Pride & Pink Eye

We started off the week with some pride and shame.  Great Clips was having their annual half price sale on haircuts, so I took that as an opportunity for Josiah to get a real haircut as opposed to my meager attempts at cutting his hair.  Over the years my skills have improved by itty bitty baby steps, so I was interested in what a real haircut would look like on him.  After it was cut, he and I were both smiling with pride because he looked so handsome.  There was also a huge dose of shame at his "before" hair.  He was smiling all day and he loved it even though it technically is shorter than he wants me to cut it.  Then I got the silly notion that it'd be great to see what Henry looked like with a real haircut as well.  So, on Friday, we headed back to Great Clips on the last day of their sale.  Henry had mentioned that he didn't want to get his hair cut, but we talked about it and I thought he'd do fine.  The hair dresser called his name, and upon hearing it, he decided to go limp and lose all sense of walking ability.  I tried to carry him to the chair, while he hit me several times and then scratched me (with an angry/scared face).  He went limp again and refused to sit in the chair at which time the hair dresser said, "I don't think he's ready today."  So, I swallowed my pride and we walked out of the store slightly embarrassed.  When we got home, Henry felt bad and drew a picture of a heart showing me how much he loved me.  He said he only wanted me to cut his hair.  Poor sweet boy.  One day he'll want his own real haircut, too.

 

I was so proud of Caroline earlier in the week by showing self control with her blanket.  She loves her blanket, she carries it around all the time and sucks her thumb.  She's our Linus.  However, it drives me crazy to see her dragging it around across the dirty floor, or leaving it near the shoe rack (probably the dirtiest area in the house), or just leaving it on the floor in general for the boys to step on (which they do).  So I would take it from her and tell her I was going to put it "up high" to get it off the floor.  Well, as the week went on, she would hand me her blanket and say, "up high" asking me to put it up high.  I was so proud that she was willingly allowing me to put her beloved blanket up high.  What self-control she was showing to not need it every moment.  Then the days went on and it became clear that she wasn't showing self-control at all, she was totally manipulating me to put her blanket up high so that she didn't have to walk it back to her room.  Every time I asked her to put it in her bed, she'd say, "No, up high." which meant I had to stop doing what I was doing to put it up high.  She's a smart little one.

When she is not carrying her blanket around, she is swinging and climbing from all the furniture.  This week she learned to hold onto top bunk and swing from it.  She definitely has a gymnast living in her small body the way she throws herself around.

On Wednesday we went strawberry picking with another family from our CC group.  It was perfect weather  - only 75 deg. instead of the usual 85 degree days we've been having.  They had long rows of strawberries and Caroline loved to walk ahead of me down the row.  One time I looked up after hearing her fuss and it looked like she had fallen and gotten her hands dirty, but she wouldn't move.  So I casually walked down the row to her, at which time I realized the row had turned muddy and she had gotten stuck in the mud.  She was literally stuck and couldn't move her feet.  I pulled her out of the mud and you could hear her shoes suction out.  The kids all had a lot of fun and afterwards we all went to church to visit the Awana store.  Josiah spent all his points on a plastic slinky (now bent out of shape), a plastic billiard set (with half the balls now missing), a small bouncy ball (nicknamed "Patchy" due to its patchwork pattern), a parachute guy (since lost?), and another spikey ball thing.  He totally skipped over the unsharpened pencils which were only 5 points each.  How is he my child?

Caroline

muddy shoes

Henry

Josiah

The next morning, Josiah woke up with one eye sealed shut.  We initially thought it had to do with being outside at the strawberry patch, with all the pollen and such.  That evening, Josiah told me to come to my bedroom, he had to talk to me.  I get in there and he says, "It is un-inppropriate to say that your son has disgusting eyes."  I had used that not very kind word to describe his eyes to Todd.  What Josiah doesn't understand is that I cannot handle eye problems.  I am very blessed to have good eyesight because I could never handle contact lenses or anything to do with eyes.  Then Friday morning, he woke up with both eyes sealed shut.  The same for Saturday.  I had hoped to wait until Monday morning to take him to the doctor, but when he woke up with both eyes sealed shut on Sunday morning, I figured we better take him in.  Pink eye in both eyes and a right ear infection.  Thank goodness Todd was able to do his eye drops (every 3 hours!) all day today.  I am going to have to buck up tomorrow and do it myself.

Josiah's reading has really improved.  Now when we go out driving, he will read as many street signs as possible.  He loves to tell me the speed limit now.  I remember reading "clicking" with me when I read a gas station sign and afterwards reading every sign I could, so it is very neat to hear him read signs when we're out and about.

I am still teaching the boys about gratitude.  On Friday, I let them pick out two wrapped gifts each from a box.  They were to open them and find a way to express gratitude for the gift.  I knew Josiah would go for the biggest, heaviest gift.  He opened it up to find a can of sardines.  So we talked about how he could say "thank you for thinking of me" and how he could share them with his Daddy who liked them.  Henry unwrapped his gift and found a plastic fork (a "to go" fork from Jason's Deli).  He immediately came up with the idea that he could take it in the car and eat food with it while we were driving.  Even when they couldn't think of something, they could always say, "Thank you for thinking of me."  It is always amazing how quickly they pick up on these character traits.  Sometimes I get frustrated that they aren't showing gratitude or being polite, but when we actually take the time to teach them these concepts they pick up on it surprisingly fast.  And its not that I want them to show me gratitude all the time, but I do want them to be boys/men who show it as part of their character.  

Of course, it is always a work in progress.  The other day Henry suggested we take a walk around the block.  His words - "a walk around the block."  He rode a two-wheel bike (with training wheels) which was a big step for him.  He usually always rides the tricycle.  He made it 3/4 of the way around the block before he started in on me about what a bad idea I had to take a walk.  Why were we doing it?  He was thirsty and wanted to get a drink of Gatorade.  Why-oh-why would I make him walk around the block.

Henry was also my house hunting buddy today.  He went to two open houses with me.  The kids are not much help though, because they are ready to buy any house they see as long as it has stairs.  That's their vetting criteria.  Stairs.

Our craft of the week was to make pictures in a style somewhat resembling Ezra Jack Keats' books. We ended up doing tissue paper pictures and while they do not resemble Keats' books, we still had fun.