Tag: Boys

watchin’

Leave a comment

It’s been quite a week. Came back from our weekend in Cape Cod with a nasty cough and headache. I worked from home on Monday and took off Tuesday because I was so miserable. I worked yesterday and felt a bit better but was so inundated with emails and tasks that I wanted to crawl into bed as soon as I got home. 

After dinner, Mario walked up to me and asked “are you still coming on my field trip tomorrow?” Ahh, the field trip. I had completely forgotten about it. I had so much work waiting for me, my head was still aching, I just wanted to sleep for 48 hours. His blue eyes sung to me. I couldn’t say no. I told him I could go for a half day but that I would have to leave at 11:30. He hugged me and said that was fine.

10 pm arrives. I am answering email. My boss’ assistant emails and asks if I can be on a call at 10 am the next morning. Immediate distress. I will be with Mario at the creek. But my boss needs me. But I rarely take days like this with Mario and he’s so excited. But my boss rarely needs me for emergency meetings.

I email the assistant and ask her if we can move the call up to 8:15 am. She can do it. I get the call the next morning on my way to the creek and am still on it as I park and walk over to Mario. He sees me and runs towards me. I hang up. 

We walk to the field full of crickets and katydids. Mario catches a female wolf spider with an egg sack. He is proud of himself. Next, we catch a colorful field cricket. Then, Mario whispers for me from a few feet away.

“Mom, come fast!”

He has spotted a katydid resting on a leaf. It took me a while to spot it because it blends in so well with the plant. He captures it after a few tries in his empty peanut butter jar and runs it over to the guide. The guide is impressed. Mario is pleased.

   
 We move onto the creek where the kids will get to use nets to try and find different water life. I really need to head out to get to my work meeting. Mario begs me to stay a bit longer. We listen to the guide give instructions on how to hold the net and what they may find. Mario and his buddies are excited. They endure the guide’s instructions and jump up at the end to get their net. I listen to the boy chatter as they head towards the creek:

“Dude, the water is going to be cold! Dude, did you bring other shoes? Dude, we get lunch after this.”

Mario looks for me as he climbs the hill with a net full of crawdads and silver dollars. He reaches down to pick up a crawdad and peeks up at me with those siren eyes. 

“You watching, mom?”

Yes, darlin’, I am.”   

 

Mario time

Leave a comment

We’ve only had Mario all week with Maria gone to camp (how is she at a six day overnight camp already?!). We promised him dinner of his choice and where do you think we went two nights? Skyline. After night two, Jon and I swore we would not head back there for at least six months. It’s so good when you’re eating it, but then….

Mario has been the BEST son this week. I wish I could say it’s just because he decided to turn over a new leaf and not argue when it’s time for bed or time to do homework. But no, it’s not that. He has been an angel child because he wants an electric scooter and he keeps hoping that if he is excellent for us, we will get him one. 

He took out the trash, got his own water, cleaned up his mess, fed Rocco, took Rocco on a walk, went straight to bed. You name it. Everything that used to be a fight or end up in whining tirades, is simple now. It really has been a beautiful yet strange week. 

He’s also been Mr. Independent wanting to ride to the library by himself and read books. Whether he does that or not, I’m not sure. But I did follow him up there one evening and couldn’t find him anywhere. Sure enough, he was in a study room reading his Wings of Dragons book. Impressive. He had his blue sports bag on the table in which he carried his book. When we left, he tossed his bag over each shoulder and hopped on his bike. He looked 13. It seems everyday he grows another inch. 

   
 

We’ve been biking together every night, which he loves. I used to refuse to bike and only walk along side of him. But I do enjoy biking with him because he loves it so much and it’s much more relaxing to be by his side and able to talk. We biked to Stauf’s last night for a bagel dinner. He beat me at Crazy Eights four times in a row and won $6 off of me. He was stoked about that. We biked home talking about that electric scooter again. 

“Mom, I’ve been so good. Don’t I deserve a scooter now?” 

I told him I was concerned about what he’d be like once we got the scooter. Would he go back to complaining at bedtime and whining about cleaning his room?

An emphatic “no” shot from his mouth as if he knew that would be my question. He shot those pacific blue eyes my way and I knew he had me. But I didn’t let him know. I just reiterated that dad and I would talk about the scooter knowing full well we would end up getting it for him as an early birthday present. How could I resist this sweet biking partner of mine?

