Fairies, redux

 A couple of years ago, I posted about an exchange I had with Iain, looking down on the river. It was late in the afternoon on a sunny day, and the light reflected in tiny bright twinkling points on the surface of the water. Iain stared down at the water intently, and just as I was about to ask what he'd spotted, he asked me a question: 'Are they fairies?'

Ferries? I thought. Then it dawned on me what he was asking. He was trying to figure out what those little twinkling lights were, and 'fairies' was his best guess.

Now he's 6, and I miss those moments. The world is less magical. He wants to know if Spider-man is real. He draws pictures of tanks and likes watching Scooby-doo. So yesterday, he was sitting on my knee and I told him the story about the fairies. 'How old was I, mummy?' he asked, and 'what did I say?' and 'what did you say?' until he had the whole narrative.

A little while later, Lewis came upstairs, and Iain met him at the top. 'Daddy,' he said, 'when I was little...' and proceeded to relate the whole tale, proudly. 'I said, "Are they fairies?'..."

It was almost as good the second time around.

Birthday season

Birthday season is over. Anna is 11 (and will tell you so, if you catch her in the right mood), Thomas is 9, and Iain is 6. Thank goodness Lucy's birthday isn't until the spring. I am not ready for her to be 2.
 
The boys' birthday parties were on consecutive Fridays, and as different as they are. Iain and a dozen classmates ran around an indoor play place for an hour and had pizza. He hated being the centre of attention when it was time to sing and blow out candles. He turned away from the table, even, hiding his face, and refused to blow out the candles. Why? I asked him. He said, 'Because everyone will clap.' Iain is so easygoing and talkative at home and with friends that nobody would guess how shy he is. Thomas and Anna, with help from Iain's friend Alex, blew out the candles for him, and everyone did clap. But he survived, and wants to have a party when he's 7. I have explained to him, though, that 6 is hard enough to take: he can't possibly be seven.
 
Thomas had a football (soccer) party--no big surprise there. He and about ten friends from school (and one from his football team) played hard for more than an hour before gathering for a bit of mayhem around a big supper table. One of his friends had an MP3 player with a portable speaker and got them all moving to the song from Madagascar (I like to move it...). Noisy, chaotic, and fun for all around the table. It was great to see Thomas enjoying himself so much. He had a really good birthday, and I am pleased.
 
Among Thomas's gifts were a couple of £10 notes and gift cards, and he calculated his birthday wealth at £50. I asked him how much he was going to give away. At first he looked at me like I was crazy (fair enough, I guess). But we talked about it, about charitable giving, and he thought for a moment. 'Maximum £8,' he said. That seemed like a lot to me--more than the 5-10% that I had in mind--and I said so. But he had decided, and didn't back down. He followed through, too, starting with £2 in the collection at church. I am amazed at him. He has a generous heart. I wonder what he'll be like when he's older, with his sensitive soul: this is a boy who cannot bear to hear of the suffering of others. He feels it so deeply.
 
Anna has grown, and grown up, an amazing amount. Today she looked at a picture in the Sunday newspaper, one I had noticed out of the corner of my eye. 'Mario,' she said, not perfectly distinctly, but clearly enough. Yes, that's who it was--as soon as she said it, I knew that was why the figure was familiar. How does she know that's Mario? I wondered. We don't have any video games here. She must have picked it up at school.
 
They know all sorts of things now, things I haven't taught them. And Thomas knows all sorts of things I don't even know. Mostly these are about football. But he is extending his knowledge of geography and is learning French at school; he's learning German from a friend. Iain knows all sorts of things about tanks, most of which Lewis has taught him. So far he hasn't outstripped me, but I can see that day coming.
 
I love it that they're growing up, and I hate it that they're growing up. This parenting thing is exhausting, frustrating, heartbreaking sometimes; but it is also filled with joy and amazement. I just hope that I will learn to ignore the socks on the floor and appreciate Lucy's little feet, Iain's delightful smile, Thomas's sensitive thoughtfulness, and Anna's enjoyment of the small things. I always wanted this, and now I have it: my four little dreams come true.
 
Nobody could have convinced me that parenting was such hard work. I would never have believed it. But if the work is harder than I thought, so also is the love deeper and the joy greater than I ever could have imagined.
 
Happy birthday, Anna, Thomas and Iain.

