Five Years

Last month, we celebrated Eliot's fifth birthday! It's one of those big birthdays because it sounds so big and means that school is just around the corner. However, I feel like we eased into it because Eliot is in his second year of preschool anyway. When he turned four, I said that he had seemed that old for a long time anyway. As it is with five.

Eliot has done so many really big "kid" stuff this year. He's doing great at soccer. He plays (and beats) video games on his own. Sometimes he seems like such a teenager because he wants to watch Youtube videos of other people playing video games, but I don't let him indulge in that much. Eliot ran a few races this past spring and fall, and is an amazing swimmer.

Eliot is doing well in school. When he gets to class, he is always a bit shy, but the kids excitedly greet him and set up games. He tells me all about the games they play at recess. Sometimes I don't even realize how much he is learning until he surprises me with his new knowledge. His teacher has been assessing and making recommendations regarding school, and they said he is doing awesome and is definitely ready for kindergarten. His teacher is especially impressed with how well he can write his name.

Eliot's favorite thing in the world is still dinosaurs. He loves watching Jurassic Park, playing with dinosaurs, writing stories about dinosaurs, impressing everyone with his dinosaur knowledge, and more. He knows the names of so many dinosaurs and facts about them that I can't even keep track.

He also really likes to play outdoors, dig in the dirt, swim in the pool, and go to the beach.

Eliot always has a plan or a design or an explanation for something. He has clear preferences and will strongly tell you how he thinks it should go. One thing we have been working on is getting him to accept that we can't always do his plan right away and sometimes no just means no. Although Eliot can be difficult to work with at times, he truly is the sweetest kid. He is so kind-hearted and gentle. He is always happy to cuddle me. He is sweet and empathetic. He just adores Jack and happily plays with him. They tease each other sometimes, but they're so good one another.

He has learned some tough lessons about sports and soccer lately. While he had a rough season in the fall at first and kept giving up too early, he really turned it around and has developed into a team player. Most of the fall season, he would complain that he didn't have fun if he didn't get goals. Some kids were being pretty tough bullies, but I told him to keep trying. At the end of the season, he got a few goals and was really excited. He had a much better attitude and would hang in there instead of quitting. This winter, he played indoor soccer with his team. He stopped talking about "his" goals so much and started trying to help his team get goals. The whole "team player" concept finally sunk in. I'm excited to see how spring outdoor soccer will go. Then next fall, he will step up an age group.

To celebrate Eliot's birthday, we had a Jurassic World birthday party. I made a cake with an edible t-rex image and also a fossil dig cake with crumbled up nilla wafers as sand. Birthday parties honestly stress me out because I'm not good at directing activities and the kids all ended up wanting to play video games. Arg. I caved and let them, but I wish we could have gone outside or something. Oh well. He had a good time.

I can't wait to see what "five" has in store for him. Eliot tells everyone that he meets that he is "five now" and that "Jack is two and calls all drinks 'juice.'"

Christmas, the New Year, and a Birthday

Christmas Eve was a warm day. I have struggled to take a family photo each Christmas Eve and of course this year I do not take one either. I was very disappointed in how little photos I managed this holiday season. I didn't take a photo of one of the boys putting the star on the tree because Eliot begged to decorate the tree early in the morning before school. We had a good time together decorating it, but in the rush of the morning, I enjoyed our moments together instead of taking pictures. Then on Christmas Eve, I felt pulled in so many directions that I didn't even take a picture of us all. I did manage one photo of Chris and the boys (which is still on the camera) because they all wore Hawaiian shirts since it was so warm.

Eliot had so many questions about Santa this year. I feel like a horrible parent, but I just don't "feel the magic" when it comes to perpetuating the Santa story. I love the lights, the greenery, and celebrating Christ. I just can't muster up creating elaborate explanations for Santa. I didn't tell him Santa wasn't' real, though. I just asked him what he thought and let him develop his own ideas.

We did a lot of other Christmas traditions, though. We walked through the lights at the Botanical Gardens. One of our neighbor is quite famous for having an insane Christmas light set-up (like, featured on TV famous), so Chris walked to their house with the boys most nights. We went to Busch Gardens for Christmas Town. On Christmas Eve, we had dinner with my parents, sister, and her family. My aunt and uncle came in town for a visit the day after Christmas and then Chris's parents came to visit shortly thereafter. It was great to see everyone.

