What Are My Options?

That is the question I was asked this morning when I asked Harry what show he wanted to watch.

Have you met Ted?

I am in no way implying that Harry is a wing man, but Harry's new line seems t o be "Have you met my sister?" It definitely brings out the "oohs" and "aahs"- for HIM! He knows how to work a crowd.

In other news, Harry brought me his spare Snoedel today. "You can share it with Daddy." It was just what I needed.

Cuddly!

Harry wants his sister to sleep in his room...all of us actually. He says she won't fall off of the bed. He will hold her.
When we are sitting on the sofa, he also likes to lean his head up against hers (I try to put my arm there instead, at least to absorb the weight).
Yesterday the best part of his day was that people liked his new Big Brother shirt (different one than in the picture).

He IS getting bigger

Without even a second thought, Harry climbed into his carseat in my car, all by himself this morning! Although he's been doing that in Kim's minivan for some time now, he had never even tried in the Forrester (not many handholds).

In related news, after work yesterday, Kim was telling Harry and me that Ainsley seems to like to be sung to, particularly "Twinkle Twinkle"

With that, Harry immediately shot into...

Twinkle, twinkle traffic light
Shining on the corner bright
Red means stop
Green means go
Yellow means to take it slow
Twinkle, twinkle traffic light
Shining on the corner bright

Needless to say, Kim and I looked at each other dumbfounded, as we've never heard that version before, and certainly not from this guy!

Always something new... even if he is huger than ever (Kim suddenly insists his hands are bigger than hers)

BIG Brother

Big brother

So Big!

A week ago, Harry was just a tiny little boy. Now he's gigantic!!! His hands used to be little, but now they are almost as big as mine.
He is a very mature big brother, and very helpful. But he wasn't too big to spend his last 15 minutes before bedtime last night sitting on my lap. He knows I can't pick him up, but he asked if we could still cuddle. He's just the sweetest little guy! Tonight he spent his final minutes before bedtime just watching his sister, and touching her little feet!
I am so glad we waited until he was almost 4 to have Ainsley. He had a long time to be little. I woudl have hated to cut that short!

what a difference a day (or six) makes

Well it's official. As of 12:31 on Tuesday February 19th, Harry is finally a big brother.

Ainsley Mae arrived, and Harry came right to the hospital to meet her that afternoon. The build up of the last 9 months has gotten him so excited to teach, instruct, direct, and just generally help out with his new sister, that he's almost a bit overzealous with how much he wants to do right away... holding her himself, bestowing her first Snoedel, helping with EVERYTHING.

I guess it's partially my fault, as I've been trying to make sure the addition of another kid to the house is a positive thing, I guess it went a bit overboard, and now he wants to do it all right away.

That said, his most noticeable change really hit me today. As small as his sister is, as small as all of her tiny diapers are (that are still too big for her), accentuates how big he's suddenly become.

When I dropped him off at school on Tuesday morning, Harry was himself. He had an awareness of what was coming that day, but to say either of us knew would be pushing it. On Tuesday afternoon, when he came to meet her for the first time, he was suddenly BIG.

Now that we're home, it's really hitting me. Seeing him next to his tiny sister, and then later today next to his also-grown -quite-a-bit-since-we-last-saw-them cousins, it's right there. I don't really know how to quite get it into words... but he's really a kid now, not a toddler, nothing like that, but a Kid.

I think it's safe to say that everything we (at least I) have done over the first few of the last almost 4 years to get Harry to where he is today, seems to have faded just enough from memory for this to be a pretty difficult time.

I know I knew how to deal with newborns (or at least figured it out), but knowing that I've forgotten it all is really bumming me out. On top of it all, suddenly seeing how much he's grown is giving me a insight into the whole "years flashing by before you know it" thing.

focus...

So when I got there to pick Harry up yesterday, I followed the usual regimen of upstairs to grab jacket, hat & gloves, and then back to the middle floor to get the boy, and home we'd go. But yesterday I got to watch him for a bit.

When I came in, he was spread out on the floor with a large fire engine puzzle. Ms Angela was handing him pieces that he'd turn a few times in his hand, take a look at what else was already down, and decide where it might fit, and began trial & error (most times he got it on the 1st try, but a few got set aside for later).

It got interesting when some of the distractions got introduced...

The girls screaming in the corner challenging one another on whether the bug in question was a moth or a butterfly (it was everything I could do to not go explain the easy way to tell), who decided they needed a teacher's intervention, which required a path across the puzzle field. Ms Angela was quick to ask them to go around, but it was a tossup of how long it took for that command to sink in, 50/50 on if it wasn't until after they stomped across the puzzle.

