Monday: Today I am on childcare duty from 8:30 am until Dylan comes home from work at about 5:00 pm. However, being a grandma to these dear ones is NOT a "childcare duty" (although there ARE times when it is hard work) but more of a privilege to be part of their young lives ... to witness their growing up and being privileged and invited to participate in it.
Since the weather has remained really REALLY sticky-hot, I ruled out the possibility of the children coming to MY place at all today. When I went to bed last night (at 10:30 pm), it was still 88 degrees in my little Beach House (with every single fan blowing on HIGH). I don't have air here and truly do not need it most of the time. However, we surely have had an extended few weeks of uncomfortable heat to bear. I generally like it HOT--my whole body is happy when I am warm. But this is a different kind of heat that just zaps the life out of me. I could not picture four more humans in this space for 3-4 hours today with me cooking for them and cleaning up after them. I am quite sure that I would not be "pleasant" in demeanor; so I dismissed that trial completely and opted to remain at their air conditioned house for the duration (with the exception of going downtown to play at the GR Public Museum for a few hours mid-day). Hopefully that idea will "fly" with the kids.
I had intended to take the kids to the museum in the morning hours; but then I changed my mind and decided to wait until after lunch. That gave me the morning hours to do a little clean-up in the kitchen and on the main floor of the house so that I didn't feel claustrophobic or unable to deal with the chaos. I don't do well with chaos--for some reason, it inhibits my ability to think straight. So the kiddos began their 30-minute "turns" with screen time while I did some tidying up.
After lunch, we loaded up my car and headed downtown to the museum. What a wonderful place! I could play there for HOURS!
Thankfully, Dylan and Kelly have a family membership here at the museum (which includes grandmas)! Otherwise, it would be rather costly for me to bring all four grands at once to enjoy this beautiful place.
On the main floor, there are many tables set up with kid-sized chairs and lots of varied building materials to see what kids will create. These little "blocks" were smooth and thin and all the same size. What could be made out of them? They truly didn't look that interesting to me! But wait until you see what Aidan built and what Brendan built!
Just around the corner, in close proximity to this table where Aidan and Brendan were "working", is a room full of dolls (the antique ones are kept behind glass) that children can interact with. Erin and Cal played here for a very long time.
Meanwhile, our very own architects were busy as could be out at the building table ...
Watching these two build was SO ... unbelievably WONDERFUL. Their patience, ingenuity, tenacity, creativity, and truly engineering minds were on full display!
I love these photos of them ...
Dear Aidan decided to build the Eiffel Tower, even though the "blocks" were all the same size ... he admitted to me that HIS tower would not be an EXACT replica ... but he was going to go at it anyway. Look at his dear little face ...
And Brendan was completely amusing himself making this circular work of art ... which did collapse a few times just because it's DIFFICULT to make blocks like this balance at this angle! But did Brendan give up? NO.
Here is a progression of Aidan's building of the Eiffel Tower. These pictures SHOW how bright this little boy is ... how determined ... patient ... skilled ... and look at his face in that last picture ... accomplished!
Brendan continued to try to get his oval stairway to go higher and higher and higher ... I am so impressed at how patient this child is ... how much pleasure he gets from his perseverance and what he creates. Both Brendan and Aidan have unique abilities and talents and the potential to be ... engineers and designers!
And almost the entire time all this creative building was going on, just around the corner Erin and Cal were pretending to live in this little doll house. It was so cute to listen to them talk everything out together.
Cal and Erin finally became crowded out by other children in the Doll room and came out to join their brothers at the block table.
This entire family of children have major skills in assembly and creativity. Perhaps it is partly due to all of the LEGOs they have received in their lives with the booklets of how to build each model. All of them do a really good job following the written instructions in the booklets--well, Cal is still too little to read--but he doesn't lack in patience to see a job done to the finish.
There was a cool station where kids could do "rubbings" on drawings of sharks to make patterns on them.
This entire main floor was full of cool games to play with kids. Cal and I did this bean bag toss for quite awhile.
When we climbed up to the 2nd floor (45 steps-ouch!!) and looked over the railing, we could still see Aidan's Eiffel Tower standing ...
I forget which game room this is, but it's on the second floor of the museum. They have giant-sized games to play, all of them very fun.
Mr. Cal, of course, LOVES to play with cars, so he did this race game for quite a few minutes.
Aidan and Cal played a game of chess. I never did find out who won the game; but my best guess would be Aidan. I will say, though, little Cal is learning the moves of this game quite well for being only 5.
Brendan and I played a game of Sorry. I've never seen a Sorry board quite like this--perhaps they've updated it since the one I bought back in 1985!
These two ... such darling kiddos ...
I was super glad we spent three hours here at the museum today. It was a fun and constructive way to play on this super hot day.
By about 3:30, all four of the kids were requesting we return home to their place; so we did just that. We ate a few snacks and goofed around until Dylan came home from work. Mondays are Kelly's "long" days at work; so Dylan is home first and makes dinner for the kids and then picks Kelly up. They are a one-vehicle family, and that's how it works when you have no other choice in the matter. I must say that I have the highest respect for their choice to remain with one vehicle until they can better handle another one financially. Not everyone would bow willingly to that restraint on their budgets. They admit that it is difficult to maintain all of the back and forth they have to do to make one vehicle work for them, but they have been committed to not accruing a ton of debt.
It was a wonderful day with all of these beautiful-souled children ...
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