And the personas continue

Allow me to introduce Dr. Jones.  As you all know, Indiana Jones has a beard (or really, just stubble), and when he is a professor, his hair is slicked over to the side.  The hair style was requested before we left for church and was much more slicked down before he started messing it up.  Then, when we got to church he asked for some stickers.  Of course I gave them to him and he sat quietly beside me for quite some time.  Finally, during the rest hymn, I looked down at him and this is what I saw.  Dr. Jones with a beard.  What a goofy kid. 

One thing I love about this girl

Really, there are so very many things that I love about this girl.  I could just go on and on, but lucky for all of you my head hurts far too bad to sit here and type all of them out.  I recently had my parent/teacher conference with this girl's teacher.  Aside from her notorious disaster of a desk (so bad in fact that her teacher will occasionally email pictures of her desk to me), the report was positively glowing.  You know the whole, she's a total delight and a wonderful student blah, blah, blah.  What really made me proud was the fact that this sweet girl has taken it upon herself to become a special helper and friend to a girl in her class who has Down Syndrome.  I have heard KK talk about this girl on several occasions, but I didn't realize the depth to which their friendship ran.  I believe that KK truly loves this girl and as a result of that she is able to reach her on more of  peer level that her teacher and assistants are unable to reach her.  In fact, KK can get this girl to do many things that her teacher and assistants are unable to get her to do and KK has done this all out of friendship.  My girl has no prejudices and has the ability to see the good in everyone.  She also lacks a lot of the drama that seems to come with girls.  You know, the whole backbiting, mean spirited kind of friends with you one day, but hate you the next day kind of stuff.  She is perfectly content to be herself and also to be by herself.  Her happiness is not tied into who she is or isn't friends with.  It is these qualities that make her a great friend and a great person and it will serve her well as she grows up.  Sheesh, I just love this girl.

Another thing I love about this boy

There is no such thing as a simple explanation with this kid.  Credit his scientific mind, but the kid can't just say, "Oh man, I fell down."  Instead, he would say something to the effect of, "I was running and due to my increasing speed, a rock leaped off of the road and when my foot hit the jagged side of the rock, the trajectory in which it threw me to the ground caused my knee to be violently wrenched to the side so that when I slammed down on the pavement my knee became bruised in several locations."  Oh, and he might be a bit dramatic as well.

Up next, what I love about my girl.

The word "need" is subjective

Tiger:  Momma, I neeeed you!
Me:  What?  What is it that you need?
Tiger:  Food.

Side note:  Do you know how hard it is to feed a boy who is going through a growth spurt and who, for the past two days, seems to be constantly hungry, but who eats virtually nothing and so after the third "I'm hungry" all of the usual options have been exhausted and he doesn't want anything that he has already eaten nor does he want any of the new suggestions that are being offered?  Do you?

Today

1.  I am feeling very grateful for those who fight all over the world for our freedom.

2.  The desire to cook has completely left my body.  Not that it was that strong to begin with, but I really just feel like leaving bowls of cereal out for everyone and telling them to fend for themselves.  Alas, since my family will frown upon this after a while, I will continue to cook.  Dang this whole needing to eat business.

3.  It has yet to snow here this fall, for which I am very grateful, but I found myself thinking about snow and how much I used to love to go out and play in the snow when I was little.  I lived in Colorado until I was 13 and there were quite a few blizzards during the winters of my youth.  I remember one in particular when I was about 7 years old.  The year was 1982 and the blizzard was a big one.  My brother and I got all dressed up from head to toe in our snow gear and headed out into the peak of the storm to play in our yard.  It was incredibly windy and incredibly snowy and we loved every minute of it.  When the storm passed, there were snow drifts clear up the side of our house and the snow was as deep as our fence in some places.  If we thought playing in the snow during the storm was fun, playing in the snow afterwards was even better!  Oh the snow tunnels we dug.  It was a child's snowy wonderland.  I thought about this storm for several reasons.  First I was thinking about how fun it was to be a child and how much I loved playing in the snow, and about the fact that my view of winter is so much different now then it was when I was a child and how I need to find a bit more of that winter joy that I once felt.  I also thought about how it is such a pain to get kids all dressed up to go out into the snow and how I really need to be a better mom about my willingness to do this for my kids.  Note to self:  Kids love to play in the snow.  Finally, I thought about a mug that my Dad had that year.  It was a white mug and on the side of it was the phrase, "1982, a very good year."  I remember my Dad agreeing with that statement.  I have no idea what was going on in my parent's adult world at that time, but I remember talking about that mug and about the fact that it was going to be a good year.  Back to the here and now, I haven't really felt like this past year has been super great.  It hasn't been particularly bad, but it hasn't been great and a lot of that probably has to do with my attitude.  So, I have decided that I am going to take a lesson from that mug of my youth and declare that 2012 is going to be a very good year.  And if I declare it, than it shall be.

One reason why I love this boy

Every morning when I quietly sneak into his room to wake him up for school, I gently touch his head, he breathes deeply, gives his body a good stretch, throws the covers off and happily heads out of the bedroom to start his day.  No moaning, no whining, no trying to ignore the fact that I am waking him up, he is just happy and ready to wake up.  He is the only one like this in this family of mine (including myself) and I love him for it every day.  It is a gift that will serve him well in life.

Two Zombies and a Pirate

Ah yes, another successful Halloween has come and gone and now we are all laying around in candy comas, at least until I confiscate all of the candy tomorrow.  This year I informed Sparky and Woo that I would not be buying them costumes and that they had to come up with something from what we had at home. Woo was having a hard time and didn't like any of my suggestions and Sparky didn't really want to dress up at all. So, voila, Zombies. Easy for me, fun for them.

This boy was so funny. He gagged and gagged and almost threw up as I was putting on the white make-up. Just one more reason he probably won't do well in drama. 

 This girl owned her Zombieness

 When little Tiger saw me making the Zombie costumes he wanted to be a Zombie so bad. For two days he kept talking about how we needed to make his Zombie costume, but then he saw the other two getting make-up on and informed me that he was not going to wear make-up. "Sorry kiddo," I said, "no make-up, no Zombie costume." That made the decision pretty easy. Captain Jack Sparrow at your service. Of course it's the whiskers that make this a Halloween costume versus everyday wear.  That, and the smirk.  For some reason the whiskers bring out the smirk. 

My other favorite of the night: instead of saying "Trick-or Treat" like all of the other kids, Tiger said, "Trick-or-Treasure."  I love a boy who fully commits to his persona.