Before I knew it, we were in 2016! 2015 had been a good year for us. The boys continued to grow. Eliot finished up his first year of pre-K and then entered his second year while Jack started Parent's Morning Out once a week. I started working part-time at the community college in addition to my full-time job, which has been fun in a new challenging way. Chris finished up his doctorate in the fall and also ran over 1,000 miles in the year! I can't begin to imagine what 2016 will hold for us. I'm not planning too many changes or anything, but I hope to continue to grow more healthy.

Thanksgiving Re-cap and Reflections

I haven't been updating recently for a number of reasons. Of course, I am simply so busy that whenever I plan to write something, it must wait and then it seems so off topic and late. However, keeping track of the years and documenting the life of my family is important to me, so I figured I should write about Thanksgiving even though it was a couple of weeks ago.


So, yes. Thanksgiving.

The past couple of years, we have hosted both of our families for Thanksgiving, which has been really nice, but this year, Chris's parents rented the beach house in the Outer Banks that we have stayed at a few times. It was a nice change of pace and the boys love going to "Mawmaw's beach house". They don't quite get that we don't own it. When I explain renting to Eliot, he just says the owners are so nice to share with us. Um, well, no, but. Sure. OK.

My parents ever-so-kindly allowed our dachshunds to stay with them for Thanksgiving and we took Marlowe down to the beach house. She gets very excited about visitors and has been known to steal food off of the counter, so I didn't want her to ruin my parents' dinner. Two dachshunds is enough--they didn't need a lab too. Ha. We headed down on Wednesday afternoon. It quite literally took me SIX HOURS to get everything ready for just a two-night trip. How? I don't know. Maybe because I would get the boys dressed and then walk in the other room to pack. When I returned to the den, Jack had gotten his clothes messy with food and Eliot threw his socks off into some infinite abyss of dog hair. Ugh. I would pack the bags and then Jack (who was just really excited) would UNpack the bags. Traveling with kids is insane. Insane.

BUT WE MADE IT. After we got settled in, we headed to see The Good Dinosaur movie, which was kind of a big deal for us because Eliot has not been able to go see a movie since he was about two years old. Eliot doesn't handle loud noises well, so whenever I'd try to take him to a movie, he'd run out screaming with a trail of pop corn behind him. It was bad. We made it work this time and he just covered his ears some. Jack did a fantastic job and sat the whole time.

On Thanksgiving, we walked down the beach and had fun playing in the sand and getting a little wet. Just a little. Marlowe may or may not have--OK, she did--eaten half of a pie and some rolls, so she was officially banned from the kitchen area if there was any food out. We managed to piece together a great Thanksgiving dinner despite cooking in a kitchen that was not our own.

On Friday, we had Duck Donuts for breakfast, took a walk on the beach, and slowly packed to head back to home and start thinking about Christmas decorating.

Life Lately

I have really been slacking big time when it comes to blogging. I guess I have felt repetitive when it comes to posting on Facebook and Instagram. Photos can be rather self-explanatory, but I won't always flip through old photos online to remember who we were.

A lot of happened lately. Simple things. Big things.

We traveled through fall still embracing warmth for the most part--and I am so glad. Chris has been taking lots of photos of our gardens. The tropical plants are doing great and thriving with the warmth. They are at a peak of sorts with all of spring and summer's growth. In fact, in one neighborhood, the gardener cut down his banana trees in anticipation of the cold. Here's the thing:  it has been so warm that they grew back! I love it! At the same time, the leaves around town have definitely turned and are falling. Our pool is disgusting. Yes, we have not covered it yet because we have been so busy and haven't had a moment without the kids around to cover it. So, I've been dipping the net in to get out a reasonable amount of leaves. Not much luck.

The leaves and cool water have attracted frogs, I think, in search of a place to hibernate. While playing outside, the boys and I rescued frogs on two different occasions. We put them in a plastic critter box and released them at a neighborhood pond.

