I am not sure my children really get the concept of prayer.  I know they know the words to say, the format, and the behavior expected during prayer, but it’s fairly clear that they don’t really understand yet what it’s all about.  Their prayers however continue to amuse me, and they are all over the board:

Engineer (the know it all 6 year old, excuse me 6 and a half year old boy)

"Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for this day.  Thank you for our family.  Please bless Sugar to be reverent during prayer.  Please bless that Spider will stop talking right now.  Please bless us to always be right.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen."

Sugar (the unpredictable, airy fairy 4 year old girl,)

"Heavenly Fath-eerr,  I’m thankful for our family.  I’m thankful we had fun.  Please bless us to be safe.  Bless us to have fun and do something tomorrow.  Lord of Commandments.  Love one another.   In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen."  (she will not finish a prayer without the italicized part)

Spider (2 1/2, blesses the food regardless of type of prayer)

"Heavenly father, thankful for this day.  Bless that daddy can go to work.  Bless safe.  Bless the food.  Thankful for the food. Chryst.  Amen."

 So there you have it.  Hopefully when they begin to have real life issues, they will understand that they can turn to Heavenly Father in prayer to give them strength and lift their burdens.  For now though, they can continue to ask to "always be right" and love one another.

(And may the food be perpetually blessed.)

In the foyer at church today, Engineer spotted a woman with white hair.  He mentioned it loudly enough for her to hear.  She commented that she had had white hair for a very long time, ever since she was 13.

To which Engineer replied, "My mom’s hair used to be brown.  It’s blonde now.  She’s been dying it since she was 28 and she’s still 28."

Thank you son.

This isn’t the first time such information has been divulged.  I have a feeling that perfect strangers are going to know EVERYTHING about me for the next ten years anytime the boy is with me.  I guess if I want to maintain a sense of mystery, I will need to either leave him at home, or invest in some strong duct tape.

Sugar and Spider both took naps today.  At the same time. I know, right?  Incredible.  As a result, Engineer and I were able to have some good quality time together.  We made cookies, wrapped presents and talked about future careers.

"Mom, I’m going to be a doctor when I grow up."

"You don’t want to be a video game programmer like Daddy?"

"No, that’s okay when I’m like 5, 6 or 7, but I want to be a doctor.  I want to find out what’s wrong with people."

Sometimes I’d like to know what’s wrong with people too.    But seriously, this was the first time I had ever heard him talk about wanting to be a doctor.  I mean, quite frankly the kid could end up being a brain surgeon because he’s totally smart enough.  He loves babies, (and talking about the parts lol) so maybe an ob?  I can see him being a doctor.  Sure.  Good blend of his smarts and his desire to help people.

But maybe his motives aren’t so altruistic…

At dinner, for Charming’s benefit, I asked Engineer what he wanted to be when he grew up.

"I want to be a doctor, so I can call for the nurse when kids come in to get their five year old shots."

Ah.  The truth comes out. 

"Daddy, could you please get me some pajamas?  It doesn’t matter which ones they are, just get the long sleeved dress one with the kittens on it."

It did.  What can I say, I love great music.  And the Moses story is so incredible.  When that opening song came on and the Hebrew slaves sing, "Elohim, God on high, Can you hear your people cry?" I just started sobbing.  It was so moving.

Of course I really lost it when Jochabed starts singing to Moses.  Can you imagine sending your baby down a river on the chance that he might live?  Seriously.  The faith of that woman.  I can only imagine the angst she must have felt as she sent him down the Nile and I would guess she was just pleading with the Lord to let him live.  I know I would have been begging to see him again.  And I am totally touched by the tender mercies of the Lord toward Moses mother.  She sends him down the river and then the Lord, through Miriam and Pharaoh’s daughter, works it out so that she gets to be her son’s wet nurse. Not only does her baby live but she is blessed to be with him for a few more years.  What love!

Anyway.  I was crying.  I just love that song– Deliver Us.  Totally worth the dollar I spent.  

Engineer, a normally slow to dress himself child, bounded into my room this morning around 7:45 and exclaimed, "It’s the first day of kindergarten!"  By the time I rolled myself out of bed he was fully dressed and asked if we could get in the car.  For the next hour and a half all I heard from the child was, "Is it time to go yet?"

Kindergarten is going to so totally rock.

He met with his teacher today for 20 minutes and he couldn’t understand why he had to leave so soon.  He had a hard time answering the teacher’s questions because he was so distracted by all the letters and numbers around the room.  He kept looking around and making observations.  "Where’s the Z?  Oh, it fell down?  The U is going to fall down too…"  The child was in his element.  I don’t think he would have had a bigger high if he’d eaten cotton candy for breakfast.

