Fun times with the kids

The kids are at a nice stage right now. Many times I enjoy just hanging out with them, watching them create whatever story it is and them just being themselves.

PM loves sticks and rocks. He is always picking up some stick or other. They are often used as street cleaners, or graders, or snow plows. Ya know – construction/utility type trucks. Or dipping sticks in puddles and then splashing muddy water all over the place. The other day PM had one of his usual sticks – about 3 times as tall as him with many small branches on it. Running this way and that and playing with the puddles. LB says she needs one too. Reaches out to the nearest tree and easily breaks off one of the lower branches. This stick is shorter than her and more like a twig and seems quite comical compared to PM and his super sized sticks. Here she is trying to be like him and really what she chooses doesn’t compare and yet it does and suits her perfectly.

They both seem to want to be like the other. LB adores PM and wants to play like and with him. He wants to do whatever she is doing and if she starts playing with something on her own initiative (which is quite often) then he needs to have it ‘NOW’ and often a struggle will ensue.

Yet today they were playing great together outside. PM gets the hoe and starts cleaning something up with it. LB gets hers and they work together. Then he puts the hoes away, gets them shovels and they work on something else. Then those get put away and they get their steel rods for digging with or clanging to the ground.

LB is at the age (2) where she is very expressive. Both in very cute and lovable ways and then also very exasperating as she reacts with great emotion to whatever issues both great and small. Her vocabulary continues to grow and she repeats most things. She is more adept at handling tools and playing with PM’s trucks but she likes to carry a purse around and some doll or stuffed animal. Today she was running back and forth giving her bunny some booby. (Is this an indication of how she feels I am with her she is at the breast?). PM’s main use for a purse has been to count out his money to buy a forklift or a snow plow (chairs lying down on the ground are vehicles and they step in between the legs and maneuver the chairs around with items on top). And LB gets more into the idea of carrying it around with some beads around her neck and some character in her arms. Boys and girls and some intrinsic differences I guess.

After a day with warmer temperatures, fun with the kids (lots of rock collecting today) I feel more inspired. Then of course LB spends much time whining and crying ‘NO, mommy! No, mommy!’ – repeat again and again. I feel exasperated and try to remember the smiles as we hang out together outside and those loving feelings. Up and down (an expression she likes to chant sometimes). Our emotions and life follow that pattern. Always different but seems good feelings are followed eventually by challenging ones and then good feelings follow close behind again. Back and forth…

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