   
 

Party animal and fitness freak

Leave a comment

Maria had four parties to attend this weekend. Mario had a 150 pound tire to pick up and turn over. Let me explain….

Maria is up for most anything. She went to the 4-8 grade swim party on Friday night from 8:30-10:30 pm with her friend Henley. There were only five fourth grade girls who showed up, including Ri, but lots of boys. She hung in the entire time going off the diving boards and eating chips and cookies. 

  
On Saturday, she played softball and then went straight to her girlfriend’s house for a birthday party sleepover. When we walked in the condo lobby, seven girls ran across the hall to greet her. So precious. She didn’t even say goodbye as she ran with them towards the elevator. 

I picked her up at 11 am on Sunday morning and she went straight to the basement to get revived for her 1 pm soccer party. She was ready to go at 12:45. She chowed on pizza and lemonade and ran around with her girlfriends while one of the parents got the Kaoroke machine running. Then they all let loose singing Lady Gaga and Katy Perry songs.

 

After some brownie batter ice cream (La Tavola ice cream is the BEST), we hit the road to go grocery shopping. We came home with 50 minutes left before book club, and cranked out some lemon zest cookies to take over to her friend’s house.  I picked her up at 7 pm and we went home to throw the softball with the boys  until 8:30. Party girl!

  
And then there’s Mario. I am sure he will follow in his sister’s footsteps in a couple of years – running around with his buddies to their different houses. But for now, he still hangs with mom and dad more often than not. He’s my biking and running buddy – we walked to Stauf’s and ran Rocco on Saturday. 

On Sunday, Mario’s friend Henry was available to play. We biked over to get him at 11:30 am (it was blazing hot already) and decided to hit the football field. 

  
These two ran the steps with me and threw the football together. While we were tossing the frisbee, we noticed two guys close to us who were doing a Crossfit workout with a huge tire and weighted sled. Mario was entranced. One of the guys asked if the boys wanted to help him flip the tire. Neither of them hesitated.

  
After the thrill of flipping it with one of the guys, they had to try it themselves. I tried to help them but Mario shoved me away. “We can do it, mom!” And they did. 

   


The testosterone was pumping after the tire flip so they moved over to the weighted sled. They looked like mini weightlifters with their shirts off and muscles pulsating. 

  
But what did they like most? Acting like hamsters in a hamster wheel when I let them run in the tire as I rolled it across the field.  They may be strong men but they are still kids at heart.

wild childs

Leave a comment

There is a family who lives close to us that we adore and they have two kids who are Maria and Mario’s ages. H is the same grade as Ri and R is one grade higher than Mario. It is a god-send because we can get the girls together at the same time as the boys and no one feels left out. 

This weekend, Jon and I took the girls and Mel and Stephen took the boys. Inevitably, we have crazy stories to tell when we swap the kids back to their respective houses. These kids party hard together! 

The girls went to their first book club meeting Saturday evening and made waffles with all sorts of toppings in honor of the book they are reading “Everything on a Waffle.” 

 
They were dosed up on sugar when I picked them up. We decided to head to the G-View Hop to get some Jeni’s ice cream. It was packed with people and the girls were charged to get two scoops of Jeni’s ice cream. We walked down to Nicholas’ house and said hi to him and his dad.  The girls love Nicholas, who is five years old and sweet as can be. After chatting with them, we headed to Trinity to play on the playground. The girls were wild and crazy along the way saying hi to people and jumping all over the place. They were even more insane at the park getting wet on the slides and taking their shoes off to run around. All I could envision was the two of them in college at some campus party; they would be the center of attention, no doubt.

  
They settled into the evening at 11 pm after taking showers and putting their hair up in towels.

  
The next morning, they begged for waffles so they could load them up like at book club. I agreed (I’m such a sucker). Notice how delicate and organized H’s waffle is compared to Ri’s insanity.

   
 

After some playing on the trampoline and xBox, we headed back up to the Avenue for one more dose of Jeni’s (Sunday Funday = ice cream for lunch). Of course it started pouring rain as soon as we left but the girls wanted to keep scootering. Wild childs.

  
Yea, these two make the boys look tame. They met us at Jeni’s with dry shirts and calm demeanors. They clearly had not been sufficiently sugared up on waffles, chocolate syrup and marshmallows. 

