I watch an adorable little boy–I’ll call him Baby  W. to protect his sweet identity, even though most of you know him–1-1/2 days each week.  It’s a nice arrangement: just enough time to break up our week and give Daphne someone other than me to interact with, but not too much time that I can’t run my errands or clean my house or see friends.

The best part of watching Baby W. is seeing my daughter love on him.  When he gets here in the morning she hurries over and rubs his back and kisses his head.  Then she follows him around with an empty bottle and shoves it in his mouth, because if the bottle is available then it should be used.

Might I tempt you with a bottle, the contents of which have already been consumed?

Sometimes I find them having these baby conversations without words.  This morning she was tilting her head and nodding at him while making sounds that she thinks are actual words but aren’t, and he responded by flapping his arms.

Babies can hurt you with their cuteness.

Gideon was still playing with age-appropriate trains and toddler toys when we took a walk around the neighborhood and he pointed his “boom stick”–a tiny curved tree limb, barely in the shape of a gun–at objects and made the sound of them exploding as his arm jolted upward from the imaginary recoil.  I’m still not sure where he got the idea for that.  The most violence he’d seen up to that point on TV was when Thomas the Tank Engine ran through the buffers and oil splattered everywhere as his eyes spun in circles from the surprise.  Obviously this was well before his love for Spider-Man and Transformers..

Friday afternoon Neighbor Boy called and said he had a surprise for Gideon.  We stopped at Neighbor Boy’s grandparents’ house on our walk and Gideon was gifted with a very nice, homemade pretend gun carved from wood, made by Neighbor’s Boy’s grandpa.  It even came with a holster.  Then Neighbor Boy and Gideon fought off the bad guys in the neighborhood with their matching guns to protect Mia’s heart.  Very cute.

Saturday morning Neighbor Boy ran to our house and brought another very nice homemade pretend gun carved from wood, this time for Mia.  So Sunday afternoon I asked them to make thank you cards for Neighbor Boy’s Grandpa.  They made the sweetest cards, told him he’s “awesome,” with people at the bottom of the page, smiling as they point guns at each other.

I don’t think they understand guns yet.

Sometimes you forget that your baby is just a baby, and instead believe her to be a genius stuck in the teeny body of a toddler; the only reason she does not wow you with her erudite thoughts on philosophy and theology is because her large command of language gets thwarted by her tongue that is still working to form the words.  Otherwise, WOW, you two would have profoundly important conversations during the day.

But then she motions to put on her brother’s (clean!) Spider-Man underwear over her pants and BAM! you remember, nope, she is just a baby.

Pretty fly.

In a new every-other-year tradition that my husband probably hasn’t yet realized, Hubby goes duck hunting the Saturday after Thanksgiving.  When he told the kids his plans Little Missy looked at me with wide eyes before turning back to her father.  “No!” she squealed. “You can’t kill the baby ducks!”  She never cried, though, not like she did two years ago when Hubby told her his killing plans.  That’s improvement.

This year Gideon even got to go, and he maturedly handled the wind and rain with nary a complaint.  Somewhere deep inside his little body his boy DNA told him that is what you must endure in order to shoot ducks with your daddy and uncles.  It’s hard for me to understand the appeal but he loved it.

When my two very cold men got home Gideon walked right up to me.  “Mommy, I need to talk to you but Mia can’t hear.”

I walked into the kitchen, sat down on a stool and looked him in the eye.  “Okay, what’s going on.”

“Well, we shot a duck but it didn’t die, so uncle Shane had to pull it’s head off and then it’s body still moved after it was dead.”

He looked at me with his serious face and slightly excited big eyes and I tried not to show him my freaked-out face.  I (calmly, I think) said the best thing I could think of.  “Whoa.  That is pretty crazy.”

“Yeah.”

Who knows what Gideon will experience next time.

