. Man, I love this kid…
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