  

Play Ball!

Leave a comment

The start of baseball/softball season has arrived with the Memrial Day weekend. Ri played on Friday night, which was strange since we have always played on Saturday after the parade. We are hurting for pitchers this year so I’ve been working with Ri on the mechanics of fast-pitch. She’s got the strong body to swing that ball over her head and swivel those hips and whip it over the plate. During practices, she just wasn’t consistent and didn’t have her groove. She also doesn’t have the desire to go out and practice for hours to improve. But the times I’d get her out with me, we’d continue to work on it. And then one day, I had her concentrate on turning her hips so they pointed to the side and then return them center towards the catcher. She did it and pitched it perfectly. And again. Something clicked in her. And so it was – she started our first game as pitcher. 

And she pitched awesome for her first time. She only walked one batter and struck out a few! I was so excited for her. And it made the game go so much faster watching her pitch two innings because she was the main attraction. It made Jon and I nervous as heck but it was cool. And it’s even more fun for me because I was a fast-pitch pitcher; so to see Ri going at it makes me smile. 

  
The girls lost the game but held their own throughout. They had one bad inning that doomed them but I was much happier about their play than I thought I’d be. They were bummed for three seconds about the loss but then quickly recovered when they found out they got a free treat from the concession stand .

  
Mario got to be in his first parade this year since he’s finally in baseball and not tee-ball. He was excited to be able to ride in a truck with his buddies. I made him promise over and over that he would not pelt anyone with candy. I should have made Ri promise it, too, because her and her teammates were winging candy at kids. 

   
   

By about half way down 1st Avenue, the girls started to get tired and thirsty. They began to peter out. Surprisingly, they still had candy (in years past 25 pounds was gone in three blocks). But Ri got them pepped up again by cheering “we’re number one not two not three not four….” We arrived at the field and participated in the Opening ceremony. Grandview feels like Mayberry on this day. Everyone is lined up for the parade and everyone comes to the field afterwards to watch the ceremony and running the bases. 

   
 

Mario played his game later in the day at 3:45. We went home after the parade and wrestled a while to get him ready (he is my child – he’d rather stay active than rest before a game). Ri got invited to the pool with Henley – her first pool trip of the year.

 
Mario looked like a bad mo’ fo’ out on the field with his shades and his snug baseball pants. 

  
He refused to go out on the field without his shades. He didn’t have a chance to catch a pop up fly but he did get a grounder hit to him… and he missed it. But he did decent hitting – went 2 for 3. Of course, he struck out once which really irked him. He stomped out of the box and whipped off his helmet. “My coach can’t pitch” he told Jon. He was accurate in his statement – his coach threw some horrible ones to him. But, he needed to brush it off. I’m sure he likes Jon being in the dugout with him even if he acts like he doesn’t. 

The game finished an hour and a half later. It was rather long but much better than tee-ball. I can’t wait to see him snag a pop-up next game; he gets a DQ gift card if he does! 

  

pulling teeth 

Leave a comment

  

This kid didn’t lose a tooth until he was seven years old. He used to complain in Kindergarten that everyone had lost a tooth but him. Then this year arrived, and his friends were losing them like crazy. He would pull and wiggle all his teeth hoping he could loosen just one and it would fall out. 

Then out of no where, he has lost three in the matter of a month. He’s a perfect jack-o-lantern. He is so super excited but we think we know why…. All along, I think he was less concerned about losing teeth and more concerned about scoring cash from the tooth fairy. 

“I hope she gives me $100 so I can buy a skateboard.” 

He got $5 with the last one so I have an inkling that he will be pulling at the remaining baby teeth with that skateboard in mind. 

Mario and his pedi

Leave a comment

Mario, my son who flipped out when I asked him to wear a polo shirt that had pink trim on it, decided he wanted a pedicure. Jon was out of town and I had promised Maria Grace a mani/pedi prior to her birthday. There was only one day in the entire week that we didn’t have something going on so Mario was stuck coming with us. 

Ri and I situated ourselves in the massage chairs and dipped our feet in the bubbly water. Mario came over with my computer because he couldn’t log on to wi-fi. Maria said “Mario, sit in that chair and turn on the massager. It’s awesome.” He obeyed. His little body waved up and down with the flow of the balls in the seat. He loved it. As I finished logging him in to wi-fi, the manager asked if he was getting a pedicure, also. I laughed. 

