Happy

It's no secret that we live in the great frozen north. My grass sleeps under its white blanket for many months at a time. The trees are barren. The birds are mostly away.

My husband's car has a warning that pops up when you start it when it's under 35 degrees: "Ice Possible: Drive with Care." Clearly this car wasn't designed by anyone who lives in a clime such as ours, for they would have realized that we know ice very well. And they would also realize the obscenities that people who are shivering in below-zero weather would shout at the message.

I was born in an even colder area and have lived here since I was wee. I should be used to this. A stubbed toe hurts no less every time you do it. No matter how many times I clean the bathroom, I still hate doing it. Some things you can't just "get used to."

Winter is that thing for me.

So when a Saturday in February rolls around with temperatures above freezing, my boys get to hear words they don't hear often when the weather is white and the mercury low: "Let's go outside."


They ran around and climbed and sledded. When I was spotting Moose on a ladder, I tuned to check on Bee. There he was laying down at the top of the slide, surveying all he could see from his vantage point, a slight smile on his face.

"Bee," I called. "Whatcha doing?"

"I just happy," he called back.

And with that, I stopped too. I turned to look at what he was seeing. It's a pretty great vantage since the playground sits in a high spot in our neck of the woods. The sun was shining, just starting to get low in the sky. The air was free of that bite it carries most months between October and March.

Sometimes, you realize your kids are far wiser than you give them credit for. What would it take for me to stop what I was doing, look around and just feel happy? It's hard to do when you have meals to plan, appointments to keep, things to clean. Hard to do, but what's the cost for not doing it? When I stopped with him, I felt my shoulders relax, a filled my lungs deeply, and a smile spread across my face.

When you stop the rush that's ever-present in your and replace it--if even just for a moment--of being present in what's around you, the world can be a really happy place.

The Old Life

I had to train a new person for the day job today. Because I work from home, this person was welcomed into my home for this training.

He's a nice guy. Young. Very bright.

He and I were both writing majors in college. It's not a common major. More likely people will be English majors. I didn't want to be an English major because they focused more on reading literature and interpreting it. No about putting your own awesome thoughts on paper. Clearly, I like to "hear" myself "talk" through my writing so being a writing major was a much better fit for me. We bonded a bit over this fact.

We had a nice moment talking about how rare of a major that is. But then he wanted to talk about what I write. And I had to say stuff like:

"I write this little blog about having my boys."

"I have 3 note books started with the novels I want to write. I haven't done any writing in close to 3 years."

"I used to write a lot. But since I had the boys...."



He saw my bookshelf and he wanted to talk. He wanted to analyze each book in there, talk about favorites, ask me if I've read a related book, and just generally judge my taste in books.

He said he approved of my book shelf.

But through all through the conversation with him, I had to make statements like:

"I haven't had a chance read that."

"I haven't read a book in...."



The fact of the matter is, having kids dramatically changes your life. I love my Bee and Moose more than I could have imagined. But I also couldn't have imagined just how different they would make my life.

I haven't read a book in way longer than I'd care to admit. But I've played with legos and play doh.

I haven't done any of my writing since they were born. But I've read hundreds of stories in a vast array of voices.

While I miss parts of my old life, it doesn't make me sad about where my life is now.

How could I look at that face and feel sad? He's the most precious thing in my world.

How can I look at this messy face and not laugh? How can I think back on the hundreds of way he's made me laugh this week, let alone in his lifetime, and be sad? I can miss parts of my old life without being mad that I'm not there any more.

Now that the boys are getting a little older, it's getting to a point where I'll soon be able to pick and choose what I do. There's definitely a time when they're small that you're just so tired....you just can't...with anything.  I won't reading a book for a whole afternoon because I can. Because I'd rather be building a fort with these guys. But when they go to bed, I'll grab my book and relish the heck out of it.

Bee the Gabber

This little boy...I tell ya.

He refuses to look at a camera 98% of the time, which implies some sort of shyness.

Don't be fooled.

This is the least shy little boy known to man kind. I'll give you an example:

We went to Target. We needed a couple of things and the rest of it was just wanting to get out of the house and look at stuff. If we passed someone in an aisle, he said "Hi!". If they respond, he starts telling them about how they went to Gramma's earlier, and how there's a gorilla in the zoo, and how he has blue shoes, and how he had oatmeal for breakfast, and...and...and...

And he does this all without taking a breath, I swear.

There was an employee stocking shelves over in the office supplies area. She had a tube of a bunch of rolls of tape in her hand.

"Oh," Bee says. "You have tape!" And then cue another 20 questions about the tape, and what she's doing with it, and why she's doing it.

I apologized, laughing, and took the boys to another part of the store.

After probably 15 minutes I remembered that there was something I had forgotten to look at on the other side of the store, meaning we had to walk past the office supplies again. And the gal who had previously been stocking the tape was still there, stocking other supplies.

"You still here!" Bee said. "Where's your tape?"

"I finished putting the tape on the shelves," the Target worker replied.

"How was your tape?" Bee asked.

"It was good, thanks for asking," she said.

"Now you have that," he said, pointing to a stack of merchandise in her hand.

"Yes," she said. "Notebooks."

"Oh, notebooks. What you going to do with the notebooks?"

