The Maker

Today, I realized that my younger child is like me in a way that my older child is not.

When D was little, we spent a lot of time at the library. For a small town, the Sherman library was not too shabby. At some point, D figured out that there were craft books at the library. Man, I hated when D picked out one of them. Although we had a lot of supplies, a specific craft inevitably meant a trip to Michael's or Hobby Lobby, and even though I've spent hours in many of them, I still don't understand how they're laid out.

D LOVED to make things. D still loves to make things. What all has D done? There was a beads phase.

It coincided with the Harry Potter phase.
I'm laughing about D asking the Easter face painter at my parents' church to try a snake.

There was a papier mache phase.

A Maya ceremonial plate. D also made a fish and a thunderbird, among other creatures.

And then there was the time that D became a self-taught balloon-animal maker.

When Mal was about 9 months old and D seemed securely out of craft mode, we donated 3 under-bed-storage boxes full of supplies to our local unschooling group for use at a retreat.

But then D moved on and learned (alone, no lessons; maybe some YouTube tutorials) how to sew. And how to sculpt clay, from forming to firing to painting. 

Throughout all of this time, D has also drawn. A lot. Thousands and thousands of pictures, and I haven't seen one of them in about four years. Ahh, teenagers.

Facilitating D's creative passions is what we do. Even when it's made me really tired, wandering clueless around a big box craft store for hours.

Mal... is a consumer more than a creator right now. I know that consuming gets a bad wrap (I just had to stop reading an interview with some author in Texas Monthly because she was bagging on that kind of thing), but it behooves creators to have consumers, doesn't it? Anyway. Mal is also right on brand with my lack of desire to complete crafting projects.

James's work is having a create-your-own Mario Kart contest. This should be right up Mal's alley because, Mario. I asked him if he wanted to do it, and for about a day and a half didn't get an answer. Then he said he did want to do it. We got a box, and I asked him how to design it. He said it needed to have a white circle with an "M" on it, like Mario's real car in the game (which we don't have).

Mal also said that the car needed to be red, like Mario's in the game. I asked, "How will we get it red? Paint? Or construction paper?" Faced with the extra work, Mal decided, "It doesn't need to be red." Later, we were talking about the wheels. I had a few plates to use for wheels, and asked Mal if he wanted to put some sticker letters on them or something. He said, "There aren't letters on the wheels in the game." I said, "That's okay. We can do whatever we want." "I'll just leave them plain." "But they're white. You just want white wheels?" "Never mind. We don't need wheels."

Needless to say, what we came up with was extremely minimalist, because Mal was just not interested in investing too much time into the project.

This is exactly how I've approached his Mario "kingdoms" that we've been making out of cardboard boxes. I've realized that he's at an age that even suggesting something poorly seems like magic to him, and he's pleased with whatever I do, even if it's messy. He's also willing to overlook inaccuracy, to a degree.

Anyway, here's what we came up with.

He did want the steering wheel to turn, so I made that happen.

Hanging with my brain

Do you ever play mind games with yourself? Not the kind where you wonder, "What if a fire breaks out, and one of my kids is trapped in the back in the back of the house alone?" I am talking about the fun, boredom-busting kind. Things you do to keep yourself occupied during an otherwise brain-numbing activity.

Today, I was refilling bird-feeders and doing some yard stuff and this one bit from "Pirates of the Caribbean" (the movie, not the theme park attraction) kept running through my head. Every time I hear that song, I'd guess it's from "The Amazing Race," but now I know it's actually PotC.

Anyhoo...

At first, I was just singing stuff, and imagined what it might be like to be in a free-styling competition. There's no way I could do it. But then I started challenging myself to sing a random first line, then see how quickly I could complete a somewhat coherent rhyming stanza, to the tune that was playing in my head, anyway.

This is what I came up with, all unrelated:

I do not want your jacket.
I don't think I could hack it.
I have a sugar packet
In my coat but you lack it.

I will never go skiing.
Hate it with all of my being.
Make me -- In fear I'll be peeing.
Yellow snow you'll be seeing.

Where is that kitten hiding?
He won't answer my chiding.
It will be so exciting.
But he doesn't like riding.

I do not like this bonnet.
I did not Amazon it.
My head's so hot, doggone it.
Fine. Fine! Put that thing on it.

I will sing this forever.
When will I stop it? Never.
I think I'm pretty clever.
You might not. Well, whatever.

See? That's just a tiny little peek into what the inside of my brain parts look like. You're welcome.

