Kid Quotables

I love driving with my kids in tow. It's when I hear the really good stuff.

On the way home the other night, Thane emerged from gazing out the window, breaking the silence with this thought.

"Can you imagine what it was like before you learned how to read?

It's like as soon as you know how to read the way you knew things before just vaporizes. You don't even remember what it was like to not be able to read. 

Like, if Seth and I switched bodies I would be in kindergarten but I would still know how to read." 

At one point the thought of my kids growing older made me really sad. I thought it would be so awful and hard for me to lose my sweet, cute, snuggly little chubby cherubs.

But my big kid is so interesting. He has thoughts, quirks, and opinions. I love listening to him.

I am really liking this new chapter.

A pause.

The other day as I bustled about in a morning rush on a chilly windy morning, getting Max and the boys and our things for the day into the van, I stopped, noticing Claire was not in line. A quick look around found her standing mesmorized on her way to the van, watching the leaves fall around her like rain from the big front yard tree.

A few days later, I hassled Seth to shut the door quickly, "You're letting the heat out, we're not ready to go out yet.", when he stopped me.

"But it smells like winter Mommy. Smell." 

And it did. The cold smelled so good.

That night, Max and I were on our way up the stairs in the dark, his head snuggled on my shoulder, ready for bed, when we heard the geese hosting their annual general meeting in the river. The honking is loud when there's so many of them. Max perked up and we stood at the top of the stairs for a while, looking out the window and listening to the change of season in the dark.

Sometimes, I love when they make me stop.    

Patchwork

We had a problem.

Actually, Blankie had three problems.

Blankie was falling apart. 

Blankie, who has played the supporting role to Claire's lead in life, the other family member throughout our photo albums over the years, the superstar of bedtime, was in need of our help.

Or we would have a very sad girl.   

I had made blankie way back when Claire was born. Now, at the ripe old age of three, a much more faded and soft, well-loved blankie needed a facelift. So Claire and I made a plan.

Armed with a few scrap fabrics and a couple of Claire's cute old shirts that I had saved for just such an occasion, we went to work.

Now blankie sports three beautiful new patches and Claire couldn't be more pleased!

Laundry solace.

I love this post.

I love that a chair like this, a gorgeous chair I've seen a million times in beautiful, well designed and serene settings, can also be piled with laundry.

On the night bus.

We drove home from Nova Scotia this evening.

"Look at the sunset guys".

I think the most enriching sentence I had said to the kids this trip.

It was duely noted. The sky was pink, peach, warm yellow, meeting the black silhouette of the forest at dusk below it, looking like it had been cut out of black paper and placed on the sky, the road aiming into the sun, white lines glowing.

My earlier wild-eyed, "Seth, if you don't stop throwing things SOMEBODY is going to get hurt" moment, paired with a threatening point in his direction with Claire's shoe, the missile he had just launched at Max for no apparent reason at all and I was seriously, however briefly, considering beaning back at his head, definitely hadn't earned any amazing mother of the day awards. At which Troy chuckled, not helping, proceeding to describe that I sounded like a stand-up act I hadn't seen, pointing out that the somebody who was going to get hurt was very vague and didn't sound like I was necessarily referring to the people Seth was throwing things at.

In the back were two runny noses; Claire a dirty faced ragamuffin straggly haired but cheerful mess singing loudly and persistently, Max whining in between losing his food in his seat and mashing it into his eyebrows, both of them succumbing to the beginnings of a cold. Seth was the crankiest boy alive. I almost hope he's getting sick to at least give an excuse for his crap behaviour. Thane was holding in there as long as his DS batteries held out. The van was loud, even just the road noise seemed louder than usual. The van was crowded, every space packed with a body or bag, food, pillows, garbage. It had been a large weekend. A beautiful enjoyable long Thanksgiving weekend. But a weekend we were on the losing end of.

The trip home.

Some trips go better than others. Max did not enjoy this trip. Taking a big kid on a long drive? Sure. A baby? No problem. A toddler, no thanks.

When the older boys were babies we used to favor the night trip approach. Tucking pyjamaed boys into the car we would head off, them soon for sleep and Mommy and Daddy to whisper the trip away in the dark, coffees in hand. But then they got bigger and entertaining themselves became easier by light. Now, we just have all of the different ages to consider and pluses and minuses to any schedule.

Thane's video game batteries died.

"Agh," he lamented, "if I have to listen to Dora for three more hours I'll go insane!"

Then he proceeded to complain that he was starving in between 'righting' his brothers wayward behaviour with more violence. The alpha-male conflict will be the end of me.

But finally, thankfully, we made it to the night part of the trip.

We always make it don't we.

The point when the sunset marks the beginning of quiet. One by one the voices, the gnashing of teeth, the bored little trapped and antsy bodies drop off to sleep. Mommy begins instead to hear soft breathes in and out. What was the roar becomes the quiet of the road taking us home.