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birthday season

Autumn is always busy. Birthday season begins in late August, when I start planning for Anna's birthday, and runs until October 12th, Thomas's birthday. In between, we have the start of school for the children, the start of the new term for our students (with all the events that involves), and--of course--Iain's birthday. We're coming up to the end of birthday season now, thankfully. I enjoy their birthdays--how could I not?--but I always breathe a sigh of relief when the morning of October 13th (or the day after Thomas's party) dawns. (A full birthday report with photos will follow.)
 
Thank goodness Lucy's birthday isn't until May. Between now and then, we just have to get through Christmas...

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As promised

Ready for the birthday girl!

glad the boots fit--and that she liked them!

On the day: she had to wear her new boots, her favourite party dress, and the hat & jewellery she received as presents. And the cupcake frosting had to be pink, of course.

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Autumn, again

Oh, dear. Has it really been more than a month since the last? It is back-to-school and birthday season around here. Anna turned 11 last weekend! I admit that the above photo isn't from last weekend. It wasn't quite that warm here in Durham, and we certainly weren't having a pool party!

Not being a technological genius, I am having difficulty getting the photos from Anna's most recent birthday uploaded here. But rest assured that there are some, and I will figure it out. And when I do, I'll add a picture of Anna in her new ballet getup, complete with tutu. Stay tuned!

going by bus, again

Some days, I am amazed at how helpful bus drivers can be. (See 'a free ride' for a story about one in particular.) Several weeks ago, I stood waiting for the bus into Durham, with Lucy in the stroller (pushchair, pram, buggy, or whatever-you-like-to-call-it), hoping fervently that it would not be a double-decker bus with steps. Though it isn't a common occurance, the last time I tried to board such a bus, the bus driver just shook his head. Then he drove on. So when the bus approaching was the dreaded item, I signaled anyway, hoping against hope. The driver, who was young and friendly, nodded approval, but said that I'd have to collapse the buggy. No problem. Except it was impossible with one hand so to do. Another waiting passenger offered to help, and I accepted. Lucy was not keen on being handed over. Amidst the fumbling and screaming, the driver descended the steps and picked up the stroller, stowing it for me without needing to collapse it. When we arrived at our stop, he fetched it for me and set it on the pavement.

If you've ridden a bus in Durham, you know that's like winning the lottery. Not unheard of (a couple won over £200K just last week), but a rare bit of luck. Contrast the above with a shorter story with a less happy ending: a couple of weeks ago Anna, Iain and I waited at the bus station, with Lucy in the stroller, on a warm and sticky afternoon a . We'd been into Durham on the bus and were heading home. I struggled through the crowded station to get onto the bus. Upon hearing our destination, the driver quoted me a fare of £5.90. I stood there with £3.30 in my hand, the fare we'd paid to get to Durham. For a split second, I started to reach for the difference. Then I turned to the driver again and said, 'But it only cost us £3.30 to get here.' He looked straight at me and said unapologetically, 'It'll cost you £5.90 to get back.'

We didn't take that bus.

Snapshots

Snapshot 1: Lucy shows her personality. Or, as we call it, Lucy reaches for the iPhone. By far her favourite playthings are the phones (home phone or anyone's cell phone she can get her hands on) and the remote controls. I confess that I have given her the remote for the radio (which lives in the kitchen) to satisfy her lust
for power without actually enabling her to change the channel or disrupt the DVD. (In fact I hadn't been talking on the phone or even sending a text message: I had the phone in Lucy's general vicinity in order to record for posterity the extent of the couscous-scattering. She's world-class, and comes second--narrowly--after Iain, the champion scatterer.)

Snapshot 2: Big brother and the (soccer or foot-) ball. Thomas was watching Lucy outside; I was about to scold him for picking her up, when I saw what he was doing. He had only carried her as far as the lawn, and only in order to get a ball so that they could play with it. Lucy was thrilled. Suddenly it didn't matter so much that the house was a mess and the washing machine constantly running. This was one of those moments I dreamed about when I daydreamed about what having kids would be like. I dropped what I was doing and went to take photos.

Snapshot 3: Iain, taking a photograph with my iPhone. Photographed by Thomas, who was using my iPad. What more could I possibly say...except that I didn't give permission to either of them, and only discovered the incident as it appeared in my photo stream. So this is what they do when I'm not looking. Could be worse, much worse, couldn't it?