When all three kids are with me, it’s loud. It’s busy. It’s chaotic. It’s hundreds of movements, words, needs, demands (hello toddler), stories, questions, games, decisions, and more - all making claims on my consciousness. Which is why I love one-on-one mornings.
Today it’s just Adam and me - and it’s beautiful.
I’d never give up any of my kids, but being able to cater to one is something I always relish.
3 Comments
With all our children, we started responsibilities early with something simple: shoes. WE come home; YOU sit on the stairs; I take off your shoes; YOU put them away. Simple, repetitive, effective. It was also the first real power struggle we encountered with each child. At some point they refuse to do this task. Merely because they are 18- to 24-month-olds and want to flex their sense of self-control. Contrary, resistant, maddening.
A few weeks ago, Lucas hit this mark. As the third child, he had the most personal flair added and the most all-out defiance. In his defense, he did make it the longest, avoiding a case of the You Can’t Tell Me What to Do’s until 23 months into his sweet life. “Alright, Buddy, here are your shoes,” I said, holding them out to him, like every other day. “Mommy do,” he said, looking me squarely in the eyes. “No, this is Lucas’s job. You put them in the closet,” I prompted, holding the shoes out again. He turned his head, intentionally looking away. “Lucas…” A grin spread slowly across his face. He turned his head ever so slightly so that I was in his peripheral vision. My hands didn’t waiver. I waited. He raised his arm, and with one swift flick of the wrist, knocked the shoes out of my hand. They tumbled to the floor. He turned his head back to look at me, smile still spread ear to ear. I picked up the shoes and placed them firmly next to him on the step. “That’s okay, you can take your time. But you can’t play until you put your shoes away. Mommy hangs up your coat; you put your shoes away.” Before I could even stand up, off the step the shoes flew, landing next to me once again. Lucas stood up, sauntered over to the gate between the entryway and the living room. Hands on both sides of the gate opening, he glanced coyly over his shoulder. Then he stepped through the gate, looked forward, and waved dismissively in my general direction. Having lived through two toddlers already, I took a deep breath and thought, Game on, Kiddo. I placed the coat next to the shoes on the floor, stood up, and walked over to where Lucas now stood playing a recorder he found on the couch. “There’s no playing until you put your shoes away. You can either put your shoes away now, or you can go sit in timeout.” He ignored me. “No recorder, Lucas. Shoes first.” His eyes flashed, and he turned to run. I snatched him up and plucked the recorder from his hands. Back over to the stairs. “Timeout, Lucas. Sit on the stairs. No getting up. Mommy’s job is your coat. Your job is your shoes.” He arched his back, laid his head on the stairs behind him, and howled. I stood up, hung up his coat, and headed down the hallway to the kitchen. Hiding around the corner to listen. Within five seconds his crying stopped. I rolled my eyes. Crocodile tears. And then I heard footsteps. Little Stinker, I thought. I turned the corner ready for round two. Of course, there was Lucas, halfway to me. He stopped and then beamed at me. “Lucas… You need to put your shoes away before you can play.” “Shoes. All done,” he said. “Really? Show me.” I held out my hand. He led me back down the hallway, around the corner to the closet, and pointed. Indeed, there they were: a pair of size 6 toddler shoes, sitting on the top shelf of the shoe rack. “Good job, Buddy! I knew you could do it all by yourself. Give me a high five and off you go.” And just like that, we’re into the battle royale phase with our last kid. May the odds be ever in our favor. “Mommy, how old do you need to be to date?” my seven-year-old asked last night.
