Snips and Snails and Swirlies

I grew up in a pretty quiet home.  My sister and I were always pretty mellow.  Books were for reading.  Dolls were for dressing up and caring for.  Game pieces were used for playing the games according to the rules.  When friends came over, we would go in our rooms to play until dinner time.  The loudest game I remember playing was NOK Hockey or pool. 

How I ended up in a house with two little boys is a complete mystery to me.  Neither Luke nor Benjamin would ever be described as mellow.  Everything around here is loud.  Books are used for reading, but also for stacking on top of each other to reach the light switch (and then falling on their heads).  Action figures fly around the room, jump on every piece of furniture, are tied to a string and then flung across the room at a stack of blocks.  Game pieces are used as ammo.  When friends come over, they run while yelling/laughing at the top of their lungs.  Everything is loud.

My sister and I liked to play dress up.  My boys prefer to run around in their underwear.

This morning, I was feeding Olivia while the boys were playing together.  I was talking to my sister on the phone, so I had closed the door.  All of a sudden, I heard something come from the bathroom that never would've been heard in my house as a child.

"Ben, just stick your head in and I'll flush!"

By the way, this is what happens when you leave your camera on the counter while you put the baby to bed.  Photos courtesy of Benjamin

Routine

When Luke was born, one of my first missions was to establish a routine. From the time that he was about 2 months old, we had a written schedule posted on the refrigerator detailing when he would (most likely) eat, "play" and sleep. I scheduled events completely around his nap and feeding schedule and, for the most part, he kept to the schedule unless he was sick. To this day, he prefers to have a plan with set times for his day. If you ask him, he will tell you that he wakes up at "seven - zero - zero," watches his show, eats breakfast, goes to school or plays at home, eats lunch, watches one more show, takes a nap at 2:00, drinks apple juice, eats dinner, plays, takes a bath, eats snack and goes to bed. He likes knowing what is going to happen and when.

When Benjamin came along, all bets were off. When I would normally be starting to solidify a routine, I was in complete survival mode. He had whooping cough and for at least a month would wake up coughing every 45 minutes. Night and Day. During every coughing spurt, one of us had to rock him to help him calm down, so we were both only half awake from mid-April until the beginning of June.   Once everything settled down, we established our new routine and kept to it as much as possible.

Having three children, however, has changed life in our house.  For the past two weeks, I've been trying to write down our daily routine to hang on the refrigerator.  (I like to do this so that in case I have to rush out and leave the kids with someone new, they'll know what we usually do and when.  Like I said, my kids thrive on routine.)  It hasn't worked a bit.  With an infant and a potty training toddler, one day never looks like the last.  Sometimes we eat lunch at 11:30, other times we eat at 1:00.  Sometimes the boys are dressed by 8:00 and sometimes we all stay in our jammies until 5:30.  Bedtime and my work time are still set in stone, but everything else is up for grabs.

Boys in their jammies after Easter Sunday dinner.

Four years ago, I would've found this to be extremely frustrating.  After all, how was I going to schedule doctor's appointments and play dates if we didn't have a schedule?   Now, however, I find it to be somewhat freeing. 

I'm starting to enjoy the flexibility to our day.  I was so proud of myself for choosing to go at the last minute with the boys and my parents to the zoo on Good Friday.   I didn't schedule anything around Olivia's feedings, but just decided that I'd find a place to feed her when she was ready.  I gave the go-ahead to visit the monkey exhibit even though it was dangerously close to lunchtime (although, my mom saved the day with her bag of Nana snacks!).  And, even though it was already right at the boys' nap time, I agreed to go to lunch at Wendy's.  We had a great day, made some memories, and even though we threw our routine out the window, everyone recovered and (as my friend Michele would say) no one died.

Right before Ben fell off the turtle statue.

Watching the hippo get a bath and lunch.

I even sometimes find myself doing spur of the moment things like walking home from my parents' house (a mile or so) with the boys at 7:30 at night.  Yes, I should have dressed them warmer and started out earlier, but we had a great time at the park and they were completely exhausted when we arrived home!

Young Romeo

I am constantly amazed at how my two boys are so different. Luke enjoys being an active member of any group, while Ben prefers to observe from the sidelines. Ben is persistent in solving problems, while Luke truly prefers everything to work perfectly immediately. Luke loves sweets. Ben cried at his first birthday party because we tried to get him to eat cake.

Most recently, however, I've noticed that both of my boys are big fans of the ladies. Very. Big. Fans. Sigh . . . They have very different approaches in their attempts to get a foot in the front door.

Ben has always been more drawn to older women (must be at least 12). Even as a baby, he would stare down men and give a great big smile to women. He acts very shy and makes them work hard to get that first smile. Once they've shown that they're willing to put in the effort, he rewards them with smiles and cuddles. He sits in their laps to read books and won't let them go to do anything else (as long as they obey his every command).

Luke, on the other hand, likes girls who are slightly closer to his age (between 4-13ish). Yesterday, his friend A came over for an hour while her mom went to an appointment. Luke was excited. . . no ecstatic . . . about her arrival. He watched out the window while nearly jumping out of his skin while he waited for her. She was coming over close to lunchtime, so I decided to distract him with a PB&J. A arrived just as he was sitting down to eat, so I told him that he could play as soon as he finished his lunch. A sat down to talk with my sister and I. She was so sweet and I could tell that she enjoyed chatting and being "one of the girls."

Luke could see that his opportunity to have every ounce of her attention was slowly vanishing. After all, this is the girl that he has proclaimed at least once a week will be his future wife. (He really is very convinced of this). He knew that he had to act quickly.

