| Rock Stars | | Date Created: Feb 20, 2007, 03:47 PM |
|
I'm back! I've been keeping my head just above water. And Will, too. The other day I told my therapist how tired I've been lately and she looked back in my file and this exact same time last year I complained of the same thing. She said it was my natural need to hibernate this time of year and do as little physical activity as possible and that it's perfectly okay. This is why I pay that woman good money! But I really haven't been able to DO much hibernating--mostly cleaning up potty accidents and washing loads and loads of underwear. But still, I feel better haivng a reason for why I just want to crawl up under the covers more than usual.
Yesterday was finally warmer at least and it did give new life to my normally out-of-sorts Tuesdays. Will's mom kept the boys early in the morning while I had a tennis lesson and then I picked them up and we went to the park. It had been a while since we'd been to the park, and I was amazed by how much easier it is now that the boys are older and can at least understand concepts such as "stay out of the road" and "come to me when I call you" if not abide them. Besides making sure James didn't steal one of the shovels from another little boy in the sand box I really just sat back and enjoyed watching them play. I'd brought some coffee with me and that made it even better. Last week at school the teachers commented that the boys really needed to "get out and run" which is nice-teacher code for "they were bad today". So since then I have tried to get them running off as much steam as possible while we're outside. And with the weather turning a little warmer (I hope for good), it's getting so much easier to do that. After the park we met Will at a pizza place for lunch and that was fun for all of us. To have contact with an adult halfway through my day with the guys is a special treat, especially if that adult is my special someone. Once we got home it was only a few minutes after James pooped in the potty (Yay! And a Girl Scout cookie as a reward--for BOTH of us), that he had a major major mudslide down his pants. A shower then bath was the only option, and so once all the yuckiness was washed off, I threw the other boys in for good measure saving Will and me from having to give them a bath that night. So the mudslide did have a pot of gold at the end of it. For the second day in a row, George did not take a nap but instead talked and sang for about an hour and a half. Of course I am not mean enough to be mad when the little guy sings, but almost. Singing is sweet, happy, blah blah blah--if only I didn't have to listen to it my entire one break of the day. If I couldn't hear it from every room in the house I wouldn't care, but it is almost as if it is piped into every room via tastefully hidden speakers. I am a person who needs quiet at least a little while every day. Only rarely do I get it, as you know, but one day around 1:00 in the afternoon while they are in first grade I will notice the quiet and really really appreciate it. I finally went to check on George after he called, "Mama! Mama! Mama!" I was worried he might have a poop or maybe fell out of the bed. But when I got there he exclaimed, "Mama, little x isn't in bed!" This is in reference to his latest favorite book--a mystery about the day the alphabet was missing little letter x. I really wasn't in the mood to star in George's stage adaptation of the book, but quiet time had pretty much maxed out anyway, so I woke up the other two guys and we went outside to run off MORE energy. We fed the ducks in the pond, played football, which is really John running everywhere with the ball running into his brothers and knocking them down, filled up the birdfeeder, and ended up with the classic "chop down trees." The trees in our front yard actually have rings around them about oh I don't know, 3-feet-high on their trunks that look as if some horrible pestilence of beetles has invaded on a mission to destroy. Which is no so far from the truth. By the end of the summer if I am ever sitting here at this computer and their favorite chopping tree should come crashing down on me I will not be surprised.
Today has been another good day. Two in a row for the first time in a very long time! I got a lot done while the boys were at school, including assembling tonight's supper in the slow-cooker. I am the queen of the world! And then I forgot to turn the slow cooker on. Not quite the queen of the world! When I picked up the boys and brought them back home we ate lunch and they brought up what letter words start with. They get the phrasing a little off, but that's okay. I was still impressed by their subject matter. "What do 'A' start with?" George was a very quick learner and already knew a bunch of words that start with each letter and was able to put all the information together. We discussed "hummingbird" for a while, because we have a bird book with a hummingbird on the front of it. I did the exaggerated phonics sound, "Huh, huh, huh," for "H" and of course George said, "H!" A little while later, John was looking at the bird book and pointed to the front and said, "Look! A Huh-huh-huh-huh hummingbird!" He also picked, though, in the book the red-bellied woodpecker out of all the other woodpeckers and remembered its name and remembered that it is the kind we have in our yard. I was pretty impressed! Then James picked up his little guitar and I swear he looked like a natural! I'm not bragging too much on the guys, I promise. I'm more surprised than anyone with this smart behavior. The last few weeks they have been absolute, 100 percent meatheads who throw plastic potties down the stairs and intentionally wipe their snotty faces on chairs rather than use a kleenex.
Smart isn't always a good thing. It can lead to smarty pants. George has been Mr. Excuse lately. The other day we went to a festival downtown and the boys got kettle popcorn. Each had his own bag. John ate his the slowest and so still had some left in his bag and was eating it in the car on the way home. George had already eaten his in about 30 seconds flat, of course, and now was dying to have some of John's. John did share some, but George wanted more and more. Will told him it was John's and that George had already eaten his own. George said no that he needed the popcorn. "It might get stuck in John's throat," he said.
Yesterday morning in the car, the boys were talking about me having a big car because I have to take them everywhere. Will has a Honda Civic. "Daddy has a little car," George said. "And one day it'll grow up to be a big car." Over the weekend we were all in the car and singing, "He's Got the Whole World in His Hands," which we have sung a thousand times before. I asked the guys, "Who is 'He'?" "The giant!" George said. It does make perfect sense.
So I think everything is on the right track around here, considering the singing quiet times and the ever-underlying insanity. I'd like to say I will write again soon, but as I told my therapist the other day, some days I feel as if Will and I both are clinging to a rock. But things are looking up, the weather is getting warmer, George is quiet today, the slow cooker is turned on, and Will will be home in 1 hour 17 minutes... |
|
|