Adventures With Tentacles

The other night, my day job sponsored an "end of fiscal year" celebration at Dave and Buster's.

I was one of the few who invited my wife. I'm pretty sure I was the only one who dragged along a small child.

It was fun. And Laura got lucky enough a couple of times that we were able to pick up enough points to walk away with some good swag (including a couple of spiffy novelty glasses).

We also got a little glow-in-the-dark rubber tentacle finger puppet thing. Every time Mal breaks it out, I act completely grossed out and terrified of it. He assures me that it's nice, and it's okay again until the next time.

This evening, I woke up from my knee-heating nap to hear her on the phone, engaged in some sort of serious conversation, and Mal demanding that she count for him.

So I shouted out that I'd do the counting and dived in to try to give her a breather.

We spent a while playing "scare and seek." Which is basically hide and seek, except that suppose the hider is supposed to leap out and scare whoever's "it." Something along those lines.

I'm not very good at it. I just hid until Mal tracked down Laura to ask for help finding me. The first time, she might have helped a little. Or maybe just encouraged him enough to convince him to put some effort into looking). The second...he wound up sitting outside with her for long enough that I just gave up on it and move to the recliner in the living room and broke out my phone to check the news.

He decided he was ready to move on to running races. Which basically amounts to lining up in a single file (we take turns in the poll position) and chasing each other in circles around the house. Eventually, we wind up in his room, with Mal proclaiming the he won.

I spent about 45 minutes doing this Friday or Saturday night, while Laura got some alone time. It was long enough that my ankles are still sore, but it was great exercise that the rest of my body desperately needs.

Tonight, I'm sore enough that I couldn't.

So Mal decided to just join me in the recliner.

He played a "game" that starts with cleaning Pepa Pig's teeth using a variety of dentist implements. He's already fixed hers, so he's unlocked Rebecca Rabbit's, which are much nastier. He always gives up as he's getting close to the end of hers, so he hasn't unlocked Emily Elephant yet.

Today, I messed with his ear with that tentacle thing from D&B while he told me that he couldn't and needed help.

I finally told him that he totally could, but didn't have to. It's a game, so he should stop playing if it isn't fun. He jumped right over to "What's a tentacle?"

I tried to explain it, then came up with the brilliant idea of showing him videos. So I googled for "tentacle."

For the sake of your sanity and whatever innocence you may have left, never make that mistake. Luckily for the sake of my illiterate child, the results didn't come back with pictures.


Searching for "octopus tentacle" returned results that were safe enough that I felt comfortable switching over to focus on videos.

We watched a couple of those. I don't think he was impressed enough by the ability to squeeze your entire body through a hole the size of your beak.

Fun fact: the real plural for octopus is "octopuses." A bunch of academic snobs managed to foist "octopi" on us a couple of hundred (or so) years ago. But that's Latin. Since the roots are Greek, the "proper" plural would be octopodes.

I don't think Mal appreciated the subtleties of these distinctions.

He got bored with the octopus video (it was too long, and the predation didn't have enough cheesy dialog), so we moved on to one about the skin of squids. I thought it looked fascinating, but he wasn't interested.

So we watched one about jellyfish for a bit. He proclaimed that they're "bad." I tried to explain that we should stay far away, but they aren't really "bad." That's another distinction that's lost on him. I probably should have just agreed, but I don't want to be one of those parents who tells their kids something's bad just because it can hurt you a bit.

Somehow, that led to a video about "the glass couldn't contain it."

It was a long video, but it was Mal's speed. Because it was basically a sequence of 3 second clips of predators in zoos trying to what they do. Except for the glass.

I think the scariest one was a polar bear in a swimming pool. There was a kid about Mal's age crouched down just below the water line. The kid stood up, popping his head above water, and the bear struck. You could see its jaws clamping down.

Mal thought the entire thing was hysterically funny.

He got bored when the pace slowed down and they switched to discussions about this time a bear (grizzly? it looks to big to be anything else) managed to splinter the glass, but it looks like it didn't actually break through. One of the witnesses commented about how the bear was a clown that had been playing with the rock for a long time.

He made me go back to the beginning so we could watch the first 12 minutes (or so) again.

The second time through, he allowed us to keep going. They showed a segment of a gorilla charging the glass and managing to make it spider web. They showed that segment over and over.

I'm not sure where they were going (the volume was way down). We moved on to playing Mal's "I don't know" game.