“No, he is all good.”

Mario immediately chimed in and protested. He wanted a pedi. So the manager turned on the water for him and he soaked his tired feet. What a life.

  

Maria warned him that the pumice stone would tickle him but he dismissed her as wimpy. Yea, he learned his lesson.

  

He could barely control himself but it was all worth it in the end. His feet were smooth and shiny. Yes, he got clear polish on them based on Ri’s suggestion. Actually, he wanted a “cool color” but Ri convinced him to go clear. Thank you, Ri. 

Meanwhile, Ri got a French manicure on her fingernails and polka dots on her toes. She knows how to do it up.

  

As we left, I told the kids we needed to get Dad to come with us to make it a family affair. Mario remarked: “he may go for a pedi but no polish!” So true.

  

Girls and Boys

2 Comments

The boys and girls split up early yesterday morning. Ri and I left at 8 am for her indoor soccer game and Mario and Jon left at 8:45 am for Mario’s basketball game. Ri took me up on my advice to get more aggressive, at least somewhat. She went for the ball a few more times than last week. Slowly but surely….
After soccer, we stopped at Starbucks and got my coffee. Ri wanted to try something new so we got her a chai latte. She loved it.

IMG_0453
We saw the boys off to go hunting (Mario was so excited) and got to work cleaning the house. All the salt and snow had been tracked in and it was driving me nuts. Ri agreed to do the toilets and I did the floors. As we began, she looked at me with a rag in her hand and mused “Susan B. Anthony would be shaking her head at us doing the cleaning in the house after everything she fought for on behalf of women.” Touché. I explained to her that we are doing it of our own choosing and the boys would definitely be folding laundry when they got home.
After finishing the household chores, we settled down for a mani/pedi in the kitchen. Ri wasn’t too concerned about this activity when I said “why should girls feel they have to get their nails done and not boys?!” Her response: “boys should get them, too.” I had told Ri that we could go to CK Nails but she responded ” why don’t we save money and just do them for each other?” That’s my girl. And so she arranged the kitchen as a nail salon with two trays and chairs and polish, clippers, files, moisturizer, towels, and bowls of water. She gave me my mani/pedi first. I have to act like I’m in her salon and she tells me about all the famous people she treats at her salon. She informed me that I had large veins in my hands which was a sign of stress. I needed to take it easy (her way of getting me to sit with her all afternoon). She finished my hands and moved onto my feet. Yowzer! She had her hands full with my feet. They are definitely runners’ feet. She kept her game face on though as she worked on them since she didn’t want to offend her customer.

IMG_0460
By the time I finished Ri’s nails, we were starving. Ri agreed to walk to Stauf’s but only if she could scooter. Deal. I miss heading up to Stauf’s on the weekends. When the kids were little, I’d stroll or bike or carry them up to Stauf’s for a muffin or bagel at least once a weekend if not two or three times. We lived two blocks away. All those memories flooded back as I sat across from Ri and she worked on a crossword puzzle and we ate our bagels. How has she grown into such an amazing girl in what feels like three seconds?
We played tether ball on the way home and I’ve never felt so uncoordinated in my life. Ri got a kick out of seeing me so unable to play an activity. She also got a kick out of me getting slammed in the stomach by the ball. Yea, it was ugly. Not a fan.
On the way home, we decided to go see a movie at the dollar theatre. We decided on Alexander and the Horrible, Terrible, No Good Day. Before we saw that though, we had to try on Ri’s new Susan B. Anthony outfit that we ordered for her play next week. She looked like she had been blasted out of the 1800’s. She loves it.

IMG_0461
As we drove to the movie, I remembered that Ri could not eat popcorn with her palette expander. Dang. I didn’t want to make her jealous so I had to be relegated to Milk Duds and nachos. Ri got a one quarter pound angus hot dog, God love her. The movie was bearable, which was a gift since so few are at her age.
We drove home and ended our night with a call from Jon informing us that Mario and him got a rabbit. Mario climbed through the thorn bushes to retrieve the rabbit for him.
Ri and I laid in her bed while Rocco ran back and forth from her bed to the hall chasing a ball. We laughed so hard at his crazy antics until he finally had enough and laid his head at the end of the bed. We rested our heads on her purple pillows and fell fast to sleep.

