Like father, like son

"I'm so ready to vege," Andrew said, stumbling out of his office after turning in his prospectus last night.

"Wanna watch a show?" I asked.

"Yeah, but only one episode because I also want to go to bed. I was up way too late last night and then got up at six this morning."

"What time did we go to bed, anyway? I didn't look at the clock when I got up."

"Around three," he said. "Do you even remember moving to the bed?"

"Yes, of course..." I said.

"Oh, that's right. You're not me."

Unless he's awake for a significant time—a couple of hours—Andrew remembers nothing from his night wakings, which is always slightly disconcerting for me when we have a new baby and I send him to do anything for the baby. Usually I just do all the night time stuff because waking Andrew up is quite impossible in the first place and then I really can't trust that he'll do everything right (eg. put a diaper back on the baby and put the baby back in bed (unimportant things like that)) before he returns to bed himself. And then even if he does manage to do what I ask him (which is usually just, "Bring me the baby,") when I thank him for getting up with the baby in the night he says, "I got up with the baby?"

The baby thing is just an example (as well as something I'm gearing up to deal with in a month and a half) but pretty much any time he gets up for anything he doesn't remember it.

And it's been a longstanding understanding between us that he's not responsible for anything he says before he showers. Because—I believe it was in our first year of marriage—he once told me to, "Leave me alone, idiot," or something like that when I was waking him up in the morning and then could not figure out why I was upset with him later in the morning (after he'd had his shower).

He's since, for the most part, grown out of calling people names (carryover from childhood, I guess (something that happens when you get married in your early twenties)) but I still don't take anything he says seriously until after he's showered for the day because chances are he isn't really awake before then.

Where: PROSPECTUS

For the last few weeks there has been a mysterious event on our calendar, coinciding with the last day of classes for Andrew: "TURN."

That's all it says. I assumed, for a while, that it was some crazy acronym of Andrew's. There are several that dot our schedule: GPSC meeting, SGRW, BCFAC meeting. There are also a few of my own sprinkled around: VT Carrie, OB and 17P. I'm able to identify most of them as normal acronyms, even if I can't tell you exactly what the letters stand for. But...TURN?

As it turns out, he typed "TURN IN PROSPECTUS" into the calendar and the computer decided that "PROSPECTUS" was the place he would "TURN" in.

This degenerate age of miracles

I'm so happy to be back in Anne Shirley's head, though I think I only have one more book to read after I finish this one. Today a couple of quotes stuck out to me as I was reading on the pollen-dusted front porch and watching to make sure the kids didn't get run over while they chalked up the street.

First, is this:

[Mrs. Gibson says,] "This is a degenerate age, Miss Shirley." 

"Homer said the same thing eight hundred years, B.C.," smiled Anne.

I think that's referring to The Iliad, though I'm not sure because I've never exactly read The Iliad, but a quick Google search revealed that Homer does refer to a degenerate age (though from what I read about that he was talking about physically small, not morally wonton). But it's true! What's now considered the halcyon days of yesteryear was then thought morally reprehensible.

Like sewing collarless dress and wearing rouge and kissing your wife's cheek on the steps of the chapel—oh my!

So, really, every day and age has had their problems and every day and age has had their merits.

Later, still at Mrs. Gibson's house, is this charming exchange:

"You talk as if it was something to eat," grumbled Mrs. Gibson. "Babies are common enough." 

"Oh, no, babies are never common," said Anne.... "Every one is a miracle."

Crayons and pollen

Phew! It's 8:45 PM and I just closed Benjamin's door because he was telling knock-knock jokes to himself and, as terrible as this sounds, I just can't listen to him talk anymore. Plus he doesn't even know any good knock-knock jokes.

Once he told one that actually made us laugh and ever since then he's been pretty sure he's hilarious all the time. And, really, that's often the case. But the knock-knock jokes...ugh.

This was his joke, in case you were wondering:

Knock! Knock!
Who's there?
Sam.
Sam who?
Sambody!

This was probably only funny because we all knew he was saying 'somebody.'

At any rate he was a bit of a terror today, which is fair, I suppose, because he is at the tail end of the terrible twos and really hasn't been too terrible so far. But today I am just so happy it's bedtime.

This morning Benjamin found a bowl that had HEISS written on the bottom while he was putting away the dishes (for an hour). He found the bowl quite distressing.

"Mom! Who coloured on this bowl? Who did this?" he demanded to know.