Laura wrapped up her conversation by describing that, then rejoined us before I could show him what that gorilla had really done to that plate glass. I think her conversation up to that point revolved around dysfunctional relationships and the difficulty of finding a good man.

I'm pretty sure it didn't have anything to do with the tentacle videos.

Honest, sweetheart. That's why that's why such an awful thing is in my search history.

Control Freaks and Passive-Aggression

Today is Palm Sunday, and some churches have a procession into the building with people waving "palm" branches (ours were not, but were some lighter frond-type plant) which are placed around the "altar' (table).

This morning, we went back to our church after having visited a new church last week (it was fine, but not many kids; Mal wanted to go back today, so we might try to go again sometime soon, but... I really want him to go to church where there are kids his age), and here were more kids there than usual, I'm guessing it's because we're leading up to Easter.

There was one older boy, with whom Mal enjoys playing. Then there were two little girls (and their very small sister) who come occasionally, and another little girl who might be related to those girls but whom I don't remember having seen before. She was probably 5 and was there with her grandmother.

So... we were inside the sanctuary when a lady requested we head outside for the palm event. Mal and I were among the first outside. He got a palm branch and asked for mine so he could "fly." He ran around the giant front lawn of the church, and when the other kids came out, this girl ran out to follow him. Her grandmother asked her to come back, but she didn't. The other two little girls stood with their grandparents.

Mal and this girl continued to run around, while the grandmother asked her child to come back and stand with her. I didn't intervene, because we weren't actually doing anything, and people were still coming outside, and the accompanist had not arrived yet, and we all know church doesn't start until she gets there.

One of the two little girls who wasn't running around started yelling at the other girl to come stand still, and her grandparents instructed her not to boss the other kid around.

Eventually, the grandmother said something to the extent of "resist peer pressure!" in order to get her child to come back. And a moment later, "Be a good example!"

Finally, the older boy Mal likes to play with came out and they tore around like crazy people until the service started. At that point, I called Mal over and he stood with me. The end.

I'm sure that lady (who doesn't normally go to our church, and might not understand how people welcome kids as kids instead of as miniature adults) saw Mal and this other kid running around and thought something about wild and crazy boys, but I'd have let Mal enjoy the outdoors and the space up until we were organized even if he'd been a girl.

In hindsight, I wish I'd spoken to this lady. Maybe. I can't decide whether it would have mattered.

First of all, "peer pressure" was an inappropriate label. No one was pressuring this girl to run around. Her sense of fun was stimulated by watching a free child enjoy himself. Mal didn't invite her to play with him. He didn't notice her at all. I should add that he was doing absolutely nothing wrong or inappropriate. And neither was she. I mean, I guess eventually she wasn't "minding" her grandma, but it was a pointless request, all for the sake of needlessly controlling a child's behavior. There was no good reason to stand quietly in a line seven full minutes in advance of the actual event.

Secondly, "be a good example" to whom? The other two children out at the time were standing quietly. "Obediently." So the only one who she might have felt needed a "good example" was my son. WHO WAS NOT DOING ANYTHING WRONG OR IN NEED OF CHANGE. Again, the moment it was time to stop being distracting, I called him over, and he was fine. This was extremely passive aggressive, and it's the thing I kind of regret not asking her about.

I wish I could say that I was a grown-up and blew it off, but I was frustrated. So when Mal asked to leave after the passing of the peace, I took him. I was in a bad mood. My pastor wasn't there today, as she was injured in a car accident on the way to a debate on Thursday. She's recovering, but it felt "off" with someone else leading, and so many different faces there, and someone treating my happy kid like a menace, that I was ready to get out, as well.

Rest assured that if you're judging me for my letting my kid harmlessly enjoy himself, I care not one little bit. In fact, I'm judging YOU for needlessly reigning in a child. Loosen up, be happy, and let your kids be happy, for the love of all that is good and holy.

This wild child has my heart.

A Day in the Life of My Little

Usually, Mal wakes up with his computer, like some grown-ups do coffee. But today, he jumped headlong into playing, and just did not stop all day. So here are some pictures of the way his days usually go. Spoiler alert: There is lots and lots of Disney's Cars.

A lot of times, after he's played Cars, he adds in other stuff. Here, we're playing fire station Cars.

Here, he's acting out a racing scene from Cars 3.

At this point, we'd gotten dressed and were playing Cars for a minute, then would read "A Very Hungry Caterpillar," comparing the pictures in the book to our refrigerator magnets. We read it at least half a dozen times.

