Game Boys

Luckily, I am not referring to the Nintendo gadget of the same name. Rather, Alex and Nate are suddenly game playing fools — the old fashioned kind. Alex is all about checkers, and I am amazed to see how he improves with each game we play. The other day, he brought home Connect Four from his after school program, and the first game we played I tried to be fancy for a long setup for a diagonal win, and he totally and fairly blindsided me with a move that had me unable to win. I was so impressed!

For Nate, it’s Go Fish. He loves it so much that he has started saying “Nope, Go Fish!” in response to every day questions. As in, “Nate, can you please bring me that book?” “Nope, go fish!” Also, even when we don’t have cards, the boys will play imaginary Go Fish, holding their hands up like they have the cards, asking each other for cards. We have a deck with letters, upper and lower case, so it goes “Nate, to do have an N for Narwhal?” “Nope, go fish! Alex, do you have a U for Umbrella Bird?” “Yes, here you go!” etc. They have all of the animals on the cards memorized, though the fake games also sometimes include “S for Seminoles” and “B for Bucs.”

But wait, there’s more. Between the rough week of separation last week and the colds the boys were fighting off, they had no desire to leave the house today. Instead, we played games. Guess Who? Chutes and Ladders. Go Fish. Concentration (the Leap Frog version). Wood Checkers. Tic Tac Toe. Good old fashioned Hang Man on a white board. Randomly spelling words on the Scrabble board. They just couldn’t get enough!

From Your Lips to God’s Ears

I got the sad news this weekend that my dear friend Colleen has taken a turn for the worst, and where only a month ago there was hope for recovery, now, there really isn’t. I have been terrifically sad about this all weekend, and have been prone to bursting out into tears. I finally had to explain to Alex why I was so upset. He has been extra kind and loving, knowing how sad I am. Tonight at dinner, after our normal grace, Alex proclaimed “I want to say another prayer, Mommy.” So we rejoined hands, and Alex said:

God, please help Mommy’s friend Miss Colleen. I don’t want her to die or be sick any more. I know that that is what happens in life sometimes. I hope you understand what I am trying to say. Please watch her more and more every day. Amen.

I was, you can imagine, just floored by his sensitivity and thoughtfulness. Then he turned to me and said “I really love you Mommy.”

Saturday

Took the kiddos to the pediatrician this morning, as they have been fighting colds all week.  Nate’s nose is alternately running and crusty, and is now sore at the delicate corner of his nostril from so much wiping.  Alex has had laryngitis on and off all week.  They’ve been troopers through school anyway (no fevers, thankfully), but I don’t think either of them has ever been so glad to see the weekend.

They were great at the doctors’ office, though.  We had to wait half an hour, and every time the door opened, Nate would ask, “is it our turn?!?!”  We passed the time playing Rock-Paper-Scissor.  Alex kept trying to control the game:  Mommy, you play scissor, I promise I won’t do rock.  I refused, of course, and finally he got the hint, realized I would do paper in response to that, and did scissors himself.   Good job Alex!  They also drew admirable comments from all of the staff for their full cooperation on the scale.

Diagnosis?  Viral upper respiratory tract infections.  We got some Dicel (LOVE that stuff — yay for sudafed!) and some ointment for Nate’s nose.  Oh, and the boys were so excited to tell the doctor their new knock knock joke. Well, Nate got shy and couldn’t quite do it, so Alex did:

Alex:  Knock, knock.

Doc:  Who’s there?

Alex:  HIPAA.

Doc: HIPAA, who?

Alex:  I can’t tell you!

Oh, did she ever laugh! Funnier still was the ensuing conversation:

Doc: Where did you learn that joke?
Alex: Some other lawyers told Mommy and Mommy told me and Nate so we could tell Grandpa and Aunt Katie and Nani.

Hey, that was spot on!

Uncharacteristically but very necessarily, both boys took a long nap this afternoon. Afterward, we played Go Fish for a few rounds, ran some errands, grabbed dinner and got the boys hair cuts. All in all, a good day of recharging.

I hate working late

It’s been a rough couple of weeks for me at work, and these rough times prove the adage that when mama ain’t happy, ain’t no one happy. My poor boys are just miserable when I work late (and by my poor boys, I am referring to Mike, too). While Mike doesn’t have a problem with having one on one time with Alex and Nate, Alex and Nate act out because they miss mama. Which makes the one on one time harder than it otherwise would be. The more late nights I have, the harder it is on the kiddos, and therefore on Daddy, too. Alex has taken to saying things like “Mommy, can I help you with your deadline so you can come home?” and “I hope you don’t have any more long papers” and “why do you have to write long papers for court?”

