The move has been hard on all of us. As well as it went for a move, it was still a move. And that still involves packing and upheaval and so forth. And well, I have a three year old. So let me tell you, two doesn’t hold a CANDLE to three. Nuh-uh. At least not in this house. Terrible twos? Pashah! Living with a three year old is like being screamed at all damn day. He starts screaming about something, we spend half an hour with me trying to help him use kind words and voice so that I can do whatever he is asking me to do, since I won’t do it if he screams at me, then he finally asks kindly, I do it, and thirty seconds later the cycle starts again. And that’s what we do all day long. It’s like constantly living in fear that whatever you do will set him off on another tirade.

So you may find yourself sitting there blubbering and asking what you did that ruined your child and talking about what a horrible mother you must be to have everyone so unhappy. It may launch a little cry-fest that lasts late into the night. Then you find yourself writing about it the next morning when you hear the little footsteps above your head. You think oh no! He’s up and he’s going to start screaming because no one was upstairs when he woke up - it’s going to start already, like a continuation of the fit he was having at bedtime… So you try and get it together and run as fast as you can to try and deter the tantrum, and as you approach the hallway where he is standing he smiles at you and says, “I feel better.” He walks toward you and says good morning. You tell him to be extra careful on the stairs because you fell down them last night. He wants to see your boo boos. Then he says, “I’m sowy you fell. I will kiss your boo boos,” which he does, gently planting a little kiss on each elbow, your back, and blowing one to the big bruise on your ass. You wonder what  you’ve been talking about. You must be doing something right at some point in time to have such a sweet boy. And there you’ll sit, at the bottom of the stairs, telling him that now you feel much better.

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It was at this point that Sam reenacted the manner in which he had “given Robby the toy,” the hard, wooden toy, I might add. And it involved him holding it up high and a slamming down kind of motion, in the direction of, I can only assume, Robby’s head.

I’ve read before that when kids this age lie they are not really doing what we adults think of as lying; they are really trying to tell what they wish had happened instead of the way it actually played out. I would buy that, except for the fact that he changed his story. Once I told him he wasn’t in trouble, the truth flowed out, and I think that is the most upsetting to me. It indicates a much more aware state on his part and it is much more purposeful. I have to admit this has taken me by surprise. I wasn’t quite ready for this to start yet - he seems awfully young, just turned three - and that coupled with the fact that I had just told him he was not in trouble made the whole thing very difficult to deal with. So soon? How do you deal with young children being untruthful? Especially after you’ve just told them they are not in trouble in order to get the true story out of them? (Let me just say I was not intentionally trying to be manipulative. When he originally told me he had not hurt his brother I believed him, so I was not actually expecting find out that he’d caused the problem and that I may have to backtrack.)

When I told Hubby about the incident he tried to reassure me that we have two boys and these things will happen sometimes. He was really responding to the hitting part and trying to tell me it was ok that I had left them alone for a minute. He went on to say that eventually Robby would be able to “fight back.” Jeez, that’s comforting! Now I envision running in to find my two boys strangling each other on the floor while I try to do the laundry. And Hubby has a brother who is just as close in age, so I’m afraid he may know what he’s talking about here. Is that what I have to look forward to?

Boys . . . what am I going to do with all these little penies running around? For those of you that have boys, there was recently a nice Wondertime article about raising boys. I particularly like the part where the writer describes one of her sons heading toward her daughter’s ponytail with a pair of scissors while the younger one cheers, “Go! Go!”

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Wow.  Now if only I could make sure he feels that way for the rest of his life.

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The dishwasher holds more than my old one.

The rooms are painted the colors we chose.

The bathroom fixtures are not far from what I would have chosen myself.

The kids now have their own rooms.

Our living room is not overwhelmed by both a TV and a computer (each are in their own separate rooms).

But the best part, you ask? The best part is that at approximately 3:15 school lets out, and at that time ALL of the school buses go by our house heading to the school parking lot and back out again. And at that time, you can find Sam, sitting joyfully in the living room window eating his snack and yelling, “Look! Look! ANOTHER one!” And that, my friends, is a great investment.

I will say, however, we have not a window dressing to speak of, and no intention of doing anything about that until the weekend. The neighbors are getting to know us quite well.

And sorry for the comments being down over the weekend - my brother was moving us to another server and, of course, I didn’t know there was a problem because our computer wasn’t hooked up. Hope all are well. I’ll read blogs again soon, I hope, once we are functioning. I think I have like over 200 posts on bloglines . . . heh, heh.

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(birth)

We went to the zoo, and you helped me push the stroller around.

(Halloween - 5 months)

We rode the train.

(crawling, first vehicle obsession)

You ran around with your friend and chased the geese.

(sick day)

You told me about nine times that tomorrow you wanted “chockat cake . . . with FWOSTING! And Thomas!”

(your sense of humor)

You had a tantrum about eating at the dinner table. I explained that we eat at tables.

(playing in the pool at Mimi and Poppy’s)

You pointed out that the train table is also a table, and that it also has two little chairs . . .