Then Mal brought in the "marble maze" he does with his dad's carboy and funnel.

Mal is making a "pathway" with the bulldozer, then he used the marbles as a track outline to race the... yes... Cars.

Outside break, because it's a GORGEOUS day!

He was "hiding" from me.

We moved to the back yard to play for a while.

We ended up at Veteran's Memorial Park for an hour.

Then we went to the sculpture garden.

We met James at Logan's Roadhouse for dinner, then James took Mal to Target to get some soda, and Mal talked James into buying... MORE CARS.

So when Mal got home, we had to get out the Paw Patrol track to use as a racetrack.

He did finally watch TV for about half an hour, then took James into his room to play for a while. He finished up the night by playing "Cars get stuck in the 'mud'" (play dough).

When he was finally ready to go to bed, it took about 4 minutes. But most days, it's non-stop from wake-up to falling to sleep!

Thanks for spending our day with us!

General Weirdness and Vice Admiral Serendipity

Today, Mal asked to go to Little Land, and I love it when we're in a position to be able to drop everything (in this case mostly because we weren't doing anything) and I can just say, "Yes! Let's go now!"

James had taken Mal last time, so I had to make sure we had Mal's socks and the 5-visit play ticket. Found the latter easily, but had to dump the contents of my massive purse out before I could locate the former. I handed Mal his socks, I did a quick sweep for my phone, realized I had no idea where it was and didn't feel like spending more time looking for it, and we braved the drizzle out to the car... only for me to realize that I hadn't grabbed my keys. A dart back in, and we were off.

Once we got to the gym, it was properly pouring. Cars in the far lanes were shooting up huge walls of water as it accumulated in deep puddles along the side of the street, and I was concerned that if it kept raining, we'd have to stay in that shopping center all day because the water was about as high as I'm comfortable driving over at the entrance.

When we got out at the building, there was water standing in the "greenbelt" between the parking lot and the building. It's a weird set-up because they have maybe 2 stone blocks you can walk across, so our choice was to find where those were or to try to slip quickly in near where we'd parked. I realized Mal wouldn't be able to make it across so picked him up... then stepped right into about ankle-deep water. Fortunately, I was wearing Crocs. Also fortunately, I had a back-up pair of socks (no, I wasn't wearing clogs; they're dressier shoes).

We stepped in out of the rain and got checked in. I looked all around and couldn't find Mal's socks. Then I remembered that I'd handed them to him in the house, so they were probably somewhere he'd set them. So we paid $2 for a pair of socks there, and they're just plain socks, as opposed to the ones we usually use from Altitude Jump Park, which have the grabby little nubs on the bottom. I turned our shoes over to dry and picked up everything to step into the play area. As I did so, my can of Diet Coke fell, hitting the ground and rolling about 10 feet. Memo not to open that for a while.

Mal played for about an hour, and I wasn't feeling 100%, so when he wanted to swing, a move which I know includes his kicking me for amusement, I was less than enthusiastic. At about the same time, the lady who teaches the sensory art class came over and said, "We're about to shoot a video for my art class; would your little boy want to do it?"

We've never gone to the class because it costs extra, beyond the free play (which is significantly more expensive than My Gym was), and Mal just isn't in a place to get the full benefit of anything that structured. But for free? We're in!

Oh, also... Mal was wearing pajamas. He was actually giddy about doing that, because they were the red and white striped Hanna Andersson PJs, and he knew the white would pop in the black-light room. Also, I felt like death warmed over, but had managed to put on lipstick and eye liner on the way over, so in case I ended up in the video, at least there was that.

I was happily surprised that Mal sat on the colored circle as Ms. Chelsea asked. She explained what they were going to do, then set them loose after they'd put on smocks. Everything was winter-themed, so there was a paper mitten where the kids could glue on tissue paper squares. Mal wasn't interested in that at all.

There was one station where she had wreaths cut out of paper plates, and the kids could glue on green bow-tie pasta pieces and red popcorn kernels. Mal completed two of those holly leaf and berry combos before he decided he'd had enough of it.

He is with crafts as I am with home improvement stuff. I start enthusiastic, then say, "Mehh. Boring. Good enough." when I'm about half way through.

This next one surprised me, though.

