Take a peep

On Friday Ms. Janette and baby Jules came to visit us. Jules is 11 months old and on the precipice of walking. Janette and I did a lot of catching up and comparing notes while keeping our third eyes on the boys. God how I wish Janette would move back to Philly. Any time she mentions even the slightest possibility of being in town more often I get my hopes up. Friday night it took us two hours to get Noah to bed. Though he always has issues waking in the middle of the night, he rarely has issues going to sleep (other than the fact that I have to nurse him). But for some reason, the last couple of nights have been a bit more of a battle. He seems to be in the throes of getting his upper molars – and with that comes sinus issues like runny noses, headaches and the rubbing of eyes. So I’m willing to blame the resistance to sleep on the teething. Of course I’m willing to blame anything on teething. Certainly the reason we are still in Iraq has to do with teething.

On Saturday I set out downtown to get my haircut at American Mortals. After my shearing, which I’ve been told went successfully though at first I had my doubts, I met Mark and Noah who had taken the subway to hang in the park across the street from the salon – Washington Square. Mark had been trailing Noah around and around as Noah pointed out the birds, the trees, the motorcycles. After I joined them I picked up burritos at El Fuego and we ate in the park. Noah proceeded to take his food and move to his own bench. He’s such a loner. Filled to the brim with yummy Mexican goodness and thoroughly wiped, Mark and I took the still very energetic boy home. Luckily he calmed down once he was chilling in the stroller. Nap time commenced once we got home at which time I headed to the nail shop across Girard to get my annual springtime pedicure. And a crappy one at that. In my enthusiasm to have prettier toenails I always forget just how bad they are. When I returned home I learned that Noah woke up after a paltry 20 minute nap and was still a bit out of sorts. Teething, I guess. Or Iraq. Anyway – we went to the Rec center playground, had dinner and went to Walmart to buy a broom. And of course it was a madhouse. And of course we bought a lot of other crap. And of course they were out of brooms. The checkout line was so long that Noah and I walked to Home Depot, bought brooms and walked back while Mark checked out. And then bath and bed.

I spent Easter morning cleaning the kitchen. And then made a mess of it while making a side dish to take to my Mom’s for dinner, but only after Mark dropped pizza face down on the freshly mopped floor. Why bother? Then we headed to Mom’s to join my Grammy, Aunt Jill, cousin Tammy, her husband Tom and their two kids Aelan and Evan – as well as Mark’s Dad, his wife, and Mark’s Grandmother. It was a nice full house. The kids really enjoyed the new play set my mom had installed last week and also had a little fun with the egg hunt I put together. I hid plastic eggs filled with super balls, cars, plastic animals and whistles. I spent most of the time free to chat while Mark and my Aunt Jill took turns watching over the little captain. I heard he went down the slide approximately 35 times. Dinner was nice as was the company. I like being in a house bustling with people, knowing your kid is somewhere else, having fun and being looked after by someone who loves him. Noah got some candy, clothes, a lamb and a bunny for Easter – though Mark’s Grandmother insisted the fuzzy white animal with a cotton ball tail and long pink floppy ears that she bought him was a dog. And when a 96 year old woman tells you a bunny is a dog, well… then it’s a dog. I see Easter in the pagan sense - as a celebration of spring, rebirth and fertility. Oh and peeps. Stale peeps to be exact. And I certainly have room in my celebration for Easter dogs too.

It’s another beautiful day and once Noah wakes up from his nap we’ll head to the park. We spent a great deal of the morning running cars down a makeshift ramp crafted from items in the pantry. I’m hoping with a few more design efforts I can do a much better job on my craftsmanship.

We leave for vacation in less than a week, so the next couple of days are going to be a mad scramble of planning, packing, excitement and fear. I need to stop worrying about what toys and snacks to pack, the plane ride, and the possibility of an over-tired over-stimulated toddler throwing a public temper tantrum or two. And once I figure out how to stop worrying I’ll be set. For life.

Oh and a quick note on the last post. I will raise Noah to be a hugger if it kills me. The problem is that no matter how great it is for your 30 year old son to give you a hug as a sign of affection – it can’t possibly match up to the feeling of a 17 month old suddenly stopping in the middle of playing, running toward you full speed with arms open and hugging you because you are obviously the most important, awesome, lovely thing in the whole wide world and he just needs to be close to you. It’s a feeling like nothing else and I treasure it and him every day.