Cinders and Ashes! Jett is Three Years Old!

Jett! You are three! You are three! You are three!



Happy Birthday, Jett! You turned three weeks ago, I can't believe it. So much has happened in the last few weeks that I barely know where to begin or how to include it all. For now we'll concentrate on your birthday weekend. It was, appropriately, a very Jett-friendly weekend. You loved it.

really, you loved it.

What made it so Jett-friendly, you ask? Well, for starters, we spent your birthday at Grammy and Papa's AND Aunt Jenny, Uncle Brian, and Ellie were there. (Yes, their sweet dog Bella was there too, and you survived). The morning of your birthday we set out a scavenger hunt for you and Ellie. You followed pictures all around the house and outside of it too, and at the end of the hunt, you found the treasure - a bike! (Bonus: it was Megan and Owen's old trike, so you know it's cool)! You sat down on that tricycle and looked about a thousand years old. We took a long walk/ride that afternoon, and spent a long time at the park, which made me feel like a thousand years old, what with all of the sliding and climbing and swinging we did together.

cousins on parade

We spent your birthday dinner at a restaurant that Grammy and Papa picked out and it was perfect. The restaurant had video games and skee ball and a merry-go-round, and you had a Papa with a pocket full of quarters - what luck! We all ate pizza and you ate a cheese stick. You opened presents and blew noisemakers and wore your birthday hat and sat right next to me all through dinner and we all just felt like a million bucks, celebrating you, and handing you presents to open.

cousins on the merry-go-round

One of the most memorable parts of your birthday, for me, was the fact that ever since Kai's birthday (three weeks before yours), you've been asking me not to sing "Happy Birthday" to you. You didn't want anyone singing happy birthday to you on your birthday, so we didn't. We put candles in the pizza and you blew them out in (relative) silence, perfectly happy. After dinner we went out for ice cream, and then five hours later, or something like that, you finally fell asleep.

a birthday puzzle - one of your favorite activities

Oh, but the party was not over, it was only beginning. Because the next day you saw Thomas. Thomas. Thomas the Train! Grammy and Papa said you would like it and they were right. It was magical. The national train museum hosted Thomas and his gear. You were particularly mesmerized by the table of battery-powered trains running on a web of tracks. (Silly me, I thought it would be ok for you to pick up a train, and then put it down on any old random place elsewhere on the track - what a crash that caused)! You could have spent hours watching those trains, and I could have spent hours watching you watch them.



But we couldn't stay there forever, eventually we had to drag ourselves away to actually ride Thomas. Now the car we sat in was like any metra car you've ever been on, and you've been on a few. But we could see Thomas pulling us, and you had your ticket to hold, and Grammy and Papa were with us, and it really couldn't get any better than that. I watched you hold your ticket, and then so seriously hand it over to the train conductor, and I just held my breath for fear of interrupting your sweet solemnity. We looked out the window and laughed with Daddy and widened our eyes in wonder when we drove over a bridge and saw only water below us.

Kai was with us too!

It was a hot, thirsty day, and at the end of it you didn't want your picture taken with Thomas and you didn't want to leave the trains, and Daddy and I were preparing for a meltdown when we realized that we could take a school bus back to our car. A school bus! We rode in a school bus! What a save. It was a fabulous day.

on the bus

Happy Birthday, Jett. You're pretty fabulous yourself, and we love you.

The Only Thing Missing was the Umbrella Drink

I still have to blog about Jett's third birthday, but wow, it takes some planning to find time to find the camera, find the camera batteries, find the cord so I can upload the pictures, and then find time to sit at the computer and get it all done. So while my camera sits across the room and the cord is in another room, and batteries are who-knows-where, I'll write about what we did today.

Today was, to my surprise, awesome.

My friend and I had agreed to take our kids to the pool today. This friend of mine, she seems to do everything with ease. She arrives places on time - with her kids. She packs amazing, well-balanced lunches, she never seems to need 20 minutes to organize her stroller before she can put her kids back in it, and her kids are always happy. So when she suggested that we take the kids to the pool, I was a little intimidated. I wasn't intimidated of her, I was just in awe of how she mentioned a trip to the pool. She said it so casually. Like it wouldn't take her an entire week just to gather the energy to think about taking two kids to the pool. As if it wouldn't take her a day to pack the bags. As if watching two kids in a pool would be easy. I was exhausted just thinking about it. In fact, I even pushed it back a day so I could rest up first (thankfully I could blame it on the weather forecast, although the rain never came). When I finally admitted to myself that I needed to pack for the pool, it took me over thirty minutes - and I did this the night before when the kids were sleeping, so I had no distractions. Two towels, sunscreen, bathing suits, swim diapers, a couple of tupperware bowls as stand-in water toys (You can imagine how excited Jett was to play with those.), lunch, water bottles, change of clothes, extra diapers, kitchen sink - you get the idea. We were loaded up.