"Put them on the shelf so people can buy them."

He started in again with the endless, nary-a-breath-taken-between-words schpeel about his daily activities.

Laughing and apologizing, I dragged him away.

This is not an isolated incident. Not by a long shot.

As a mom, I don't know what to think. Am I proud that my kid doesn't seem to lack the shyness I had as a kid? Am I embarrassed because of the way he just takes over? Who knows what this will mean for his future.

Boys vs Girls

Being a parent has a million and one potential things you can mess up. Not only do you want your kids to be healthy and safe, but you have to worry about raising them to be caring, thinking, contributing members of society.

In this vein, I think it's pretty important to teach my kids that toys are toys. There are no boy toys or girl toys. I try to stick to very gender-neutral toys, though I can't deny that Moose has a love of all things construction, building, and trucks, so we do have several toys in that vein.

But they also have play food, a baby doll, they wore pink and purple diapers when they were still in them. I let them watch "girl cartoons", and don't hesitate to put my hair accessories on them when they show interest.

For Christmas, I sewed my niece a hooded sweatshirt dress. Because she and Moose are of similar heights and builds, I had him try the dress on to give me an idea of where I should hem it.

Max was willing to put the sweatshirt on. But almost as soon as it was over his head, he looked down and said, "But I'm a boy, Momma."

What.

The.

Heck?

Who taught him to think like that?

So I said, "Baby, it's OK. It's just a piece of clothing."

But he insisted on taking it off.

So what do I do now?

We're back!

Yes, it's been way too long. I have a list of excuses: stress at the day job, impending Christmas with all the sewing I did for it, illness, etc, etc.

We got the flu, the boys and I. We were a pretty pathetic bunch. Look at poor Moose here. Cheeks red with fever, eyes half-mast in exhaustion, in his PJ's all day. It took us almost a week to get over it. We never went to the doctor for that illness, but we did for the ear infection Moose got right after. And after hearing our symptoms, she agreed that we most likely had the flu. And considering we live in what has recently been reported as the 3rd sickest metro area, it isn't surprising. Moose was miserable with the ear infection! He wouldn't get out of bed and he just wanted me to snuggle with him. The doctor practically leaped back when she looked in his ear because it was so bad.


But we're better now! And then we were on to Christmas. The boys were spoiled! They destroyed our house in the process of unwrapping all of the gifts. Thankfully, they allowed me to purge some old toys so there's still space for their toys in the container.












I think this is the first posed, nice picture I've posted of either of the kids. Bee is wearing a sweatshirt I sewed for him. I made one for Moose too, but he's a little heftier than Bee and his didn't fit (*sob*). In addition to those sweatshirts I sewed:

• Bathrobes for each of the boys
• A sweatshirt for their cousin
• An apron and chef hat for another cousin

I swear there was more, because that doesn't sound like that much, but I sure was busy!







And now we resume our previous program. Sorry for the interruption.

Zoo trip!

Seeing as how we live in an area where the winters get pretty cold and miserable, and because the boys are old enough to really enjoy things, we decided we need to purchase a membership somewhere where we'll be able to go and have some fun throughout the winter.

First up is the Minnesota Zoo. There are nice long trails outside that are open all winter, but there are also several indoor buildings. I think the winter time favorite will be the Tropics Trail which is warm and humid which will be the perfect antidote to Minnesota's cold, dry winters.

This weekend was absolutely gorgeous. Even though it was nearly October, the weather was in the 80's, low humidity, and sunny. Add that in to the leaves starting to change color, and it was a great weekend to be out and enjoying time with the family.

Bee is still talking about the big snake we saw. It really was big...it must have been 10 inches in diameter. He's also still talking about the gorillas he saw. Except, this zoo doesn't have gorillas at all!

Moose is an odd duck. There's really cool, live animals right in front of him, but what is he enthralled by? The railings, the rock structures, the informational signs. So yeah, pretty much anything but the animals. He did touch a snake (NOT the really big one!) and he thought that was pretty cool.

We'll be frequenting the zoo this winter, I think. Bee asks every day if we can go back, so I know we have his vote of approval.

I Like Big Trucks and I Cannot Lie

Our city hosts a Big Truck Day every year. They have a couple of fire trucks, an ambulance, a police car, a huge combine, a garbage truck, a snow plow, the ice cream truck, a small semi truck, and some other big vehicles. It's basically a chance for kids to come out and actually get to touch and sit in these big vehicles.

Of course my boys were happy to get to see and touch all the vehicles. They were surprisingly patient waiting in all the lines, and the lines were long because the weather was so amazing.


Bee is funny in crowds of people. While normally he's the child who talks with every stranger, when the crowds get big, this kid gets nervous. He was certainly interested in all the trucks, but he didn't want to do anything unless he could be touching me too.

I think the favorite may have been the garbage truck. Moose will be eating breakfast and on trash day will hear a garbage truck go by. He will immediately get up and leave his breakfast to go watch the garbage truck go back up the street (we live on a dead-end street, so what goes down must come back up). And always, "It's a garbage truck!" with as much enthusiasm as the 2.5 year-old can muster. Apparently this is another way in which he takes after his father. His mother tells me that he wanted to be a garbage man for much of his childhood.