• Do not assume that your daughter–the only (non-baby) girl in attendance–is the one with the high-pitched screams.  Otherwise you’ll look her in the eye and tell her to cut it out as that same shriek simultaneously erupts from the other room.
• If you allow one of the guests to chase two of the other boys with a golf club, make sure it’s a NERF golf club.
• Video games, while not normally ideal, sure come in handy.  Oh sweet electronic bliss, bring on that mind-numbing virtue we parents usually abhor.

excitement is about to burst through their calm demeanors.

Monday the kids had ANOTHER day off from school.  Which again, I love, but SERIOUSLY with the days off.  Out of the four full weeks in October, my kids are only attending a five-day school week two of those weeks.  Same for September.  How do the parents that work deal with all the time off of Augusta Public Schools?  I’d like to copy the Bluestem school district that has four-day weeks.  Or even better, I’d like to copy the school my husband’s cousin sends her child to, where kids only attend two days a week and then parents work with their children on the off days.  I would love love love that.  My kids would get to meet friends at school and learn music and run around in P.E. but I’d get to have them home and see their brains grasping new concepts.

Anyway, for this day off Hubby planned long in advance to take Gideon and Mia to Papa’s Vet Clinic and shadow him for the day.  Daphne and I hung out with Grandma; we ate pecan rolls downtown and shopped at cute little stores.  More my speed than getting cow poop in my hair.

At lunch we all met up at the Mexican restaurant.  Mia couldn’t sit down before telling me about their day, “Papa got to feel the babies in the mama cows tummies and he STUCK HIS HAND UP THEIR BUTT!”

It’s called preg checking.  OBs do something similar with us pregnant ladies once we know we’re pregnant, but large animal vets put on gloves that go up to their shoulders and manually find out if a heifer or cow is pregnant and how far along she is.  Although gross, it seems easier than asking the cow to pee on a Clear Blue Easy stick and then making her wait three minutes for the results.

Other highlights: looking in a microscope, getting food from both of the housecalls (if that’s even what Papa calls it) when Papa preg checked more cattle (I don’t know if Papa is always so well-fed on his calls, but that day one family [a Mennonite family, so you know that stuff was delicious and homemade] brought out sweet tea and treats for Papa, Hubby and the kids; at the other stop they shared candy and pop with the boy who lived there.  They got spoiled.), seeing a tazer (or cattle prod).

And now for the pictures!

Yep. Stinky.

Standing in front of a mama cow.

The last time Gideon saw Papa neuter a dog he whispered to Grandma post-surgery, "When is Papa gonna put those back?"

Looking at microbes.

My other budding scientist.

After all the treats and the microscopes and the cattle prod from the day prior, Tuesday morning as Mia got ready for school she once again told me about Papa sticking his hand up the cow’s butt.  I wonder what part of her day off she’ll share with her friends.

Things I don’t want to forget:

• At dinner the other night I was telling my family about this MONSTER fountain drink you can get from the Presto station for only $.99.  The kids were like, “Get it!” And I was like, “Not without Daddy, cuz there’s no way I could drink that much pop.”  Gideon said, “I could!  And Mia could, too!  Come on, Mommy, you can buy it for us.  It’d only be one dollar and ninety-eight cents.”  (Emphasis mine.)  I looked at Hubby as he looked at me with a shushing hand movement.  After dinner he said that he refused to be astounded by him anymore.
• After we got up from dinner, Hubby and Daphne played in the living room when she took a tiny tea cup and gave some to her baby, because she loves to share her food with those she loves.
• A couple days later Mia didn’t come down from her bedroom after she woke up.  Usually she sits on the couch and stares at the TV as her body slowly adjusts to no longer being unconscious.  That morning she blasted tunes from her re-discovered bedroom CD player.

On Sunday, after our Oops! We Ran A Bit Further Than A 5k, we smooshed into the crowd (albeit a much smaller one this time) to run the Fun Run portion of the Prairie Fire Marathon with our kids.  Gideon and Mia have been showing their excitement over the past few weeks with his questions of “Do we need to practice?” and her questions of “Oh no.  Oh no.  I’m going to run a MARATHON?”

