Naked Benjamin Needs More Time

So... it's no secret that Benjamin doesn't like to wear clothes. Really, I suppose most people feel inhibited in clothing, but living in the frozen tundra and being self conscious will eventually get the better of adults and so we like to cover up. Most kids grow to see us adults over dressed, and start learning to wear clothes also. Most kids. But, not Benjamin. Many of my friends and derby girls have come over to see him running around in his tighty whities. It's often a topic of conversation, in fact.

Ben loves his naked time. He always has. From the time he was little, he would strip his clothes off as fast as I could get them on him. This is actually a family trait, I suppose, because as soon as I hit the house, regardless of what I'm wearing or what I have been doing, I strip my bra and socks off. (9 times out of 10 you'll find them laying next to my favorite spot on the couch, actually.) What was really impressive was when he could magically get all of his clothes off while wearing a 5 point harness in his car seat. But one time, I distinctly remember driving down the road, heading to a pediatrician appointment and hearing Jake scream, "MOM MOM MOM MOM MOM MOM MOM MOM!"


Of course, this type of screaming while I'm driving is dangerous, so I yelled at him to be quiet until I could stop. I stopped at a stop light, and turned around to look at him. 


"What's the problem, Jake? CALMLY!"


He replied, "Ben threw his shoes out the window back there!" Dammit! I should've listened to him when he was yelling, because we were going to be late going to the doctor, but I had to get those shoes on him. What kind of mother brings her child to a hospital without shoes? (Probably the same kind who shows up late because she yelled at her oldest son to be quiet while she was driving...)


Unfortunately, Ben was sternly warned not to throw things out of the window ever again. I totally forgot to mention that he should make an attempt to keep his clothing on when we are not in the house. 


That same summer, Ben lost 4 pairs of sandals. Every time I would take Benjamin to a playground, he would find a way to lose his shoes. One time, he buried them in the sandbox. None of us could find them. Another time, Jake said he might have thrown them in the garbage while I was in the bathroom. It got to the point that I learned to take his shoes off and just leave them in the car, hoping desperately that he would not cut his foot on glass or any other danger lying around on the ground.

There was one particular day though, when Ben really tested the limits of how much he could get away with. It was the middle of a dead cold winter. We were all really sick of being cooped up in the house, and so I decided to take the boys to a nearby Burger King with a giant playland for lunch. Before we sat down to eat, Ben had his shoes off and they were in the shoekeeper. I made him sit down and eat. When he finished eating, he darted for the playscape. Two times I had to wrangle him down and put his socks back on him, as he would tear them off and drop them right at the entrance.  


With the kids happily subdued playing the in the play land, I started getting comfy and reading my book. Just as I was thinking I had made a good choice getting the kids out of the house, I hear Jake start into his tattle tale again. "MOM! Ben took off his socks again."  


"Jake, just bring them here buddy. I'm just going to hold on to them."


"MOM! Ben has his toy on the slide and that's against the rules!"


"Jake, chill out."


Just as I settled back into my book, "MOM!"

"WHAT JAKE???!?!?!?!" 


"um, Ben took his pants off on the slide."


"Dammit! Jake, get his pants and get down here. BEN COME HERE NOW!"


Jake brought me Ben's pants, and I started putting them back on Benjamin. I questioned Ben as to why he would refuse to wear clothing. His answer was very simple and clearly well thought out.


"I don't have time to wear pants, Mama." 


Then began my internal rant. WHAT?!?!?! You're four! You have all the time in the world. Your agenda's pretty open. AND, how does wearing pants slow you down? What could you possibly mean by that? As I got my thoughts together and started preparing to lecture Ben about appropriate clothing in public for the millionth time, I noticed his sweatshirt was laying next to me and he was headed for the playscape entrance again. I quickly grabbed him, threw his shirt on him, and screamed for Jake to get his butt down here and get ready to go.


On the way home, I calmed down significantly, and apologized to Jake. I regretted both yelling at him for trying to help me, and for cutting his playtime short when he was being so well behaved. (After all, Jake almost never strips down for no apparent reason. He has TIME to wear his clothes properly.) After a little more time had passed, I realized, (begrudgingly) as I was telling Ryan of the horrific day that I'd had; it was pretty funny.


He doesn't have "time to wear pants". That's classic!

Learning About Birth Order with the Hostettlers....

Yesterday Ryan had a disc golf tournament, so I had the whole day alone with my boys. Somehow, I had a stroke of luck, and on this day a good friend of mine (Lisa) was home with her two boys and not on call for work. Also a stroke of luck was that the sun was shining brightly and the rain kept away for the entire duration of our stay. After much debate on what to do and where to go, we decided to spend the day at her house, as she lives in the country and has lots of room for the boys to just be boys. So, I packed my boys up, made only a few quick stops on the way out of town for gas and juice boxes, and headed out to their house.


It was a perfect day. Lisa and I sat in lounge chairs and soaked up the sun. (Which reminds me,a tip to the wise, ALWAYS shave your legs before you get them sunburned....) The boys were slow to warm up with each other at first. Jake immediately went to work finding a place to plug in his Sony Playstation Portable (PSP), and Ben tried to figure out how to use the slip and slide. Eventually, Lisa's oldest son, Jadon, was giving Benjamin demonstrations, but somehow Hunter and Benjamin decided instead that driving trucks and tractors along the slip and slide as if it were really a car wash would work better.

Please excuse my feet.... I was lounging... and much too lazy to sit up.

When the heat was starting to get to us, we'd head in the house for a cool beverage and some popcorn, and then we'd head back outdoors again. Jake and Ben learned to play with the dog. (BIG dog, looks mean but is super friendly.... even when you're throwing rocks at him, oddly.) Lisa's younger son, Hunter, let the heat and the play get the best of him, and he went down for a nap. At this point, Jadon and Benjamin, who are very similar in age, figured out how to work together, and they played creating a river which lead to a lake in their sand box. Jake even stopped in to help out a few times, though his efforts were thwarted when he kept hitting his head on the playscape, because he was so much taller than the younger boys were.

