We're off...

The Traveling Trio is about to leave town for the cold, dreary, rainy weather of Seattle. What possessed us to leave 78 and sunny for 50 and rainy? Well, for one thing, we have tickets to see the live broadcast of Prairie Home Companion on Saturday. And, Seattle is fun! Great food, interesting museums and Aunt Sally, of course.

This past Saturday, we went to play tennis at our local college campus and stumbled upon a fairly large collegiate track and field meet. Serendipitously, the event that was starting when we got there was the girls' 4x100 meter relay (which I used to run). So, M and I watched that and the boys' 4x100 and then we wandered over to see the girls' long jump (also one of my old events). Must have been the least qualified girls because they weren't very good. My track coach would have loved to correct their form. And one girl scratched (crossed the "take off" line) on each of her first 4 attempts. M thought that the sprinting looked cool so he has been practicing to see how fast he can run - mostly in the house - ever since. I may make a track runner out of him yet!

"Good mommy" day

As I'm sure all of you who are parents can understand, sometimes you have "good" parenting days and some days you get to the end of the day and think, "Hmm, I fell down on the job today because I...[let my child watch too much TV, let him eat too much sugar, didn't pay enough attention, etc.] Anyway, I declared this afternoon a "no TV and computer" afternoon. I wasn't sure how this was going to go since I often use the TV as a way to keep M quiet if I have impromptu afternoon work calls. And, at first, you would have thought that I said we were throwing away every toy in the house, based on the fussing, crying and whining that this provoked.

I offered a trip to the library or time playing games together. At first both were summarily refused, but after M realized I was serious about no TV and no Wii and no computer, he quickly decided that a trip to the library would indeed be a fine idea.

I love our library. It is bright, airy and the children's section is decorated in a very inviting and fun manner. They have tons of books and very helpful librarians. We walked right over to the Berenstain Bears aisle. This aisle has the added bonus of also being the Arthur and Franklin books aisle too. So we loaded up with our first 10 books or so. All told, we left there with, I think, 18 books - all for M. He could not wait to get home and read his books. In fact, there was barely a peep out of him after we got home as he quickly devoured the first 7 books or so.

As we were there, reading books, wandering around, finding even more books to take home, I realized that (good) libraries and (good) book stores are very peaceful places for me. It appears that they are also a place that M enjoys spending time. Our friend, Sally, sent me a shirt last year that reads "Reading brings tranquility". I love that shirt.

Side note - As I was typing this, I was also baking shrimp scampi pizza. Well, the oven obviously needs to be cleaned b/c the entire house is full of smoke. And, the upstairs smoke detector went off (repeatedly) right outside of M's bedroom. Bet you can't guess who is sound asleep in the midst of all that racket? :-)

Eyes of a child

Last week, M and I were at the Target over on Colonial. It isn't my favorite Target, but it is the closest. As we got out of our car to walk to the store, we saw this big, rusty, white Cadillac driving down the parking lot aisle. It was so beat up! But, M looked at it, his eyes going wide and said, "Look at that FANCY car! Mom, did you see that car! Wow!!" And, then as it got closer and the many rusted out spots became apparent, he said, "Hmm. I guess it is a little dirty but boy is it fancy!"

I giggled to myself but later I got to thinking about it again. When is it that we lose the ability to look at the world as a place of joy and wonder? What happens that causes us to look at a rusty old car and only see a rusty old car instead of a fancy automobile? What would happen if we all kept looking at the world through the eyes of a child?

If you ask M about whether everyone should have health care or just people who can afford it, he says, "Well everyone should have it Mom. It is not fair for only some people to get medicine." If you ask M what he thinks about war, he says, "You aren't supposed to hurt other people and you can NEVER point guns at them. Don't their moms take away their guns if they point them at other people?"

See, all these issues we debate endlessly as adults could easily be resolved if we just remembered the basic rules we learned as kids.

Mom, you treat me good

Today M is still feeling lousy - just this weird virus I guess. Vomiting Friday night, high fever over the weekend, sore throat, headache and then today diarrhea. Ugh!