Pause. Think. Tread lightly, I think to myself. Pull out teacher stall tactic. “How old do YOU think you need to be to date?” I volleyed back. “Probably like 16.” “Hmmm. That seems like maybe a good age. I guess it depends on why you think people date…” I trail off, leaving the comment open ended. His brow furrows. “Probably because you like someone. And want to spend time with them,” he replies. “That makes sense. I think that most people date because they like the other person and that’s all. I think most older people maybe date because they’re trying to see if they might want to marry someone. But you don’t really know what you would like in a husband or wife until you’re older and are thinking more about your grown up life.” There’s a drawn-out silence. “Whoops! Forgot I have to go get Lucas from Papi upstairs. I’ll be back!” I head toward the stairs, pause, and look back. “I’m glad you asked me that.” Several minutes later, I return, Lucas in tow. “Mommy? Thanks for talking to me about that.” “Anytime, Bud. You can always ask me anything.” I turn away and smile. Parenting is hard. As everyone says, there’s no guidebook. They don’t teach you how to navigate certain situations or questions like these. Questions float through your mind. When do we have ____ talk? What age is too young? Too old? How detailed do you get? And often, you have no idea if the route you chose to take was right. Tonight, I think I got it right. It was a busy kind of Saturday
I was a get up early and get at it Saturday It was a put the house back together post renovation Saturday It was a do all the laundry Saturday It was a prepare the house to be listed Saturday It was a squeeze in haircuts for the boys Saturday It was a ‘kids with Grandma’ Saturday It was a donate all the things Saturday It was a there’s way too much to be done Saturday It was a stop for a family movie night Saturday It was a collapse into bed Saturday It was a somehow-it’ll-all-get-done Saturday Nathan
You wake up the same way you live your life: chipper and ready for almost anything. You roll over, take one deep breath, and sit straight up. Within two minutes of waking up you are out of bed, completely dressed, and headed downstairs to start your guaranteed to be cheerful day. You’re easy and independent and sometimes I forget to soak you up in the morning because outwardly, your soon-to-be 8-year-old-self needs me less. Adam You wake up in a way that no one who knows you during daylight hours would anticipate: grumpy and lethargic. Your run-on-six-cylinder personality doesn’t show up until about an hour after you’ve woken. Our first ten minutes are always spent with me trying to tease you awake, attempting to get you dressed and out of bed without poking the bear that is lurking under your sleepy demeanor. You’re stormy and bristle at any morning humor and sometimes I forget that you’re just five and aren’t out to intentionally sabotage the start of my own day. Lucas You wake up a different character every day: some days I open the door to bubbling chatter, others to a slumbering snore, still others to a crotchety scowl. Will you immediately pass me your blanket? Will you writhe in anger when I touch your pj zipper? Will you pretend to hide and play hard to get in your crib? No one knows. One thing is for sure: everyone knows you’re the one who can bring the morning to a screeching halt, for there’s nothing in the world like an almost two-year old who refuses to eat breakfast. You’re precious and unpredictable and sometimes I wish that our mornings were less rushed so I could soak up the many facets of YOU. Coming home each day the past week has been like Forrest Gump's proverbial box of chocolates. We never know what we're going to get.
On Thursday… It was an unhooked vanity in the upstairs bathroom. No normal bathroom routines up there. On Friday… It was a disheveled family room, half the old floor remaining, half the flooring replaced. No couch-lounging, Netflix binging over there. On Monday… It was a kitchen in disarray, all the furniture pushed into the dining room. No cooking in there. On Tuesday… It was an entryway closet completely emptied, its contents of shoe racks and coats and snow gear deposited in the living room. No indoor space for kids to play anywhere. On Wednesday… It was an unexpectedly disconnected dishwasher, with not a clean plate in the kitchen post dinner. No first world easy button over here. On Thursday… Well, today is Thursday. It’s painting day. After work, I anticipate… chocolates. Some kind of chocolates from the chocolate box. Chocolates that are probably unlike one we’ve already enjoyed. The guarantee is that we have no idea what we’re going to get today! Have you seen the video of the man asked to spell ‘yes’ and ‘eyes’? If not, do yourself a favor and google it. You can thank me later. (Just make sure you watch it more than once, because like most videos, it’s probably only funny with repetition.)