Notice the real actual lake inside the sand box. Also notice Ben's vertical smile:)

Eventually, we wrapped the day up with some pizza and Popsicles, which are a favorite of pretty much all kids in general, and I rounded the boys up and headed back for home. I was amazed they both made it all the way home without falling to sleep, though they certainly slept well from a great day of play when it was bedtime. They even slept through some thunder rumbles.

Jadon cruising down the driveway.

While the kids were busy learning social skills with one another, Lisa and I were busy taking note of the truth about raising boys and birth orders. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the concepts of birth order, let me give you a quick run down. "Birth Order" is a term to describe the rank that you take with your siblings, and it is believed by experts to have lasting effects on psychological development. If you look at theories developed on such ideas, experts generally break birth order down into rankings like "first born", "middle child" and "youngest". Advanced theories take "only children" and "twins" into account also. Their hypothesis is that there are common traits in personality and development among people who share birth order rankings. I will use myself as an example. I am an only child. Here is what one website listed for traits of an only child: (and my thoughts when compared to myself.)

• Mature faster (yep- have to if there's not kids around and only adult to keep you company)
• Get along well with older people (uh-huh, see above)
• Responsible (generally...because who else can you blame things on without siblings?)
• Self-Centered (ugh. Sadly.)
• Perfectionists (relative, I suppose.)
• Attention seekers (I do blog, don't I...?)
• Use adult language (um, I use a LOT of language.. swearing included, I suppose..)
• Prefer adult company (I did when I was younger. Now it's optional.)
• Have difficulty sharing (this is the only one I completely disagree with. I'm better at sharing, it was the only way to get people to play with me...)

So, Lisa and I began noticing similarities in our boys. First of all, we noticed that they had MANY things that all four of them did naturally, like a natural attraction to anything with wheels (You might notice this in all my pictures.) It was an interesting social setting for observation though, because our boys are both about 2-3 year apart from their brothers, but my boys are older than hers. So, though Jadon and Benjamin are just months apart in age, Jadon behaves more like a classic "first born", and Ben like a "youngest child". I noticed, for instance, that Jadon immediately took an interest in Jake's PSP and Ben's Vsmile (which Ben doesn't actually play with), while Ben and Hunter could have cared less about those items existing. Jake and Jadon both tended to help Lisa and I out keeping eyes on the younger two. They worked harder to keep us happy. You can Google "birth order" pretty easily and find out these are really common traits among first borns. (You might also learn that there are actually two types of personalties associated with first borns, but rather than one or the other, our boys seem to fit parts of both.) If either Jake or Jadon found themselves bored, they would come running to us, eager to do whatever we were doing. We would both have to redirect them, suggesting that they make friends with one another or continue playing with this or that... 

Benjamin and Hunter were much less concerned with Lisa and I. Both of them seemed to be able to entertain themselves more easily with toys and needed less direction. Both seemed to think that our opinions were equal to their own, or lessor, generally, when they disagreed with us completely. We both found ourselves challenging Ben and Hunter. I had to tell Ben, REPEATEDLY to stop spilling his juice on the floor and throwing popcorn down for the dog to eat and drink. He heard me, each of the first 12 times I said to stop,but he didn't really think my opinion was important until I had to enforce it. I saw Lisa have a similar show down with Hunter regarding playing with her Blackberry Phone. He looked directly at her, acknowledged that he heard her, and disregarded her message until she finally got up and took it from him. These are are also qualities you'd probably find to be shared among youngest children in your Google search of "birth order". 

Hunter on his four wheeler.

So, I think the lesson of the day, which was deeply embedded into a day of fun, sunshine and great company, was that in order to know who you are, you might need to look at your birth order. The good news is, there are both good and bad traits to each and every birth order. If you identify with the traits that you share with others in your birth order that are good, you can learn to use them to your advantage. If you identify with the negative traits, you can learn to work with them or work around them. If you learn about the traits your children share with others in in their birth order, it might be a key to helping you understand why they do the crazy and amazing things that they do. 

Thanks to the Hostettlers' for a wonderful day in the sun!

Happy Birthday, Erin Ryann!!!

Growing up as an only child, I was never really bothered by the fact I had no siblings. Partly, I suppose, because I have a cousin who more or less or functioned as a little brother, but also because I enjoyed being the center of my parent's lives. However, if I could have put in an order for siblings, I would've wanted a twin sister (so that we could play jokes) or a big brother, and those weren't things that could've happened after the fact, so... I just didn't really worry about it. The only thing I was really bummed about was that I'd miss out on was being an aunt. I must admit, I did feel some envy when my friends were having nieces and nephews of their own. 


Luckily, my life long sentence without possibility of aunthood came to an end when I married my husband... And, the day we wed, I not only got a husband and in-laws, but also a sister and her two sons and her daughter. I could not have been more excited. I honestly never believed I'd be called Aunt Mindy. (Or, Aunt Windy for that matter.) In fact, on that particular day, Ms. Erin even stood in our wedding and helped us celebrate our holy union. 