While I was in the hall, another mom (realizing this was my first to go to school) asked me how I was doing.  I said I was great.  No qualms, no issues.  Feeling fine.  It wasn’t until (like Kathyrn) I was filling out some paperwork that I got a little fazed by it all.  The last question on the page was somewhat to the effect of, "what makes your child a special person?"  And how do you answer that?  I mean, he’s special because he’s mine?  He special because he’s my first born, chubby cheeked baby boy?  I wanted to write all about his sweetness and his brilliance.  How he calls me into his room when he can’t sleep and says, "Mommy, will you just talk to me?"  How he still gives me random hugs.  How even though his knowledge has increased, that nearly everything his teacher quizzed him on today he could have answered when he was still this boy: 

I can hardly believe my drinking milk from a straw cup, sleeping with his letters j & k, baby boy is entering the public school system.   Am I a little emotional?  No.  Nope, not really.  No.  Not at all.

Okay.  A bit.  Just a little bit. 

…than the feeling of tiny hands wrapped around your neck while you’re snuggling in bed.

I haven’t really posted anything lengthy or interesting for awhile so here goes….

I have been itching for spring lately.  Just wanting to get out of doors, do some gardening, get some sun in my face.  And my loving Heavenly Father has absolutely blessed me and many other folks here in the Northwest with some flat out gorgeous weather these past few days.  We have taken full advantage of this with going to the zoo yesterday and having a picnic lunch in our backyard today.

There is something about being outside in the sunshine that just allows me to take my life at a slower pace.

As we sat on our blanket in our backyard I just felt peaceful.  As Spider dumped upon the ground an entire bag of Craisins my first reaction was, ‘Seriously?’ and then as I watched the last bits fall, I thought, ‘that really does look kind of neat,’ and I suddenly understood why these people do some of the things that they do.

It really isn’t to make me angry, and it really isn’t always just to get my attention.  They do those things because they are fun, and interesting and they are just exploring their world.  When was the last time I dumped out a bag of quinoa to watch it waterfall down to the ground?  When was the last time I used a unique media combination to create a work of art such as marker on wall or pen on legs?  And when was the last time I used an eyeliner on my face to make angry eyes?  When was the last time my mom told me to clean up styrofoam and then in front of her eyes took a marker to the carpet to make "tracks" for them (the foam pieces)?  They call them children for a reason and I love that they are having the time of their life.

I love watching these people grow.  I love learning about them and seeing the choices that they make. I take pleasure in their funny little quirks and habits.  I love how Spider, my little Person Baby, loves to get under blankets, and today when I walked outside with our picnic, she was already all snuggled in.  I love walking in on her cozied up in my freshly made bed reading the Look (my Mary Kay catalog) and laughing.

It is the little unique day to day experiences that make life so worthwhile, don’t you think?  Rare things, like the moon not being in the sky tonight because of the eclipse or even freshly fallen snow.  Silly things like fourth of July parades.  Wonders of nature like deer showing up in our backyard or undpredictable animal things like this event that we witnessed at the zoo yesterday: (the large goat in the beginning was periodically breaking things up)

And just the wonder that children see in all of it, is so tender so precious, and so worth holding on to.  If we could just be more like them.  I think we’d be lot happier, don’t you?  Well, anyway, I think it is time for me to go take pleasure in bubbles or dumping rice on the ground or maybe even just snuggling in.

You know, one of the challenges of being a work-at-home mom (with a business, since ALL moms work-at-home moms) is switching back and forth between business woman and mommy.

I caught myself saying to Sugar today, "Yes I would love to read you stories.  I’ve just got to make a quick phone call, shoot a quick email out and then you and I can get together."

Whaaaa?

As in, "Yes, I would love to get together with you for some stories and a quick facial.  What’s better for you, evenings or weekends?"

Sheesh. 

I don’t know why the nursing is such a hot topic for me right now, but here’s another tale of the lactating bosoms.

So, I am sort of past the pumping stage with Spider.  Instead, when I need relief from engorgement and I have no baby nearby, I hand express.  I have found myself doing this in public bathroom stalls when the pain necessitates it, and this evening I did a little "expression" in our own bathroom.  Spider had decided she was finished, and there was no way I could go to bed in my current state.

In walks Engineer.  

Now, Engineer is 5 and a boy.  So maybe he shouldn’t see my bosoms, or maybe it’s okay.  I just figure that nursing is a part of life and if I don’t act all embarassed about it, that he will grow up with a healthy respect of the functioning female anatomy.  At the very least, he won’t freak out when his own wife decides to breastfeed their children.

The following conversation ensued.

E:(giggling) It squirts milk!
Me: Yep.  (Pause, as I think of a devilish question to lead the witness.)  Do yours squirt milk?
E: Nope, because I don’t have big ones like yours.  I just have little ones.  (Begins unzipping his footed pajamas.)  See?  (Points to his chest).  They’re just belly buttons. 
Me: (Suppressed laughter).
E: They only work with toy babies.

And then I run to the computer to blog it.  Because even if none of you think its funny, it’s going to make for some great embarassment come the teenage years.  And that kind of blackmail is always good to have around.