The Crane

We have been making it a habit to take the boys to the park after dinner in the evenings. They run around the duck pond, feed the ducks, watch a little baseball and get too tired to see straight. This means they go to bed without a fight. It is glorious. And fun. And they are cute and almost well-behaved most of the time.

We were at the pond the other evening and the boys were throwing bread to the ducks. A crane was standing in the water just watching the ducks and turtles and fish bite at the bread. The crane then stuck his head in the water and came back up with a fish speared onto his beak. The boys watched the crane jiggle the fish off of his beak, toss it into the air, and eat it whole. It was amazing. I have never seen anything like it!

My Favorite Age

I know that I have written this before – it is so fresh in my mind…but I am too lazy to look for it and really don’t care.

Do you know that wonderful nostalgic feeling that can sometimes hit you when you hear a song from your past, drive through your old neighborhood, or see someone you used to know so well? I love that feeling… it makes me feel warm all over, familiar, content. I cannot explain how it feels, but I want to. I want to put on paper what that feeling is so that someday when I cannot grasp it, I can read about it and remember exactly how it feels. I have never been very good with word pictures – never seem to be able to express things I feel as well as I can feel them. I suppose that is what makes writing a talent…one I wish dearly that I possessed.

Yesterday driving home I had that old familiar feeling, and I don't even know why. It wasn't the song on the radio, or the area of town I was in. I hadn't run into an old friend or even come across anything particularly familiar - but it hit me like a ton of bricks...that content, happy, nastalgic feeling. Perhaps it was because it was warm, sunny, and a storm was headed in - giving the air that funny smell. Perhaps it was because I was headed home early looking foward to spending time with the boys. Perhaps it was just a good day. I only hope I have more of those.

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Yesterday I took the boys to the “big park” which is not too far from our house. They have soccer fields, baseball fields, two jungle jims, volleyball nets and picnic facilities. They also have a pond. With ducks. Lots of ducks. Ducks that LOVE to eat bread. So – we took bread for the ducks. I let the boys run around feeding the ducks until a ½ loaf of bread was gone – which took a while since they kept giving them one tiny piece at a time. Cole would chase the ducks until they would take the bread from him, which surprised me. I assumed he would be afraid, but he was so NOT afraid that it frightened me a little. I don’t want to be that mother. You know the kind - the one that lets her kids get pecked to death by ducks. But – I also don’t want to be the over-reacting clingy mom with two girly-boys (which I totally am) so I tried to let them have fun. It almost killed me.

After feeding the already fat ducks, I let them walk around the pond. Letting them do this nearly killed me too. I kept envisioning the boys running head-first into the water and drowning – which is crazy…because I would help them before they got hurt and how would they run head first anyway? There are toddlers, they would fall at least 6 times before they got there – but my mind is insane and thus I kept worrying. I managed to keep my worrying to myself (sort of) and let them have fun. Roark would run ahead, stop, turn around to face me and announce, “RUNNING” with a huge grin on his face. Cole would try to run too, but would fall or stub his toes. He ended up with a bloody toe and knee, but didn’t want to stop trying to run. It was hilarious! And cute. Much of the cute.

On the way home they were both thirsty so I let them take turns with my water bottle. Every time we would get to a stop sign I would make them switch and let the other boy have it. It was a riot to get to a stop sign, have them recognize it, yell “STOP” and hand over the water… or try to hide it so they could keep it. I just love this stage of their development – everything they do is cute, funny, or a riot (sometimes in an annoying sort of way). Roark has started putting words together and even making some words up. Cole is beginning to talk more, and they are both so expressive. I wouldn’t mind staying at this age for a while.

My Sleepless Nights

Didn’t sleep last night. At all. Just watched the clock tick…tick…tick… away and wondered when in the hell I would be able to fall asleep. It NEVER happened. How annoying.

Virginia Tech Sadness

Last night we were giving the boys a bath. This was after dinner and a few hours of watching the unraveling story of the shootings at Virginia Tech. As I was watching the boys splash in the water, talking and laughing, I was thinking about how sad it was that those children had been killed…just teenagers with their whole lives ahead of them. Todd and I talked about it for a bit and I kept saying that I felt so bad for the parents of those kids – that they never in all their wildest dreams imagined, or hoped for a life like that for their kids. He thought about it for a minute and said “imagine being the parents of the guy that killed them”. And I have not thought about much else since then. It is sad to think that he was a silly little two year old not all that long ago – his parents watching him laugh and play. How can they possibly handle this?

My Silly Boys

This morning while I was getting ready for work I could hear the boys in their room:

“Thump, thump thump…. Giggle giggle giggle… Book. Story. Car-car. Thump, thump, thump…”

So I went in to get them and Roark scrambled back into bed and pretended to be asleep. With his eyes opened. He hasn’t learned the art of deception quite yet. Meanwhile Cole was playing with a matchbox car on the floor “rooooooommmmmm” and decided that he would continue playing with it, on the floor, all the way down the stairs. He tried to crawl headfirst down the stairs and started to tumble, when I stopped him. He is bright like that. I had to eventually carry both of them down because they were more interested in playing than coming down and getting dressed… but they were incredibly cute.

After getting them dressed, Roark realized he had pockets in his pants and kept putting matchbox cars in the pockets, taking them out, and announcing “Car!” “Pocket!” over and over and over. He then proceeded to feed the dog his breakfast and tried to give him a “mukky drink” too… lucky dog. Hungry boy.

My Boys are Growing

The boys are changing every day. They are different now than even a week ago. “No shit?” you say? Well, it seems surprising to me…

They both are getting more verbal, however talking is really where Roark is a Viking. Cole is better at being a sneaky obstinate toddler…in the form of climbing on the table, in the toy box, on the window sill, or on the back of the sofa – only to look at you and grin – challenging you to make him get down.