"Oh, that was me," I said. "I wrote our name on the bottom. We must have taken it somewhere."

"Mommy!" he chided, "That's so bad! We colour on paper! Don't do that any, any, anymore!"

I had to laugh a bit about it because just yesterday he scribbled on the wall at the dentist and he definitely got in trouble for that.

Later in the day he pointed out a work of art he'd completed on the blinds. He'd carefully balanced crayons on the slats. I was relieved that he didn't scribble on anything because this child, specifically, has been my most common culprit in that department. This time Miriam got the lecture about being sure to put the lid on the crayon box (because Benjamin, fortunately, can't unscrew it by himself yet).

Allowance

With our new chore system has come a lot of questions about allowance. Miriam was the first to bring it up today while she was clearing off the table after dinner.

"Will you give me 55 cents per chore?" she asked Andrew.

"No," he snorted.

"Why not?"

"You have no concept of money," he said.

"Uhhhh... Yes, I do—saving it up!"

"Okay, but that's all you know. How many cents are in a dollar?" he quizzed her.

"Let's see," she hedged. "If you have twenty quarters and seventy pennies..."

"Now you're just making stuff up," Andrew observed.

"Yes, I am," Miriam nodded.

Later while I was helping Rachel do the dishes she brought up the idea of allowance again, but not before learning how to use the sprayer on the kitchen sink.

"What is this thing for?" she asked.

"It's a sprayer," I said.

"How does it work?" she asked, squeezing the trigger.

"Well, you have to turn the water on first," I said.

She turned the water on...but still had her hand on the trigger so ended up soaking herself. It was hilarious, except that it got everything in the kitchen wet, and Rachel had dirty feet so then everything got muddy in addition to just wet. I told her that she needed to clean up that mess now, too, which she was fine with because, "sometimes [she] love[s] cleaning and sometimes [she] hate[s] cleaning and [she] can never figure out when or why; but right now [she] love[s] cleaning, so..."

"When can we have an allowance?" she asked while she was mopping the floor and I was cleaning the stove.

"I don't know," I answered. "Probably when Daddy gets a Real Job."

"He has a job," she said.

"Yes," I said. "But you know what I mean—a Real Job, like one that pays money. We've talked about this before."

"I know, I know," she sighed. "At least we get money in our birthday cards...and we find money on the street sometimes. Hey! It's like the street pays us our allowance!"

Yes, that's exactly what it's like.

So much soccer

Miriam had her first soccer game this morning. Andrew drove, so on the way we listened to Wavin' Flag in three different languages so we could get "pumped up!" When I drive we don't usually listen to music, much to Benjamin's disappointment.

The game was...cute. The kids all crowded around the ball, taking turns kicking it, and scoring on whichever goal they happened to be closest to, whether it was their own or not. Without any goalies were were several goals scored, but a lot of those goals were technically own goals, not that it matters when you don't keep score. They were just happy to be out there playing.

Miriam's the one wearing the rainbow socks, Rachel's old shorts, and her jersey tucked in:

There's no place like...

Sometimes I enjoy living thousands of miles away from our families. There's so much adventure in this world, so much to see, so much to explore; I enjoy traveling but even more than that I like living places. Sometimes (often) the idea of settling down in any one place intimidates me. Though I'm sure we'll have to make a commitment like that sometime (and trust me, that's what it felt like when we signed onto a five year program here (I'm starting to breathe easier now that we have two years "left" because two years is an amount of time that makes sense to me)) I hope that when we do it will be somewhere with lots of adventure and newness to it. 

With that newness and adventure comes the often unsavoury side effect of being far away from family. Missing the big things—the weddings and funerals and the like—are obvious downsides, but there are everyday downsides, too.

Sometimes all I want to do is go for a walk with my mom. Or attend that family dinner. Or not have to think about time zones before trying to communicate with anyone back "home."

Currently, I'm missing out on this:

Naps and soccer and things

In order to get Benjamin to go to bed before 11:00 at night we took away his afternoon nap. Some days he's fine until bedtime and then falls asleep very nicely. Other days he crashes in the late afternoon and it doesn't matter if he sleeps for an hour or five minutes—he'll stay awake as long as he can after bedtime. For example, he took a five minute nap in the car today and he just barely fell asleep.

It's 9:45 PM, which is way better than 11:00, I'll admit, but still! People who have their kids in bed by 7:00 baffle me. How? How do you do this thing?! How?!!!