I was most nervous about watching both of the boys in the pool at the same time. First, because it's a pool, and kids drown in pools. Secondly, because Jett is starting to run away from me when we are outside (or inside). Thirdly, because it's a pool and kids drown in pools. But, it's a kiddie pool, I reasoned, trying to psyche myself up. It starts out about ankle deep, and is only up to Jett's belly-button at the deepest point. Plus, it will be crowded with kids and it's in an enclosed space, and my friend will be there with her kids, and she has quick reflexes and Jett almost always does what she asks. Still, I was nervous. I was nervous that one of my kids would drown and the other one would run away. I was nervous about fitting in to my bathing suit. I was nervous about appearing nervous. I was a nervous wreck.

We walked in to that pool area with all of our stuff and all of my tension and I talked happily to Jett to mask my stress and I tried to walk lightly, the way relaxed mothers walk, and swing my backpack jauntily over my shoulder the way carefree people do. I wore a backpack and carried Kai on my hip and two towels around my shoulders, and held Jett's hand while he dragged the water bottle, and did it all with a smile, because this, carrying all of this crap into a watery death trap, this is pure fun. Changing two wiggly boys out of regular diapers and into swim diapers while they stand, sit, lay, wriggle on a towel - oops, make that a soaking wet towel (thanks, splashing kid) - oops make that scratchy concrete - this is fun. This was totally worth the half hour walk in the stroller just to get here.

The pool was packed with babies in sun hats and little girls in pink bikinis and boys in board shorts and twelve million water toys that were better than my plastic bowls. There were moms in shorts trying to play with their kids without having to sit in the water, and moms in the water, and one lone dad holding hands with his son. The water was shallow and the pool was small and I realized that nobody was going to drown. Jett wasn't going to run away from me because there were boats to play with and strangers to avoid. Here was his friend, with a toy boat even. Things were looking up.

Kai and I sat in the water and played with the toys the floated by. My friend and I chatted and kept an eye on our kids. We broke up some failed attempts at sharing and met some other moms and talked about what to do tomorrow, and I kind of relaxed. I kind of started thinking that this really isn't so difficult after all. I kind of started to think that I am living in the lap of luxury, cooling off in a pool in the middle of the workweek, with two wriggly kids and a soaking wet towel. I kind of started thinking that we might come to the pool every day. I started thinking that summer just got a whole lot easier. I love easier.

Dear Jett,

Your third birthday was last week and I would love to sit down and write about it if only you would take a nap. Or go to bed on time.

Either one, kiddo. I'd take either one.

Two Pictures and a Little Writing

Have we been celebrating this week? (Since Charlie got a job). Well, kind of. Really we've been running around trying to finish errands and complete tasks before Charlie starts work. Things are really going to change next week. Charlie and I will have to wake up as early as Jett, and then actually get dressed and start moving, instead of laying on the couch and watching cartoons, which has become our happy routine. Then Charlie will leave and it will be just me and the boys, wrestling our way through the day.

I wanted to write about all of the fun stuff we've been doing this week, or more accurately, all of the fun things that Jett and Charlie have been doing (the zoo! Home Depot! watering the grass!) but ack, I can't think of any words to make it sound as fun as it was. Maybe because I wasn't there, and Jett only tells me the main parts of the day: "We saw sea lions, Mama!" "I found this rock for you!"

So instead of details, I leave you with pictures. Happy pictures. Yay!

Jett feeling happy that he can finally take this guy (Uncle Dave) out to lunch.


Blowing bubbles on the fire escape.

Main St. Update #7: The One We've Been Waiting For

Charlie got a job.

A job! A job he is excited about. A job he is going to excel at, in a company that is lucky to have him if I do say so myself. A job in Chicago, a job with a challenge, a job higher up in the hierarchy, a job in a brand-new industry. The sun is brighter, the sky is bluer, my step is skippier, my hair is prettier, and my kids are better behaved. In fact, I don't even think this is Main Street anymore. I think we wandered over to Candy Land, and all of the weight that was on my shoulders has been replaced with a big (but weightless) chocolate bunny, and that chocolate bunny is handing me his ears, telling me to go ahead and take a bite. Yum!

Charlie starts work in about a week. We are thankful and thrilled, and can't help reflecting on how generous our friends and family have been these last eight months. We can't wait to take you out to dinner, to pick up the bar tab, to buy you a coffee, and show up on your doorstop bearing big boxes of diapers. You all have been the best, and we wouldn't have made it through without you. (Trust me, we did the math).

Aw, we just love you guys. Honestly, we love everything today. But mostly we love you.