Sunday morning, with a healthy breakfast of brownies in the kids’ bellies, Hubby, Gideon, Mia, and I stood in the drizzle and jumped up and down waiting for the race to start.  Daphne kicked back in the stroller.  A dad behind me told his kids to start stretching their legs and I thought our kids might as well, because we all know walking around the grocery store can be terribly strenuous for them and we were asking them to walk an entire mile.

Pumped and ready to go.

Then the race started and our kids TOOK OFF.  Gideon ran around people to make sure he won the race and Mia followed him.  Hubby looked back at me with a WhatAreTheyDoing? Weren’tTheyGoingToWalkThisThing? face.  Then he was off, weaving in and out of people to catch up with the our two munchkins who had more fervor for the race than either Hubby or I expected.

Daphne and I walked at a good clip but got passed by every runner.  I watched for my family as the front of the crowd started making its loop back to the finish line.  Then I saw my brightly grinning Gideon as he almost passed me by, with Daddy and Mia nowhere in sight.  So I cut across and ran with him for a bit.

“Gideon!  I can’t believe how fast you’re running!”

“I know, Mommy!  I have barely even walked so far!”

Daphne and I kept up with him for about 50 yards, but then my very healthy breakfast of a chocolate/nutella pastry caught up to me and I had to walk.  Gideon grinned at me as he kept running toward the finish.

I came to the last stretch just as the marathoners hit the same spot, with lots of people clapping for them as I pushed a baby in a stroller, ahead of the pack behind me because I’d cut across to be with my son for a little bit.  It was wrong for me to be in the middle of all that, so I found a good place to sneak into the spectators and loop behind the finish line to find my family.  Right as I made it to the back I saw Gideon, Mia and Hubby all proudly showing their medals to each other and clutching their Gatorades.

Fast little runners with their Daddy.

We celebrated how fast our two little people ran and made it back to our truck.  You guys, by the time we got Daphne in her carseat, the stroller stowed in the back, and everybody else in their seats, it was 11:35.  The race started at 11:15.  So my kids ran a what, 10- or 12-minute mile?  Cuz they ran it, got their medals, excitedly compared notes, let me take a picture, walked back to our vehicle and climbed in, all in 20 minutes.  They were barely out of breath.

So Gideon and Mia: I am totally on to you.  I know that your legs are not tired after a quick trip to the grocery store.  If your bodies can handle a one-mile race in twelve minutes with no training whatsoever then I don’t want to hear any more complaining while we get yogurt from the grocery store.

And also: I’m very, very proud of you.  You guys are awesome.

Back when we lived in Tulsa the kids and I never played outside at our house.  Hubby and I bought a house in a pre-gentrified neighborhood, which means that we bought a cute house for very little money in a sketchy neighborhood.  I never felt unsafe there, but strange people did walk by at all times of the day, so if Gideon and Mia and I wanted some playtime we had to load up in the car and drive to the park.

Hubby and I knew we wouldn’t stay there forever and then the day came when it was time to move.  Nothing monumental happened, but two kids with two parents working opposite shifts so that the kids didn’t have to be in daycare got to be too much.  So Hubby found a good job up here and we moved so that I could stay home.  We loved Tulsa but we love it here, too.

I love our neighborhood.  I love that the kids and I can simply walk out the door to take walks and see pretty houses and play in the leaves.  I love the big trees that change colors in the fall and drop so many leaves that they never all get picked up.  And I love the sidewalks.  Yesterday morning Daphne and I took a 45-minute walk that only got us around two blocks.  But we could meander in and out of people’s yards and look at broken walnuts on the ground and never be in danger of passing cars.

And I love my new phone.  After all my wondering about whether it was a good idea I finally decided it was.  The day after we were allowed to upgrade our phones Hubby bought me a pretty little smartphone.  The best part about it is the camera.  Three years ago my mom took me to Best Buy for an early Christmas present.  I picked out a really nice point-and-shoot camera that got good reviews but was TERRIBLE in real life.  We changed the settings, changed them back, held the button halfway down in anticipation of a good shot and that thing took terrible pictures for three years before it finally broke.  Now I aim my phone’s camera at my kids and voila!  A not-blurry picture taken right when I want it.

