Wednesday, August 22, 2007

AAAIIIIIEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I really don't intend to devote my entire blog to Carolyn, but she always has something up her sleeve to make me take notice. Usually it is her cuteness, her big chocolate brown eyes, freckles, and sweet grin, knowing if she turns on the charm she can weasel anything out of me. Today it was an earwig.

I was checking my e-mail a bit ago when she walked up and says, "Mommy, theah's something in ah house." (Sorry, I just have to try to write the cute way she talks. Translation: "Mommy, there's something in our house.") I turned to ask, "What is?", but before I can even take a breath to get it out I see an earwig crawling up her arm while she tries to keep it somewhat under control, but if you know anything about earwigs they are kind of fast and not very controllable. Then I took a really BIG breath (i.e. gasp!), and remembering an experience when my cousin, then about 2, walked in to his mother carrying a snakeskin very happily until his mother, my aunt, screamed and reacted very frightened, so he suddenly realized that it must be something he should be scared of too and would no longer touch it or get near it, even though we all know a snakeskin is perfectly harmless unless your 2 year old happens to wander in the house with one catching you totally off guard... So yah, that memory flashed through my mind and I just screamed inside instead of outloud and drawing on depths of calmness and using a really fake calm voice I said, "Oh look honey! You found an earwig! Doesn't he look neat?" By then he had succeeded in falling off her arm and was again running around on the floor, so again fakely calm, not wanting him to run under anything but again not wanting to make her afraid of it by freaking out or just squashing it (after all, she is kind of a bug lover) I said, "Let's get a nice big piece of paper and help him go back outside!"

I quickly got him to crawl on the paper, then headed for the back sliding glass door, all the while flipping and turning the paper so he wouldn't crawl off or crawl on ME, heaven forbid, because then the scream would most assuredly escape. Unfortunately, the blinds and door were closed, and I had to flip/turn the paper with one hand and scramble for the blind cord and door handle with the other, eyes always on the earwig. I finally got the door opened and went to fling him outside just as he succeeded in escaping the paper. He was back to the floor and on the run. Before I could get my paper to him again, Carolyn just reached on down, picked him up, struggled with him for a couple seconds while he tried to get away, then very calmly set him down outside. "Quick Mom! Close the doh-ah (door) so he can't get in again!" Whew! Our home is again safe, thanks to the bravery of my 3 year old, my knight in shining armor. Only, she was wearing a pink ballet outfit.

Friday, August 10, 2007

Carolyn Sue

"Charlotte's Web" is playing on the TV. Carolyn and I are sharing a pillow on the floor. She's watching. I'm reading.

Giggles erupt next to me while Wilbur gets a bath, then "Mom, I'm gonna get a pig like that."

"You are? What are you going to name him?"

"Wilbur!" More giggles.

She has quite the imaginary menagerie - a horse named Melango, a monkey named Titi (every time we go to the zoo she points him out and asks when we are going to get him), a dog named Mimi, and just recently, a bunny and a cat. So now I guess we can add a pig to that.

"Will your pig get scared of lightning too, like Wilbur?"

"No, he will sleep in the house with me."

"Oooooh, of course."

Always in her sweet little 3-year-old world, happy and full of life, completely heart-broken and even almost surprised when someone or something mistreats her. Like she can't believe anything bad could enter her fairy land.

"Can I have some hot chocolate milk?"

"Can I hold your pig when you get it?"

"Yah."

"Okay, let's go get some."

She is happy to be who she is, not realizing there is any other person to be. And I am delighted to be a part of her world.

Thursday, August 2, 2007

A Drippy Walk

We are just one big adventure after another. Today's was much less eventful, though.

While sharing yesterday's adventure with some friends in the neighborhood, one of them asked if we had seen a remote control airplane, since her husband had been flying one, it headed off that direction, and never returned. Lo and behold, I HAD seen what looked like the tail end of an airplane but it was on the other side of the swampy so I didn't investigate.

So this morning I rounded up the kids to see if we could see if that was the airplane. Heading out we realized it was a little drizzly outside, but after a 4-1 vote (after all, Adam is a baseball player and they are afraid of rain) we decided to go for it. We stopped by Jason's to see if he wanted to go on a "drippy walk" with us.

It was actually quite nice and refreshing. They baby didn't even mind it a bit, packed along in the baby front pack. Rocks are so pretty when they are wet! Everything smelled fresh and clean. Here and there it got a bit "drippier," but never too awful. We even visited the spot where Melanie took her plunge. I need to remember the camera next time we head over there!

Sometimes I think I'm a big lunatic for attempting the ideas I come up with (i.e. yesterday), but today it was well worth it.

Oh, we never did find any sign of what I thought could have been the airplane, but there was also a more noticeable washer and dryer missing, so maybe another clean up crew went through.

Our 100 Year of Scouting Adventure

Happy 100 Years of Scouting today! Well yesterday, August 1st.

In our BSA council they've been advertising today as World-Wide Do a Good Turn Day. There is a group of scoutss that camped on Brownsea Island that as the sun rose this morning, renewed their committment to scouting and did a good turn.

Being the good scout that I AM, I rounded up the two cub scouts that live in my house (Adam and Sammy), and my three little girl cub scout wanna-be's (Melanie, Carolyn, and of course Erin) to go do a good turn. But I cannot stop there, as it is born within me to want to help other people have great scouting experiences as well. I called Adam's friend (Jason) and Sammy's friend (Cody) to see if they wanted to come along. Jason did, Cody didn't, but Cody's sister, Elizabeth, who is Adam's age, did want to. I knew it would be a bit of a challenge to keep everyone together and 'friendly,' but with promised rewards I knew we could do it.

We wanted to go clean up along a path near our neighborhood that I've heard is pretty trash-filled. It used to be a train track, but it hasn't been used as such for years so last year the city paved a nice walking/bike path with dirt along each side. We set out with lots of bags and water. Not very far into it, we realized some other good turners had been along not necessarily today but at some point previous to us, as there really wasn't that much to be found. Still, there were things here and there and it was a nice walk. Sammy even found an old railroad spike.

The kids kept telling me there were swampy areas ahead with lots of junk in them, and when we made it to them, yah, lots of pop cans and water bottles tossed in. The other good turners must have seen the swampyness as a challenge, but not us! We found some big sticks and went fishing. At least the swamps weren't too big - at the widest point maybe 4 feet wide, and a foot deep tops and overgrown with trees and bushes around. For quite a while the swamp runs along both sides of the path, with the path raised above it about a foot. Carolyn found a little toy frog at one point she wanted to toss in the trash, but I told her it was okay to leave it since some little kid probably left it there as a friend for the frogs that live there. As she was replacing it I heard a soft kind of, "Uh...!" I didn't turn at first, until my brain registered a half-panickyishness (did you know I like to make up words?) to it. I was surprised to see Melanie's bike tire laying down and sticking out of part of the swamp and overgrowth - can't see Melanie, and no more noises. I quickly got over to it, and could see that somehow Melanie had driven off the path and her bike took her right down into the slime. She still wasn't saying anything, but was struggling on top of the bike to get up and out of the mess. Thank goodness she was okay, but pretty covered in mud and other yummy stuff. I am still amazed that there were no tears involved.

After rounding up Adam and Jason, who had of course chosen right then to ride way ahead of us all, I got all the good turners turned back around for an immediate trek home and a big clean up.

So there's our Scouting Commemoration Adventure. Yes, I took pictures after we got home.