What Happened to My Little Boy

Dear Sweetness,
For the last several weeks every time I would ask you to stop doing something you would look at me and ask in the most innocent, sweet tone:

"Joo not want me get hurt?"

It seemed that was the only reason you could imagine for me to ask you to stop something.

Even if that something was feeding your food to the dogs.

This last week, something flipped.

I think the terrible threes caught up with you.

Or you learned something on the mean streets of daycare.

Now, when I ask you to not do something you immediately grab something and try to throw it.  Usually at my head.

What happened to "Joo not want me get hurt?"  Can we go back to that?  I not want ME to get hurt either.  And really, how much of your life needs to be spent in timeout??

I love you, but I'm not so thrilled with the train chucking phase we've entered.

Let me know when we can move on to something else.

Love,
Mama

It Was Only a Matter of Time

It's like a rite of passage to write on your face, right?

I'm just glad it was a highlighter.

Can you believe this cheesy mug??

Sweetness, you will never know how much I adore you.  Thank you for letting me be your Mama.

Isn't It Ironic?

Dear Nathan,
This weekend Mama was making your breakfast.  You were sitting on the stool on the other side of the counter from me.

Mama turned around to grab the butter out of the fridge.  I estimate it took me approximately 3 seconds.

While my back was turned, I heard you say, "That's dangerous!" in this silly voice that you use when you're repeating something that you heard somewhere that you thought was funny.  I know that you normally have no idea what you're saying - you're just repeating what you heard.  Usually I can ask you what you mean and you tell me where you heard it.

"What's dangerous, Sweetness?" I said as I turned back around.

And then I gasped.

In that 3 seconds, you had climbed on the counter, grabbed a metal butter knife and were jabbing it, "shower-scene-from-the-movie-Psycho" style into the slot on top of the toaster.

Yes, it was plugged in.

And yes, you were saying "That's dangerous" while STABBING a piece of metal into an electrical device.

My gasp startled you and you dropped the knife.

Then we had a little chat about what "dangerous" means and how it's ALWAYS a bad idea to stick knives into other things.

We'll wait until you're older for the "metal conducts electricity" discussion.

I love you,
Mama

Make a Box

Dear Nathan,
We've been working on potty training lately.

You were potty trained in Haiti.  When you were there and Papa got there to bring you and your friends to America you would tell him when you needed the toilet.  Papa said sometimes he was pretty sure you just used the toilet as an excuse to get away from the other 200 children that were crammed into Foyer post-earthquake.

Then we came to America and started all sorts of meds for parasites and you weren't sure you wanted to talk much so we didn't push it and we went to diapers.

I actually typed "went back to diapers" until I remembered that you'd have just been bare-butt naked in Haiti.  No disposables there.

We won't talk about how the kids at your O just "went" wherever and twice a day they'd spray down the concrete.  You ate, played, pooped and napped on that concrete.  There were also a couple of buckets (literally) in the tiny alley behind the building.  I don't even want to know how often those were "cleaned".

And they wondered why you were always sick.

Anyway back to the here and now - Mama made you a chart and every time you tell us when you need to go potty you get to mark off a box.  At the end of the line of boxes, you get a Thomas the Tank Engine toy from "the Walmarts".

Cheap bribery.

Before Mama introduced "The Chart", you'd actually sometimes tell me you needed to "go potty".  Since "The Chart" you seem to be humoring me.  You now tell me that you need to "make a box for Percy".

Yup, that's what you call it.  "Make a box".  Call a spade a spade, right?  It's like you're saying, "OK, woman.  I'll play your little game if I must."

We've propped the couple of trains that you're working toward up on the wall above the shower.  You can see them in their packages and sometimes I've found you standing in the bathroom, looking up at them longingly.  I'll ask you what you're doing and you'll turn to me with determination and say that you need to "make a box for Percy".

And I love that now you clap for EVERYONE that goes potty.  You're so proud of ME and you've even asked me if I, too, am "making a box for Percy".

Sadly, no.  Mama isn't "making a box for Percy".  By the time you hit 37, people expect you to do things without rewards.  But we'll hold off on that lesson for a few dozen years.

You're just awesome, Little Man.  I can't get enough of you.

I love you,
Mama

Dear Nate,

Mama likes to ask you random questions to see what you'll see.  Sometimes I ask you if you like asparagus, even though I know you have no idea what that means.  Or I'll ask you if you have a purple nose or if you like the Seahawks better than the Steelers.

I also like to ask you if your name is something strange.  I'll ask you if your name is Hephzibah McGillicudy, for example.  Or Dwayne Smarkinsky.  Or Eugene Parsnip.  Whatever strange-sounding names or words come into my head.  Just to see what you'll do.

You're used to it.  You know your Mama is silly.

The other night we heard the garage door open, signalling that Daddy was home.

I asked you who was home and you said, "Daddy".   I said, "Nathan's daddy or Divot's daddy?"  (Divot's our dog).

You said, "Divot's daddy" (and I could tell by the look in your eye that you were on to me - you knew that I was being silly).

Then I said, 'What's Divot's daddy's name?"

You did this funny thing with your eyebrows (that seemed to say, "Wait for it...") and then you proudly pronounced, "Felix!" and then you started laughing your head off because you knew you'd just played my own game back at me, and that you'd done it well.

I have no idea where "Felix" came from, but it is a pretty strange sounding name.  Good job, son!

We laughed and laughed at how silly you were.  You were so proud of yourself that you spent the rest of your night running around the house yelling, "Felix!  Felix!" and laughing proudly.

I'm so happy to see your sense of humor beginning to develop, Little Man.  Nothing in Haiti is funny.  It's hard to be wacky when you're starving to death.

So here, in this safe place, you're blossoming.  You're stretching your mind and you're discovering imagination and you're learning that the world has words like "pretend" and "playing" and "silly" and "more, please".

You're even branching out into wacky.

And I love every minute of it.

I love you, Felix.
Mama