Way Back Whens-day

I guess I'm on a nostalgia kick. Having a child reach a milestone must do that to ya. First she turns 18, next she graduates high school. Then he turns 16, gets his learner's permit, gets a job. The next one becomes a teenager in a few weeks. One receives First Holy Communion soon. I can't keep up!

This is the only picture I ever took of our animal collection, which is long gone. We used to have buckets of plastic animals of every stripe, and when the oldest two were preschool age, we played with them constantly. This photo shows one of the elaborate zoos they used to build.


But their favorite game was called Animal Cabanimal. Sarah and Scott used to take all their animals and spend hours "setting up" somewhere - usually in a main thoroughfare or on the steps. They wouldn't actually play with the toys. The "setting up" WAS the play. But I digress. They'd huddle together on the steps, setting up all their animals, and then - oops! It would be bedtime and they'd be "too tired" to clean up. You can imagine how this scene usually went.

It was this "setting up" one day that gave me one of my favorite memories. Sarah and Scott, aged 5 and 3, perched on the stairs, playing busily and quietly. Scott coughed. Sarah looked at him skeptically and asked, "Scott, did you fake cough?"

Scott replied, "No, I didn't fake it. I realed it."

Butt Hat

Noelle is 2.

Her little brain is processing language like mad. She just mastered her colors, and now she can't turn them off. Everywhere she looks, she sees colors, and she is compelled to name them all...out loud.

A few weeks ago, every color that she couldn't readily identify was 'pink." What color is the sky? Pink. What color is the green couch? Pink. What color are mommy's blue jeans? Pink. What color is your hair? Pink. Get the picture?

But now, it's nonstop - "Blue kye. Yeddow fower. Bown hair. White moon." And as we're driving in the "gray van," she has to name the color of every car we pass. It's cute but maddening, and I revel in moments of discovery like these.

She recently had another epiphany of language discovery. We have this set of chunky farm animals for toddlers.

There are actually three more animals to the set, but they're currently MIA. I picked the set out 'specially because they're soft, chunky, and best of all they don't have an air hole, so we can use them in the tub without them getting that gunky, black mildew inside.

So one evening the twins are enjoying a bubbly soak. You can't exactly call it a bath, because that would imply that I actually rubbed soap on them and washed their hair. But doing so can be akin to slow torture for Mommy, so sometimes they get away with a prolonged sit in soapy water. Hey, it's better than nothing...

Noelle and her farm animals are having a grand old time. They are swimming together, diving under the bubbles, talking to one another, etc. And then Noelle takes the cow in hand...


...and turns it over. She sees this...


...which makes absolutely no sense to her at all. She doesn't know how to process this. All her synapses are firing as she struggles to make sense of what she's seeing. I can literally see the wheels spinning.

She says to herself, "Turtle?" and then dismisses the idea. Why would there be a turtle on the cow's belly? That's just crazy talk!

Then she wonders, "Hat?" Yes, that must be it. "Hat." And with absolute finality, she declares, "Butt hat!"

And with THAT out of the way, she continued her play happily.

Way Back Whens-day

Of my three sons, these two are closest in age. I always think of them as a unit - "Brian-n-Conor," and, like most siblings, I suppose, they're the best of buddies and the worst of enemies.
This pic was taken in 2001, the first year we learned that we can rent a beach house for a week post-season for less money than a weekend during the summer. The boys were just tickled with every corner of the house, especially when they learned there was a balcony porch. I only included it here so you could get a good look at the partners in crime as I relate my anecdote.

Picture these two little guys, ages 5 and 3. I must have been busy with the then-current baby, and Conor wanted someone to read him a story. I guess all other avenues had been explored to no avail, so he took his storybook to Brian and asked, "Will you read me a story?"

Brian, exasperation personified, squared off and faced Conor and said, "First of all, I DON'T WANT TO. And second of all, I CAN'T READ!!!"

Makes me laugh every time I think of it.

Ellie the Gourd Girl

This little slice of randomness isn't actually so random after you visit KathyB at The World According to Me.




The young woman in this photo, taken 5 years ago, is actually Sarah, the new young adult in our household. So she was 13 at the time she named, dressed and cared for this gooseneck pumpkin, affectionately referred to as "Ellie the Gourd Girl." Although the kids probably think she went to Gourd Heaven, what they don't know is that Ellie ended up peeled, sliced, boiled, mashed and eaten, topped with a dollop of whipped topping.

Barbaric?

Yummy?

You decide.

Happy 18th Birthday To Our Baby

THEN>>>

NOW>>>

Where has the time gone???

I feel like Golde in "Fiddler on the Roof" when she says to Motel, "Look at you...a baby, a sewing machine...You've become a person!"

....and such a person she has become....

Happy Birthday, Honey. May all your dreams come true.

Love, Dad & Mom (the two weird people you were paired up with in the hospital)