I've tried to take advantage of nice days outside and played with the boys in our amazing new treehouse. I have been promising Eliot a treehouse since we moved in over two and a half years ago. We found an awesome local company that builds custom playsets, and it was way less than anything else I had found and about the price of us building it ourselves. So, that is the boys' birthday and Christmas presents for the year (or two. or three). The boys have had fun piling leaves at the end of the slide and crashing into them.

Somewhere in there, we all got sick. We all took turns feeling crummy, but fortunately it didn't last long. Then I somehow caught it again.... I was so sick that I didn't even take the boys trick-or-treating on Halloween. I just hid in bed while Chris took them around the neighborhood. Jack almost slept through Halloween, but I woke him up and helped get them dressed as Jedis. Chris said they did good and that Jack really got the concept of taking candy and saying thanks. Well, he said "bye" with a sucker hanging out of his mouth, but it's the thought that counts. Ha. I kind of hate Halloween because my kids go bonkers about candy. I rarely let them have candy, so on Halloween, it's nuts around here. Fortunately, they got really picky (they would only eat Starbursts, M&Ms, and Smartees), so it's pretty much all gone.

A couple of days after Halloween, it was time to head to Lynchburg for Chris's dissertation defense! We had been looking forward to this trip for a long time, but since I was sick, we had to post-pone the trip by a day and didn't do much on our "list". We hoped to climb some mountains, see some friends, visit some family, drive by our old house, and more. And as we were packing to go out of town, I realized I was breaking out in a rash on my hands and feet! I thought maybe the rash was hives, but as time went on, they formed into blisters. I ignored it the best I could and pushed on. We were able to go to a park when we got in town, swam in the hotel pool, and then the next day I took the boys around campus with my boss while Chris defended his dissertation. So, we did see SOME mountains. And Chris passed! He was officially called a doctor. Afterward, we headed to his boss's office to talk for a little bit, but Jack was so ready for a nap and we were all hungry. We just walked back to the car and drove home. The next day, I went to the doctor and it turned out to be hand, foot, and mouth disease! It's a virus that mostly just toddlers get, so I'm sure I got it from the kids, but, man, it was crazy. I STILL have it on my hands a little--12 days later--but it doesn't hurt anymore.

Since we've returned home, we've kept pretty busy still. Soccer is over; Eliot started swim lessons. Eliot and Jack have kept busy building train tracks. We went to the zoo on a particularly warm day. We played putt-putt too, which Eliot was great at and Jack was stoked to throw his ball and hit things with his club. Cool... In October, we went to Jamestown for a day trip. The other night, we went to see Wild Kratts live, which is a pretty big deal because it's their favorite show ever and we never go to movies. Both boys did awesome! In the day-to-day, it feels like nothing is going on, but when I look back, we have made some awesome memories.

A Boy's Life: Fall

We hold onto summer as long as we can, but the gardens seem to hit their peak in October. They have been growing since summer and the first frost hasn't come to bite the bananas, cannas, and elephant ears yet. The weeds are not growing as quickly, but the leaves slowly clutter the yard--and clog the pool.

I love playing in the yard with the boys. The bananas tower over them as they weave in between the plants. It must feel like a jungle to them. Recently, I fulfilled my two-year promise to them and had a treehouse built (for their birthday and Christmas presents for the next year or so). It is the stuff of dreams, and we've all had a blast climbing the ladder and sharing picnics in the house and rushing down the slide. I know they'll love it for years to come. Chris even put a chair on the deck up there to sit while doing work.

Lately, Chris has been using the camera more and taking lots of photos. He's doing great, and it has reminded me to take pictures too.

It's hard to believe that we just have a few more weeks left of soccer season for Eliot. He's done a great job on the field and I am amazed by how big in looks in photos. For the first half of the season, Eliot grew disappointed if he didn't "win" a game (score a goal), but I tried to keep reminding him that it's all for fun and about teamwork. If his team gets a goal, then HE gets a goal too, but the league doesn't even keep score at this age. He grew so discouraged by teammates stealing his ball (it is just peewee soccer, afterall) that he said he wanted to quit. I told him he had to finish the season, but could sit spring soccer out. Just agreeing to that somehow changed his attitude or something because his approach completely changed. Instead of pouting when he lost the ball, he'd keep up with the group. He clapped whenever anyone scored a goal. And then he starting scoring each game too, which really helped.