Interestingly, I met my niece the day she was born. That was also the day that I met her mother, and my future sister in law. Ryan and I were a very new couple, and we spent the day with his nephew Matthew while Heather was busy bringing Erin into the world. (Come to think of it... that was the first day I met Matthew also. Can't wait to blog about him also. UPDATE:http://sunmoonbrothers.blogspot.com/2010/08/matthew-g-goodboy.html ) When we got word we were welcomed, we took Matthew up to the hospital to meet Heather and Erin. When we got there, Ryan casually held his niece, who shared his name within her own. Once he had looked her over and enjoyed her, he thought nothing of handing her to me. But, I was terrified. She was SO small! She seemed sooooo fragile! And, I couldn't help but wonder where in the heck she got all that hair from already! (Turns out that Ms. Erin has always been able to amaze us with her beautiful hair!) Erin was the first baby I really remember holding in my arms. She smelled good. She was calm, as though she knew I couldn't have handled an upset child.  She was very soft. And, although I was pretty rigid and terrified to breathe or move (or do anything) to disturb her until Ryan took her back, I was pretty smitten with her from the moment I met her. I secretly couldn't wait to visit Ryan's family again to get a chance at practicing holding her.


As time went on, I got to know Erin Ryann better and better. Here are the things I've learned about my one and only niece: She has two brothers and two boy cousins... so she is the very much needed splash of dainty and pink in a sea of blue. She is a very good big sister, helping, comforting and teasing her little brother as often as she can. She is a very typical little sister, following her big brother around and learning from him often, but being sure to remind him that he does have a little sister in his way. She is an excellent cousin. Both of my boys enjoy playing with Erin, mostly because she is just very kind. You'll rarely find Erin teasing you, unless she is actually trying to have fun with you, but certainly never at your expense. She doesn't get upset often and forgives easily when she does. She is dainty, careful and proper as a lady should be, and yet, she is rough, tough and tumbly when she needs to keep up with all the boys. She is playful. She is graceful. She is a Highland dancer, and through her dancing we've learned she's a perfectionist also. She's competitive, though she seems more driven to compete with herself and her own perfection than with the girls around her. She may well be the best cuddler in the whole wide world. She is very smart. She is strong, stronger than I think you or I could imagine. In her short life she has suffered broken hearts and broken bones, and still she can dance circles around you or I. She knows the difference between right and wrong and she will stand up and assert herself when she knows it is the right thing to do. She is beautiful. She is an absolute angel, and I love her very much.


When I sat down to write this blog today, I very much intended to leave a story of Erin to honor her birthday, and to allow for my boys to one day know what I've learned about their cousin. But really, what I discovered as I continued writing, was that I have left them with a story of lessons she has taught me, over the years. Ms. Erin Ryann has been a lesson in strength, love and beauty from the day she was born, and I think we could all take something from her teachings into our own heart.

Happy Birthday Erin! We love you SO MUCH! And we miss you always!

Happy Birthday, Grandpa Wayne!

So, it turns out July is a busy month for us, as far as birthdays go, anyhow. (And we're not done yet!) Today we take a moment to celebrate my father's birthday. Now, I do intend for this blog to be about and dedicated to my boys, but it is vital to me that they understand who they and where they came from. And... Grandpa Wayne is a huge part of who my boys are.


My father was the oldest of 6 children, a huge baby, and born breech. This is important to know, because I like to point out that he was a trouble maker from the very beginning. When I was younger, he'd tell me stories of his youth, and to be honest, most of them them began with a six pack of beer, involved a fast car and ended with a police man. (Well, most of the good ones, anyhow.) Apparently, things were different in those days, and boys were allowed to be boys...  and yet somehow, despite all of this mischief, my father has been a most excellent role model in many ways.


I am my father's only child. (Unless you count one of his motorcycles, snowmobiles or other ATVs.) He always wanted a son, but he got me, so he made do. Initially in my own life, he called me "Tattoo", because I reminded him of the man in Fantasy Island at birth, with lots of dark hair and jaundice darkened skin. That nickname has stuck to this day, actually. He introduced me very often as his "son" though. He took me hunting, boating and on any other adventure he could think of. When I was young, I had mini-bikes, go carts, 3-wheelers, quad runners, snowmobiles, mopeds, BB Guns, and random farm animals. I actually had a few Chevettes to drive around  a racetrack in the back yard. I also had a full sized basketball court in the back yard, and though I wasn't actually a boy, all my toys seemed to attract the surrounding neighborhood boys. My father taught  me how to hunt (NOT COOK), water ski, drive a boat and drive a car (Really, I could drive anything that moved, other than an airplane, I think). 


When my father first met my would be husband, Ryan and I told him we had wanted to take out the quad runners earlier in the week. Unfortunately, Ryan didn't have a hitch on his car so we left them. My father questioned my husband's ability to drive a trailered vehicle, and after a quick demonstration, he was satisfied. The next time my father met my future husband, he had already purchased a baby blue Sonoma to pull the quads, in the off chance he was up North again when we were hoping to take the machines out. (He actually did a nice job pimping the Sonoma out, including a steering wheel cover and a skull shaped shifter.) 


This is pretty much the kind of person my father is. He likes to go fast. He likes people to go fast with him. He loves outdoors, especially when water or snow is involved, and he loves to actually live life. This is pretty much the father I had always known, until the day he met my first son. At that time, my father was in a battle for his life, literally. He was diagnosed with an aggressive type of lung cancer which had already metastasized at the early age of 42. He had a biopsy, a surgery to remove part of his lung, chemotherapy, radiation and prophylactic radiation. At the time of diagnosis, his doctor felt it was unlikely he would live much more than six months. Ryan and I had decided that because my father fought bravely to live long enough to meet my son, he should be the first to hold him.

Now, remember that my father always wanted me to be a boy, so essentially, Jake, to him, was a gift from God. I watched my father develop a soft and tender side that I had no inclination existed. My father, off on disability and busy fighting cancer, came over every morning before I went to college, held Jake while I ate and showered, and would happily hold him any time I offered. He and Jake were the best of friends. That was the happiest I had ever seen my father. (And my stepmother, too.. but her birthday's in May, so that's a whole other blog.)

