March 28 Gregory Callaghan

Friday:  Cal was all ready for me when I came to his house this morning at 11:30, except he did not want to wear shoes out to my car. It was only 41 degrees; so of course, we convinced him to put some shoes on his cute feet. Cal was very talkative today. I wish I could remember all of the remarkable things he said to me! He's such an interesting little person, with such an organized and rather "grown-up" way of thinking. He CAN be a rascal when he decides to be; but mostly, he's a very logical little guy. He has a very confident personality, and is as easy as pie to entertain.

It's been a few weeks since I've had the tree house down from the high shelf in the playroom. It's good for me to put things "up" for a few weeks, because then when I get them back "down", it's like an almost new toy. Cal really really REALLY enjoys playing with the tree house. It comes with a bald eagle, which Cal always informs me is his FAVORITE animal. "I'm obsessed with them, grandma!" 

When I was cleaning out the toy room last week, I stumbled upon a few puzzles I had put away several YEARS ago that I had completely forgotten about. !! Imagine that! Cal will be FIVE in about seven weeks, so he is capable of putting together more challenging puzzles now. This one (I think) has 48 pieces, a "Melissa & Doug" wooden puzzle. I have two of these: one is a pirate ship with accompanying parrot and alligator in the water, and a canon and canon balls, etc.; the other one is three or four zoo animals: a zebra, lion, giraffe, and hippo. I thought sure Cal would choose the zoo puzzle first, but he did NOT. He went right for the pirates! Look at his little face as he concentrates!

Cal was super pleased to sit here for the longest time putting this together. I did help him a tiny bit; but not because he was desperate for it or anything. He just wanted my company. Cal is a very companionable child. I love him to pieces.

After we finished the puzzles, we got out some of our many magnets. I was fixing lunch while Cal decorated my side door with all of my tiny cloth/magnet animals, as well as other assorted magnetic toys.

He got quite elaborate with his "plan", as he called it.

Here he is telling me what is going on with the magnets. You see, there was a WAR (yikes) and everyone began to fight (!!!) and now some of them are DEAD. This is Cal's usual storyline whether we are playing with stuffed animals, puppets, building blocks, LEGO's ...  you name it! Refer this kiddo to the Armed Forces, quick! I'm only kidding. I hope and pray that NEVER EVER any of these sweet children have to go to war.

Cal then announced that it was time we played with the cars back in the toy room. Okay! Let's do it! The "plan" was to dump an entire bin of cars out on the rug and then decide which four of them we were going to race down the hallway. This, at least to me, was a much better plan than a war plan any day of the week. So we did that for quite awhile. We kept choosing four different cars and racing them down the hallway. Of course, Cal's favorite thing was having them all C R A S H !!!!

"Where is your nice dump truck and digger, grandma?" I found these on the shelf for him and he immediately remembered my BEAN bin and asked if we could play that for awhile. Cal is very good about asking without demanding. This is a huge improvement (!!) from last year; but then he was only 3-and-a-half last year and NOW he is so much older. He does such a nice job playing in the bean bin and completely accepts the rule that the beans have to stay in the BIN, not all over the floor. He complies with this rule without a single complaint. Look how careful he is!

He gets a huge enjoyment out of digging in these beans. We hide some of the sparkly rocks under the beans and Cal goes hunting for them.

Look how INTO it he is! 

Three hours came and went very fast at my little house. I am so thankful for this one-on-one time I get to have with this small person. I will always cherish these Friday afternoons in my heart.

We drove on back to Cal's place (!!) and arrived a little after 3:00. Cal was sound asleep as we pulled into their garage. I took the opportunity to do a little inside clean-up, visited with Brendan for awhile, worked on some dishes, and waited for "the littles" to get off their bus. I brought Cal inside after about 30 minutes and gave him to Brendan down in the basement. It's not a good idea to let Cal nap too long in the afternoons, and he loves to be with Brendan.

The little kids came home as scheduled, and Aidan right away wanted to show me some furniture that was along side of the road down his street. He thought maybe I would want some! I told him I truly had all the furniture that would fit in my very small house; but he was very determined to show me anyway--so we walked down the street and had a look-see. When Aidan talked about "furniture", I was thinking there was a whole bunch of separate pieces of furniture; but it turns out that there was just this shelving unit turned on its side. Aidan wanted to know if he and I could carry it back to his house! It's really quite a sturdy and not bad looking shelf; but it was way too heavy for the two of us to haul down the street to Aidan's house AND it was of a size that would not fit inside my car. Also--how was I to know if Dylan and Kelly would even WANT this shelf? Thankfully, Aidan was satisfied that I took a picture of it and sent it to his mom for consideration.

Near the end of their street runs this little creek--it actually goes UNDER their street. This is Little Plaster Creek and its really the first time I've taken a close look at it. I love creeks. At this location, however, there really isn't a good way to get down to it without being on someone's private property.