It was a set up to paint a picture of an igloo with ice cube paints. Mal was freaked out. He didn't like that it was so cold (per his usual desire to have everything exactly room temperature), but also was horrified by the fact that the paint was getting on his fingers. In the picture above, I'd tried to get him to use a strip of paper towel as a wrapper, but he still wasn't ever on board for this one. He wanted to be, but couldn't get past the cold and messiness.

Mal did enjoy drawing on the chalkboard with Ms. Chelsea. 

Her: What are you drawing?

Mal: Lightning.

Her: Oh, good! It was raining pretty hard out there, wasn't it? I'll draw some clouds. Can you draw a cloud? Here's my rain.

Mal: No. Lightning McQueen.

Her: Oh! The race car! Okay. Can you draw a road for him? Where is his road? I see. Is that the road?

Mal: No. That's a lightsaber.

Her: From Star Wars?

Mal: Yeah!

This went on for a few minutes, then Mal announced proudly, "Now I drew Finn."

Her: From Star Wars?

Mal: No. From Cars 2!

Her: I'm just getting my movies messed up today.

Me: In your defense, there are Finns in both movies.

Mal: There are 2 Finns!

By far, though, Mal's favorite thing was the "cloud dough." He kept going back to that after he'd try each new, different thing.

She had made it with some red glitter and peppermint oil, so it was super sparkly and smelled good. In the end, the filming had clearly wrapped up and I had to move Mal on or he would have stayed in there all afternoon.

We left soon after that, and not only had it stopped raining, but the water had gone elsewhere from the streets and mostly from the grass area. When we got into the car, I realized that Mal had actually brought his socks. They were just up under the dash board in the very front, so I hadn't seen them. Oh well.

As we waited in the drive-through at P. Terry's, I realized that I had several remnants from my lemon poppy seed protein cookie breakfast in my teeth, and hoped I didn't actually end up in any of the promotional video, after all.

Then when we got home, I found my phone in the closet in my skivvies cubby, naturally. 

Mal had a bit of a rough afternoon. I don't know how many times I mentally said "Jesus, take the wheel." But as I was preparing dinner, James went outside with him for almost an hour, and while they did that, I decided to make Mal some cloud dough for use at home.

We were almost out of flour, so I used half whole wheat, and we didn't have any peppermint but I used some lemon extract and some almond extract (Interestingly, the final result smelled like my Aunts Polly and Clyda's house). Oh, and of course glitter.

Mal loved it! And James and I got to eat dinner while he sat at the table, happily playing, for quite some time. It's a lot easier to clean up than the Hawaii sand I've been letting him mess with.

Glitter goes with construction vehicles, right? Also, can you tell from this picture that his cuff is practically brown? I stripped him fairly soon after I took this picture.

Now, wish us luck. I've tried to prepare Mal for the fact that tomorrow is his dad's birthday, and there will be presents to open. But he cried about it today and will likely do so tomorrow, as well, so... Jesus, take the wheel. :)

They're Coming to Take Me Away, Ha Ha...

I'm not saying that parenting a baby is tedious or that I'm losing my mind or anything, but the other day, I was in Mal's room playing with his blocks and said, "That's interesting" out loud. When James asked me what, I realized that it wasn't actually interesting, but that I was spending way too much time in my baby's room.

Seriously.

If you talk to me and I'm boring, here's why. This is what I do all day.

This is a set of stacking blocks that Mal has. I got them for like $6 at a second-hand store months before he was born, not knowing how much I'd end up playing with them. Can you tell he teeths on them? Especially the top ones?

Anyway, this is how they're "supposed" to go. Sometimes I stack them upside down just because it looks impossible and fun and I love that. But then I try to find other patterns or ways to stack, or try just to be completely random. Or make the stacks look of uniform size, which you can do pretty well by alternating big and small pieces. But I digress.

Here's sort of rainbow order... I usually pull the red one off of the bottom of the disc pile and put it on top. Didn't do it this time, and now it's going to bother me. This is the worst blog ever.

Here, I tried to get uniform colors all the way across. As you can see, there are only 2 light blues and 2 reds. However, there are four dark blues, greens, and yellows. And three purples and oranges. I wonder why they went with 4 yellows, when this is such a ugly yellow it would have been prettier to do orange or even my favorite: purple. But, as you can see, I think about it way too much. This is what my life has become.

Also, if one piece is missing, I can tell you by looking at the rest which one is gone. Sad, sad times.

Color blocks. I have to have the red "toppers," and this bothers me.

Mal has another toy that is similar, and right now, I have it "random with as much off-track as possible." So, basically, it's a hot mess.

