Kid Rorschach Test

We took all three boys to the 1/4-mile running track by our house the other day. It was like giving them a personality test. We didn't tell them what to do; they didn't ask. Here's what happened.

Sam: ran around the track three times. He paused for a few minutes after each lap to brag on himself, but mostly just ran.

Jude: ran the straightaway, then stopped, wandered slowly back to where Ben and I were sitting. He tried out waiting for Sam and announcing his start and finish. Then he wanted to go sit in the bleachers. Then he wandered off down the track again.

Owen: ran the straightway, ran back. Sat on a painted starter triangle for a while, smiling, like that was a purposeful activity. On Sam's third trip around Owen tried very hard to run with him. He made it more than halfway around, and then required personal coaching. He wanted me to say "Ready, set, go!" and then he'd run 10 feet and demand, "doitagain".

God is with Me

This week is Vacation Bible School at our church, which Sam and Jude both get to attend this year. Here they are in some awesome masks they made, going with the robot theme and the day's message: God transforms you and me.

In an unrelated (sort of) story: Jude was saying grace before dinner this week. He ad libbed a little.

Jesus loves me, this I know

He is with me everywhere I go

Jesus is with me when I pee in the bathroom
He is with me when I go
somewhere in the car
Jesus is with me when I pee in the river...

Newsflash

About four weeks ago, Jude visited my brother and his wife (aka "Tio" and "Tante") overnight by himself. He had a fantastic time. He always loves to have the special treatment of being the only brother who gets to go somewhere. I thought he gave us a pretty detailed report of his adventures as soon as he came home.

Important tidbits are still floating around in his little brain, though. One popped out this morning. He came to our room as soon as he woke up and announced urgently, "Something got stuck in my toes when I was at Tio's and Tante's house!"

Different Like Me!

This morning I took the boys to a playground near our house. They are great playground kids. They try out everything, they wait their turn at the top of the slide, they get into games with kids they've never met. They're even pretty good at judging what they can do without getting hurt. It makes me very proud of them. And proud of my laissez-faire playground parenting technique.

Today, I saw Jude talking to a new friend who looked to be about 5 years old. A few minutes later, they parted ways, and the new friend found me. He pointed to Jude and observed happily, "He's different like me!"

I couldn't figure out exactly what sort of different he was referring to. They both had curly hair and light brown skin, but to me it looked like a third of the kids on the playground fit that description. A while later I had a chance to introduce myself. The new friend's name was James. He wanted to talk more about how Jude was different like him, so I asked what he meant.

"He has curly hair and shorts!"

Visits

Special day! Sam's school friend, Tru, came over to play. He's a fun kid. He had a nice Charlie Chaplin move with the toy grocery cart, and there was a fair bit of all the boys pummeling each other with (plush) balls. Here they are posing in their fiercest stances.

Also captured some nice moments while Grandma and Grandpa were here. They kindly drove Owen all the way back to our house after his week of "Grandchild Camp". (He came home with a t-shirt and everything.)

Here Jude and Grandma are building a frog house. Jude demanded that it have no door, so we lifted him into his frog prison, where he happily ribbited.

Cousin Camp 2009

The third annual cousin camp at Nana and Pop-Pop's was a great success. Sam and Jude came home with lots of important news items - I swam in a pool! I saw a movie! It had a dog in it! Mary Cathryn read me Junie B. Jones! I can take my sandals off all by myself now!

Camp is awesome.

Nana and Pop-Pop keep up an impressive pace of activities all week. I'm half their age and used to being with kids every day, but hearing their schedule makes me want to take a nap. They have my deepest respect.

Owen came home from Grandma and Grandpa's with his own t-shirt from Grandchild Camp 2009. He doesn't have as many stories to tell, because he doesn't report anything that happened more than three minutes ago, but he is talking about his cousin Audrey all the time. Grandma and Grandpa told us Owen was happy for his entire 5-day visit, except when he finished a lollipop and they took away the cardboard stick.

Cross Cookies

Jude turned three recently, and in my scheme, three is the magic age at which a kid starts sitting in the worship service. For now, he mostly comes just for the first part and leaves after the children's message. Last week, he came running back to our seat after the children's message hollering, "That was fun!"

So, at dinner a few weeks ago, I announced the change in routine. "Jude, you're three years old now and that means you get to come to the worship service with Mama and Sam!"

I was shocked that Sam spontaneously launched into a sales pitch for worship attendance. "You get to go up to to the front and get a cookie with a cross on it and a drink!" Hmmm... cookies, church... there are usually no cookies at church. A-ha! Communion!

Mama: Are you talking about communion? (enthusiastic nodding) Do you know why we take communion? God promises that when we eat the (tasteless) cross cookie and drink the wine, that Jesus comes inside us.

Sam, arms flung wide: And that brings us so much JOY!

Summerfest

Milwaukee is the home of Summerfest, an awesome, enormous music festival. This year we spent an afternoon there with all the boys and Owen's birthmom. It was a fun afternoon and Owen really got into the spirit of things with this kettle drum group.