Tonight, was particularly bad, though there was a silver lining. Mike had a 5 pm hearing, and I didn’t know how I was going to tear away to pick up the kids. Luckily Mike understood my panic and quickly thought to arrange for our neighbors to do pick up (did I mention thank GOD we have neighbors whose two sons are in the same to programs as our sons, and that we like and get along with to boot?!?!?!). When he got home a little after 6:30, they ended up enjoying an impromptu dinner all together. That was the good part. The not so good part was that when the boys called me at 8:30 to say goodnight, Alex was a miserable, crying mess so bad that he couldn’t even talk to me. He was SO SAD that I was not home, yet again. It broke my heart. Nate, in the meantime, was pleasant enough on the phone, but acted out afterward by biting at Alex and generally making his bedtime miserable, so that Nate had to be separated from him and put in his own room for sleep.

I can’t wait for this craziness to be over. And there is no end in sight.

Ready to Be Star Student!

Click Photo to see All Journal Pages!

Originally uploaded by Through a Child’s Eyes

We had a lovely weekend with Olive the Otter. The picture to the right links to the group of five journal pages we made for Olive. I realized after the fact that we totally forgot the pictures of Olive at the library with us on Saturday (which were on Alex’s camera, and so poor quality). Oh well. Still, this little project gave Alex a lot of confidence this weekend to go in to this week of school as a Star Student. He has packed a picture of himself on his scooter as his show and tell picture, and Little Bunny Kung Fu as his show and tell object.

Play by Play

Watching Football

Originally uploaded by Dineen.

Alex kicked off football season this year by watching some ball with Daddy. Interestingly, he insisted on having his whiteboard on his lap, and this is what he drew.

Future Gardeners of America

Last weekend, despite Alex’s injury, we had a great time weeding and mowing together. In fact, Alex begged me to find him some garden gloves in his size, so during the week I found some dino gloves in toddler sizes, and this weekend we spent some more time weeding on the side of the house. The boys looked so cute that Mike ran in and grabbed the camera. I am glad he did!

Pedicure

As I write, my boys are giving me a pedicure. They are in the tub, and I have my feet in there too. Nate has a purple nail brush and is scrubbing my leg and toes. Alex is mixing shampoo with water in little cups to dip his tools in, and then pouring the soapy water on my shins.

It feels nice!

Before I taught him the word pedicure, Alex was calling this my “soap heel appointment.” This was totally their idea. They did it the other day for Mike, and I was told it was my turn tonight.

Now Alex is using his toy electric shaver to shave my legs. I can’t make this stuff up!

Olive Otter! Part 1

Alex has had a rough week at school.  Some behavior issues — typical five year old stuff, but stressful for him.  So it was really nice to see him come home so excited today to share something about school with me.  He whipped out a cute stuffed Otter and handed me a notebook, and inside the front cover was the following note:

Dear Star Student,
Please take good care of Olive Otter over the weekend, and return him on Monday. [Him? I would have thought Olive to be a girl's name, but OK.] Have Mommy or Daddy help write about what you did with Olive while he was with you. You will get to share this with the class. Feel free to draw a picture or add a photo to show what you and Olive did together….Enjoy!

Love,
Mrs. E

Apparently, he gets to be the “Star Student” of the week, which means a few things.  First, he has to fill out a questionnaire about his likes, dislikes, etc., and gets to bring in some favorite pictures and an item for show and tell.  And second, we do the aforementioned journal entries for Olive the Otter.

 We had some neighbors over to join us for dinner, and the four boys had fun posing with Olive. We had originally been planning a pretty lame weekend at home catching up, but are now contemplating something more fun. After all, Phoebe included lots of pictures of her beach adventures.

In any event, I do hope that Alex’s excitement over being “Star Student” this week really inspires him to rise to the occasion! I’ll be sure to post our final journal entries!

* * *

For our family and friends outside of Florida, no worries — we have an escape route if Ike hits us hard, plenty of supplies if he hits us not too hard. I am expecting just outer bands. We’ll stay in touch!

Knock, Knock!

On the way to Longboat Key tonight, we were telling each other some jokes. I introduced a new classic knock knock joke to our rotation:

Knock Knock
Who’s there?
Cow go.
Cow go Who?
Silly, cow go moo, not who!

What amazed me is that Nate came up with several variations on this joke, substituting various non-owls and their proper sounds for the punchline.

Chicken — cluck cluck cluck!
Pirate — ARggggggh!
Cat — Meow….

There were also Mommy and Daddy variations, and Alex:
Knock Knock
Who’s there?
Alex go.
Alex go Who?
Silly, Alex no go who, Alex go blah blah blah blah blah.

Seriously, he said blah, blah, blah…. Alex was telling a lot of jokes too. We had such a fun drive!