Anyway, I was called back up to M's room after I had put him to bed because "Mom I have to tell you something." So I went back up and got him some water, put the trash can by his bed because his tummy feels 'yucky' and tucked him back in again. Meanwhile, I'm thinking to myself, "please just go to sleep. I'm hungry, I'm tired and I just want to sit down and eat something and maybe read my book for a little."

Right at that moment, M looks at me and in his adorable little boy voice says, "Mom you treat me good." My heart just melted. It is like the closest you ever get, as a mom, to a gold medal or an award certificate. Just 5 little words that are worth more to me than any prize I ever won at school or any praise I get at work. At the end of the day, I'm most proud of achieving, "Mom, you treat me good."

Kissy Mischief Lips

Today, M and I were playing around and I was pretending to give him lots and lots of kisses. Now that he is getting older, he always tells me, "Mom, stop giving me so many kisses." But, what he doesn't know is that asking me to stop kissing him is almost like asking me to stop breathing. I love him SO much that I just have to kiss him sometimes. After all that B and I have been through on the "family planning" front, I honestly look at M and feel deep, abiding gratitude for his presence in our lives every single day. I wonder if parents who have not struggled as we have remember to feel gratitude for their child(ren) every day. I sure hope so.

Anyway, I digress. While we were playing and I was pretending to try to give M "too many kisses", he at one point yelled out "Keep your kissy mischief lips away from me!" I started laughing and I asked him if only I had 'kissy mischief lips' or all women. "Oh, all girls have kissy mischief lips," he replied. I'm making sure to record this so that when he is a teenager I can remind him that girls have 'kissy mischief lips' and he should be aware.

Born to read

There are many, many things that I adore about our son, but his love of reading is definitely toward the top of the list. Today he told B, "Dad, you know I was born to read." How adorable is that?!

If you get him a new chapter book, he will sit down, tune out the entire world and just READ for hours. I can very much appreciate this because I can do the same thing and used to do it a lot when I was a kid. My mom was always telling me to "get your nose out of that book" and I have given her a hard time about this for years. "Who tells their daughter to stop reading?" I always tease. Well, I hope she is reading this particular post because lately I have heard myself saying, "M STOP reading that book right now and...[put on your shoes, get ready for school, set the table for dinner]" and half of the time he holds the book in one hand and tries to comply with what I have asked him to do while not actually losing physical contact with the book. While the grown-up side of me finds this to be irritating because it is usually at a time when we need to be doing something else and in a timely fashion, the kid side of me remembers so well loving to have my book and not wanting to tear myself away. I hope his love affair with books lasts a lifetime!

Happy birthday to M

My sweet baby boy turns 6 today! I cannot believe that he is 6 years old already. Feels like we just brought him home from the hospital last week, sometimes. Now, unlike some moms, I don't cry at each birthday because so far every year has held joy and discovery as I watch my little man grow into the person he is destined to become. But, I will take this opportunity to reminsce a little.

Bringing M home from the hospital was joyful and overwhelming all at once. Having arrived a little early, he had jaundice and we had to keep going to the pediatrician's office every day for them to prick his tiny heel to see if his bilirubin count was going up or down. We tried putting him near the window for sunlight. We tried feeding him formula, which is better for jaundiced babies, they say. But he hated it so much that he refused to swallow it and just sat there glaring at us with his mouth open and the formula laying in his mouth. We finally used the nose suction bulb from the hospital to suck it back out. (We really should have been aware at that point ath he was going to be one stubborn child!) Finally, on Saturday, Feb. 14, they told us that he needed a bilirubin blanket to help resolve the jaundice. The only problem was that it was a long weekend and the only places that our insurance covered were either closed until Tuesday or out of bilirubin blankets. But he couldn't wait until Tuesday, he needed one now. They finally found one and it was brought to our house. The thing had a very short cord, so you always had to sit or place him in a seat near the socket. We had to drag his crib halfway across the room to stay close to the equipment and it was so frustrating. Then, my brothers and my dad showed up on Sunday and the boys came to the door, bursting out of the car in their excitement to see M, they left my dad way behind. They got to the door, took one look at M and yelled back out the door, "Hey Dad, M is here and he is glowing!!" It is one of my favorite memories of those first few, sleep-deprived, overwhelming weeks.

And that was 6, SIX, years ago. My oh my how time flies.