(your first steps)

Dinner was at the train table tonight.

(walking on your own)

As I put you to bed you told me you loved me “so much.”

(my favorite picture of you)

I told you I loved you so much too.

(Christmas - 19 months)

I told you that you were my big boy. You said Yes.

(second birthday)

And I asked you how you got so big, how it had happened so fast.

(Halloween - train engineer, of course)

You wanted to sleep with your “favorite cars: owange O twuck, bwue wace car, and big wed wace car,” as you have every night for the past three weeks. You always list them for me, despite the fact that I have known which are you favorites this whole time.

(first day of school)

I told you that “tomorrow when you wake up, you’ll be three.” How did this happen?

(last week at the carnival)

You fell asleep, snoring and exhausted from your last day as a two year old, with my hand rubbing your head, your arm slung over your eyes, and telling me that you really like cake . . . and pudding too.

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It was around this time two years ago that we were doing exactly the same thing as we prepared to leave Chicago. It was hard packing with a mobile baby - he got into everything imaginable. A few of you may remember Sam eating the zipper. I thought we’d learned our lesson from that incident but nooooooo. Today Hubby and I were dealing with files and paper shredding, and when I went over to check on Robby he had that exact same expression on his face, causing me to open his mouth and sweep out a tiny piece of plastic that was working its way toward the back of his throat. It was something that had no business being on the floor to begin with ( I think it was a broken piece from the cord to our blinds or something), but of course the whole apartment is covered in packing material and crap right now so everything just kind of blends together. Packing with one baby and one toddler is, well, it’s ridiculous. And now I’ll stop complaining because it will all be over in a week.

And on a really, REALLY good note, I’m going to be writing for Mama Speaks, which I am so happy about. Mama Speaks is an awesome review blog that showcases mom-designed products, eco-friendly tips and merchandise, lesser known charity organizations, and generally very cool stuff for moms. It’s a great place to check out for new products and to get a mom’s opinion on whether or not something is a good purchase for you and your family. I’m sure I’ll be biting my nails when it’s time for my first reviews, but I’m totally excited.

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Nothing quite so disconcerting as handing over pretty much ALL of your money in one tidy cashiers check, is there? We closed on the house. All went well. I think my stomach is finally settling down. And, well, I guess we’re home owners now. So I suppose one of us had better get around to mowing that unattended lawn . . . and moving. That would be good too. We move a week from Saturday because we wanted to have work done to it before we brought the kids in. Now I wish we could just get it over with.

You know, this was a very different post when I put it up two hours ago, but it felt wrong (and I apologize for any confusion for the few of you that may have seen it in its original form).  It was sort of a downer, which is not indicative of how my husband and I feel about the purchase of our new home - it felt dishonest and forced.   And most of all, it told details of a story that is not mine to tell, so I’m taking a lot of it out.

What I really want to say is this:

That’s our house.  Those trees? Those are our trees.  That’s where my family is going to live and play and settle.  And we’re so excited about it we can’t stand it.  We can’t wait to be there and wake up for the first time in our new home.

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And you know me - I started to wonder what awful thing had happened at school that made him so upset about going. Had a classmate been mean to him and the teacher didn’t help? Had he gotten into trouble and no one told me? Had he gotten hurt?

So as we drove there I continued to ask him why he didn’t want to go. I started talking about how they would get to go to the “big room” to play instruments since it was raining outside, and then he yelled, “No! I NOT want to pway Duckduckgoose!”

“Oh, did you play Duck-Duck-Goose at school?”

“Yes. It raining and I NOT want to pway.” Aha, so on rainy days they not only go to the big room for instruments, but also for games. That was a relief.

But then, about four seconds later, I started up again - Wait, why does he hate Duck-Duck-Goose so much? Does nobody pick him as the goose? Is he always the first one “out”? Do they put him in “the pot?” Oh God, they shame him and make him sit in the pot so that all the other kids can sit around him in the circle and stare at him because he was out first. He’s already having sport-related school anxiety! He’s going to hate gym. He’s going to have stomach aches on Field Day. He’s going to be like my brother and run himself into a wall to break his arm so that he can get out of P.E. because a shattered ulna feels better than the shame of being a non-athlete . . .

“You put your hands on the heads and I NOT want them to touch my head.”

“What?”

“I NOT WANT THEM TO TOUCH MY HEAD!”

“You mean you don’t like Duck-Duck-Goose because they touch your head? It’s not because of the part where you have to run around the circle and get chased and sit in the pot if you are out?”

“No, that a wittle fun. Running part is fun. I just not want them to touch my head.”

” . . . Ohhhhhh.”

When I picked him up two hours later I looked in the window to see Sam happily sitting in a circle with his hand stuck out so that the kid who was the ducker could walk by and tap him high five style - “Gooooooose!” - and Sam running and laughing around and around the whole room as the teachers tried to direct the two boys to at least head in the general direction of the circle, which had really spread out into something more like a line. There was no “out,” no “pot,” and absolutely no shame.

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