Friday, August 24, 2007

Sometimes it's cool to be the mom...

I never cease to be amazed by my children. All of them! See, I'm not such a great mom. I'd never ever make it as a "Mommy Blogger" because I am pretty sure that I don't have all the answers and I'm too lazy to look for them. I parent with a few principles in mind and so far it seems to be working.

This week has been a pretty cool week to be the mom. I love watching the interaction between the "older set" and the "boys". There's so much love there. In some families, I suppose there would have been step-sibling issues amongst the older four (and maybe we had them, they were just never that serious so we confused them with typical bickering! Oh! There was a lot of bickering back in the day. Now it's more of a banter and it's fun to watch.) But when the boys came, there was nothing but "Yay! We have little brothers!" And, of course, the bickering. But we all know that "I hate you!" really means "I love you but you're making me mad right now just because you can!"

But sometimes cool stuff happens too! For example, Wednesday of this week, Shrek sends me a message that he's bored and he wants to know what his sister - yes, that's right! His baby sister - is doing. She happens to be off that day and the next so he drives over to take her back to his house to hang out and play video games with him and his roommates. I think that is so cool. I can tell you there's no way in hell MY brothers would have ever done that. In fact, I think my older brothers only remember they have a sister named me at Christmas when I walk into their mother's house with my husband and children. They recognize Shrek and the Queen as their nephew and niece and since I am apparently their mother... they do the math. Whoa... I have a third sister? Neat. But I digress...

The other part of Wednesday's cool was telling the guys that Shrek was coming. They get so excited about seeing their older siblings that its fun to watch. Whether it is La Reina, Squidward or Shrek, every time they get to spend time with one of the "flown the coop" kids, it makes their day. It seems like therapy for the big kids too. Makes me feel old and nostalgic to say, but I love it when everyone can be home. I settle for most of them as often as I can get it.

Other examples of cool closeness? Guitar Hero II. The Queen bought it yesterday (after playing it at Shrek's) and The Senator's been playing it at daycare. She brought it home, set it up and they played TOGETHER! FOR HOURS! It was neat. No fighting. They were even nice enough to illustrate to the Khan that he couldn't play because his hands are just too small. Some families bond over the dinner table. My family bonds over the PS2.

Last, La Reina stopped by to deliver some treasures she'd found for her dad. The boys were so geeked up. She's the queen of cookies for them at Wal-mart 'cause they get one from her whenever she's working and we're there. She puts frosting and sprinkles on the cookies especially for the boys. They love it and so does she. So she plays with the boys a bit, but the neat part was when she wanted to surf the web. The Queen and the Senator were playing GHII in the same room as the computer and The Queen was sitting in the chair at the desk the computer is on. The Queen moves so her older sister can sit at the computer. Sensible, right? La Reina's response was "You didn't have to give up the whole chair!" So they shared. After all these years, they still share - a lot. Different enough always that clothes sharing never happened but they took to sharing a room and a library and a set of parents with incredible ease. They still have so much fun together. I love it.

I love it. I really do. Even Shrek and Squidward seem to get along now. I must have done something right, right? I wish I knew what it was. I could blog about it!

1 comments:

Unknown said...

I got a huge kick out of this blog. I don't know what you did right, either, mom-lady, but you really did a marvelous job! :)

I mentioned in my trip-blog how much I enjoyed staying at your house (though I was dismayed by your post-trip blog to find how MUCH stress you were under -- I WARNED you!!!). You have turned out some pretty "all right" kids. Jourdan is a hell of a story-writer. I will be very smug, someday, to point to a book I'm buying at the register and saying, "I KNOW her! I've slept in her HOUSE!" (Well, YOUR house, actually, but you know how it goes...) The emperor and the khan were everything you warned me they would be. :) And poor Alex has suffered a dreadful smear campaign over the years. I liked him. And he plays a decent game of cribbage. :D I didn't have enough interaction with Miranda to say much about her -- but I could see she was perfectly able to hold her own in the rough-and-tumble teasing that went on pretty much non-stop while I was there. :)

All in all -- I vote your home the best place to visit to feel truly "at home" in -- and not like a visitor. Clogged up garbage disposal and all.