Wow. I left the house on Saturday, with a car full of kids and strollers and diapers and Leapsters and changes of clothes and an IPOD dull of Dan Zanes and They Might Be Giants' Here Come the ABC's. I had a long day ahead of me... a long but fun day. First, we met Hal and Jen at Georgia Tech for the State Competition of the F.I.R.S.T. Lego League. We went to the International competition last year... and although this state-wide one was much much smaller, I think we got more out of it. Actually, we got more out of it thanks to Hal for walking the boys through and helping them understand it all, and to Jen for taking Olive off my hands so I could just try to keep the two year old in line long enough for me to participate a little.
It is a tragedy that Asa has to wait until next year to participate and be on a team. Yes, there are "Junior" Lego league teams, but they are k-3 and I know Asa would be disappointed in the lack of competition and challenge. He spends hours every single day of the week linking motors, gears, and whatever the heck else he does to make his machines work. Today's piece of machinery wound thread from one spool to the next. This child is a mechanical engineer to the bone. We'll be counting the days until we can get him hooked up on a team!
As we sat there watching the robots go through their obstacle courses, I asked Addison if he might be interested in participating one day. His answer was perfectly typical Addison.
"It costs a lot of money."
I sighed. "It's fine, Addison. Would you WANT to?"
"Well... I'm not old enough yet."
"No", I answered, "but you will be pretty soon."
"It does cost a lot of money."
"Addison, take money out of the equasion completly. Do you WANT to?"
"These kids are older than me, and I can't make the decision about what I want to do when I'm older, right now."
The car ride was full of much more of Addison's quirkiness. Anyone who has hung out with him for any length of time knows that the boy loves to talk. He will talk your ear off. He will talk in great lengths on the details and subtle differences between the various light sabers found throughout Star Wars, what they were used for, who wielded them... with no clue whatsoever that the woman behind us checking out a Publix doesn't really care. This car trip was no different. Toward the end I tried to explain to him that people have a limit to how many sentences they can listen to at one time... and that he needed to learn how to judge all the sentences in his head and not just let them all come through. We'll see if any of that sunk in on my next road trip with Addison.
"You know what? I think if someone had a lot of jobs to do... like maybe 5 jobs to do... with a bobcat.... that it would probably be cheaper to just buy the bobcat than to rent it, don't you think so?"
"Did you know people can tell time using the sun? Down to the minute? Can anyone tell it to the second using the sun? Hey, Mom? How far does the sun move in one second?"
"We need five more kids. That woman at your doctor's office had eleven kids and they filled up the whole row of seats in the waiting room."
"They say that up in space, there's no air and people can't survive more than 10 seconds outside of the spacecraft... but I can hold my breath for way longer than 10 seconds. I don't think that can be right."
"I wish I could be a girl when I grow up so I don't have to drive to work."
"A lot of girls do have to drive to work." I responded.
"Well, if a mom and a dad both worked, they wouldn't really get twice the money... it would be more like just one and a half of them worked, since some one has to get paid to watch their kids."
"When can we go back to Uncle Hal's house? We haven't stayed there very much. It's even hard for me to remember what it looks like. Even though they don't have toys there, I still like it because I can ask Hal a million different questions and he never gets tired of them."
My child serves as an active self elected role as the risk manager. He lets me know that it wasn't a good idea to put real fire on Ivey's birthday cake that was right in front of her. He informs me that he doesn't believe Olive should be playing with X, standing near Y, or eating Z. He's my 7 year old boy who gets up before everyone in the house, does all of his "seatwork" that's written on the board, and hits the couch with a good book. He's the boy who yelled to me down the cereal isle, "Mom! Can I have Bran Flakes if they're on sale?" The smell of Fruity Pebbles, Apple Jacks, or Fruit Loops make him queezy, but if he has to smell any of them in a bowl with milk he just may heave. He has never liked fruit, but he asks me to buy the V8 Fusion Drinks because he wants to drink the servings of things he doesn't like instead of just miss out on their nutrients.
After riding in the car with all that verbiage, we made it to Cameron's birthday party. The kids ran around like crazy people and had a great time. Again, I was surrounded by awesome family members who were willing to lug around my smiley, happy, but very heavy little Olive. All of the cousins are growing so quickly. It's hard to believe even our own little caboose will be turning one in a month. How quickly time flies when you live in a cave made of off-brand fruit snacks, tater tots and glue stick glue and your only news comes from brightly colored felt puppets that dance around in between Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and the Imagination Movers.
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