Goblins and Guardians

There is a goblin following me around, I'm absolutely sure of it. He likes to take things I will need and move them. As far as I can tell he doesn't just hide them, he moves them to another dimension. How else can the loss of the memory card for our camera be explained?? Friday I used the last of the juice in my camera batteries to get a few shots of Willie on his birthday. Then I sat down at the computer, plugged the memory card into the flash drive, and waited for the download window to pop up. My intention was to blog about my baby and this big milestone. Well, I was surfing the net while waiting (sometimes my computer is incredibly slow) Willie was crawling around, Polly was around, all the kids were in the living room and went nowhere at all. I looked back down at the computer to see if the card was in right, because it still hadn't started to load. It was GONE. Poof, vanished. As I said nobody had gone anywhere, but Willie had been down there, so we started to search the living room. Nope it's gone. LONG gone. Not a trace. It is possible that the dog ate it, but I don't think she could just swallow it whole and there are no pieces to be found, neither have I found any evidence of it passing. So we have a goblin, definitely a goblin. He has also taken the battery charger for the camera (last of the juice used up remember?), and Harvey's floaty vest. Which brings us to the guardian.

Last night we had a swim party with Jeff's company. I had kept the kids floaty suits on top of the laundry sorter, and went to get them into the bag. Abby's was there, Harvey's was not. We spent 20 minutes looking in all the places we could think of for that floaty vest. When Harvey is wearing that suit and in a floaty ring, he has a lot of fun just leaping into the water and playing. I felt horrible when we couldn't find it for him. But off we went, nothing to be done. Later Jeff was helping Abby in the restroom, and I was watching Willie on the deck. Harvey was wearing his water wings in the pool. The pool we were at has a large ledge that creates a kiddie depth at one end, with a drop off into water 3-4 feet deep. There were quite a few people in the water, including adults, and some giant inner tubes. Earlier this summer I had read an article about pool dangers. It pointed out that small children do not splash or yell, and most accidents happen when a parent assumes that one of the other adults close enough is keeping watch. When you are swimming with 3 small children and 2 adults there is the chance that one will be unsupervised for a while. I remembered the article at that moment, and looked up to see the inner tubes crowding Harvey on the ledge some bigger kids were pushing them around, and it looked like he might just get pushed off the edge. Yep, pretty sure he's off the edge. I stand up and drop my stuff, to go ask someone to push him back. His water wings were holding him up OK, but he was floundering, then just as I got to the edge of the pool, down his head goes. There was an adult 2 feet away from him, but no, they weren't looking. I jumped right, in grabbed him up, and held him tight. He was sputtering and scared, but otherwise fine. We got out and dried off, he ate a few chips, then got back in when Daddy was back. I am so very grateful for the guardian that whispered into my head that article. I don't know how bad it would have been if not, but everything is fine now so it doesn't matter really. The goblin can take my stuff. I can replace it. I'd really like to find the card so I can have those pictures, but I have what matters- my kids.

Girly Day

Or that's what Abby likes to call it. Friday afternoon Jeff's brother called and said there was some emergency work to be done on family property, and could he borrow our car so he could go get it done? We have asked them to borrow our car if they need it, as they are currently a one car, 2 job, live next to nowhere family. So we said of course. Saturday morning Jeff asked if he could be of any assistance, and decided to go help too. That is when Harvey started begging to go. So it worked out that Jeff took Harvey and the dog with him and Abby and I had the day to ourselves- baby in tow.

She rode her bike over to the playground while I helped get Harvey ready to go, then Willie and I went to meet her. It's hard to believe I have a child old enough to ride a bike and go somewhere without me, but she is basically there. After we played on the playground we came home and cleaned up the garage while Willie napped, so we could park the van in it again. Abby was a great help, sweeping and picking up garbage for me, while I hung up bikes and lifted things to shelves. It wasn't a hard job, but it was one of those things that was very nice to get done. Abby had done a lot of listening to stories to earn reading minutes, and her prize was a Happy Meal certificate. I got a certificate for a premium salad for doing the reading. So off we went to McD's for lunch. The last time we went to a play place it was no fun at all and the kids kept getting stuck. But apparently they've upgraded- adding in Foosball, air hockey, and basketball. That's in addition to the traditional tunnel maze, which Abby really loved. Her favorite thing is to play in the tunnel slides on the school playground. Next on the agenda was dropping off stuff in the back of the car- recycling and a stroller for DI. The recycling center seems to have shut down. The gates are closed, very frustrating. We went over to DI to drop off a too bulky single stroller, and found a nice compact one for just 3 dollars. Then we went inside and found that they were having a clearance sale- several racks were just one dollar. I was able to buy Abby quite a bit of fun clothes so now she has some that will work for school. Not new, but that is actually a good thing, I think. I was also able to get some onesies for Willie, and some tshirts for me. Best thing though was I ran into a friend from St George at my Cedar City DI. We came home, had a fashion show, and kicked back to relax. All in all it was a busy but good day.

*****

Ok so now that I've bored you to tears with the play by play of our Girly Day, I'm going to just make this longer and say how grateful I am. Abby is my personal challenge. She's very dramatic, and precocious, and I am not sure what to do with her most of the time. I usually find myself expecting her to behave much more grown up than her actual age, or treating her like she still is incapable of doing anything. Maybe it is because she's the oldest, and I'm still figuring this out?? At least partly. I have tried in the past to take time with just her, but have struggled with enjoying what she wants to do. Yesterday was a good mix. I found myself really enjoying watching Abby playing on the play ground and the Playplace. I didn't have any of my sort of thing to do, just hold the baby and watch her. Usually that would drive me batty, but I really was able to enjoy it. I had fun shopping, and while she got a little bit bored, it was mostly about her so she enjoyed it too. Abby and I were really able to just enjoy each other and that one on one time when I didn't have to worry about Harvey or the dog was really very nice. Jeff and Harvey had a good time too. They spent the day chasing cows and mending fences. Harvey occupied himself digging cow-traps, lol. Harvey declared he didn't miss me at all when they got home today- and I didn't miss him much either. Yet it was absolutely wonderful seeing him again. We need to take more opportunities to enjoy our children on a personal level. They are quite different people on their own. I don't know if Harvey will ever be as excited to spend time with me instead of Daddy, or if Abby will get quite as thrilled about a Daddy Date as she does Girly Time. But soon we will do it- split them up and enjoy them, then come back together as a family appreciating each other even more.