When we had walked halfway back to their house, Aidan and I met Erin coming towards us. Aidan told Erin that she MUST go and look at the creek because it was very pretty and you could actually SEE it since the leaves had not yet grown back on the trees (which usually blocks the view). So I turned around and went back with Erin. Aidan also instructed me: "You might want to put your phone in your pocket, Grandma; so you don't drop it and have it fall into the creek." I told Aidan that was a very good suggestion (!!) but then we got to talking about other things; but before Aidan turned to go back to his house he said this: "Don't forget about your phone, Grandma." Aidan is EIGHT. There is a lot to Aidan that is really closer to THIRTY-eight--but he is not being a smart-aleck about his comments. He is seriously warning or proclaiming something that he believes very deeply. His whole face gets into the advice he is giving. What a dear child he is.

Here is dear Erin looking at Little Plaster Creek and wishing we could get closer to it. "I wish we could cross that little bridge, Grandma!" I told her I thought the exact same thing! I explained that the bridge looks to be on private property, so we couldn't go there; and then we walked back to the house.

We had a nice snack time together, all of us, eating cinnamon toast and fruit; and then it was time to take everyone over to Kelly's work place. They have a church event tonight, so I brought the kids to Kelly so they could all pick Dylan up from work and go together. 

It sure was a nice day. There is going to be a BIG gap now until I take care of the kiddos again. Lots of stuff going on. I will miss them very much. They show me so much love--it's amazing how WARM I feel for days after!

March 23 Brendan's Presentation

Sunday:  I was invited to Holy Trinity today to see Brendan present his paper on how Orthodox Christians should deal with anger, as part of the St. John Chrysostom Oratorical Festival. There were two "junior" presenters (one of whom was Brendan), and one "senior" presenter. They had a choice of topics. Brendan chose to write/speak about how Orthodox Christians should deal with anger.

Brendan is 13 now and in the seventh grade. He was the youngest presenter. His essay had to be about 4 minutes in length and he had to speak it in front of the entire congregation. Wow. I could tell Brendan was a little bit apprehensive about getting up in front of everyone--but he did an amazing job. He was composed, expressive, articulate, and Biblical. I couldn't be more proud! Thankfully, they got to READ their essays and didn't have to memorize them. Dylan helped Brendan type his essay up; but he said the actual words were Brendan's. 

I love this child. Look how expressive he is. He had his hands in his pockets for awhile ... but was unable to keep from using them as he talked! Yay!

After all of the presentations were read, each student was given recognition and a few small gifts.

Look how much "smaller" Brendan is than his contemporaries! 

Afterwards, there was fellowship and treats in the Hall. Here is Erin enjoying a few cookies ...

Aidan made an origami "balloon" which he actually blew up and it retained the air!

Erin made a "face" out of her cookies and then asked if she could use my camera to take the picture. She did a very decent job at her photography.

I asked her to give me one of her beautiful smiles ... sigh ... she is darling, though--isn't she?

Cal decided he could outdo Erin ... okay, Cal. You WIN.

But then ... look at this sweet picture of Erin! Love all of you beautiful children so much.

March 22 Aidan's Party

Saturday Noon:  Aidan turned EIGHT more than a week ago; but his party couldn't be scheduled until this week for various family reasons. He was fine with it!

But ... today was the day! I didn't count how many children were actually at the party--it seemed like a LOT! What was super nice, though, was the fun they apparently were having chasing each other all around their huge house. Dylan and Kelly are good partiers and are so relaxed about their house--very kid friendly. Clearly, they value people over things! How nice to grow up in a house where people are welcomed and fun happens.

I took a lot of pictures. I'm positive I cannot name all of these kids; only a few. Aidan requested pizza from Buddy's (my favorite!) for everyone to enjoy. Aidan's former neighbors, Benson and Abbott, and standing just to the left of Aidan. They are neat kids.

There was an art table set up in the dining room where kids could gather and draw, color, eat, or whatever.

I forget what was going on here with Dylan and Aidan--but apparently something funny happened!

Then it was time for cake!

Kelly picked out a very special #8 candle ... look!

It's a sparkler!

A very rousing "Happy Birthday" was sung by everyone!

It took a few minutes for the candle to finally stop sparkling ... everyone had fun watching it burn.

The cake was a double-chocolate delicious wonder ... I could have eaten the whole thing.

Cal ate his piece and then went out to do a little bit of art ...

Cal! You are the dearest little boy.

Right in the middle of eating her piece of birthday cake, Erin's front top tooth fell out! It dropped on the floor, and for a little bit she couldn't find it. I think Cal crawled under the table and fetched it for her.

Our birthday boy was rather opposed to me snapping his picture today. Rats. He is only EIGHT and already is resisting my camera. That's okay, Aidan. I will manage to sneak a few of you every once and awhile.

Love you, Aidan Paul!