Tights and Tinfoil

First Field Trip, II

Interesting fact about me: when I volunteer to chaperone field trips I always get paired up with the slightly more difficult children. You know those ones. They run around, never stop talking, wander off, spill their lunch, eat their own boogers, try to ride the polar bear, require stitches.... or whatever. If it's a problem in the classroom, I will be required to follow it around a museum, a zoo, or the botanical gardens. Mark. My. Words.

During Mason's first learning adventure afield I acquired another badge of chaperoning glory. Amongst the children in my car and then chaperone group was a child who's name is difficult to pronounce and makes me uncomfortable to shout across crowds. In fact, the name starts with a D and rhymes with whoosh. And she was a runner. I wanted to stab myself in the eye.

That's when the teacher also realized that somewhere between the parking lot, the restrooms, and the pumpkin field she dropped the bag that had all the snacks, the first-aid kit, and all the emergency response permission slips. Here's what I know, the band-aids and latex gloves were not missed.

It's moments like these that I take a step back, look through the lens of my camera, and think, "I volunteered." I SO volunteered. I was like the first mom on the list. I always am. Why? It's not because I like stumbling over a name like, well, you know, the one that rhymes with cartouche. It's because I love watching my sons fit into their classes. I want to know what they think about the bees (a little nervous you'll see in the above photo). And all romance aside, I like to see teachers think on their feet.

This is Mason interacting with the little girl who has the hard to pronounce name. He calls her the bully. Can you tell by his face how he feels about her?

There is a fascinating field trip trend that I do not understand. The school (and this wasn't the only one) requires the children on the field trip to wear the same shirt and a bandana. But here's what I don't understand, when you are looking for a lost child, you look for unique attributes. If I'm helping you look and I don't know the child and you say, he's wearing a white shirt with an eagle on the front and all I see is a sea of white shirts I'm not a very effective searcher. Besides, Mason HATED the bandana.

I Run My Life

I can't remember if it was a phone call or an e-mail from my brother Devin. But at some point last year I agreed to be in a Ragnar Relay with him. And there have been times during my training that I've wondered what I was doing. But I've had a great partner in crime encouraging me and here I am just a week out and I am ready. For real.

Here's what I have learned while running.

Running suits me. I can run for a long time. I can run by myself. I don't mind running every day.

I run my life. If I'm not on a trail running as fast as I can, I'm trying to fit as much into my day as I can. My husband says this is my life running me. That is fine. But it's just how I do things. So if I weren't running 45 miles a week I'd be doing something that rushes me around.

I have a high tolerance for pain. And a low tolerance for nausea.

I don't like running in the dark. Or the rain. Or snow. Loathe snow.

I think about a lot of weird stuff when I'm running. For instance when I'm getting really tired I almost always think about Kenyans who just wake up one day and think, "I'm going to invite my brother and his wife to dinner. I better go ask him." Then the little Kenyan runs 30 miles to the next village and invites said brother to dinner and turns around to run home. Yes, I'm that weird.

I believe in possibility, not reality. I know our team can't win the Ragnar. But I'm going to win. What I will win is yet to be determined, but I'm ready to accept it.

I cannot run faster than my 5-year-old after running 16 miles. He loved winning -- so maybe that means he'll follow in my track shoes.

PS -- If you live in or near Las Vegas and you would like to cheer us on... that would be incredible.

If You're Scared, Don't Show It

Do you remember who taught you how to ride a bike?

I do. I remember just about everything from that moment. Of course that first tingle in your belly when you realize you have lift off and you're doing it. Doing it all by yourself. But I also remember silly things like the street I was on, and that I basically wobbled straight down the very center of it. Most importantly I remember it was my Grandma Helen who chased after me, hootin' and hollerin' and saying, "She's doing it. She's doing it." She is a peach, that Grandma of mine.

I even remember telling her that I was scared and I didn't want to try riding a two-wheeler. She told me to climb up on that bike (my father's childhood banana-seated bike) and said, "Well, that's OK. Just don't tell anyone."


