The other day my son told me he wanted to make all of us breakfast the next morning.
The only problem with this very sweet gesture was that it was the end of the month and we were at the “creative” stage of the month/meal plan.
Bread? No
Milk? No
Cereal? No
Not much available for a 5 yr old to fix, so I convinced him to wait till after I went grocery shopping on Monday.
Tuesday morning we woke, and stayed in bed per his request (didn’t really take much convincing since we aren’t exactly early risers).
A little after 7 we saw him race down the hallway (like a child on Christmas morning).
I had poured milk and orange juice into glasses the night before (per his request) so that he could do it himself. He ran to the bedroom once to have me open the jelly (without looking). And then when he was almost ready, we peeked around the corner and saw this.
“toast for Daddy”
don’t forget the cereal Dad. (brimming with milk)
He made Mommy chocolate Ovaltine
He even made both girls their breakfast as well.
When I asked him what prompted this gesture of love, he told me that they talked the other day at his tutorial about how if your mom was sick, you could help her out by making breakfast for her. He said, “I thought, why wait till your sick to do it!”
Scott had a meeting he had to rush to get to at work, and we had schoolwork to get done before a well check up at the pediatrician’s office and our field trip that afternoon.
But we sat and waited while he jellied our toast, poured our cereal, and stirred our milk. 
And as I watched him serve with joy and excitement, I was reminded of the privilege it is to serve one’s family.
May we always find it a joy to serve.
When I came out to the kitchen to make breakfast this morning, I felt a cold draft. I then noticed my son sitting in the sliding glass door.
He told me he was listening to the birds in the backyard. They were offering up a beautiful melody. One thing I love about life with small children is that they help you to stop and take notice of the everyday miracles in the world around you. How often do we just sit and listen to the birds?
After awhile though, I was cold so I told him to put a coat on and sit outside to listen. He made some toast and took his breakfast outside on this cold February morning to spend some more time with his beloved birds.
As is often the case, it didn’t take long for his younger sisters to follow his lead.
Check out their bird watching attire.
On mornings like this, I love the flexibility of home schooling. I love that we can just start our day a little later and let them follow their whims a bit. We can’t let their whims direct our entire day, but it was a sweet start to our morning.
That’s right after her total regression back to diapers in August (after a completely embarrassing trip to the grocery store which involved my wiping pee up off of the floor–twice, the shopping cart, not to mention our groceries….I thought I would never leave the house with her in underwear again) but after Christmas we decided to give the ol potty train a try once more. My mom told her at Christmas it could be her New Years resolution. To which she replied in her sing songy voice, “resolution? I don’t have any resolutions!”
She was ready this time. We’ve been accident free during the day for several weeks now and this week we took the plunge and starting putting her to bed in her underwear.
It’s official folks…after 5.5 years…the circus is diaper free (for 4 months anyway).
I’ve b
een putting it off for far too long (as you can soon tell by my before picture). But today I decided that my poor girl was past due for a hair cut. We’ve cut her bangs, but nothing major since what I refer to as the “debacle of 07” when I took my sweet 22 mth old for a hair cut and returned with a sweet little girl sporting the bowl cut. Honey, I am so sorry. I didn’t know what I was doing.
Since then, I’ve stuck with my best friend for bang trims and avoiding cutting anything else.
But, if I am totally honest with myself, she’s been looking a little ratty lately. And that didn’t seem fair to the cute girl hiding under all that hair.
So we braved the local hair cutting salon and I am happy with the results.
Take a look.
Before:
During:
After: (being true to the girl that she is, she had to change her clothes upon arriving home, b/c what day would be complete without changing our clothes at least 2 or 3 times?)
Man, who knew that hiding behind all that hair, was a little girl, all grown up? She looks entirely too old for my liking…but I concede it was long overdue!
Every now and then at the circus, I find myself enjoying a moment of peace. All too often that peace and quiet is the result of complete and massive destruction going on quietly in another room of the house… say an overflowing sink, or crayon art on the wall, or something else which seems to bind my children in complete quiet.
But sometimes, sometimes all is calm and when I fearfully peek around the corner, I catch a moment like this.
or this
(first one taken one afternoon last week and the second one taken Friday morning… I love how when I walked into the room his arm was around her as natural as can be)
And I do my very best to hold fast to those moments and savor them. Because I know all too soon someone will be touching someone or taking her book or sitting on his blanket. It will be “my turn” and “she hit me!” and “he’s not my best friend” and I will want to throw my hands in the air and scream for quiet!
So I cherish these moments and hold them close. Because in the midst of the whining and arguing and chaos that exists each and every day, beneath that, there is love and comfort and it is my hearts prayer that these children will grow up not just siblings, but life long friends…
Something happened to my baby girl.
Seems she was just learning to crawl.
How is that she’s running around, skinning her knees and swinging beside the big kids?
Didn’t she know she wasn’t supposed to grow up so fast?
She’s my baby.
What is she doing conversing and counting and going on the potty?
Where did my baby go?
And who is this pig tailed princess that’s serenading us in the morning with her sweet cherub voice?
