Hippity Hoppity

Easter is long gone, I know. But I have zillions of birthday and egg hunt and preschool pics sitting on my desktop that need a home and a little narration so I can look back on one very busy spring and remember all the good little bits that make busy worth our while.

Looking a little slouchy. Guess that's what I get for
hiding out behind the camera 99% of the time.

And it was definitely worth it (and by it, I mean the month-long sugar buzzed kiddies -- followed by weeks of whining about why, suddenly, we were back to applesauce and raisins for treats; the cankers from eating too many Robin Eggs -- I have no self control when it comes to pink and turquoise candy; the late night basket stuffing; and the bickering with Andy because, apparently, Porter's beachy sandals were a bit to feminine for his liking).

I always loved Easter when I was a kid. It kinda creeps up on you -- unlike Christmas and its paper chain countdown. You're just relearning how to fly a kite and blow the biggest bubble, and bam -- you get to dress up in something pretty and spend the day eating candy in the sunshine. Never mind that at least half of the time, it snows and you're left with puffy coats over sundresses. The potential of Easter Sunday best -- of little girls excited about new dresses and twirly skirts -- and of lollygagging in sunshine with nothing to do but go to church and run around in pursuit of candy is enough to tide me over on the cold years.

I also really love the goodies. Easter has the very best candy. Peeps. Cadbury Cream Eggs. Robin Eggs. Starburst jellybeans.

She really is my girl -- only the pink, red and purple jellybeans, please.

And a new classic: Target brand pastel lollipops that taste exactly like the opaque pastel pink watermelon lolly I got from the hospital when I was four after getting stitches in my forehead that my older sister then stole from me (AFTER shoving me into the fireplace which split my head open in the first place). I have been looking for another pink sucker like that ever since. I remember several times when I'd see one of those sucker trees in random stores, and I'd pick out the lightest pink one I could find only to tast bubblegum or blah fake cherry.

This one -- again, my girl -- lined each goody up by type, sat back with a
glimmer in her eye and marveled at all the sugary goodness that was hers.

She also really loved the "pwinchesses" sing-along CDs and butterfly "flippers".

As for the boy, he moved through his Easter basket in record time with eyes only for the new Matchbox cars. But he LOVEd coloring eggs and cried when we ran out, giving explicit instructions to boil "at least  50 eggs" next year.

He is our artist-slash-scientist. And at least once every two weeks, asks if we can do a "science project" that involves food coloring and bottle of water. So egg coloring was right up his alley as he moved each egg from one cup to the next, always ending with a cracked brownish-green or rust-colored masterpiece that he declared "just right."



Nora, however, did not like dipping eggs, which I had mistakenly been referencing as "painting eggs." After 25 minutes of pouting, we finally figured out that she was expecting paint brushes and watercolors not cups of colored water.

True to her stubborn nature, our girl refused to have anything to do with the eggs once the dipping strike commenced, so we pulled out the painting pad and shuffled her share fo the eggs over to one very happy big brother.

With baskets and eggs down (we have 1:00 church, so we had plenty of time to lollygag -- especially since I forgot two of the key ingredients for our orange roll Easter breakfast and ended up only with toast and fruit with last-minute scrambled eggs), all we had left was the egg hunt, which I had planned to save until after church but which two very eager kiddos and an equally geeked daddy did not think should be delayed.

The highlights:

Porter's nervous cheek biting after Andy shouted "go!" but before he spotted his first egg

And realizing that we did not need to police the hunt to balance the odds for Nora, who came out with just as many eggs as her big brother all on her own thanks to her generally more aggressive second child nature and a more focused search (Porter kept stopping to see what was inside and -- really, just a great big brother -- would pick up one but leave the two next to it while yelling for Nora to to come see the eggs he found for her).

A great welcome to spring (even though we would get at least two more snowstorms over the next few weeks).

No Girls Allowed

Following one great Easter weekend birthday with our little family, Porter finally got the birthday party he has been talking about ever since he went to his friend Jonathan's Toy Story party the first weekend in February. The almost three-month party planning started with one almost-five-year-old edict: no girls.

From there, we went back and forth between themes based on whatever Porter had most recently played with his friends at preschool. We went from superheroes to Transformers to race cars, back to superheroes, then to dinosaurs, and finally back to race cars. Considering this one eats, sleeps and breathes Matchbox cars, Lightning McQueen and Mighty Machines, the birthday boy's final selection was not at all surprising.