Our Coop has learned to ride his bike. It was a rocky road to success. This past summer he swam lots and lots of laps, but he didn't pull that bike out of the garage much. So when he started first grade his badge of pride was a couple of medals, a few ribbons, and a trophy tucked away in his bedroom. Most of his friends rode up on their pride -- two-wheelers sans training wheels. It was a blow to the ego.

On one particular afternoon he had decided he'd had enough and he begged for a lesson from mom and dad. We planned it carefully. We mapped a gravel path that is mostly down hill where he could coast along and get the feel for balancing. And then we let him fall pretty hard. With a, "It doesn't get any worse than that." we brushed off his knees and put him back on the bike.

As with all things, once you get it you can't believe you took so long to figure it out. Now he's a real pro -- riding up hill, out of the saddle, over speed bumps, sideways inclines onto the sidewalk, even a small single track trail through the weeds to his school.

Congrats Coop! As always, we're proud of you.


PS -- I've even taken him with me on runs. He on the bike, me running like crazy to catch up.

PHOTO NOTE: Black gloves?????? He's cautious. What can I say.

On This Day, You Are 5

Our desire was that Mason would wake up to a surprise worthy of his adorableness. And at 7:30 a.m. we discovered that a life-sized bear can be just the surprise to render a 5-year-old speechless.

9:05
Drop off brother at school and begin a long walk and discussion that went something like this.

Mason:
Mom, I know what they do when people are about to die.

Me:
Really? What?

Mason:
Well, they bury 'em deep in the ground and put one of those gravemind things which are oval on top of 'em.

Me:
Do you mean gravestone?

Mason:
Then they squish their faces with dirt and they can't breathe so they turn green. And then they walk like this. (Pantomimes frankenstein walk with arms and legs outstretched and face stone still.)

Me:
Are you thinking of a Halloween decoration? Or actual dead people?

Mason:
Anyways, are we going to the museum?

9:50- 11 a.m.
Mandatory gym time.

11:20-12:40
One salami and cheese sandwich, and TV with bear.

1:30 p.m.
Museum of Nature and Science. Our first exhibit was the mummy room -- surprise surprise. Followed by the T-REX named Sue, which was scary. And finished with Space and then minerals.

3 p.m.
In the middle of the minerals exhibit Mason proclaims he's tired and would like to go get Cooper. As he's loading into the car I say, "So, how does it feel to be 5." He says, "I'm not actually 5. You have to blow out candles and sing Happy Birthday before you turn 5." Ummmmmm... was I supposed to get a cake?

5:40 p.m.
Start dinner. Mason has requested Macaroni and Cheese. It may be his birthday, but he is overruled and we settle for spaghetti and meatballs. Steve starts spaghetti while I start baking a cake and hunting for candles that say something other than CONGRATS!



8 p.m.
It's official.

PS -- A big thank you to our accomplices who have hidden this bear in their house since July!

The Front v. The Back

Tonight is Mason's last night as a 4-year-old. Since he will awake as a strong and mighty 5-year-old, I thought I'd share his current professional aspiration.

But to really share the story I need to disclose that it involves bad smells. So, if that may offend you, well then you've never lived in a house overrun by boys. Of course I have. Always have and apparently always will. So, I'm comfortable with poop, vomit, and all manner of toilet talk.

At the close of the night I was reading stories to Mason when he passed gas. My goodness! That boy smells bad when he wants to. Anyway, I think I might have said something like, "Mason! How can you stand to smell yourself." To which he shrugged his shoulders and explained he doesn't mind the smell of farts.

Astounded, I suggested he pursue a career in proctology. When he asked what a proctologist was I ineloquently replied, "A doctor of butts. Specifically buttholes, and everything inside your body that you get to through that opening." Go ahead, be horrified at the way I speak to my children.

After the giggling subsided he pensively said, "I wouldn't like that. But I wouldn't mind being a pee doctor." So there you go, after generations of plumbers it seems the family business will soon be urology.



PS -- I promise to pay tribute to his awesomeness tomorrow in a reflection befitting his birthday.

From His Sick Bed

Collecting my thoughts is impossible. Organizing them is far worse. So, I could approach this from a chronological standpoint, or I could relate to you one little moment on one afternoon that will shed some light on some of the shi-izzle that is going down here.

