Raising Watsons

We finally joined the AYSO team.  Last season, I narrowly missed the deadline to get Tucker enrolled on the team but this season I was on the ball!

Tucker loves soccer.  A favorite past time is kicking the ball around and at St. Michaels one of the teachers has talked to me repeatedly to make sure Tucker goes into soccer.  His interest in ice hockey has waned considerably, so I’m in to it.  I love soccer!

First practice was an absolute blast.  Tucker is a natural – raw power, driving kicks and a solid sense of sportsmanship, twice helping a little boy (that he may or may not have tripped) by extending his hand and making sure he was okay.  Good stuff, right there.

On the down side, he didn’t understand the physical parameters of the game (when have we ever played with a de-marked field?).  And he was really confused by the “line” the coach kept referring to, because friends, there were only cones.  No lines, as far as the eye could see.

After a long, long summer, we finally arrived to the first day of school.  Did I cry?  Yes, yes I did.  In hindsight, after the Summer of Feelings I thought Tucker would have a harder time on his first day.  He was actually pretty cool.  I, on the other hand, was an absolute mess.

We have a new 30-40min commute.   In the car on our way to the very first day of school Tucker breaks out with:

Hey Mom, the hard part about babies being born is when the doctor has to take the shell out of the Mommy.  Then the Daddy has to hatch it.

….

:cough cough:

Yep.  That’s right.

#nottoday

Our sweet, darling daughter Emilia is a sneak.  At three years old, she scouts, plans and executes her ideas with startling precision.  Take the other night for example:

Heather puts her to bed.  Turns out the light.

A few minutes later, Ben notices the light on.  We go to her room and she has Heather’s handbag dumped out all over her room.  Ben scolds Emilia and re-packs the bag.  Ben then scolds Heather for leaving her handbag out in the dining room.

[[[Thing is, Heather always puts her bag in the same place every day, in the living room.  But whatever.]]]

A few minutes pass and the light in Emilia’s room goes on again.  This time, she’s wearing a princess dress that was somehow not put away.  Princess dress off, Emilia to bed, lights off again.

…Lights on, AGAIN.  Walking into Emilia’s room on the third time was a sight.  She had stolen the wooden cooking salt container from the kitchen -it holds all the really coarse salt – and emptied it onto her bed.  Where she was picking up salt rocks on saliva dampened fingers and shoving them into her mouth.

As Heather and Ben carried the organic, everything-free mattress out the door to dump off the salt, Heather couldn’t help but wonder if the cooking Salt had been left in the dining room as well.

Kindergarten has officially arrived.  After a long summer, some would call the “summer of feelings” we have arrived to the pivotal moment in our son’s history – First Day of School.

Summer of Feelings was a bit rough, to be honest.  Tucker could sense the stress that Ben and I have been under trying to make sure he went to the right school.  I’ve been pretty hot on an immersion school for the past year and had applied to a public school with a Mandarin program.  Both Ben and I really like the school.  Unfortunately, so do about 80 other parents.  We were far, far down the wait list.  In the meantime, we had a backup plan to go to our local school.  Which is perfectly fine, but not the language school I had set my heart on.

After a long summer and a lot of research, I realized that while we didn’t get accepted into the Mandarin program, there was still room in Spanish.  Why the principle doesn’t offer this information to prospective parents on a wait list, I do not know.  But I don’t really care because we got into the Spanish program.  When I began researching immersion, I was solely looking at Spanish.  With my Cuban heritage, I could not be happier with a Spanish program.

Tucker, meanwhile, has sensed the change in the air.  It has been a long summer for him full of anxiety.  At one point he said – Mom, I’m just so stressed…

I quite honestly told him – Me too.

Princess MiMi has turned 3 and my floors are covered in glitter to prove it!

While, I’m not normally a fan of the princess stuff I’ve got to admit to having softened up at how much she loves it.  I picked up two birthday dresses for her: one to ruin at school that came from the second hand shop and another for her actual party on Saturday.

She loved her birthday dress, crown and wand.