Roark says:

Dun (done)

Myeeeene (mine)

Noooh (no)

All gun (all gone)

Ite-ite (night light)

Wa-wa (water)

Bash (bath)

Aaan (on)

Mukky dink (milk drink)

Oooopeeen (open)

Memo (Nemo)

Mobie (movie)

Repeats pretty much anything you say – even the bad stuff

Many animal noises and names

Gash (Cassie)

Bitney (Brittany)

Gock (rock)

Cole says:

Myeeeene (mine)

Nyu (no)

Doggie

Kittie

Blabder (water)

Bat (bath)

Muk (milk)

Dink (drink)

Cash (Cassie)

Bitney (Brittany)

Many animal names and noises

I think Cole can say everything Roark does, he just chooses not to talk as much. Roark loves talking – chatters all the time. Most of the time I cannot figure out what he is saying…but he still goes on and on. It is awesome to hear him start to put words together and recognize things by name. He seems to understand a lot more than he can express and this appears to drive him crazy sometimes… like he can’t find the words to explain something and it makes him mad. Cole is too easy-going to care about things like expressing himself… life is just a big ol’ party to him.

I don't guess any of this is very exciting to anyone but me - but I just don't want to forget how cute their little voices sound or the way they said words when they were little. It is such a joy to see them turning into little people...and this is the most people-like they have been yet! I love being around them. I love watching them think and talk and put things together. I love being part of their little lives.

My Global Freezing

It snowed here over the weekend.

“Here” is in Texas.

Global Warming, my ass!

My Whiney McWhinerson

I walked in the back door yesterday evening around 5:30. As I stepped into the living room I practically stepped on Cole – who…was asleep on the floor. I gingerly stepped over him and a few paces later almost stepped on Roark – who…was asleep on the floor. Apparently they decided not to nap during the day and couldn’t stay awake a moment longer. It was cute. Very cute. But not cute enough to make up for the Whiney McWhinerson that Roark became the moment he woke up until the moment he went to bed. I could not look at him without him breaking down into a sobbing mess. EVERYTHING MADE HIM CRY. Dinner? Cry. Milk? Cry? Holding him? Cry. Pajamas? Cry. Diaper? Cry. Bedtime? Well, you get the idea. He cried and cried and cried until he was finally asleep for the night.

I can no longer remember when the boys were babies and they were like that all the time. How did I not kill myself? Seriously. One night of it drove me CRAZY. Oh thank god they actually grow out of that stage. Now we need to get past the terrible twos. Quickly.

My Annoying Toddlers

So the babies? They grow up. They assert their independence. They don’t remain slugs that wither along doing as they are told. And the growing up? It starts at..oh….lets say…19 months, 21 days, 9 hours.

We have had a rough couple of nights with the boys this week. Cole was running a fever (clueless as to why…it appeared and then *poof* was gone 2 days later) and therefore was the king of the complaining. Whiney McWhinerson. All. Day. Long. And nights too. So much whining in the nights. We ended up falling into the great parenting pitfall – we brought him in bed with us. OK – I will be fair to Todd here – I brought him in bed with us. Because I was tiiiiirrred (I wonder where Cole got the whiney genes from?). And he kicked and moaned and kicked some more. But – I could sort of rest there as opposed to downstairs playing legos. And this continued until last night when there was no sign of fever and we were all spent – so we dumped the boys in their beds and headed to bed. And then all hell broke loose.

Roark and Cole howled and screamed at the idea of sleeping. I think they may have yelled “fuck you” – but it is hard to tell when they slur their words so much. The point here is that they were VERY pissed off that we would dare make them go to bed. Cole specifically wanted OUT. OF. THE. DAMN. BED. ALREADY. He kept yelling at us, which must have meant that he was hoping we would wear down and just put him in our bed.

After yelling for all of 10 minutes I heard a huge “KERTHUMP” followed by hysterical screaming, coming from their room. I then knew that Cole had just hurled himself out of his bed. I went upstairs, calmed him down, put him in bed, and left the room…listening to him and Roark continue with the screaming. 2 minutes later? There was Cole standing at the gate to his room – yelling at me. So – back in bed he went, and he proceeded to climb out WHILE I WAS STILL IN THE ROOM. Defiant little boy! There was simply no keeping him in his bed at this point… dilemma.

So at 9:something last night we proceeded to turn Cole’s crip into a toddler bed. Which we knew he would not stay in. We then baby-proofed the room. Of course guilt got the best of us and we did the same with Roark’s bed – thinking how mad he would be that Cole could roam free while he was stuck like a rat in a cage. We then put the monsters in bed, shut the door, shut the baby gate, and went to bed ourselves. Oh! The crying!

We listened to them cry until about 10:30. I could hear them stubling around the room – hitting the door, stomping around. And then, all of a sudden? Silence. Wonderful, beautiful silence. Of course the quiet got the best of me while I lay in bed wondering if they were quiet because they somehow managed to escape out the window, or perhaps pulled the dresser over on themselves – and were now dead. What? Those are not normal thoughts? Seriously?

I finally went into their room to check on them – and would you believe it? They were each in a bed asleep. And – they slept all night long. Until 7:30 this morning. Holy hell, that was nice.

Portugal

Portugal, originally uploaded by ckindsfather.

Portugal is a beautiful country. It is full of winding roads, brick walkways, huge old trees. There are miles and miles of vineyards and farms and pastures. There are countless hills and churches and castles at every turn. The people are quiet, friendly, and purposeful. They cling to family, religion, tradition tighter than anyone I have yet to meet. It is a wonderful place and I feel like more of a person having been there – if only for a week.