This toy is actually superior to the first one because the sticky-up parts can fold down. On the first toy, the sticky-up rods don't move, and many were the times that I worried my wobbly infant was going to impale himself. I don't think he ever did, or if he did, it obviously wasn't too traumatic for us. But I like the train's design better.

Unfortunately, I also liked to twist the posts around and watch them unwind, and I ended up breaking one off. So, yeah. I broke my kid's toy. I don't think he's cared yet.

Next, we have a linear alphabet Noah's ark puzzle that my friend Jana gave me. She had the pieces in a shoe box, and I put them in this Wilton's candy Christmas tin.

May I be honest and tell you I have spent more than two months trying to figure out how to get all of the animal pieces on the bottom of the tin (not having to stack or pile them)? Well, a couple of days ago, I finally got a combination that worked, and while I was trying to take this picture, Mal took out the giraffe and I almost had a heart attack getting him back in so I could get this shot.

This probably looks pretty easy, but figuring it out... well, wasn't. Maybe I'm just not spatially inclined. But here's my next challenge: I KNOW in my heart of hearts that there's room for the ark, too. I want them all on the floor of this tin. I don't know why. It's just that this is what my existence has become, and I'm leaning into it, friends.

Wish me luck! Or pray for me. Whatever.

See these books? I've memorized all of them. If we're ever waiting in line for something and you'd like an oral interpretation, hit me up. I have a lot of material here. (Yeah, Mal teeths on these, too, even though we've tried not to let him.)

Another thing: Since we moved and Mal has carpet instead of wood flooring, I've been working on places to put his top. Obviously, we can put it on books, but sometimes it spins off. It will spin on the floor, but just not as long.

One thing that I've found works is these oatmeal tin lids. It holds the top in place until it starts to slow down, then it falls off about the time it'd have stopped on a hard floor, anyway.

But the other day, I got super excited because I figured out that I could do this. And, yes, "super excited." At the moment, I seriously was. And this makes me pity myself just a bit.

Is it a spyglass or a top stand? It's BOTH!

That's blurry, but it was difficult for D to focus on a moving object with my picky camera. Plus, I'm sure she wondered what the heck was going on with her mom that I kept asking her to try it "one more time." I mean, what is wrong with her mom?!

Wheee!

Next step: See what kind of repertoire I can build up on this thing.

It's a little tricky because there are no sharps or flats; it's just the straight scale, with a few extra notes on either end.

Oh, did you also know that you can make the sound come out by sucking on the keys with them open? It might make you pass out, but that's possible. Also, James and I had a "contest" (I suggested it) to see who could make this thing work with their mouth furthest away from the blow hole. I won, or I wouldn't have suggested it, of course.

And last week, James and I spent a good hour tossing/rolling a ball back and forth while Mal did other things.

So, please. Someone. Help me.

Mal's first games

Twice this week, Mal has initiated games of sort. He's participated in "peek a boo" (and enjoyed it) as well as rolling a ball or car back and forth, but he's never started the process. Until this week!

The first "game," if you will, just involved Mal forcing himself to laugh to get us to laugh. When we laughed back, he actually cracked up a lot. (And mostly without hiccups, thank God! FINALLY!) I got a video of his fake laughing... I had to keep feeding him, though. :)

When Mal was a newborn, after I'd change his diaper, I'd pick him up and lay on my back, then say, "Baby attack!" and have him come at me like he was tackling me. I'd lay on the floor and pretend to be knocked out, and say things like, "I never saw that coming! I can't believe it!" I've done it more recently as he's been fussing to get out of his "seat" toys like the piano and ExerSaucer... but not in the past month or two because he's way too heavy!

I don't know whether this was a throwback to those memories, or just something he made up, but today's game had more of an actual structure, simple as it was. Mal started off by standing beside me where I lay on the bed and then throwing his head into my torso. He would then giggle, stand back up, yell, and do it again. Of course, I acted very shocked and injured. He did this about a dozen times.

My husband saw it and went to pull out my camera, saying, "What do you bet he won't do it again?" (as per usual, when we get out the camera) However, he did catch it a couple of times as Mal was tiring out. Oh my goodness, it was the cutest thing!




He's feeling a bit better from the ear infection, but we're still fighting it! I think it spread to his other ear, too, so I'm even more determined to wrestle him twice a day to get as much of that medicine down as we can. If we can just get him well, he's being a lot of fun and happily busying himself on his own a bit nowadays. The good times are starting. Yea!