That evening Aunt Lindsay came over and we had one of her favorite meals – bratwurst and corn.  Afterwards we did cupcakes with both grandparents Skyped in.

Tucker made Emilia a card at school. He was also lucky to get a few presents himself.  Grammy Bonnie/Bumpa gave him a backpack and a new Spiderman mask and Grandma Cupcake gave him a toy smart watch.

The next day Tucker asked me why he got presents on Emilia’s birthday.  I explained that sometimes little kids get jealous and sad when their sibling has a birthday.  He said – Not me, Mom. I’m happy for Emilia and don’t need a present.  …but I really love my presents!

All told Emilia had sparkly wings, headdress, Hello Kitty necklace, Princess Anna dress, Cinderella shoes and a tutu on ALL AT ONCE.  She was so happy.

This from Aunt Lindsay.

Tucker on vegetables:

“Spinach makes grown-ups big and strong. I’m not a grown-up though. I’m just a kid, so I don’t really see the value in it just yet.”

Tucker on school:

Tucker Watson is 5 and 3 months and a Tic Tac Toe shark.  The director at school (Ms. Lauren) today informed me that he beat a teacher (Ms. Elizabeth) five times recently.  Thing is he will get you talking so you stop paying attention, because, you are competing with a five year old after all and then – the strike.  We’ve wisened up and fully concentrate now. He got me yesterday by writing really lightly (left corner of the picture below).

So, I’ve started teaching him Sodouku. It’s single player and one of my favorites.  (So much in fact, I was part of a commercial for it.)  He picked it up pretty quick and now talks of columns and rows.  It’s all coming together…

First camping trip was a big success.  It was great to get the kids out of the house and away from any screens – no iPads and we only used our phones minimally to capture pictures.  Since it was the first time, Ben and I thought an overnight would be appropriate.  Which it was, we were pretty tired by Sunday (which also happened to be Mother’s Day).

We got to the site pretty early on Saturday for set up.  Lake Perris isn’t a very popular camping spot so we had plenty of room.  The sites around us were all empty which gave the kids lots of room to play “soccer ball”.  Emilia didn’t quite understand the boundaries at first and went running off into other camp sites and other people’s tents.

The early afternoon was spent at a museum nearby where we learned about the Native Americans and made our own clay pots (ie: stabbed a clay ball with a poker).  Afterwards the kids went wading soaking in the river while throwing handfuls of silt and rocks.  It was pretty chilly so we didn’t change into our swimsuits.  That was a mistake.  Once we were back to the campsite everyone hopped in pjs and we laid our wet clothes out to dry.  Tucker soon found a mini swiss army knife, the kind with three extractables (a tiny dull knife, nail file and scissor).  Ben and I told him that he wasn’t old enough and should throw it out before he cut himself.

The next morning Tucker cut himself on the swiss army knife.  He authoritatively declared he was not old enough to play with swiss army knives and threw it out. When not cutting ourselves, the kids also enjoyed playing swords with sticks, extending a tape measurer repeatedly (measuring nothing), rolling around in the tent and chasing chipmunks.

Me: Tucker, did you leave your jacket at school?

Tucker: Mom, 1 bark means “yes”, 2 barks means “no”,  3 barks means “I don’t know”, 4 barks means “maybe yes”, 5 barks means “maybe no”.

Me: Okay, 1 bark means “yes”, 2 barks means “no”,  3 barks means “maybe”, 4 barks means “maybe yes”, 5 barks means “maybe no”.

Tucker: No, Mom.  3 barks means “I don’t know”.

Me: Got it.  Tucker, did you leave your jacket at school?

Tucker: No.

Growing up, I always heard how my sister could be in a white dress all day long without getting a spot on it. Me?  The exact opposite.

In many ways we’re still learning about Emilia every day.  We do know that pink is her favorite color and dress (as in any pink dressss are faves).  However, we also know she does not care about keeping clean. And this I will not discourage in any way. Play in the dirt, kid. That’s what it’s there for.