Probably not by having soccer practice until after 7:00, that's my guess.

Anyway, Benjamin crashed yesterday afternoon as well. I think playing hard outside all day is wearing him out more than being trapped inside during the winter did. He and the girls were watching Signing Time on Netflix because Auntie Katharine had said that Kayl likes to watch it and we thought that if we watched it too then the kids might just learn the same signs as Kayl (who has some communication barriers) and it might be fun to use those signs the next time we see Kayl.

Soon though, this was the scene on the couch—Benjamin fell asleep and collapsed on Rachel's lap (Miriam was diligently mimicking signs, off to the left of this picture):

Clearly Benjamin wasn't going to pick up any sign language that way!

Eno River Walk (and Wade)

Exercising after every meal can get tricky—there's clean up and kid stuff and so much else to do. Sometimes I hop on the exercise bike because that way I don't have to get the kids ready and drag them along with me on a walk. Other times the thought of hopping on the bike one more time kills me so I get the kids ready and drag them along with me on a walk.

I'm still high risk and will be until I deliver, but I'm to the point now (I'm not going to have a micro-preemie and am almost to the point where Benjamin was born) where my doctors are encouraging me to exercise again...a lot because of the diabetes. A lot like three times a day for a half hour.

I will admit that I'm a little worried about the message this is sending to my children ("I ate, therefore I must now bike/walk for a half hour,") because I'm not sure that's a healthy message to be broadcasting so we talk a lot about how my body isn't processing sugar and I'm not exercising to burn off calories or to loose weight or to look better; I'm doing it to keep myself and the baby healthy.

Because I've had gestational diabetes my risk of developing type two diabetes is higher than it would be otherwise. I told Andrew that I knew why that was. It's because they take these poor women who are in their third trimester of pregnancy and restrict their diet and tell them to work out three times a day when all they want to do is eat a bowl of ice cream and take a nap. After this baby comes, I swear I'm going to eat an ice cream cone and then I'm just going to sit there and let it digest on its own. And that's why we're at higher risk for developing type two diabetes. Because this is torture. That's why.

Anyway, today was one of those days when I couldn't fathom getting on the bike again. Last night I had the hardest time getting through my workout after dinner. I kept checking my timer.

"Has it been a half hour yet? Only three minutes?! Okay—I can do this."

I thought that a good night's rest would have me all set to go today, but my post-breakfast bike ride was much the same. Ugh. So after lunch the kids and I got ready to go for a hike.

"Us go hiking in the 'oods?" Benjamin asked.

"Yes, buddy. We're going to go hiking in the woods."

"'At's not a good idea!" Benjamin said.

"Why not?" I asked.

"'Ere's lotsa scary things in the 'oods!"

"There's not a lot of scary things in these woods," I assured him. Just ticks and poison ivy and copperheads, mostly. Other than that, they're all good.

The first thing we saw was a gigantic turtle sunning itself on a log. I swear it was as big as my head.

Ice Cream Man

We've given the girls more responsibilities around the house, realizing that they're probably ready to move beyond simply putting away the dishes. They've been helping out with more, of course, but not on an official level. But we decided that they could—so now they're assigned different dinner jobs every day (ranging from doing the dishes to sweeping the floor) and it's been so nice to not have to do all of that myself.

"It's like we have a standard of cleanliness now," Andrew said one evening when the kitchen was clean before the children were put to bed.

"Hey, I had a standard of cleanliness before!" I said defensively. "It just wasn't very high..."

"Okay," he said. "It's like we have a slightly higher standard of cleanliness now."

For real. It's been so nice to not have to do everything everyday.

We also made a list of extra jobs (like folding laundry, sweeping the front steps, washing a door, playing with Benjamin for twenty minutes) that the girls can do to earn points, which they can then spend (on TV time...or to pay for lost library books).

This means that Benjamin has been put on dish duty. He is almost three, after all. He hates putting away the silverware (but only now that it's his job; he enjoyed it before it was his job) so I try to make him do that first thing in the morning so we don't have to fight about it later.

After he finished putting away the silverware this morning he set up an ice cream stand under the silverware drawer.

"What'oo want?" he asked me. "This is my ice cream shop! What'oo want?"

"Lemon gelato," I answered (because what else is there to want?).

"Okay. Beep, beep, beep," he said, punching in a secret code on top of the stool before climbing out of his store to bring me my request. "Here you go!" he said, handing me an imaginary something, "Emonade chacado."