Q: What is a young Romeo to do??
A: Shove your entire PB&J into your mouth.

A was completely mortified. Luke knew he had to regroup and come up with a better idea.

Q: What is a young Romeo to do??
A: Play that you're a skunk and pretend to spray her.

A thought this was a little funny, yet a little strange. She gave him a courtesy giggle and tried to make the best of her crazy little playmate. Luke could tell that things were not going quite as successfully as he had planned.

Q: What is a young Romeo to do??
A: Give up. At this point, Luke looked at her and said, "A. My sister has dolls. We can play with those if you want."

Looks like we have a while before we have to worry about his first date.

Oh, Ben

Luke is (usually) Mr.Flexibility, but Benjamin is my little boy with a mind of his own. Ben likes to
feel that anything he does was his decision. This generally applies to every part of his day. Every. Single. Part.

Now, many people would label him as stubborn, but since I know that he mainly gets this from me,I prefer to call him independent.

Independence can be a wonderful trait. I am hopeful that it will be what causes him to resist
peer pressure and be his own person. When other people tell him that he isn't big enough, strong enough, smart enough, whatever enough, I pray his little independent spirit will tell them that he is content with the person God designed him to be and that they can just deal with it.

Stubbornness, however, is what I am dealing with now. If someone else suggests it, Ben does not want to do it. You could say, "Ben, come eat your ice cream sundae!" and he would
absolutely refuse. He has to feel that eating that sundae was his choice. Our best method of getting our little two year old to do anything is to make him feel as if he was making a choice. We find two options that are both satisfactory to Aaron and I, then allow Ben to make a decision.

(Now, there are times where he has no choice. He can pick which book to read in the car, but he has no choice about being strapped into his car seat. He can pick which stuffed animals to bring to
bed at night, but he has to stay in bed. We have also been known to use my friend Susie's expression, "You git what you git and you don't pitch a fit! Ben knows “the look” and he can
tell when we’re not messing around.)

Examples:

Problem: It is 40 degrees out and Ben needs to wear a jacket.
Choice: Ben, do you want to wear the blue jacket or the green jacket?

Problem: Ben doesn't want to eat his dinner.
Choice: Ben, do you want to eat your broccoli first or your chicken?

Problem: Ben doesn't want to pick up the blocks.
Choice: Ben, are you going to pick up the red blocks first or the blue blocks first?

I know people who would completely disagree with me on this issue. Some would say, "He just
turned two! He doesn't need choices! He just needs to obey his mom and dad."

I agree and disagree, but probably only as a matter of wording.

Agree: Ben does have to learn to obey his parents, but that is why we offer the choice before he flat out refuses. We've learned a great deal about how Ben operates and already know what is going to cause him to turn into a puddle of Benjamin mush.

Disagree: Everything we do is a choice. Aaron chooses to get up and go to work in the morning to support our family. I choose to make sure that my kids are fed, dressed (well, most of the time) and cared for every day. We choose to use our money to pay our bills so that we can live in
our house. We choose to go to church as a family every Sunday. We choose to obey laws.

As a parent, part of my responsibilities (that I choose to fulfill) is to teach my kids to make good
choices. I'm also teaching them that each choice comes with consequences. They are learning that obeying their parents is a choice, but that if they choose to disobey, they will face consequences. Every. Single. Time.

I think that one of the biggest things I've learned from being a parent is to look at the future goals that we've set for our children (Aaron and I have actually made a list, but that is for a future post) and keep the long term in mind. I can't wait to see what God had in mind when he created this little stubborn, independent, contrary and adorable Ben.

God Answers Even Little Prayers

Luke absolutely loves his preschool class. He loves his teachers. He loves his friends. He loves everything about it. Of course, his favorite part of preschool, though, are the parties. Now, I use the term "parties" loosely, because as my friend Pamela once told me, they are most structured parties she's ever attended. The teachers set up several stations that are manned by parent volunteers and the kids rotate between them doing little activities.

After the last party (Valentines Day), Luke subtly mentioned that it sure would be nice if one of his parents could come to his party. I promised that I would try, but explained that with Ben and Olivia, I have a hard time finding time to even get dressed in the morning, so getting to a party is what his Daddy would call a "stretch-goal." He completely forgot about it (as did I) until last night.

"Mom, are you coming to my party?"

"No, baby. I have to stay here with Ben and Olivia."

"Is Daddy coming to my party?"

"No, he has to work."

"Oh . . . "

He was so sweet about it. I could see the disappointment in his eyes, but he didn't say a word. I felt terrible.

I spent this morning trying to figure out how I could get to this party at the last minute. My parents are awesome at helping out with the boys, but they both had commitments this morning. I have lots of friends who are great about babysitting too, but I couldn't figure out a schedule to make it work, especially since Olivia was going to need to eat 15 minutes before the party started and they all live 15-20 minutes away. Aaron assured me that Luke would have to learn to understand that this is part of having siblings and that Luke wouldn't require counseling (at least for this) later on down the road, so I said a quick prayer asking for some way to get me to the party.

Not even 10 minutes later, my grandma called and asked if she could come over to get a "kid fix." I fed Olivia and we were out the door (Benjamin was very happy to have his Grannie Bop to himself).

Luke wasn't quite sure what to do when we walked into his class. He kissed and hugged both Olivia and me at least 10 times and I could see how proud he was to have us there. On the way home he said, "Mom, thank you, thank you, thank you for coming to my party."

Sometimes it is easy to forget how the little things are the big things to your kids. . . .