The man’s wife asks him how to spell y-e-s. Which he successfully does. “Yes.” She then asks him how to spell e-y-e-s. To which he repeatedly responds, “Ee-Yes.” The man’s earnest expression, his confusion, and his wife’s laughter tickle my funny bone every time. So much so that one day, several months ago, I introduced my kids to it. After explaining why it was so funny, my 7 and 5 year old children took to using E-Yes! On a frequent basis. So much so that our near two year old will shout it too. Someone asks how to spell something? E-Yes! The youngest is shouting NO on repeat? E-Yes! Can’t figure out what someone is trying to say? E-Yes! Whatever the scenario, there’s a E-Yes for you. I consider it one of my parenting wins: instilling E-Yes! into our daily lives. Yes please! Or should I say: E-Yes!? Within 4 feet of where I sit, 4 items:
My ever present, almost-two-month-old side-kick, who is playing with the Pop Up Pirate A pile of throw pillows that seem travel from family room to living room couches and back again thanks to our boys to treat them as pillows, forts, wrestling pads, stacking blocks, balancing beams, and oh so much more The box full of items waiting to be picked up from the ever-amazing Buy Nothing group My husband, doing his due diligence with checking and changing light bulbs so they’re “bright and similarly toned” for putting our house on the market Snow. On March 13.
We don’t live in the far north of Michigan, Wisconsin, or Minnesota. We don’t benefit from the beauty of the mountains in Colorado, Utah, or Wyoming. So why? We’ve done the bitter below zero cold of winter. We’ve done the snow - no, wait ice - yep, it’s freezing rain covered with snow routine. So why? We live in the suburbs of Chicago. We get hard winters from November through February. Sometimes we’ll get some snow for Halloween, and everyone once in a while the first week of March. But why, oh, why is it March 13 with actual snow sticking, causing me to pull out snow pants and boots for my kids? I’ve often envied the ventilation system for the range hood that was in my mom’s house growing up. It was large, powerful, and vented directly outside. It was great. Well, it was great except for the year of “the odor.”
And then the smell came. Slight at first. A faint whiff that you would catch in passing. And no one could put their finger on it. Sometimes it was in the kitchen. Sometimes in the dining room. Sometimes in the pantry. It was never in the same place twice. We’d glance at each other in passing. Ask, “Do you smell that too?” Try to pinpoint the origin. All to no avail. Over time, the whiff became a smell, and then the smell became overpowering. Surprisingly, that made it harder to pinpoint, because the whole room reeked. You also didn’t want to inhale too deeply, because it was nearly vomit inducing. The hunt got serious. “It’s coming from the cabinet above the stove!” my brother shouted one Saturday. “That makes no sense. There’s nothing up there but tupperware,” my mom disagreed. The cabinet was a good ten feet from the exterior wall, with a duct feeding from the range hood to the flap venting the air out the house wall. Despite the fact that it made no sense, we clustered around the oven, climbed the stepladder, and inhaled ever so slightly. “Definitely coming from there.” “Yep.” “Oh, it’s so much worse here!” And that’s when we realized: the birds. Birds had figured out they could lift the vent flap and build a nest just inside. It was warm, covered, and completely protected from predators. They came back annually to nest. From inside the kitchen you could hear them flapping around, lifting the vent flap, and settling in the nest. Not horribly bothersome. This year's birds had moved out a few weeks ago. The realization that a bird must have died inside the nest was less than pleasant. But the ordeal that followed was worse than we could have imagined. Ryan headed out to clean the vent from the outside in. Up the ladder he went. Out came the nest. But no birds (or carcasses for that matter). Inside we came. We opened the cabinet doors again. With no choice but to detach the round duct connector that fed up from the range hood before turning to vent outside, he set to work. As soon as he removed the screws and slid the duct to the side… maggots. MAGGOTS. Maggots, maggots, everywhere. They poured out of the duct, spilling out of the cabinet, collecting on the stovetop below. The cleanup was a revolting, stomach churning, horrific experience - one I can relieve in each of my five senses, even today, three decades later. So on days like today, where I find myself coveting a much better range vent than our house currently has, I remind myself that at least no baby birds can fall to their deaths, leaving us with a stench and the abomination that is maggots in your house. |
AuthorHeidi. Archives
March 2022
Categories |