And Jack will be old enough for soccer next fall.... We might wait until the spring season for him so he's a little old. I'll just have to see how he is at that point, but he is so eager to get to play too.

Dear Jack: Two Years, Four Months

Dear Jack,

This month, we made a new move for you. A while ago when we were on vacation in the Outer Banks, you figured out this cool trick where you could CRAWL OUT OF YOUR PORTACRIB. Well, that was terrifying. And I knew it was only a matter of time before you applied those portacrib escape skills to your regular crib. Sure enough, when we returned home, you were shimming that foot over the side and escaping like it was nobody's business. So, we transitioned your crib to a toddler bed. That was all well and good for a while until you kept crawling on top of Eliot's top bunk bed over and over again. Uh oh. I was so afraid that you were going to get hurt, so we unbunked them and put one in your room. So, now you are officially in a twin-sized bed!

Your biggest change this month was starting school! You are going to the same school as Eliot once a week for a few hours as part of a Parents' Morning Out program. You are more independent than Eliot and I think the fact that you have seen Eliot go to school there has helped, but you did really well. You were not so sure for the first couple of weeks, but you barely fuss anymore. I think it's good for you to get some extra play time with other kids and it will make your transition to preschool easier next year. I had a rough time with it at first. I really wrestled with the idea of sharing you--I didn't quite feel ready. You are doing wonderful, and I am confident that it was the right choice.

You've really gotten into painting since you started school as well. I let you do water colors at home somtimes, but you get to use all kinds of paint at school. When you come home, you try to get in your backpack and say, "Paint! Paint!" You have brought a painting home to show me.

One of your favorite activities is exploring with flashlights. You like to take them in the dark hall, in the closets, in the laundry room--anywhere that is dark. Sometimes we take flashlights to the beach at night to look for crabs.

This semester, I have been teaching twice a week at the community college during your naptime. I hate to say good-bye and you cry at the door when I'm trying to leave, but then we have the best cuddles when you wake up from your nap. You are always either so amazingly happy or angry, going so fast and snuggling up, extremely attentive or totally uninterested. It's always one way or the other, and I am so thankful that I get enjoy all of your love and affection still even as you grow from a toddler to a boy.

Dear Jack: Two Years, Three Months

Dear Jack,

At two years and three months, you are our adventurous son. You are always ready to go exploring in the woods or paddling. Recently, we bought a kayak, and while Eliot is always nervous, you get so excited to ride in the boat. I was surprised how well you did (and how you didn't tip us over). You just sit in my lap and let me paddle as you look around.

You are still our wild child. I think sometimes that you were meant to be raised by wolves. When we go to the zoo, you just want to chase the geese and peacocks. I always wondered what you would do if you caught them. Well, apparently you would throw things at them. Sigh. It is tough wrangling you and your brother, but you have a lot of fun.

Still, you must be civilized to a certain degree because you recently have gotten super stoked on accessorizing with hats. You love hats! You want a hat with every outfit. Your head is a little on the big side, so we had to buy new ones since Eliot didn't have any hand-me-downs to offer. It works out well, though, because your skin is so light that wearing a hat helps protect your face. The hats also tend to make you look like a teenager, which is weird.

You have become an absolute pro at getting your hair cut. You get so much practice because I need to get your hair cut every four weeks, but I try to push it to six. Your hair grows so fast and it is so fine (still like baby hair), so it quickly turns into a mullet. I'm not about to let that happen.

This summer has been amazing with you. We have had a blast splashing in the pool, and you just sit on the steps playing until someone can help you jump off the side (over and over and over for all eternity). We've explored the woods. We've eaten icecream and crushed ice. You love the beach and chase the waves while screaming. We feed the seagulls and, of course, chase them too to give them their exercise. You collect shells and give them to me for safe keeping. Fall is just around the corner and you'll be going to a Parents' Morning Out program once a week, but for now (right now) it's just the four of us finding new adventures every day.