Wrestling times

Leave a comment

Mario brought home a wrestling flyer a couple of weeks ago. One of his friends was trying it out and he wanted to, also. The problem was that he had basketball on Tuesday nights and wrestling practice was Tuesdays and Thursdays. I tucked the flyer under some workbooks and forgot about it. Then Mario questioned me for the third time “can I try wrestling?” I emailed the coach who informed me that Mario was welcome to just attend on Thursdays.
Great.
I am not a big wrestling fan.
But we went last Thursday and Mario enjoyed it. He didn’t walk away yelling “I want to be a wrestler” but he enjoyed doing wrestling moves on his buddy and running around on the mat. Towards the end of the first practice, Ri joined in the fun. She ran around with the group of boys. There were two fourth grade boys who were practicing and Ri and they were teasing each other.
When we left that night, Ri said “I would like to try wrestling.” Nothing more came about it until this past Thursday night. I came home from work and Mario proclaimed “Ri is going to try wrestling!” I looked at Ri and she shrugged her shoulders like “no big deal.”
I fed them some chicken and grapes and we were off.
Ri participated in the warm-ups and gave all the moves a shot. However, some of the moves like where she had to tuck her hand in the boy’s armpit and grab his leg made her uncomfortable. And when they did it to her, I could tell she had experienced enough.

IMG_0450
She leaned against the wall while the coach explained to the group that they were going to try out a “real” wrestling match. Ri looked straight over to me, eyes wide open, and shook her head no. She mouthed “I don’t want to do this.”
I waved her over to me. And that was that. No wrestling for my girl. Jon and I were relieved. She thanked the coach for letting her try it out. I was proud of her for giving it a try. A lot of girls her age may have never fathomed the But Ri didn’t flinch going out on the mat. She gave it a go and realized it wasn’t for her. Pretty simple. No pomp and circumstance; no tears; no excuses.
Meanwhile, Mario didn’t want to leave. Practice ended and he continued to climb the wall to try and reach the metal chin up bar. He finally reached it and did a chin up. The coach praised him. He looked over at me with that cool smile on his face, trying not to look excited about the compliment but not hiding his excitement to well. I gave him a thumbs up and Ri yelled “good job, Mario!” She’s his number one advocate.

IMG_0448
We finally were able to pull him out of the wrestling room and get his shoes on him. Another reason I’m happy that Ri decided it wasn’t for her: the smell of sweat and heat on the two of them was nearly unbearable as we drove home.
Ugh!

Lime and Cucumber Mario

Leave a comment

The last two weeks Mario has stayed up until at least 10 pm but most nights until 11 pm.  He has been soaking up the winter break, and until today, has had no desire to head back to school.  Jon and I are still perplexed at what changed in the matter of one day, but he was cracking us up tonight. We fought to get him to take a shower but after he did, he was transformed.

“Mom, where are my new jeans you bought me?”

“They are in your drawer.”

“Mom, can you put my belt on them for me.”

I took the belt off the pair of jeans he has worn for three days straight and placed it on the new pair.  I wondered why he was asking me to do this since I had asked him the last two days to change pants. My question was answered when he called me into his room.

He had combed his hair over to one side. He walked up to me and leaned his body into me.

“Smell me, mom.”

I sniffed and the aroma of lime and cucumber filled my nostrils. He had used my body scrub on his entire body.

“I want to smell good for my first day of school tomorrow!” He had laid out his clothes on the floor so that his shirt was on the top, boxers under it, jeans under them, and socks under the jeans.  He has never done that in his life to prepare for school.  Was this Mario or an alien abductee?

Then he proceeded to ask me for an alarm clock he could borrow.  All I had was my watch.  I brought it into him and asked him what time he wanted to wake up.

“6:30 am.”

This is the time he typically awakes anyhow but I asked him why he wanted to get up so early since he doesn’t leave for school until 8 am.

“I have to wake up, comb my hair, put on deodorant, brush my teeth, floss, rinse my mouth with mouthwash, and get dressed.  I have to smell good AND look good on my first day back to school.”

Ok, Maria has never once been concerned about such things and she is in fourth grade. This Mario man is gonna be quite the high maintenance fella’ as he gets older. I don’t think it is gonna be Maria begging for her own bathroom…!

IMG_0074