Cocked Hat

We were all hatted this morning. It was because we were all going outside for a run. In December, of course, in upstate New York.

I saw that the weather for the next few days was supposed to be gray and constantly rainy. My reaction to this was, as always, "thank goodness it isn't going to be snow." But my second reaction was "we ought to go for a run all together if we're going to get one in this week." I'll probably get up and run a few times in the early morning, even if it is rainy out. J might head out during the afternoons if there's hot coffee waiting when she gets back and/or the boys have been steadily driving her insane all morning. But this was our last chance to go out as a family.

So we put on our hats.

The boys look SO cute in their hats, which means that they don't want to wear them at all. James wore his James D. Bear hat, which is one of my favorite hats ever. It used to look huge on him, but now it's starting to look a little stretched on his bulbous head.

THE James D. Bear hat

Owen has a nice hood on his fluffy winter jacket, but J put a hat on him anyway. Owen does not appreciate hats. He doesn't appreciate his fluffy winter jacket, either. He can't move his arms in it, which means he can't suck on his fingers. And if he can't suck on his fingers, he can't cope with the world when he feels sleepy/cranky/happy. Even when he isn't sucking on his fingers, he thinks they should be in someone's mouth. This morning when he woke up at 6:45 am and I brought him downstairs to read with me on the couch he kept on trying to shove them into my mouth. Then he smacked the lampshade repeatedly with James' Greek flag. Kids are weird.

Anyway, neither kid was particularly happy about wearing their hats. James thinks that his bear hat is for "babies," but of course he doesn't want Owen to wear it and he refuses to wear any other hat. (Aside from his blue San Francisco cap, which is also super cute but not nearly warm enough for a two mile run in December in upstate New York.) Owen was distressed about being in his jacket, and about having his hood up, and about having a wool cap on under his hood.

We bribed them with cookies. There's a delightful Italian pastry shop up the road from us past Culver on Empire. It used to be the case that if we were feeling particularly indulgent I'd stop in at the donut shop and get a treat. After all, I'd reason, we just got some exercise and it's nice to have something sweet and well-made. Now we go running as an excuse to get up to the pastry shop. The donuts, while quite for being donuts, are long forgotten. Today we brought back some biscotti and a chocolate-almond torte.

My hat, for the record, is a black wool cap that smells rather awful. I don't really have a good winter hat. Somewhere down in the basement there's a black Carhartt hat that I've also been running in, and neither one looks particularly elegant with a peacoat and tails.

J, on the other hand, has a cool pink runner's hat. It's warm, reflective, and looks pretty stylish. I would say that it's the nicest hat in the family, but it doesn't have ears. So James' hat still wins.