Here are pictures from our walk yesterday morning:

The beginning:

Sunshine and the perfect temperature and a precious baby.

On her balance beam:

How do babies come up with this stuff? What made her try to balance on that thin piece of curb? Babies are fascinating.

Investigating the local vegetation:

Dried seeds can be so interesting.

Hamming it up in the street so that I’ll laugh:

Back...

...and forth...

...and back again.

And then watching her shadow wave exactly as she does:

Cool cool cool trick!

As I watched Daphne’s brain process what was happening with her shadow and giggle in delight, I was reminded anew how happy I am.  When I got pregnant with her Hubby and I were surprised.  We left open the possibility of more kids, but then it was going to happen and our brains shut down and we could only say “Whoa…”  But this is perfect.  Someday I’ll be in the workforce again but right now I want nothing more than to be with my kids at breakfast and pick them up from school and fill my days with watching Daphne discover the mundane things of leaves and shadows.  I am so blessed.

I wasn’t really gone, but this blog was angry with me and wouldn’t let me type in the body of the post.  So I let it cool off for a week or two, Bloggy realized it wanted me back, and now I’m posting again!  Oh happy day.

Saturday night Neighbor Boy’s mom sent me a text asking if Gideon* would like to go to Spy Kids 4 because she was volunteering at our local theatre that night.

My first thought: No, we’d just had a movie night at Gideon and Mia’s school the night before and Gideon didn’t need to watch two movies in two nights.  But then I came back to myself, realized it’s no big deal for him to watch two movies in two days because he’s watched more than that before and will certainly do it again.  PLUS, he’d get to go behind-the-scenes at our movie theatre.  New experience bonus.

My second thought: Mia needed to go, too.  Neighbor Boy considers Gideon his better friend, but it’s always Neighbor Boy, Gideon and Mia who play together and Mia WOULD NOT appreciate her best friend going to a movie with her neighbor friend while she sat at home.  Understandably so.  Neighbor Boy’s mom agreed and voila!  Hubby and I had a date night.

It’s funny that after having two kids interrupt dinner conversations with, “Who’s that?” and “What happened?” and “Huh? I don’t understand” WHEN YOU’RE NOT EVEN TALKING DIRECTLY TO THEM that a dinner out with just a baby who you can say things like sex!–just because–without big eyes asking “What does that mean?” even when said dinner out is the Dillon’s Salad Bar in Andover.

Now, Hubby and I used to LOVE buffets.  For our honeymoon we went to Vegas and found the Pharaoh’s Feast Buffet in the basement of our hotel.  After paying we practically ran to the food.  Aisles of delicious-ness.  Hubby still loves buffets.  I loved that buffet in Vegas.  But questionable food that’s been under warmers since yesterday afternoon (a la the old Panda Buffet here in town) does not make my heart sing.

Saturday night I almost ran to the salad bar at Dillons.  All of it looked so yummy that night.  I actually vacillated on whether to get the once-through for $4.99/pound or the all-you-can-eat for $6.99.  Friends, never go the $4.99 route.  All the chicken and strawberries and blueberries you put on your plate will put you over that one-pound mark.  Then the mousse you get for dessert with the strawberries and blueberries dipped in it… yum.  I want to go back.

After dinner Hubby and I came home, put the baby to bed, then I picked up Gideon and Mia from the movie, where they’ve talked about butt-bombs ever since, sprinkled with talk of a superhero baby throwing poopy diapers at a bad guy’s head.

Too bad they didn’t pick up on more of the family-is-important theme I’m sure was in there.  I’ll work on drawing that from their memory of the movie as we eat our next buffet dinner.

*Yes!  I’m usually their real names.  I figure most of you know us in real life, anyway.  Although I will keep Hubby’s name safe.  A fun Erin’s Little Corner mystery, if you will.