words later ... so tired

Sunday

Sunday. It's always such a bittersweet day. So many decisions to make on this last day of the weekend. Do we jump right in and use as many minutes of the day as possible?

Or do we relax, breathe and savor the waning moments of the weekend?


Do we head to the city lake and watch for crocodiles?

Or do we rock out to the Zed Leppelin show?

Maybe there's time for both.

because no matter what we do, I get the blessing of seeing this beautiful face wherever I go.

always nice when the beautiful girl takes a Sunday nap in a box of pegs. seriously.

she's beautiful, but her modeling skills need honing

she sure the heck knows how to take care of the baby's asthma issues

Things and stuff

It's been a long long week (anyone see a pattern?). Lucy had her last week of summer preschool arts camps. We now piece child-care together until after labor day when we resume our regularly scheduled program. Can you believe that next year at this time I'll be blogging about kindergarden?????? Holy Crap!
Above lies Lucy on her epic 3 hour family vacation nap. This was the day after our night in the sauna. Hotel room with a busted a/c. Not the best night sleep.

Lucy and I have been having a great summer. Lucy likes playing outside, I still love the extra space the outdoors provides. It's been very fun and we've taken full advantage.

Above is Lucy and her cousin Naomi (from Florida). Naomi and Lucy have never met. Lucy was holding very still while Naomi gave her a heart tattoo.

Here is Lucy mauling a random puppy. She starts off nice but ends up smothing the dog. One day she's going to get bit. Currently Lucy is on a weekend long "time-out" from touching other people's dogs (even if she asks the owner) such was the extent of her poor self control with dogs the other night. On the other hand, people who own dogs who hate kids should probably NOT take them to Como Park, just saying.

Lucy's first pop-rocks experience. Big hit.

What I know

I don't know much. At least now I am understanding that there are many things I don't know but I do know this:

A mother lion will do what is necessary to give her child's soul what is necessary to grow and thrive.

roooooaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Mill City Ruins

Tonight after dinner we went for a walk in one of my favorite urban places. The Mill City Ruins. This place is so interesting and beautiful.

It's a nice place to walk with Lucy because there is ALWAYS so much to talk about. Are there crocodiles? What happens if I fall in there? Are there biting fish? Lucy was a CHATTER BOX tonight. It's exhausting sometimes. Not only does she need to constantly chat, she needs full engagement. No passive uh-huhs, nope that stuff does not fly with Lucy loo.

also very difficult to get her to stop and pose for photos.

these days my best photos of her are side shots, when she doesn't know I am taking her photo.

flashback

I think she's about 18 months here, practicing her skills at flipping herself INTO her crib.

Her driving cap. HOLY COW she was so so cute.

The cuteness the color coordination. The first birthday party.

it was about this age 16ish months where I started getting a glimps of the attitude to come

The referral photo

Tonight

Tonight at kuk sool won class Lucy about broke my heart. She always falls asleep on the way to class and I purposefully leave about an hour early so she can get a good rest. Lucy is pretty subdued in class due to just waking up, it being Friday evening and her still being a little "new" to the art.

I love this class. They do a special evening for preschoolers. The instructors seem to totally get kids. Each week the class focuses on a skill, a living skill. The ones I recall are; right attitude, patience, self-control, over coming fear, perseverance. The instructor sits the kids in a circle at the beginning of class and talks about the word, asking the kids for input etc. Then the class begins. They do fun activities, obstacle courses, animal walks, balancing, practicing kicks and blocking. The kids LOVE the activity where they wear pads on their arms and try to block the balls that the instructors throw at them!

What I REALLY LOVE about this class for Lucy is that the instructors lovingly and respectfully EXPECT the kids to do the activity in the correct way. The kids stand in attention position, in a line and they can't just choose where to stand, they have their place in line. Lucy (aka control freak) tries every which way to claim her own spot, to stand in a different location etc. To me, it seems like "hey at least she's standing on the line and paying attention ... good enough!" Each and every time, they correct her. They tell her to move to her place, and she does. No shaming, no yelling, just consistent expectations.