One of the other boys in class saw me, and noticed that Harry hadn't yet, and felt it imperative that Harry acknowledge me. Harry finally did, but kept on working intently on filling in the blank spots.

Some of the younger kids from downstairs were getting antsy as Harry was gaining on completion, and wanted nothing more than to start taking it all apart, but each time they got close, ms Angela gently intervened, and instead they started handing the remaining pieces to him.

At this point he had a nice crowd gathered to watch him finish the puzzle. Usually this is the point at which Harry either tears it all apart, gets aggravated that there are too many people watching, or loses it when someone takes the piece he wanted.

None of that, just a nice big dimply grin when he finished, that was instantly followed by the encroaching crowd upending every piece they could. Again, rather than burst into tears, he kept the flashy smile going and ran over for a big hug.

Then it was all business again... jacket on (no hat or gloves on today), and a quick collective good-bye to the room, and off we went.

As we headed to the door, Ms Nathalie was quick to ask if he had finished the puzzle - met with a matter-of-fact "yes," and kept walking out the door. I mentioned to her how interesting the focus was to watch, and she reassured me that that's good.

Nice.

Valentine's Day

Dude's freaking out that he's not getting any Valentine's Day cards. "I don't want to go to school."
Dude, it's a requirement. Everyone has to give you a card. Still, he doesn't believe us. Claims he has no friends and no one said by to him yesterday. Dude, everyone did at least once.

Send in the clowns!

I've got Ted White, balloon artist extraordinaire, booked for April 19. Even have the party favors ordered. It's early, but I'm bored.

Take That, Oprah!

An email message from the Hilary team:

I’ve Switched to Hillary: On Wednesday on "The View," former Sen. Obama
supporter Whoopi Goldberg announced that she voted for Hillary. On Thursday, the
video of Whoopi’s announcement was YouTube’s single most watched news and
politics clip. More than 200,000 people watched Whoopi explain that Hillary was
the first candidate to propose taking tax breaks away from companies that ship
jobs overseas.

I tried to discuss politics with Harry this morning. His current opinion is that Mommies shouldn't be president.
He's 3.
I'll work on him a little more.

Belly of the Beast

Yesterday was the Chinese New Year. Even though there were many (3) rats on Google, I forgot, and since Kevin worked late, I went to pick Harry up at school at 4. There are lots of stairs at his school that wear me out, so I try to get the picking up over with as soon as possible. When I got there, I thought I was lucky because they were all just coming outside, which would mean no stairs for me. I spoke too soon because even though I tried to bribe Harry to leave with new trains, he started crying. He said he wanted to stay and play with the kids, but he didn't explain that it was a special day. When I saw the paper dragons filling up with kids, I quickly figured it out though. I felt so bad. So, I let him stay. Harry ran off to be under one of the two paper dragons. The kids then marched around the track under their dragons for at least 30 minutes, followed by cake. There were also drums and paper lanterns. Harry said the best part of his day was when he got to be inthe belly of the dragon. That would be the front person, under the painted cardboard box, looking out of the mouth of the dragon. They did all look adorable, and everyone was so excited. It's kind of funny, I was commenting the other day that the happiest pictures I have of Harry involve him in a cardboard box. Luckily, I know kids like boxes, and this is a sign of an imaginative kid, not a road to ruin (although, would it really be ruin if you really liked living in a cardboard box?). My dad used to bring home refrigerator boxes for me, and I would cut holes for doors and windows and attach them together and make whole villages. Hmmm...I may not mention this to Harry. One box at a time is plenty!

Cough Cough

I got to hang out with Harry yesterday ALL DAY. Normally an enjoyable experience, this was a struggle because we were both sick. One thing my beautiful, bottle fed, daycare baby has not learned in his almost 4 years is how to be sick. This is possibly his 3rd time being sick, unless you count the 4 hours he had pink eye. Of course, as long as the TV was on, Harry was pretty happy. I tried to turn the tube off, since we had weaned him down to less than an hour a day, but carrying around an 8 pound baby all day and being sick and pukey on top of that is hard. I also got to carry Harry around quite a bit, because although he would not admit to being sick, he would admit that his feet, head, ears...didn't work. I spiked his milk a couple of times, but after telling him that was the only reason he felt better he became less trusting. I think maybe I watched too much X-Files while I was pregnant with him. Spooky Harry trusts no one.