Then, Benjamin arrived. My dad was equally as excited to have another grandson around, and would tell me stories of things he and his brother had done when they were young. My father was quick to point out that Jacob and Benjamin were linked as early as the bible, and that Benjamin was Jacob's favorite son in those stories. This moment felt as magical as when my father handed me a bible as Jake's 1st present, and I turned immediately to a story that about Jacob watching the angels on the stairway to heaven. By the time Benjamin was born, I had already moved to Wisconsin. My father didn't have the luxury of visiting as often as he had before, but he never let  us forget that we were in his prayers and his thoughts, always.


While Jacob tended to favor his many grandmas, Benjamin has taken a special liking to his Grandpa Wayne. I think this is largely because Benjamin has become obsessed with the Mackinac Bridge and associates that with Grandpa Wayne's house (because he lives the furthest North). Benjamin also LOVES to play in water, and Grandpa just so happens to have a boat or two at all times.I believe also that my father loves to cuddle and joke, and Benjamin, too, is a cuddler and a joker. 


Though my father had found his soft and tender side, he still clung to his mischievous side. I made him promise me he would not get Jacob a motorized vehicle for his 1st Christmas. (Honestly, I have heard many times that he would strap my carseat to the back of his bike and drive me around while I was still a baby. And we wonder why I love derby...) My father promised, and he did deliver on that promise. Jacob received a beautiful Oak wood motorcycle rocking horse, complete with the V shape engine (but no motor) from his Grandpa Wayne & Grandma Jan. The next Christmas, I made my father promise me the same thing- NO MOTORIZED VEHICLES. That year, my dad decided to beat the system. Jake had found a battery powered four wheeler under Grandpa's Christmas tree that year.

Technically, this sweet ride had a battery pack, not a "motor". Jake loved it.  And he was a natural born driver... Ben fits the quad now, and still loves it today.


But this is the type of grandfather my father has become. He is fabulous with the kids. He respects my rules, but does his best to entertain the kids, even if it means bending those rules as much as he can get away with... :) He forces us to turn off our cell phones and video games in favor of enjoying nature and family. He reminds us that you don't actually need batteries or gasoline to have fun, but you sure can have fun faster with them. He shows us that surviving life means fighting and being as strong as you can, while keeping your loved ones close. 


My dad has already taught Jake how to drive a four wheeler and pontoon effectively, at the age of seven. I know he looks forward to teaching both boys to drive the boats while trailered and hitched to trucks (because that impresses future father in laws.) I also know there's probably some learning to fish, hunt and water ski in the boy's future with their Grandpa Wayne. I love my Dad for all he's taught me, and I am very proud of him. I know that my boys will grow to know him in the same way that I do.


That being said, we love you, and "HAPPY BIRTHDAY, GRANDPA WAYNE!"

Darn Thunderboomers! The Game Got Rained Out!

Today I worked, which is very unusual for a Wednesday. If you read my blog yesterday, you're aware that most Wednesdays are devoted to my kids. But, it turns out the kids also like to wear clothes, eat and have power in the house, so... I had to pick up an extra shift while it was available to aid with that grocery shopping thing.


Alas, I did get to make the night up to them. After eating and things, I allowed Jake to play some video games while I helped Benjamin in the bathtub. That was not as exciting as I had intended. The bubble wand was missing from the bubbles, and so I couldn't surprise him and blow bubbles all around while he bathed. This is one of our favorite games, until I get too dizzy and nearly pass out from exhaling... Strike One.


 But at least Jake had enjoyed his video game time, except that his timer, set to alert him when his time was finished, went off about 2 minutes before he finished his game. And, I had intended to actually let him finish the game, but he was quicker than I was, and abruptly turned the game off without complaint, though I knew he was quite upset. I applauded his efforts as he turned the games off without contest, and I rewarded him by letting him know that I would let him play a full half hour of his choice of video games tomorrow, above whatever time his father allowed him during the day. He was still upset, because children at this age are always looking for the more instantaneous gratification, so... Strike 2. I was getting behind in the count. 


While Jake continued on to his shower, I decided to play some games with Ben. I told him we were going to play "Puppy Bingo", which is a game we haven't touched since he was a little over 2 years old and learning colors and shapes...  but, I couldn't really think of anything else. To my surprise, Ben was super excited at the news, and ran and set the game up on his floor (sort of) while I fetched a clean towel for Jacob.

Finally I was getting somewhere. Ben was very upset though, because he could only find one puppy, (and really to be fair, these puppies do not actually influence the game in any way, and I remembered that he insisted that the missing puppy needed to go in his Little People farm years ago...) so I feared I would take the strike out and be done for the night. But I was going to go down fighting! So, I remedied the situation by using Mario as my game piece, rather than the puppy. Ben thought that was really silly, but he allowed it, and I was working towards my even count at bat.

my game card and "Puppy"

Ben's card and Puppy

The way the game plays, you take turns drawing cards. Each card has either a color, a pattern or a shape on it. Your objective is to match one of those aspects to one of the houses on your card, and when you do, you put a dog bingo chip into the house. When you finally get enough dogs in the houses to form a conventional BINGO, you win! Ben did such a great job this time playing, whereas when he was younger, he'd be silly and just try to cheat. This time, he won fair and square!

Ben's winning card... and yeah, he's only got a pull up on, because he loves to be naked...

So, after a few games, I decided to try my luck with our Yahtzee Jr. Game. This is a game I wait for Ryan to leave before I play, so with him being gone to disc golf, it seemed the perfect night to play. I was excited that Ben and I would be able to play a game and then we'd be able to play a new game when Jake joined us when he finished with his shower. This game is fairly fun, even for me an adult to play. Essentially, you have five dice to roll, and you try to get as many matches on the face of the rolled dice as you can, and you do your best to get as many matches with each individual character. You get points for the amount of matches, and the most points win. You can use each character only one time. When you roll a Zurg, your die is no longer in play for that turn. When you roll Woody, he is wild and you can use him as any other character you need. (This is a really lame explanation, but... it's the best I can do. It's complicated enough that I'm surprised that my kids and I can actually play without Ryan's patient guidance...) 