They give complicated directions, and have elaborate obstacle courses. If a kid doesn't do it correctly they have to start over EVERY TIME. It's not a judgement, it's not mean, it's just how it works.

Tonight the obstacle course involved holding on to rings (like gymnastic rings) and swinging over a red pad onto a blue pad, landing on the blue pad then jumping from black square to black square without landing on the floor, then leaping over some pillow type things, going up a balance beam, jumping from pad to pad, doing a "back fall" and then navigating over some posts without touching the ground. Lucy never made it past the balance beam. She went 6 times before she even made it TO the balance beam. Every single time she slipped and hit the floor they sent her back. She was trying soooo hard. I wanted her to make it so bad and she NEVER did. You know what? She didn't seem the least bothered by it. Lucy was focused on the task at hand. Did you hear that? Let me shout it out: LUCY WAS FOCUSED ON THE TASK AT HAND. She kept trying and these amazing instructors praised her for what she did correctly. She tried a dozen times, never made it more then 1/2 way through the obstacle course but Lucy was a complete success.

The class is challenging for Lucy in all the right ways. Emotionally, socially and physically. They keep on her, pay attention, look at Sir, no talking unless it's a question ... I think we could use 1/2 hour of this class every evening.

Watching her struggle so much to pay attention even in an environment where she gets to move around and have fun is really hard. Not knowing if she actually can't figure out how to move her body a certain way or if she just doesn't want to is hard too. I want to cry for her struggles and for her successes. Lord parenting makes me emotional!

FYI I linked to the school/class we attend. It's fun AND (dare I say) therapeutic.

Dear Queenie:

Dear Queenie,

It's me Lucy. Your wonderful wife and daughter have been telling me that you are a little jealous of our wonderful camping adventures here in the great north. It's true they are A LOT of fun. Campfires, short hikes, starry skies at night etc. I totally understand your reluctance (and your wife's reluctance) to camp out in the Texas heat. I mean sheesh, you Texans are afraid of MN winters but we up here are terrified of your hot summers.

I Lucy have come up with a fantastic plan. I think we should meet in Eastern Colorado (or somewhere else pretty and in the middle) in the fall of 2010 for a camping adventure. That means G's momma has to heal up but if she's still hurting we've a nice tall queen size air mattress that we'd be happy to let you use.

Just think G and I can run around like the wild adventurous women that we are ... the mommas and the papa can kick back and enjoy the campfire. No snow storms, no horrid hot humidity.

If you say yes, I will start saving my cutest clothes to pass on to the other cutest girl in the world.

What do you think?

love Lucy

weekends

We went on another camping adventure this weekend. Mel and Morgan joined in. Gonna be honest here; the kids were not so much fun. Whew. More importantly however I think they HAD fun and really that's what this is all about, fun memories for them. A couple beers for me and I am already day dreaming about our next camping trip which is about a month from now. Lucy was protecting Morgan from bears. I know it's awful but in a demonstration of very bad parenting I kept reminding Lucy about bears in order to keep her from running off and "hiding" in the woods. I also wondered aloud about biting fish when she started laughing maniacally whilst racing toward the waters edge. Don't worry readers, Lucy is FEARLESS and my warnings were pretty much smoke in the wind by the next day. I really wish she WOULD find a few fears.

Morgan is pondering his next oppositional action.

collecting marshmallow roasting sticks

a cool breeze, green grass and no cliffs = a little relaxation for the grownups

Captured: Morgan pushing Lucy. Not Captured: Lucy telling him to push her

so fun to see MY DAUGHTER riding her bike down the campground road

morgan in some cool shades. lucy filling up a plastic bag with dirt. like diane always says, who needs toys!

ice cream and laughter at Happy's Restaurant

winding down at the campfire

making coffee. she was excited because i gave her real coffee grounds.

so we head into another work-week. so sad.