So we played Red Light, Green Light.

Had a stoplight tire toss.

And the big event: the Piston Cup, complete with pit stops to change tires from one crew member to the next.

Opened presents.

And if you've never watched a group of little boys clamor for the best spot in gifting, you should. So much fun to hear the sudden "Awesome!" and "Open mine next!" and "Oh yeah! I always wanted this!" pop out of the impenetrable mass of t-shirts, spikes and curls.

As expected, this fiery gal held her own just fine amidst the big boys.

And finished off with cake.

Note to self: next year, give yourself that extra half hour before start time.

That's right, we were 15 minutes late to our own party because, not at all surprisingly, somebody did not think it would take "that long" to finish up her two-day baking project.

It was a lot of work, but most definitely worth it to see this rapidly growing up little guy running and playing and laughing with his pals at his side. So much fun.

A Promise Kept

With parenthood, comes planning. Lots and lots of planning. Lists and lists full of stuff you have to do, stuff you'd like to do, and stuff you dream about but suspect will never materialize.

In the Burt home, a majority of Andy's planning falls into the middle category, while my own purview lies among the extremes. This means I am great at making -- and keeping -- doctor's appointments and dreaming up giant summer vacations, but that at any given moment, fifty-plus percent of my efforts are in vain, thanks to nap times and budgets and scheduling conflicts and temperaments and, and, and.

This also means that my oldest has, sadly, grown accustomed to big promises with a much smaller payoff. Like when, just this Monday, I loaded the kids, our 64-pack of crayons and a pad of art paper into the car to drive to the campus art museum (which is featuring artwork from thousands of local school kids), where I had planned for the kids to wander through the walls of kiddie-sized art and then head outside to make their own mini masterpieces. Turns out the museum is closed on Mondays, so we rolled down the a big grassy hill just outside the museum and hunted for pine cones instead.

But I digress...our five-year-old (still so crazy that he is so old!) has had his share of disappointment, thanks to a mom with very poor timing. I feel bad about this all the time. In fact, I often catch myself throwing ideas out into the air without any consideration of reality, only to find out that the ever-attentive Porter has carefully memorized every detail of said dream and will later hold me accountable for the fact that we never snuck those snow cones into the movie that had already been bumped out of rotation in our two-theater town.

All of this is my very wordy way of saying, simply, I want to give my kids the world but more often than not come up short.

But I refuse to stop scheming. Because sometimes it really is everything we imagined. And I am oh so grateful that on my oldest's actual birth day (and just two days after I had to tell him we'd postponed his birthday party because none of his friends would be in town over Easter weekend), we lucked our way into perfect.

The rain was even kind enough to hold off until after we'd left for the day.

What started as a low-key but happy morning of new toys and Porter's favorite cereal,

Turned into a dream birthday when a quick trip to pick up our bake-at-home pizza and ice cream pizza cake revealed a traveling carnival on the other side of town.

So I hightailed it back to the house and asked Porter if he wanted to go on a birthday adventure. Dubious, as he rightly should have been given my track record, he wasn't sure if he wanted to leave the new cargo plane and Matchbox cars. But enthusiasm rules when it comes to kids, and I was most certainly enthused. In one fell swoop, all the rescheduled promises were forgotten with his first glimpse of the Fanny Flyer (in truth, he was fine with the rescheduled party, but I felt bad because the last minuteness of it -- as RSVPs came in -- meant I had not planned any other birthday hoopla).

 

And, as all good perfect days go, the rest does not require much explanation.

He loved being in charge of the tickets and counting out just enough for each ride.

He got mad every time I tried to take the wheel on the bumper cars (just a few inches too short to go it alone).

Could have watched the brave souls on the Kamikaze for hours (though he made it very clear that he would NEVER want to go on it -- "not even when I'm old like you."

And made my heart stop every time he shifted or took a deep breath at the top of the ferris wheel (I didn't remember that they didn't have seatbelts -- the things I never noticed before I had kids).


Luckily, Look Mommy, no hands! was quickly followed by a slight wind gust that brought him back to his normally cautious demeanor.

We left in the very best of birthday moods and with dirty feet for me (what was I thinking wearing flip flops?) and big smears of dirt all over Porter's face that are most certainly indicative of a great day for a five-year-old boy.

A nice reminder that the tallied mommy guilt of unfulfilled ice cream bribes and trips to the park at dinnertime should be taken in stride.

Because it would not be nearly as magic if every day felt like a fifth birthday.