A Note to My 60 Year Old Self

I love this blog and I write on it like no one reads it. I suspect that short of my 2 sister in laws noone really keeps up with it regularly so I write it for me and my kids. Many times in the last 4 years since I started this blog I have gone back to look at the posts. I love the posts of my pregnancies and how crazy our life has been since then. If I counted everytime I clicked on Kate's and Carson's Birthday posts I think it would probably read 500.  I love documenting. It's my life. And I always think of myself as a 60 year old sitting  in a lonely house and just poring over my blog for hours on end and thinking ....Why in the world did I wish for time alone? So here is a post for my 60 year old self. This is what the kids were doing and saying at 2 and 3.

* I love Carson's teeth. His two front teeth turn inward. I know that braces are in the future, but right now it makes his smiles extra special

* Kate's potty training has been taken to the next step. She is waking up dry from naps and overnight. When she needs to potty she says, "I need to go potty!" and yells, "get out of the way!! Hurry!! Hurry!!" like she has 100 people ahead of her.I have taken to calling her Supergirl.

* When Kate goes poopy in the potty she talks to it. "It's alright poopy you be alright. You go down the tunnel real soon. It will be alright." And as she flushes, "Bye poopy! I love you!"

*lately Carson has been having trouble going to sleep. I try to wait it out, but  when he yells "Mommy!" for the 10th time I go into his room and scoop him up in my arms. I don't scold him. I just tell him how much I love him and that "Mommy's right here."  We go into the TV room and I sit in the rocking chair that I bought months before he was born and rock him and sing "Beautiful Boy" and "Yesterday" And I hold him long after he goes to sleep because I know that these times are getting to be few and far between. And I as I hold him I marvel at how he used to fit right under my chin and his legs couldn't stretch out past my tummy and now his legs stretch all the way down to my knees.

* Kate has been in the habit lately of taking my hand and pumping it up and down and saying, "I Kate! Nice to meet ya!" I can only suspect that she has picked this up from riding around the truck with her Daddy on business deals and seen this take place between him and his customers.

*The kids have started full time preschool/daycare recently. It seems that all of the 3 year olds are fully potty trained so Kate is in Carson's class until she is good to go in that area. Last week I went to pick them up one day and I guess they saw me as their little class passed the door way,because when I went through the doors Kate and Carson were holding hands facing forward and looking directly at me. Banding together in brother sister solidarity.  I could hear her teacher trying to get her to come with them (she didn't know I was there) but Kate didn't listen she stood there hand in hand with Carson ready to go. I bent down and scolded her for not listening to her teacher. I wish I hadn't done that.

*Last week I dropped them off at daycare and Carson was crying for me as I tried to get them situated. Kate was trying not to cry and bravely took a handle on the little rope they use to guide the kids down the hall. All I could think of was "What a little soldier and that she was trying to make things better for me." I also thought that at 3 years old she should not have to be a soldier nor should she try to make things better for me. That's my job.

* Kate has a habit that has melted both our hearts lately. She will wrap her arms around my neck and say, "Mommy I sooooooooo glad you're here." I can't wait to tell her that story when she is a teenager.

*Carson is  into shapes lately and has replaced foods with shapes. For example, his trusty sausage and biscuit sandwiches are octagons and his waffles are circles.

* With most kids when they speak their little gibberish language sprinkled with recognizable words you can usually get away with , "Uh huh. That's right sweetie!" Not so with Carson. You must repeat back EXACTLY what he said. This makes for a lot of repeating and long conversations with him. I suspect that is his goal.