I got ready to take my first turn. I placed all five of the dice into the plastic cup, and shook them wildly around for effect, saying funny things, trying to mimic the sounds of a craps table.

 "Come on, mama needs a pair of shoes! 5 Annies! No Zurgs! 5 Annies!"

 Darn it all though! I only got 1 Woody and 2 Annies. The other two dice didn't match anything and so they were useless at that point. 

Ben was very excited to take his turn. He picked up all five dice, put them in the cup, and shook them as crazy as I had. He started in on the craps table type comments also.

 "I need 4 Buzzes. I need 5 Woody's. I need Woody's and Buzz's! Buzz's and Woody's! Big roll.. big roll..."  (And imagine that buzzes and woodies make Ryan and I giggle when we play this together, so now you know why we don't always play this game while we're together.)

And it was if Mother Nature had provided the sound effects for Ben's roll. As his dice crashed to the floor, Thunder roared loudly and all you could hear was the house being engulfed in a torrential downpour. Jake came into the bedroom from his shower scared, and so we left our game and headed out to the television to monitor the storm which had stolen my own thunder. (Strike 3... )

From that point, we spent the night cuddling together on the couch, watching a Charlie Brown special on television, which was interrupted only by weather forecasts and accounts of tornadoes locally. I feared we might never leave the couch or shut our eyes for the night. I turned the television off when the worst of the storm had passed, read the remainer of a Junie B. First Grader book we'd been working on, and cuddled up with the kiddos.

Ryan came home shortly after the book was finished, and he convinced the boys to sleep in our bed. He had them to sleep within moments, playing the role of the hero once again. And I sat down to blog, only slightly disappointed that my game had got rained out!

A Special Day with Benjamin...

So really, this would be the one blog I would rather do as only a photography blog. I apologize in advance if you are a reader and find yourself bored with this story, as it has very little humor... but it was a day that was very special to me, and I hope that one day Ben will find his way to these pictures and remember this day as fondly as I do....


Because I have a wonderful job, I often have Wednesdays off of work. I generally volunteer for a few hours each Wednesday in Jake's classroom, then I try to spend the rest of my day one on one with Mr. Benjamin. Sometimes, Ben and I just play "Little People" upstairs in our playroom, and some days, we just cuddle and watch cartoons. But on this particular day, I decided I would like to do something special with him. So, I took  Ben to the "Building For Kids", otherwise known as Appleton's Children's Museum. 


The Building for Kids is a most amazing place, even if you're a full grown adult. Let's face it, Ben's mind at this age is filled with wonder and I could convince him that a glow stick from the dollar store and a dark room was full of magic. But even the most cynical mind would surrender and take in all that this museum has to offer. Though there are many, many, MANY different activities to enjoy here, let me steer away from the commercial ad here and back into my purpose of my blog... 


Oh yes. My great day with Benjamin... Let me share with you the many things that Benjamin may be when he grows older... He tried on many hats on this particular day, both literally and figuratively.  He also let me take about 50 really cute pictures, but below you will find only my favorites...

The very first thing you see when you walk into the Building for Kids is a large staircase that wraps around a giant tree house, which you can climb to get to the 2nd floor. Ben, of course, darted right for that, and we were climbed like monkeys to the second floor. Once we hit the second floor, Ben found the fire truck. We got him outfitted as a fire fighter, and he put out imaginary fires while I kept a look out for spotted dalmatians. 

After we played firefighters for sometime, Ben went to the "Move it!" room. The "Move it!" Room is something straight out of a Dr. Suess book, from what i can tell. It is brightly colored, and the walls are covered in contraptions designed to teach the most basic machine concepts, like levers, ramps and pulleys, all connected to various PVC tubing systems. There are also hundreds of brightly colored ball pit/plastic type balls that fit into the various tubes. You can manipulate the different levers and pulleys to get the balls to take different routes through the tubes, until eventually all of the balls will collect in a large basin held near the ceiling. Every so often, that basin will open, raining tiny colorful plastic ball confetti, which is wildly exciting for the kids underneath at the time.Both of my kids enjoy the "Move it!" room, though on this day, Ben would return about every 7 minutes to do a new machine, until he had tried each path the balls could possibly travel along the machine system.

Ben then took turns alternating between painting and drawing in the art room, and learning about hydrolic power in the wet room. In the art room, there were several tables, each with a different type of paint and medium to paint on, and each with a smock to keep them clean. Ben created many shimmering paintings that day. To clean the paint off, Ben played in the wet room, where there were three big tables set up.The first table had baby sized high chairs, and babies could splash and play with the many rubber ducks floating. If they were big enough to hit the button next to them, they could see a simple fountain rise. The middle table was a similar set up to the first, though there was a fountain set up in the middle that you could swim the rubber ducks around in and plastic boats to float along. You had to stand next to the table, rather than sit in a high chair. The third table, designed for the bigger kids, was adorned with  many water guns and hoses and levers to manipulate and watch how water flowed and pushed forward and things of that nature. The walls of the wet room were lined with rain coats of all sizes and shapes, and so we could get really inventive in our water play without fear of going home soaked. 

Just outside of the wet room was an Evinrude boat motor, cut in half and behind glass to reveal the inner workings of the motor. When Ben pushed the simple button outside the glass display, he would rejoice at how this is what made "Grandpa Wayne's boat go!!!" Ben was sure to study this motor each time he switched from the art room to the wet room and back.

