lest you think it's all fun and games..

You have to keep a good grip on him in public.

So, I love having the grandkids visit. So much. It's seriously my favorite. It does come with more noise, more laundry, more things breaking, and more messes. That is life.  

I often miss the child raising days of my life. I look back on them with great fondness, and a little bit of rose-tinted glasses. I feel like I did a good job of enjoying it during the moment as well and my kids are my favorite people.  Yet there are hard and frustrating parts to parenting.

He makes his way under the pew and up to the stand every week.

Having Ezra here is 90% fun, and he is so very sweet.  I love when he apologizes by putting his little hand on my cheek.  I love that we are buddies and that we can play together. I love that he will go with me without Hannah now and that he feels safe and special. I love when he cuddles in close and when we “read” together.   I am going to be very sad when he goes home to Idaho and doesn't have his Mimi right there.  Partly because I will miss him so much and partly because I think his life is a little more fun with me around. 

but there is the 10%. 

The writing on walls and chalking on house and markering on his body.  There is the climbing of the bookshelves, the poopy diapers, the wreckless & dangerous antics that lure him to the edges of rails, decks, docks, and cliffs, and the running away.  

He is really fast.  Saturday when we were at the pool, he escaped my eye and ran all the way to the deep end diving board, boldly climbed up the stairs, shoved his way past the legs of the teenagers standing on it and nearly jumped in.  I chased him yelling his name.  Luckily someone grabbed him before he jumped in, or the lifeguard might have had to execute a rescue. Or maybe not, he can swim... but I'm not sure he would know which direction to go.

That pool trip was fun and had some frustrating moments.  The pool had lots of rules, like you have to go down the slide on your bottom only.  E-Z likes to run down, slide down headfirst, swing on the bar before going down, etc.  You have to walk. You have to get out of the pool for a body check every hour.  All things that he did not want to do, and we had to make him.  So, when we got to the diving board incident, I scooped him up and told him we were done. That pool is actually a little complex with multiple pools and places to play.  I think it's overwhelming for him to have so many amazing choices and he goes a little nuts! He does way way better when there is one pool. (We were there for several hours) 

ANYWAY, today was my first day at work. It went fine. I came home and did a little homework then decided to hang out with the family and do homework after dinner.  We called R to see when he would be home and it was going to be a little later than usual, so we put a movie on for Ezra then Hannah, Grace and I played a game.  Maybe 10 minutes later I stood up to get my phone and saw Ez on the floor covered head to toe in baby butt paste.  It was on his hands and on the carpet.  I gasped and went to grab him, which is not the right way to approach a baby in the wild.  I picked him up, he started kicking, and the butt paste got all over me and got more on the carpet. It got on the wood on the way out the door, and on the door.  Then it got on the hose and on Hannah who followed to help. It did not get off of him.  He wiggled away while we were deciding what to do and he hopped into my car, my new car 😢, and got it on the seat. It was impressive how widespread the carnage was. 

Hannah took E up to shower them both, which he hates, and we all began an hours long project of cleaning stuff up.  We are becoming expert stain removers.  Luckily, it's mostly clean now. 

And I was not delighted.