Our Ponds and our Best Buther

These days every adorable thing Eli does is killing me. I'm in this strange mode right now where I am mentally obsessed with recording. It doesn't mean I actually do it...but I feel a heavy panic and guilt every time some cute thing happens or some moment of closeness occurs in my kids lives. Be it a magical moment of self-discovery, a skill they suddenly acquired, a connection with a grandparent, an hour of all of us sitting on the living room floor playing a board game, catching them during a passionate solo, a facial expression that I can’t bear to lose memory of but that I don't have my camera ready to capture.

Or a picturesque silhouette against a sunset sky to commemorate the magical evening walk we just took tonight with the three of them feeling happy and confident, creative and curious, all of us at one with nature and feeling a part of this world we've been given. There is a line in a children's book about Jane Goodall as a little tiny girl that sums up what I want for my kids in nature. In these moments tonight I believe this is how we feel.

“She could feel her heart beating, beating, beating. It was a magical world full of joy and wonder, and Jane felt very much a part of it.”

this was tonight

Today is a day for me to stop anything and everything and sit down and record, to remember, write, and feel. Sometimes something just happens that makes you suddenly see things clearly again.

I've taken to scrawling down Eli moments- a phrase he says, trying to describe a dance he does, a sweet song I hear him singing- randomly in my planner. Here are a few of the things about Eli that I will forget all too soon. There are already so many gone.

Trains. Eli loves trains right now. There are so many ways he shows us his obsession, books he adores, tv shows, and the crazy scream we hear in the car when a train goes by where we're driving. But one of the most frequent ways he shows us his love for them is that he makes a train in the middle of the kitchen everyday- several times a day. a very big intrusive train that cuts across our kitchen. It's usually made out of our long dining room table bench, a foldable step stool and a pink bathroom step stool, so now and then some variations occur, such as the flour bucket as the drivers seat. And of course he is still in that phase where whichever room I'm in is the room he needs to be in too, so the train only happens at the most inconvenient time- when I am working in the kitchen. He is extremely, EXTREMELY OCD about the whole thing. Everything has to be in the exact right place or it is just not a train to him. After all of his arranging and complaining, once it is all set up he shows me my spot, sits in his in the driver's seat and says the same thing every single time, without fail:

"Now, I wiw say chugga chugga choo choo. Chugga chugga CHOO CHOO! Now we at da tation (the station). Now we ome (home)! YOUR TURN!"

Then we switch, I say the same thing, and we switch back. Then I try to get back to whatever it was I was doing but within minutes I am always back on the train. Partly because he is bossy, but mostly because he is irresistible. If he ever sees me putting his train parts back where they need to be he gets so mad, even if he hasn't been playing with them for awhile. And then it starts over again. I am kind of pushover for the little boy-ness of it all. I believe in both nature and nurture, but for real there were no trains or cars in this house and none of us had the slightest interest in them really until he just naturally loved them.
Eli is so good at imaginative play...pretty sure we know where he learned that. Audrey and Hannah are very rarely playing any other way- everything, every inanimate object is person with a backstory (and often a tragic one) in our house. And Eli plays the same way! He plays with his little cars, but they don't vroom around the room. They have conversations. Sometimes when I play with him I have my cars crash into his just to show him a different kind of playing. He laughs but also kind of seems genuinely confused and just goes back to having them talk to each other. So again, I believe in both nature and nurture because he has been shown all his life how to play "house" or "family" and that is exactly what he plays. Even with his big ol semi-truck toy.
He is still my cuddliest baby. Audrey and Hannah do love to be held and cuddled but soon enough they will be on their way. This is partly due to age, but Eli has also seemed to just be more natural at being relaxed and relaxing to those around him. He is the child who has slept with us most consistently and most easily, which is something I’ve always loved about him.
If he ever sees me crying, he feels very concerned. He says, in his most pitying voice, “Oh, are you kying? Say…” and then he rubs his eyes with his fists. And he keeps telling me this over and over again. “Mom, say…” rubs rubs rubs eyes and sniffs. “Say it mom. Say…” rubs rubs rubs eyes and sniffs. Until he is sure that my tear smiling is happy enough, and that I feel better. And I usually do after that. Because how could you not.
One of the things I hear out of his mouth quite regularly is this: "Oh, are you Mayeee Poppis?" Almost always followed by "And is it I Geowgie?" This is because one day the girls asked me to pretend to be Mary Poppins from the new movie and they would be the kids. We have started doing this often because after the first time I noticed how well they snap to it when I say anything in that accent. Like for real. It's amazing the rules kid will abide by when they are playing. They do their chores waaaay better if I talk to them like Emily Blunt! The magic of Mary Poppins is very real in our house. They assigned Eli the role of Georgie which he happily accepted. And now he is usually the instigator of the game! Today he sat on the edge of a basket, looked at me, and said, "Cay you say "cay you imaaagiii daaaaaaaaat"?" So I started singing "Can You Imagine That" from the movie but he stopped me. He got out of the basket pointed and insisted that sitting on the edge of the boat (basket) was the only way the song could be sung. And again, that combination of bossy and irresistible got me and I squeezed myself into that basket!

He wants and expects any animal we encounter to come lick him. At the duck pond the other day...