Ben also spent a considerable amount of time building roads in a room filled with simple foam rubber shavings and Tonka trucks. Ben the Builder quickly went to work making roads and piles and creating a parking lot. This seemed so simple, yet Ben was completely enthralled when we walked into this room. This was the only room he was reluctant to play with me, and so I just sat back and enjoyed the show, as he made truck noises and talked construction.

I tried hard to get Ben to consider playing dress up in the big dress up room, or to play gas station in the city square... (Literally, there's a room has a mini grocery store, gas station, doctor's office, etc, with roads and small scooters to drive around within the city.) But Ben had found a better idea...

The AIRPLANE!!!

Ben feel in love with the airplane exhibit. He sat in the control tower and tracked storms.  He figured out where the other planes in the skies were. He played pilot, co-pilot, steward and passenger on this plane. He pushed every button, sat in every seat, and turned on and off every light. He sang "High or low, fast or slow, up in the air and away we go..." over and over again.. (which is the song from his Little People airplane).  He made crash landing sound effects. He gave me jobs to do also, so that I wouldn't miss the fun.

Eventually, it was finally time to pick Jacob up from school. At the end of the day, I'm not quite sure who had more fun. Firefighter Ben, Captain Ben (of air or sea) or me. All in all, we had experienced many adventures, and it was a day that I'll not soon forget. 

Reason #1 to Have Kids- Food Experimentation

Introducing:

Vanilla Cocoa Pancakes!

So, I'm expanding my horizons a bit here, and adding a new segment of sorts to my blog. This particular segment will be known as "Reasons to Have Kids". This segment will show up on occasion, and I will try to provide compelling reasons to the doubters among us that humans should reproduce. (Though really, I don't believe kids are for everyone, so please, try to read this with a light heart and a chuckle.) Please note ahead of time that these reasons are in no particular order.

This blog will be the first excerpt from my new segment; Reason number #1 to have kids- food experimentation. Now, don't be fooled. You don't necessarily have to test your favorite food creations on your own children, but very likely, someone at sometime will do that for you. 

My first food experimentation was not actually on children of my own, rather on my Aunt Judy's child. My earliest memory of testing food was on my cousin Nathan. Nate and I spent a lot of time together when we were younger, and so on occasion, I had to treat him like my little brother. (I still very much think of him fondly as my little brother, too, despite the fact he obtained a "for real" sister.) My mother probably tells this story better than I do, but for the sake of the blog, I will attempt to recreate this brilliant moment in our lives. 

Once upon a time, there was a little girl (Min-me) and a little boy (Nate- him) who were very, very hungry. Min and Nate decided not to wake the wonderful (Aunt) Linda (aka Mom), so Min decided to learn to cook.  Luckily, at such a young age, Min's reading skills were well developed, though her ability to follow directions correctly was not. After throughly reading the directions on the Mac & Cheese box, Min put all the macaroni noodles into a pan with the appropriate amount of water, placed the pan onto the stove top, and brought the water to a boil within the next 7 minutes. At that time, Min drained the water, added butter, milk and cheese powder as directed. The finished creation looked a lot like the picture depicted on the box.

Despite Min's best efforts, Nate still woke up Aunt Linda. Apparently, he was crunching this delicacy Min had created very loudly, and so Aunt Linda stirred. Upon further investigation, it appears as though macaroni is supposed to be added to the water on the stove top when it starts to boil, and then be left in for 7 minutes, as opposed to being on the stove for 7 minutes, and then eaten at the moment they begin to boil.

Due to Nate's heroics in food experimentation, Min's children will never live in a world with broken teeth which are the result of crunchy macaroni and cheese, and they all lived happily ever after. (Side note: Nate also learned to cook, likely because of this adventure, and is now serving time as an excellent husband who cooks for his wife.)

These days, Nathan lives too far away to force him to taste test the few scary creations that I manage to concoct while playing in my kitchen in the rare event I can't talk my loving husband into cooking for me. Luckily, I have children of my own to do that for me now. Most recently, I had an actual food experimentation that was deemed successful! After our wonderful day in the sprinklers, my children were starving. So hungry, in fact, that they would not have the patience to wait the 13 minutes it takes to cook our cardboard pizza, and they tire of the mac & cheese and beans that I usually serve to them. (Go figure!) So, I was under the wire, but I was up for the challenge. I decided on pancakes. We have a brilliant pancake mix that requires that I only add water, mix, spill onto the big griddle, and flip. Can't go wrong there...

But, I made the mistake of offering Jake cherry chips in his pancakes, which I thought we had an abundance of... and in fact, we did not. So, again, I was forced to improvise. I found an old hot cocoa packet which had been left over from the summer previous... and got considering the possibilities....

After a tiny bit of thought on my part, I decided to empty the packet of cocoa into the pancake mix, and continued on with the original mix, drop and flip plan. 

The result made both of my children quite happy. The pancakes turned a nice golden brown, which is how they will ideally look under normal circumstances, and they had a hint of cocoa in each bit. That taste of chocolate mixed wonderfully with the syrup, and after the boys ate up 2 of them each as quickly as they could, I knew I was brave enough to taste them for myself.

So, the invention of Vanilla Cocoa Pancakes was introduced to the world. Rejoice!

And we owe this marvelous invention to Reason #1 to Have Kids- Food Experimentation.

Why Twilight Might Only Make Things Worse for Jacob...

