We were talking about GoBob in the car the other day. A motorcycle had taken off very quickly from the light and Simon was immediately convinced that he was going to get one as soon as he could. Aaron and I (as good sensible parents) began the tricky persuasive talk that parents often find themselves engaged in. Acknowledge your child’s request and validate it. But also provide details – inform but don’t terrify or brainwash so they can make a good choice. Only slightly slanting your comments to result in the decision that you really want your child to make. Something like that.

Aaron told him that if you got in an accident with a car, you would really get hurt. But of course Simon would just “steer away from them”. So I pulled out the story of GoBob – that he used to have a motorcycle before I was even born and he got into a terrible accident, split his helmet on a tree and had to wear a big metal brace for a long time. (Mom, if he asks to see these pictures, I told him you had them, and now you’ll know why he is asking)

Talking about GoBob led to the inevitable… but Miriam spoke out first this time.

Miriam “I just want to see GoBob”

Simon “Me too, I want to see him again”

Me “Well you know when we’ll see him”

Miriam “In the Kingdom!”

Simon “I want the Kingdom to come today”

Me “Yes, that would be nice”

Miriam “Ummm… I would like it tomorrow”

We told Simon and Miriam that they were going to go visit with Judah this evening. Oh, Judah! He’s so cute, says Miriam. Is Uncle Seth going to be there too? asks Simon. On being told yes, they both reply, Oh good, we can do our flips!

Miriam says, I was nervous the first time I did a flip. There were butterflies in my tummy.

Simon says, I was nervous too! I had buffalos running around like they were being chased by a lion.

We haven’t gotten Simon a haircut in quite  a while. It’s on the to do list. 

Today he came out of the bathroom smoothing one of his growing sideburns and asked me if he looked like Alvis. Then turned his head to show me the other and said, Look mom, here do I look like Alvis here? I told him a little bit, he did. Then told him it was Elvis, not Alvis. Like Elephant, not Alligator. He disagreed. No Mom, it’s Alvis. And you should have named me Alvis.

Later that evening he was getting concerned about the length of these sideburns of his. “Mom by the time I’m 8 these are going to grow all the way down and I’ll have a beard!”

I explained that beards don’t come from sideburns, they come from hair that starts to grow out of the skin on your face. He was completely horrified. “Do ALL men grow beards and mustaches, Mom?” “Oh, no. I hope I don’t grow any.”

Well my dear son, you just might get your wish. Much to the dismay of your father, the genes are in your favour.

 Have you ever tracked the amount of time you spend doing a certain activity? I would be very interested to know how many minutes I spend doing laundry, or picking up hot wheels, or little dolls…. Although perhaps it’s best not to know.

Simon has become an avid reader. That is an understatement. His teacher “doesn’t give any E’s for the first report card” yet he has one for reading. The past two months his school has participated in the Pizza Hut ‘Book It’ program. His goal is 300 minutes a month, which sounds like a lot, especially on top of homework and of course the time-consuming business of being a young boy. But he has had totals of 600 and 800 minutes! That’s just the minutes that I caught him reading and remembered to write it down. I was going to attempt to capture every single minute this month just to see if he could break 1,000. But it’s the holidays, and we’re moving, and there’s still laundry and cooking and dishes. 

I think these times of reading are the best though, and I’m certain his sister would agree.

Last night Simon had a stomach ache. He was “really, really hungry” at dinner. So I let him have the 2nd and 3rd tacos. How was I to know? He is a growing boy and he’s been sick with not much appetite lately. I figured he had depleted his stores and needed to stock up again. Then he came back for mint ice cream pie. Fifteen minutes later the runs to the bathroom began. And then he curled up on the couch moaning about his stomach – poor little guy. He ended up on the toilet and then the dreaded “Mom – I think I need to puke.” 

And he did.

As he was sitting there breathing heavily into the bucket, I was having horrible visions of the days to come. Surely Miriam would get this too, the stomach flu spreads like wildfire on a dry windy day. We were already struggling with a cough and runny nose, I just couldn’t do this too. 

Then Simon pipes up in completely normal voice. “Hey Mom, I smell mint!”

Weirdo.

The stomach pain gone, he was his chipper old self. The visions of horror faded into the haze of Vicks vapor rub.

