Why My Sons are the Best – The Reluctant Grownup

Craig knows new words every day. Every day. Today, for example, he said such sentences as “No bedtime yet for Craig.” “Line ’em up, cars!” “I want juice or milk baba.” “Aunt Corrie, Aunt Caki, Aunt Amanda, uuuuuum, who else? Nana! Grandpa Doc!” When he is being disciplined (gently) or put to bed or similar by one parent, he will ask for the other. “Daddy coming?” or “Mommy coming?” He is a clever little sprite.
Yesterday Jack asked sweetly if we could watch a movie on the couch and cuddle. I said after I got the baby down to bed, and I took Craig into his bedroom to read a couple of books (This is Not my Hat, and Have You Seen My Hat. Aka, the fish hat book and the bear hat book, our latest toddler favorites.) While I was reading the various hat books, Jack poked his head in and said something like “I’m selecting a movie from the grown ups part of Netflix, not the kid part, so we can be sure that we all enjoy it. I know how to scroll down to the words that say Family Movies, and I’ll pick something there that you’ll like, too, Mom.” Then he retreated from the room, quietly shutting the door behind him. (He picked Dolphin Tale – which, you know, was a good effort.)
Liam lost his first tooth a short while ago. Something about his jaggedy jack-o-lantern smile just wrecks me.
Craig has laid claim to a giant Mack Truck that once belonged to Liam (the truck is mentioned at the bottom of the link). You can open up the back and sides, and this truck is a matchbox car carrier. Craig has discovered how to fill it up with cars and he carries it around everywhere he goes. He likes to carry it to the porch, and take all the cars out and line them up along the porch railing, then put them all back in it. He takes this very seriously, in that special toddler way.
Jack is a giant, I mean GIGANTIC, wuss when it comes to bodily injuries. The tiniest brush of the tip of a feather across his arm will make him collapse to the ground in abject misery and howl with pain. From the dawn of time -it sometimes feels that long – we have been working on the lost art of sucking it up. And while we by no means have encountered a break-through, the latest “my finger hurts a little bit and so the world is Eeeeeeennnnnddddiiiinnngggg” situation has shown me a Jack who is a bit more self aware about his melodrama. The day after the exceedingly minor injury surfaced, Jack came home from school still complaining about it. Then he thought a sec, and said “Carter says I jammed it and it’s really not a big deal,” shrugging and smiling a wry smile. Then he went on with his evening, without asking for an icepack or that I magically heal him somehow. We’re growing, people.
Liam has taken to surprising me in the mornings by appearing from some secret place (often the laundry room) fully dressed. He will leap into the nearest doorway, just waiting for me to flip at the sight of him all dressed, no yelling required. This doesn’t happen daily – today, for example, he flopped on the couch for twenty minutes and then almost went to school in his pajamas. However, it’s been happening a lot more than never, which is pretty cool. I’m tricking him into being a rule-abiding kid. *evil chuckle*

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