Naming a boy is nearly the hardest part of actually having one, I'd say. Naming a girl would be difficult because there would be so many sweet names, it'd be hard to narrow the list down to one. But naming a boy is a different animal altogether. It seems that most boys names are either well suited for small children, or specifically masculine and tough to get to stick to a young baby. And once you've found a name seems to apply to both a child and an adult, it has to pass the next test; Ryan's playground test. A name is not complete until my husband has sat and made fun of it every way possible. For instance, we talked about the name "Trey", as I like unique names and Trey is the lead singer in a favorite band of Ryan's. It seems fitting for a child, but I know of many men named Trey that seem masculine enough... Trey does not pass Ryan's naming test. How could I not realize that Trey could be called AshTrey or Treylor Trash? (Come to think of it, trey would lend itself to some great derby names....) It got to the point that we just read baby naming books outloud and waited for Jake to kick to tell us that he liked a particular name. Unfortunately, Jake would've preferred an Arabic name that I couldn't have pronounced or every memorized the spelling on, so we chose to go a different way.

We threw around the idea of naming Jake after a Red Wing's player, as we both loved the Red Wings. I was thinking of names like Scotty (Bowman), Chris (Draper), Nick (Lindstrom) and I had eventually settled on Brendan (Shanahan). These names were contemporary but classic. Meanwhile, Ryan was thinking stats... but I really didn't think we could pull of Sergei or Vladimir...  so he was somewhat content on Brendan also. Until the day Jake was born, we were confident this was his name. Our first son would be known as Brendan Edward.

Somehow, while I was putzing around the house, in the early morning hours, trying to calm myself and time my contractions, it occurred to me that I wanted his name to be Jacob Ryan. To this day, I have no idea where the name Jacob came from... but obviously I took the Ryan from his father. When I told my husband of my sudden change of heart, he gave me a questioning look, but ultimately, I was the one in labor, so he agreed and we moved on. My only justification for the name was that it could be shortened several ways. Jacob could be known as Jacob, Jake, Jake Ryan, JR, Junior, JR2... there were enough possibilities that there would be no way he could be completely unhappy with his name. It seemed to pass Ryan's playground test as well. (Though we did miss the fact that we pretty much named him after Jake the Snake Roberts, minus 2 letters....and neither of us are real fond of WWE (or WWF at that time) wrestling.  I doubt very much that Jake's generation will ever be familiar with that idea, luckily.)

So, about 4 or 5 hours later, Jake arrived into the world, and we made his new name known to our family. We let my father in as the first visitor, as at that time, his cancer diagnosis was pretty grim and we were just ecstatic that he lived long enough to meet my first born. (Though luckily, he has beat that odds with his cancer, and he is still around to speak the story of beating death.) My father handed me Jake's very first present, a Children's Bible, as I handed Jake over to him to hold for the first time. As my father marveled at this new amazing little person born into the world, I opened up the Children's Bible. Amazingly, I opened to a page in the middle, telling a story of Jacob watching the angels walking up and down the stairs to heaven. It was a beautiful story in the bible, even to a person who is a stranger to the church, to say the least. Though I spend very little time with Christian ideals, I am extraordinarily faithful, or full of faith, rather, and I recognized opening the bible to a page which had a name I had just picked out, seemingly randomly for my first born son to be a very good sign. (I later typed that passage, framed it, and hung it over his bed. I hope that Jacob dreams of angels...)

The name has always been very good to Jacob, until he made his kindergarten debut. Jacob came home from his first day of school very upset. When I questioned him as to what was wrong, he said there were 2 other Jacobs in his class and his teacher wanted him to be known as Jake. I told him that was okay with me, but all that mattered was how he felt about. Jacob made the decision that day he would be known as Jake from then on. Problem solved!

But then he came home the next day, equally as upset! Oh, Jake, what could possibly be wrong now????

"Mama, I can't make a 'K'. Why can't I just be Jace?" 

Poor kiddo. After spending all summer leading up to kindergarten learning to write his name correctly, he had to learn to write a new name with new letters. We sat down that night and practiced the 'k', but it turned out that the 'e' was even harder.... Eventually though, he could write his new name legibly. No harm done. 

Obviously, Jacob, being a bible name for us was a coincidence, but to many, it is by design. The name Jacob has been the number one name for boys since 1996, largely because so many people chose to use classic bible names. And too bad for poor Jake, because the trend seems to only be getting worse... 

Social Security releases a study of naming trends every year in honor of mother's day, and I read them each year, because it comes in handy to be able to talk to expecting mothers about their thoughts on baby names. This year, I read that there's a big trend toward using names from the popular book-made-movie series, Twilight. And although I'm a Twilight fan, (yeah, this embarrasses me too) I swear to you I named my children Jacob and (Benjamin) Edward far before the book took off and became so popular...

And yet, this information will probably not save Jake from encountering many other Jacob's in his time, despite the fact he has mastered writing the letter "k".

Learning How To Love, and Happy Birthday, Grandma!

So, I had the great pleasure today to attend Pride Alive and support the idea of encouraging love of all forms. Everyone is entitled to their own opinions, and I'll leave you to your own without my influence, because as I've stated in the past, this is not a political blog. However, I did find myself considering how easy it seemed to support love of all sorts. I know I'm one of the lucky ones, knowing how to love freely and be loved. I know I spend a lot of time making sure my boys know how to love and be loved as well. But how did we get like that? How did we learn to love?

I came to the conclusion that learning to love comes in different ways for different people. My family is chock full of love, so much so that we run out of people to love and start adopting other non-blood relatives into our family. My Gma Rae was known for this... I swear to you that she 6 biological children but was the mother of at least 20 others. When she passed earlier this year, I was blessed to know that her time was coming, and that I had that chance to say "thank you" and "good bye" as many do not. And when I sat down to thank her for her contributions to my life and to the world, the thing I realized most is that she taught me (and my mother and all my family) how to love, very much unconditionally. Today would've been her birthday. She probably would've turned about 50 years old or so plus experience:) She was cherished and she is greatly missed, but her memory and her lessons lived on in my heart today, as well as in my children's hearts.