"HEEEEEYYYY DUCKS, COME LICK ME"

...holding out his hand to the uninterested ducks who are sitting way out in middle of the pond. Snobs.
His most unique and consistent phrase is probably “I never.” This is basically how he says “I want to” do something, phrasing it as “I never get to…” I’m pretty sure it started from Hannah’s frequent claim that she never gets to do something, whatever current thing she was upset about. But then for Eli it just stuck and began to mean everything.
“I never say hi!”- as I pull him away from a dead bug on the sidewalk.
“I never turn off!”- as one of his sisters turns off the TV when I tell her to.
“I never stay here!!!”- as make him go somewhere he doesn’t want to go.
“I never go with yoooou!”- as I go somewhere without him on Saturday morning.
“I never play thlocks (blocks)!”- as we clean them up.
“I never pounin (pour it in)!”- as I quickly take the huge uncapped bottle of juice he almost tried to pour himself.
“I never eat ice ceeeam!”- as I finally say no to a third bowl of vanilla bean.

This phrase is an Eli trademark and will be long after he outgrows it. It just cracks me up every time, even when he is being super naughty. Sometimes he is just yelling “I NEVA, I NEVA!!!” as I’m carrying him away from something he wants to do, such as climb on the dry ice tornado exhibit at the Planetarium.
Color conversation filler- when he wants to be part of a conversation, he jumps in enthusiastically nodding his head and saying loudly, "Oh it's geen. And lellow. and white and thack (black) and thlue (blue). Or when he is talking on the phone to grandmas and grandpas or aunts and uncles. He just starts rambling off colors very confidently believing that this is what is being talked about.
"Yeah. For days." When he says this new super random and hilarious catch phrase his shoulders go up and down and he is wearing his conversational smile on his face, eyebrows going up and down too, just sure that he is answering your question or agreeing with whatever you just said. For days.
If he is not on a train or playing Mary Poppins he is at all other times being a cat. Even when he wakes up from a nap sometimes, randomly, he will only answer me in meows. It’s his good mood language. Also, sometimes his “I feel awkward” language. Like if he is meeting someone new and doesn’t exactly how what to do…”MeOW!”
He sings the Alfalfa song to his sisters now after we watched the movie for family movie night once- "Yoooo are sooo booootiful to meeeeee!" If I don’t have this recorded somewhere I’m going to kick myself.
He went through a phase where he called cheeks “chubbies.” Probably because we taught him to squeeze his cheeks and say the “Hi my name is Chubby” story over and over again. Instead of “pat your cheeks” he “claps your chubby!” That I do have recorded.
He has a Trip A Little Light Fantastic obsession. He loves watching the video, asks for it often. This is what happens several times a day: Sitting on a stool so that he is a little higher, he insists that I sit below in front of him (the way that Jack is sitting up near a lamppost as he starts the song) and he begins to sing very slowly..."When ya los in da pawk, Hoo! You give to da dawk, Hoo! O you cay tipalitetakik with me." Then he kind of tries to continue but doesn’t know the words well enough and so we dance around the kitchen in a line till he decides the playing is over and we just need to watch the video instead.
He still loves playing with water and pots and pans. Whenever I start the dishes I hear the scraping of a chair being pushed across the kitchen and suddenly feel his chubby little arms nudging me out of the way of the stream of water he wants to go in his cup or bowl. Without fail. Even if I put on a show for him and everything, and tiptoe into the kitchen and barely turn on the faucet, it is never long before I hear that chair behind me. Always wanting to pounin (pour it in).

See, I took a month to write this blog post and now there are about 5 new adorable things he does that I don’t want to forget, and several of these bullet points are already a thing of the past. He is a sweet, wonderful, and hilarious little boy that I could not be without.

This is a long post.

A lot to be thankful for.

he always loves leading the music

his favorite train book...that we accidently kept for like 3 or 4 months

just look at eli

he loves construction almost as much as trains. so here we are sitting inside an excavator bucket we passed by on our walk

i know this looks uncomfortable but he was upset when i fixed his arm after this picture

i still have no idea what this was about. he got up on the stool like this and asked me to take a picture.

and then told me it was my turn...

why is he so adorable

our ponds

playing piano at church

he set up all these bowls in a row and then jumped up and down yelling,

"ITS A TRAIN IT'S A TRAIN!!!"

most mornings i find him asleep with Hannah. and they usually wake up fighting. but it's still cute.

Hannah's still obsessed with rubbing his hair

he is still at the age where he will sometimes stay asleep in my arms

he puts on grandma Stowell's hat and says he is mary poppins!

raking leaves at a neighbors house

it got a little out of hand for second there

but he recovered

and was back to business in no time

sitting on the heater in the early morning hours

eli is the best brother. the girls recently fell in love with a music video where a little girl is sad at first but then rises up with wings (Rise Up cover by One Voice Children's Choir). there are people around her with their hand on her shoulder helping her feel better. so...eli knows his role. and plays it wonderfully well. they direct him and he (sometimes) complies. when they are divas, he supports them.

and cheers them on. because they do the same for him and his trains and his dramatic play moments! I, meanwhile, have to constantly cover my face so they don't see my laughter at their super cuteness and hilarity. the cute little serious acting troupe they are.