Mother's Day 2010

Who fed me from her gentle breast
And hushed me in her arms to rest,
And on my cheek sweet kisses prest?
My Mother.
~Anne Taylor

It may turn out not to be entirely memorable, at least for all the right reasons, but at the end of the day, we understood what was important.

The weekend was busy with many things, not the least of which was hosting our annual Mother's Day grill-out. Sunday morning dawned cloudy, cool and gray. Mandy had stayed out until 1:00 AM the night prior - an unheard of hour for us, given our offsprings' sleeping habits. Elliot woke up for the day around 6:00 - blessedly late, but not late enough - and I quickly changed him and got him out of the house to give the remaining two occupants a chance at some additional sleep.

Babbling the entire way, trying to tell me about his night apparently, Elliot and I headed first to the park we went to the previous day. The purpose of this visit was the mysterious disappearance of two perfectly good sippy cups. Not finding them, we headed to Eggcetera for breakfast. It was a dicey proposition, as Elliot has taken to indicating displeasure, acceptance, and "hey, a new thought" by screaming this ultra high-pitched scream that makes the nerve endings in your skin retract.

Luckily, we were the only ones in the place. He chowed. Bacon, eggs, pancakes, fruit, etc. He even reached for my coffee a few times to wash it down. As Mandy says, he'll eat anything but carbs. Only this time he did, although once he tasted the bacon, even the pancake with syrup was spit out like it was toxic.

While we were waiting for the food, I gave him a few condiments to play with - half-and-half, and a jelly packet. After about 10 minutes, he 'strong-baby'd' those two props into a Vegas volcanic sideshow, squeezing each of them in perfect unison as I shot out one napkined-hand to catch the flying jelly and the other to catch the flying cream. I only partially succeeded in either, but at least the table wasn't a total loss. Before breakfast was served, anyway.

Around 2:00, everyone started coming by, and as usual, they all felt inclined to bring a side dish. This year's theme was apparently "dessert", as we had about four times as much dessert as there was people to eat it. The sugar had an immediate, and predictable affect on Noah.

After polishing off dinner, the boys eventually convinced Uncle Todd and me to take them to the park for an afternoon of play. I asked Mandy if she wanted me to leave Elliot behind, and we had a few moments of polite "whatever you want to do, honey", before it dawned on me she would really appreciate me taking E with me. What they hey, it's Mother's Day. Off we went.

Bath time finally rolled around, and we got to wrap the day up. No gifts, no cards, and given the busy-ness of our lives these days, nothing to show for Mother's Day except my undying appreciation for all that she does, day in and day out. It's a tough, tough job. And you have definitely risen to the occasion.

Happy Mother's Day.

Strong Baby

When my little sister Sam was a baby (about 8 months old the first time), she did what became known as "Stroooong Baby!" The first time she did it, it actually freaked my mom out. She would squeeze her fists together and squeeze them so hard she'd shake. It was hilarious. It wasn't long before she would do "Strong Baby!" on request.

Well, Elliot has become addicted to swinging at the park. He also has his own agenda and lets me know when I divert from it. He screams when I try to take him out and then tries leaping out of my arms headfirst. Once he's down he'll run back to the swings in a stand off with me and sign "more", whine, pull at the swings, etc. Well the other day as he was doing this he got so mad he squeezed his fists and made a "GRRRR!" noise and shook. He did "STRONG BABY!". I was laughing so hard.

Yesterday I was telling the story to my mom and sisters, when Elliot must have been listening and did it! So we all laughed and made a big fuss about him doing "Strong Baby". All day long we kept asking him to do it and he did it and would laugh. It is so cute and hilarious! And, before you ask, yes, I do have video footage I plan on posting as soon as Paul downloads it for me.

In the meantime, here's a picture of him doing it this morning on command.