My beautiful Gma Rae

My children have been doubly blessed, for they too are celebrating the birthday of a very loving Grandmother. (She is a little younger than my grandma was though, because I believe she's only 30 years old with a little experience this year, but she's still full of knowledge despite the youth:) ) I was fortunate enough to marry into a family that shared my ideals of strong families and love. Although I refer to my  mother-in-law as "Patti", her real name, for the record, is Grandma Goo. I believe this moniker came from my oldest nephew, Matthew, but it has carried on to each of her 5 grandchildren. And just as my grandma taught me that love is being kind and friendly and appreciating one another, Grandma Goo teaches her grandchildren that same lesson. And just like all amazing grandmothers, they taught me (us) that the best way to spread love is by giving out great big hugs. In fact, you'd be hard pressed to find a moment when a grandma isn't just loving on her babies...

Our Incredible Grandma Goo


So, to our grandmas, and to all those amazing grandmother's out there, I say "Thank you!" and "I love you". 
To Gma Rae and Grandma Goo, 
Happy Birthday!

Keep Your Birds out of My Bees Knees, Please.

Today, there was not a lot of inspiration to share with you. I worked most of the day, but I still have a great story or two tucked away for days like today. Please let me share with you the story of Jake learning the difference between boys and girls. Be forewarned! There will be some PG-13 type content here, so read at your own risk.


On occasion, Jacob will recall that I wanted Benjamin to be a girl, and then proclaim that to Ben, just to get under his skin. As you might have guessed, this generally happens when they are arguing. This scenario often goes something like this:

Jake: "SHUT UP BEN! Mom wanted you to be a GIRL, you know!"

Ben: "Nuh uh!"

Me: "Jake, to be fair, I wanted you to be a girl, too. Ben, I love you even though you're a boy."

Ben: "I love you, too, Mama!"

Me: "Now stop fighting or I'll make you both wear pretty dresses."

I realize the boys will probably not appreciate me putting this picture on the internet for the world to see, but the only other illustrations I could think of seemed much too provocative.

(Let me pause here and take a moment to clarify; I have always wanted a daughter, if I had a kid at all. I never in my wildest dreams considered a son, much less two. However, there are some definite advantages to having boys, and I am happy to make the best of it. At least I'll never have to talk to them about their least favorite monthly visitor...)

So, the previous conversation had happened in one form or another many times over the last few years. It pretty much always went the same way each time. Pretty much. But, not always... Because one time, this conversation played out more like this:

Jake: "BEN, Mom wanted you to be a GIRL"

Me: "Jake, we've talked about this.. stop saying that to your brother, please."

Ben: "I like girls!"

Jake: "Ew Ben, you LIKE girls? Hey Mom, what is the difference between boys and girls anyhow?"

Me: (long awkward pause....)

Now, at this time, Jake was in kindergarten, and so he was probably only about 5 years old. It had occurred to me somewhere along the line that we would one day need to educate our children about more adult matters, but I had thought that the fact we had boys designated Ryan to be the person that had to play teacher. It really seemed like a fair trade. I would sacrifice pretty dresses and tea parties, but Ryan would take on the burden of potty training, sex education and driving. It's a pretty basic bartering system in my opinion. After all, if we had given birth to two beautiful daughters, I would never have expected Ryan to teach them the joys of using Kotex for the first time. But here we were, faced with our first exploration into the territory of the sexual education, and Ryan was no where to be found. 

I was dumbstruck, but I had to think quick. Jake's attention hadn't faded in the moments I gathered my thoughts, so this question wasn't just going to fade away. I wanted to be truthful, because I don't want my kids to be 'those kids' that get an inadequate education on the playground from Bob the Bully... but at the same time, I didn't want to offer up more information than Jake was really asking for and scar him for life. What was the real difference between a boy and a girl?

How did that poem go again? Girls, sugar, spice... everything nice... Boys, slugs, snails, puppy dog tails? Snails? No...that sounded more like girls again. That wasn't going to help....

After much consideration, I answered as simply as I knew how:

"Boys have pee-pees, Jake. Girls do not."

Phew! Glad that's over with... and now onto the-

"YOU DON'T HAVE A PEE-PEE, MAMA?"

Internal "Dammit!" followed by another awkward pause...

"No, Jake, I don't have a pee-pee like yours, buddy."

Jake seemed to be happy with that explanation, and so he climbed into the bathtub and the conversation was over. Or so I thought. Within the next ten minutes, Jake went back to the subject.

"Okay, so.. you're a girl, and you don't have a pee-pee?"

Ugh.

"No Jake, I don't have a pee-pee."

This time, Jake took the thoughtful pause. He went back to playing with Ben in the bathtub, but I could see his mind was contemplating. I had tried to guess what he was about to ask, and I was tossing answers around in my head so that I could give a more confident answer when he finally spit his question out. I considered where babies really came from, the basics of sex... but I had never expected what was coming next:

"Oh Mommy! I am SO sorry... I really wish you had a pee-pee. I LOVE my pee-pee!"

And I busted out giggling just like a child. I didn't want to embarrass him, but I just couldn't help it. It had never before dawned on me that I was at some type of disadvantage because of my gender. (With the exception of fair wages, physical ability and having to menstruate, but this is not a politically motivated blog.) This little honest and heart felt apology from my son made me realize that boys aren't just trying to annoy me by having their fingers continually up their noses or down their pants... Rather, they really are embracing their manhood. Huh. This certainly explains many of the mysteries surrounding the odd behavior of the not always fairer sex.

I think that day, Jake learned his first lesson in the much larger subject of the Birds and the Bees. I learned a little bit about the inner workings of the male psyche. I also learned that I really hope Ryan is there instead of me the next time Jake decides to ask a sensitive question... and we'd probably better get preparing for telling why that difference is so significant.