| Baby. Baby. | | Date Created: Mar 14, 2007, 04:35 PM |
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This is a picture of my new niece, Simmons! She was born yesterday! And my friend Becca had a baby boy, Davis, on Saturday! YAY!
The boys are confused that Harriette had a girl because she already had a girl. I said, but I have three boys and no girls. They had no comment other than John: "I have a gay-uhlfriend named Kristin." Kristin is our much-loved friend and babysitter.
In other misunderstandings, today while I was fixing lunch James came in the kitchen very proud of a quarter he found somewhere. "I need it to play football," he said. Will and I said, "Hunh?" "I want to play quarterback!" James said.
Our trip to Florida was really really wonderful. Harriette didn't have the baby until after we left, of course, but that might have been good because we got to spend a lot of time with her, Elly, and her husband, Michael, before all the excitement began. The boys were PRETTY good. Not great, but good. My dad knows a guy who is captain on a big yacht, so we got to go see it. James and my dad have this whole "Old Salt" relationship. They love to ride in the boat together and talk about boats, radios, ropes, boat canopies, and thrilling stuff like that. When my dad once told James that he was Old Salt and James was Young Salt, James said, "No! I am not Young Salt! I am NEW Salt!" So that's how James became New Salt and he and my dad started bonding over all things nautical. James had a wonderful time touring the boat. He got to turn the huge "pirate ship wheel," talk on the radio, and pull the horn. He got to go down below and see the engines. He asked the tough questions of the captain, such as "Where's the anchor?" All in all it was a lot of fun. Elly was adorable the whole time. When something funny or neat happens she giggles, "Oh my gosh!" or "Cool!" but still in a baby voice so that you ask yourself, did she just say, "Oh my gosh?" Whenever she sees one of the boys she says, "Hey, George!" It's funny his is the name she remembers most because George has always been a little bit jealous of Elly. But this time, he was so sweet to her. Maybe she's big enough now that he can play with her instead of his thinking of her as a baby and "in his way" the big important man with very important duties that he is (hiding the wooden pepperoni pieces from the pizza set and fishing for the plastic seahorse). John had his usual troubles adjusting. There are two toy boats--one is Fisher Price Little People and the other is Mega Blocks. George had the indiscriminate carelessness to play with the Mega Blocks Captain on the Fisher Price Little People boat. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!! John wanted the yellow hard hat cup top, but not on the blue cup. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!! In the car on the way down in order to fall asleep, John still had to have the collection of crap that usually goes on his bed. He fell asleep with his blanket, fireman hard hat, glasses, and Gamecock baseball bat piled on top of him in his car seat. On the way down, he insisted on going to Bojangles. Will hastily Googled Bojangles locations in Georgia on his Blackberry only to realize there were none even close. When Will considered the possibility of driving into the unfamiliar territory of downtown Savannah way off our I-95 track, I said something like, Only for John would we be doing this! Why do we always cave to his demands? So being the tough love parents we were, we told John no. We wouldn't go to Bojangles. And as further punishment we would instead go to his most favorite restaurant on the planet, Waffle House. When Will told him that's where we would stop, John said, "I love you, Daddy." When I got him out of the car, he clung to me in a big hug and started kissing me. Ladies, if you are ever interested in Johnnie Bags, get thee to a waffle iron soon and start practicing. To John and James' credit, they did an incredible job with the potty situation. It was our first trip in big boy pants, and the boys did well, standing at various potties along the highway both clean and unclean. The trip home went less well. First of all, it had been Bike Week in Daytona Beach. My mom said there were something like 300,000 people in Daytona for the event. All 300,005 of us shared I-95 on the way home. It took us forever. We felt sure the guys would nap, but this did not happen. They did not rest or even be quiet. The entire time they discussed the day's pressing issues.
George: "There's a wecht." (wreck)
James: "Do you like pterodactyls, George?"
John: "Are you afraid of roller coasters, Daddy?"
George: "Do ants bite James?"
George: "Is this today?"
James: "What do 'G' start with?"
Such a range of topics you'd think I'd appreciate the conversation even though they all had a complete breakdown during one of our potty stops. We were somewhere in Georgia. We all went into the gas station just to get out of the car for a minute. At the gas station they had a whole shelf with NASCAR stuff. A Dale, Jr. lunchbox, remote controlled cars, mugs, keychains. Not only did all of the boys start screaming and fussing and dragging on the ground, all three of them shouted as loud as you can imagine, "BUY ME SOME NASCAR STUFF! BUY ME SOME NASCAR STUFF!" Would it have been any less embarrassing if they had yelled, "Buy me some candy!" or "Buy me those mud flaps!" Probably so. Despite the long trip home, though, it was a great trip.
To make things even happier, John pooped two days in a row on the potty. Which is a good thing because he did not poop once the whole four days we were gone! John, do you want to sit on the potty and try to poop? NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!! But once we got home he loosened up a little bit and I bribed him with doughnuts, even giving him tiny pinches of it to sweeten his tastebuds. So we went out yesterday morning to Atlanta Bread Company for breakfast to celebrate. John loves the pumpkin muffin tops. They promised to be good, but take it from me: their word is no good, people! The breakfast crowd at Atlanta Bread is not the rambunctious messy lunch crowd. People were gathered around laptops for work meetings, old ladies sat in groups sipping coffee and looking peaceful. Even the people behind the counter seemed especially zen. And then we come in to disrupt it all. While I am ordering, the boys are playing chase behind me. A woman is trying to reach around me to grab her order, but she has to dodge me back and forth as I try to corral the boys. Finally we get our food and sit at the table farthest away from everyone else that is not that far away. We get looks. Mothers of imperfect children, you know the ones:
Why did you bring them here? Have you any control over your children? Can't you see all we want is some peace and quiet around here? Shouldn't you be at home doing laundry or taking a shower? Have you no shame?
The boys settled into their muffin tops, though, and I thought the worst was over. But we started a new theme with a whole new set of looks. Remember, it was SO quiet in there. Suddenly the boys all had the croup. They coughed phlegmatic, loud, guttural coughs. Over and over again. Over, under, across on every surface within 10 square feet. Their noses ran, the snu splattered, the wet hands and faces dragged across the table and chairs. The new looks:
Thanks a lot, lady. Cute kids if you don't mind the snotty noses and occasional germ shower. Shouldn't they be at home if they're so sick? This is why there's sixteen different colds going around right now. Remind me never to sit at THAT table. And so you have it--this is why I don't have kids. Ever heard of day care, lady? Have you no shame?
It was terrible. We got up to go and went over the whole process. Momoe's going to throw the trash away. We are going to hold hands. We are going to stop at the road and watch for cars. We are going to stay close to Momoe. We will get in the car.
Who knew there would be a knock-down drag-out over who would get to hold my one available hand? (God forgive me for choosing a big cup of coffee over my children's sweet little hands.) I should have known. James did a stop-drop-and-roll when I had someone's hand other than his. Right when we were in front of the most populated tables with people who obviously have no children and now never will. I gave a shaky smile, dropped whoever's hand I had, grabbed James' and DRAGGED him out with the other two whining and grabbing on my clothes and pocketbook. What a celebration. All for the glory of poop.
Gotta run--the poopyheads are waking up! |
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