Simon was playing with his farm animal math counters at dinner this evening (not doing math by the way, he was making farm pens for them out of crayons). He asked me which animal ham came from, I answered, and that began the protest of Miriam. 

“No, Momma!” she exclaimed. Her expression clearly showing the horror of such a thing. “We don’t eat animals! We can’t eat the animals!”

Now, really how do you answer that? I have found myself leaning in a non-animal eating way myself, but not because I feel bad for the animals. I’m just getting a little concerned about the commercial process, however I am not ready to risk missing the proper protein requirement just yet. I need to some time to figure out how to do things the right way. I have growing children to think of and Simon needs all the help he can get in the height department.

That, however is much too long and wordy of an answer for a three year old. My simple answer was that God gave us the animals to eat, and what would we eat if we couldn’t eat meat?

She answers with no hesitation,”Pizza”

But of course, how could I have overlooked that solution?

I’m not sure that I’ve ever had those words said to me. Granted, it’s a little old-fashioned and I’m not in the habit of regularly attending dances. Yet I have heard my little boy say those words. To his sister. Some days being a Mom is all goodness.

I need to install this feature in my brain. I need a programmed reminder so that the instant I think to go to Lowes, it will kick in and drive me to Home Depot instead. 

Every time I need to go to a hardware store I immediately think Lowes. And Everytime I go there I cannot find what I want. I always know what I need, I know what it looks like, what it does, I remember seeing my Mom&Dad using it when I was little, but I just never know the technical name for it. And apparently the staff at Lowes speaks a different language – Hardwarese or Supplyish or Wrench. Usually I will find the aisle that has everything close to what I’m looking for, but not the actual item in my mind. A kind salesperson will come over to help me look, but since we don’t speak the same language we will stand there staring at the wall of items together with concerned looks on our faces. We make gestures to each other and speak in half sentences – trying to describe the item needed. We pick up random items with a desperate hope, reading labels, but always replacing it while shaking our heads and sighing. At some point I will put the poor person out of their misery by saying ‘thank you’ and walking away.

It happened again last night. Aaron asked me to stop and get wasp killer on the way home from work. “Just swing by Lowes and grab the biggest can they have”. So I did. I stopped at Lowes, thinking I would run in, grab the nearest sales person and be all set and checked out in 5 minutes. But no, it was not to be. I ran in, no salesperson in sight (except for the ones at the checkouts and they can’t leave their posts). But the Pest Killer aisle was right there! Yay! This should be easy! I knew what I needed, I can read, no problem, right? Wrong! Aisle 22 had bottles and bags of pest killer, but it was for ants, ticks, roaches, grubs, spiders, flys, gnats, mosquitos, japanese beetles, and every kind of bug you can think of EXCEPT wasps and hornets. None of those large aerosol spray cans in sight. So I went over and asked at the Service Desk – she told me to look in Aisle 22. And called someone to come help. Which was very nice of her. I gave the help about 20 seconds to show, then went back over to Aisle 22 on the off chance that I overlooked it in my haste. Nope, and on further reading most of the labels said that you were supposed to put all of this stuff on your lawn or the dirt around your house. Not what I wanted at all – you need to be able to shoot these waspies from far away and it’s gotta’ be a dead on spray. Help didn’t show after 2 minutes. I gave up and ran back to my car and drove across the street to Home Depot.

In the door and straight to the Pest Killer aisle (which oddly enough was in the same position in the store) and there it was! Large cans of Wasp Killer! Three to choose from! Right next to all the lawn spraying every other bug in the world killer stuff. Where it SHOULD have been at Lowes.

My explanation for this? I’m convinced that Home Depot has either women or southerners or both on their store layout committee, someone who speaks my language.

And just so you can be informed, the technical name for wasp killer spray is: SpectracidePRO® Wasp & Hornet Killer.

Aaron and Simon were away at Bears training camp. I’m kinda thinking it was more Bears FAN Training Camp as Simon came home all fired up. He now talks about the players by name and position. I’m convinced that you have to be born and raised in or near Chicago to understand this. And I am glad Aaron has a son to share it all with. I’m sure Miriam will join in soon.

But until then….

We have girl time.

Aaron’s favorite - 

Miriam shared with me and then with Great-Grandpa Ray her reason for loving Great-Grandpa.

“I love Great-Grandpa because he is OLD”