Decorations. Talk Amongst Yehselves

Charlie said my last post was a little bah-humbug. So I am here to tell you that I am not at all channelling the Grinch this year. In fact, I'm planning on putting up our Christmas tree next week, so when we come back home after Thanksgiving our condo will already be decked out in Christmas cheer.

Speaking of our condo, you should see it. We have pipe cleaners wound around doorknobs and chair legs. Dried leaves are hung on our door with magnets, piled on our mantel, and taped to our tv armoire. Scraps of paper cut from magazines are hanging on Jett's bedroom wall and overflowing two large plastic bags. You see, Jett is decorating.

I blame Halloween. I had to dig out some Halloween decorations, and they had to be cut-out ghosts that Jett and I made last year. Now Jett seems to think that any old scrap of paper that he put the smallest mark on is a decoration. You should see the scraps of paper that he won't let me throw away - and remembers to ask about days and days after cutting them/drawing them/gluing them on to other scraps. But that's just the creating of decorations. It gets worse.

At bedtime now we don't read stories, we talk about decorations. The ones he'll make tomorrow. The ones he made today. Who he will make them for, and what they will be. One night he talked about cutting out peas and corn. Do you know what he did the next morning? He drew yellow and green circles on a white piece of paper, cut them out, and taped them on our windows.

Not only does he seem to talk non-stop about decorations, he wakes up thinking about decorations, and wanting to make them immediately. I guess it's good that he's not asking for TV first thing in the morning, but still. The other day I had dug out the glue stick, two pairs of scissors, stacks of paper, and tape and it wasn't even 6:05 a.m. yet. The kid needs an art studio and a sleeping pill (just kidding!)

Surprisingly, his teachers didn't mention anything about his artistic talent at his conference yesterday. Yes, that's right. Charlie and I acted like true adults yesterday and attended our first parent-teacher conference. Jett's teachers told us that in the classroom he's helpful, friendly, has lots of friends, is well-behaved, and mischevious (in a good way, I assume. I mean, his teachers didn't elaborate, and if there were issues they would have certainly elaborated, right)? They have mentioned to us that he really sings out - he's a good little singer - during music time, and they told us a very sweet story about Jett helping another kid finish a puzzle (he's also very good at puzzles). Oddly enough, he couldn't stack 10 blocks up without them falling (an actual part of their evaluation), but they are keeping him anyway. He's doing great in preschool.



Also, have you seen Kai's hair lately? It is a wonderful mess.