Due to construction, everyone in our house has been reassigned a sleeping space. Little Mason's sleeping space is currently a mattress on the floor of his brother's bedroom. This is not an ideal situation for anyone, however, Mason seems to enjoy having sleepovers with Cooper and he has commented many times that he likes his space (though he did tell me I should turn it into a couch -- not actually have him sleep on a couch but find another mattress to lean against the wall next to the mattress that is on the floor and make a couch out of the bed). I have made every effort to make this nook very comfortable. I have moved in his favorite puppies and penguins. I let him buy new crib sheets from IKEA in what he refers to as "batman blue" for his little mattress. Cooper has donated two extra pillows to Mason's cause, just in case he rolls off the mattress. They stay up late reading stories to each other and singing silly songs. They have been tired every morning when I wake them up for school, but it is like an extended camping trip that they enjoy. Let me also add that while Cooper has a full size bed that he could share with Mason, Mason prefers the floor to sleeping with Cooper. I can appreciate this. Cooper is a furnace that never stops moving. Sleeping next to him is like sharing a sleeping bag with a feverish pot-bellied pig.

AN-Y-WAY... besides becoming Mason's sleeping space it has become his sick bed.
This past week Mason was with Cooper and me at the rec center watching Coop's karate lesson. He was sitting on a bench and I was running on a treadmill. He decided to get up and walk behind the row of exercise machines. He tripped and fell and when he put his hands out to catch himself his right hand hit the moving belt of the treadmill.
Now, I know treadmills are dangerous. I unplug the treadmill at my in-laws house when we are there. I don't let my children play on them. Mason wasn't roughing around, he wasn't trying to touch it. He just tripped and fell. He thought that getting hurt by a treadmill would get him in trouble. So when he got hurt he lied to me and told me he fell on the brick wall next to the treadmill.

Obviously there was like this big rush of first-aid and fretting (Note to gym managers, when a patron tells you they need first aid don't page the 16-year-old lifeguard. Call 9-1-1). Though I could see it was bad, I just kept thinking all he did was fall on bricks. He doesn't need to go to the emergency room. A lot of people saw it and the conclusion from everyone was to just wait until morning and see. Mason's opinion was that it "hurts worser than when my private parts got slammed." By morning it was swollen, encrusted, and oozing -- an appetizing combination -- and I decided to take him to the pediatrician. That is when Mason decided to confess. He had actually fallen on the treadmill and did I want to send him to timeout?

The first doctor appointment was intense. The lack of attention the night before had created some scenarios that disguised the signals of his actual condition. The skin trauma was in fact severe enough that the pediatrician elected to table further testing to determine if Mason's fingers were fractured. This left us all focusing on two little fingers that looked as if they would require skin grafts to restore tissue loss.

We've since learned that the fingers are not broken. Phew! And we are fairly certain that plastic surgery to restore skin thickness is not necessary. Major phew! We're still changing the dressing twice a day and following doctor's orders to the letter because we want to avoid joint contracture. This just means that as the skin heals it gets a little tight and if we're not careful it will make it so that Mason can't open his hand all the way (I think that's what it means. Doctors talk this way to confuse mothers. Even smart mothers.). So far his range of motion is not affected.
All that mess has meant that Mason has spent some quiet time reading books and playing with sticker books because he can't draw as well as he would like. Oh, and he can't go to swimming lessons until the lesions are closed. His current plight is mild. And it would feel mild rather than frenetic if he were sleeping in his own bed, not sharing a bathroom with everyone in the family, and if his mother knew where she temporarily stashed the first aid kit.

Through this small medical mishap I learned that my job as a parent is to recognize the vulnerability that comes when a child realizes he made a mistake. I can't make the consequences of accidents and poor choices so scary that my children make more poor choices rather than trusting me.

And let me tell you, there are certain jobs I could never do. Being a pediatric nurse, physician's assistant, or doctor who has to debris burned skin on a small child or infant is one of them.

Lastly everyone in the family has been witness to the basic truth that sometimes more pain reveals new growth and if we can just endure it, everything will be restored with time. One other thing, brush up on your first aid.