Surprising

It was surprising, I told my visiting friend and fellow RDI mom, how everything can change dramatically in a very short period of time. A few months ago I could not have lounged on the couch chatting with her, cup of coffee in hand, while Oliver played alone upstairs. A few months ago I would have kept almost constant visual contact with him, especially in the afternoon. Toilet training -- or lack of it -- had taken over our lives and I was hyper-fixated on the task. And now, I told her with a peaceful smile on my face, I don't have to be so watchful. I can relax. I don't worry at all.

I didn't even worry or get up to check when I heard water running in the upstairs bathroom. Oliver often gets his own glass of water. And sometimes he likes to play with water in the sink or bathtub. And now that I reflect on it, it was surprising that I didn't go to check when I heard actual splashing coming from upstairs. Lately, I told my friend, Oliver has been asking for a bath in the late afternoon. He must be drawing himself a bath. I just hope he took his clothes off first, I said with a laugh.

So when I said good-bye to my friend and finally went upstairs to check things out I was quite surprised to see a totally naked little boy running out of the bathroom. I was equally surprised to find that all the water splashing was, in fact, cup after cup of water drawn from the sink, hitting the bathroom floor. And let's just say there was quite a lot of water in there by the time I arrived. We live in an old house and the floor in the bathroom is a bit bowed -- which I hadn't noticed before now -- and the water had collected like a small indoor lake, lapping at the feet of the tub and toilet.

I was also surprised that it didn't even occur to me to yell at Oliver. "You'd better get some towels, Mister," was about all I said. And he did. "And don't ever do this again."

After we got all the water cleaned up and deposited nine soaking wet towels in the bathtub I turned my attention to getting Oliver dressed and we fell into a lively game of basketball, pretty much forgetting about the water incident.

So then imagine my surprise when RT came home from school and said from the downstairs hall: "So, did you see all this mess down here?"

"Um. What mess?"

"All the water pouring out of the light in the kitchen ceiling."

"Hmph."

Upon closer inspection, water was actually coming from just about every nook and cranny in the kitchen. I had no idea we owned so many nooks and crannies.

Six more soaking wet towels landed on the laundry room floor.

And even more surprisingly, Oliver and I went back to our game of basketball and I again forgot about all the water.

When Nik got home some time later he asked me how my day went.

"I had a really nice visit with J. Oliver and I had a lot of fun playing today. Actually, it was a really good day," I told him. And do you know what? It really was.

It's kind of surprising, but on days like this I kind of feel like I'm actually getting the hang of this parenting thing.

Right Angles

I was never very good at math. I had to take Algebra II three times and I never got more than a C-. I still need to use paper and pencil to figure out double digit simple math problems. But for some odd reason I excelled at geometry. I loved geometry. I found it to be less math than movement, logic and aesthetic. It appealed to me on some inner level that I found surprising given my utter ineptitude at all other things mathematical. And so it is with curiosity that I find myself watching Oliver as he has become compelled to create right angles everywhere. Everywhere. Two grains of rice. A piece of bread torn in two. Random toys found strewn about. Books. His fingers. My fingers. The drawstrings on his pants. ...

And so here, I present his latest passion, which is made and re-made about a hundred times a day -- or more if I would allow it. Our bathroom Stonehenge:





















And lest we not forget the youngest member of our clan, who also has an artistic streak, some music:

Adventures on a Monday

It all started out simply enough.

Add an egg, a little sugar. ...





BUT THEN: Mom steps away to put our youngest adventurer in bed for a nap, returning to find that our boy Oliver hasn't quite had his fill of sugar.





Luckily, he is his father's son and is well-versed in household cleaning operations.

Just So Happy

I must have said these words to Nik a dozen times or so lately.

I'm just so happy.

I wasn't so sure after returning from Houston. I felt nervous. Anxious. Stressed out. All in a very general way. And I suppose it was very natural -- Big Changes were afoot. But then I started digging in and doing what needed to be done and before long I was coming up to the surface for long gulps of cool, satisfying air. Slowly but surely I'm shedding the stress of my soon-to-be former job and I'm circling the wagons around what is most important to me: my family.

The most immediate improvement is my sense of rhythm. Not in a musical way. Mercy, no. That would require some kind of act of God. This is more of a coming together with my kids in a synchronized way. And now that I am becoming practiced at it I see how much it had been lacking in our lives. Nik and I have always prided ourselves on managing our lives in such a way that we were mostly home with the kids -- one of us or the other. But the trade-off to this commitment was the logistics of it all. It was exhausting.

Imagine, for instance, that Oliver was on one of his no-sleep benders. Night after night of not anything like a full night's sleep, Nik and I jockeying to see who could squeeze in an extra half-hour of sleep before the alarm clock went off. And anyway you looked at it, I would still have to be to work by 7:30, Nik by 9:00. But, as I ease out of my job, I have had the luxury of ignoring the alarm clock. When Oliver woke in the night I could let Nik sleep. Oliver, Sami and I, could stay in bed until 9:00 if we wanted to. We weren't marching to anyone's drum but our own and we were setting the tempo. And when it was a particularly difficult night, we could pile in the car and get a bagel or go to the pancake house: none of us cranky, none of us rushed. It has been Mar-ve-lous!

I'm also allowing myself, more and more, to give Oliver the gift of time. Not more of my time -- he already has most of it. But rather, processing time. Do you know how hard it is to wait for 45 seconds? 45 seconds is a ridiculously long time to wait for a response. But sometimes that is what he needs. And if I'm in too much of a hurry to get some thing or some where then I am surely losing something in the process.

Anyway, I'm just so very happy these days. Big Changes are afoot. And it is all good.