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Life with THREE boys

We decided that we’d do another hike in the woods today. We took the western entrance to Bay Park West and rambled through the blue trail for about an hour, stopping for a snack of strawberries along the way and keeping Felix mostly asleep in the little wrap that Julie had fastened him into. As we approached the van on the way back it was almost 5:30.

“What do you think? Does your hatred of library overdue fines outweigh your desire to get home and get dinner started?”

J really hates paying overdue fines on library books, and ours were already two days over the limit. They were in the back of the van, but it meant going an extra exit down the highway and then coming back. James and Owen were clearly hot, tired, and hungry (I had to drag Owen up the last part) and Felix, though he had been sleeping peacefully, was overdue to eat.

We decided to drop the library books off. As soon as Felix was in his carseat he started shrieking. And he kept on shrieking. He shrieked and he shrieked as we pulled out onto the highway and made our way to Browncroft Boulevard. James asked some questions from the back about why Felix was crying and whether he might have some milk when we got home. Owen, tellingly, was being silent for the first time all day.

I pulled into the library and dropped off the overdue books, reveling in comparative quiet of rush hour traffic flying by the library. Then I re-opened the vandoor and was greeted by the same chorus of Felix’s shrieks.

There would be no left turn onto Winton Road. I turned right, adding on even more time to the return journey, and then ran over a curb as Felix continued to shriek and I made an abrupt turn to try to head north again.

But we made it home! Owen immediately insisted that he needed to sit on the potty, Felix kept on shrieking, and James was pre-complaining about dinner.

“What’s going to be for supper?”

“Brussel sprouts and a cauliflower curry, and some chocolate pudding for dessert if we do a good job eating our supper.”

“Mommy, can I tell you something? I think I would like just a teeny bit of the curry.”

“You’ll need to try it.”

“And also, just a teeny amount of the Brussel sprouts.”

“You’ll need to eat the portion that we give you.”

“I wish we were having ice cream from Netsin’s for dessert.”

Felix needed a diaper change too. So I took Owen to the potty, and J took Felix for a change and to nurse. I preheated the oven on the way to the bathroom. I put Owen on the potty. James came in to wash his hands from being in the woods and dropped his George on the floor.”

“Now Owen…do you remember what happened this afternoon?”

“Uh-huh!”

“How you tried to empty the froggy potty yourself when you peed in it and you dumped pee-pee all over the floor?”

“Uh-huh!”

“And you didn’t get a piece of candy?”

“Yup!”

“Because you tried to do it yourself instead of waiting for Daddy. Daddy has to go do some kitchen things, and I’ll be RIGHT back. Don’t empty the potty yourself, just wait for me, okay?”

And so I left him alone and put a sheet of pecans in the oven to start toasting. And then James started yelling, and when I came back Owen had completely missed the potty and peed all over the floor, including on James’ George.

“I waited for you, Daddy!”

So, George went in the wash. And Owen’s George went in the wash too, because he was possibly even dirtier (including the urine) than James’, and we banished the two older ones to their room while we made dinner. J sautéed onions and put some fresh grated ginger on the stove to work on the curry, and I mixed up the vinaigrette for the Brussel sprouts and did up a couple strips of bacon to crumble in. We even stuffed some mushrooms with goat cheese to use those up. Felix slept, and it was quiet in the kitchen except for the sound of our own work. I poured a beer and helped with J’s work once mine was all in the oven.

And then we called kids to the table.

James turned his nose up at the curry through most of the meal, but eventually tried a bite and then powered through his Brussel sprouts with the reward of chocolate pudding on the horizon. Owen set to work on his Brussel sprouts without complaining, but then swallowed them wrong and threw up most of his dinner all over his shirt. (Which couldn’t go in the wash, because the Georges were still using it.)

Felix fussed and was held and then dozed, and Owen played his usual game of shouting at the top of his lungs inquiries about whether or not he was being too loud. James tried to talk his way out of eating vegetables. They both ended up with pudding. And it made me happy to see them both happily eating (and keeping down) something that we had made for them.

“Will you help me scrape?”

“Sure Owen, but it looks like you already scraped pretty much everything yourself!”

I handed him the spoon that I had scraped his bowl with and turned away for a moment. This is what I saw when I looked back.

James thought that was a good idea too. And so J said…”why not?”

(NB Either the Blogger site, or our internet, or both, are currently down. Will upload photos once the internet fairy fixes things.)