Changing of the plans....

One of the many things I love about children is that they shake up my plans and show me ways to do things better.

Nathan, for example.  "Can I have these marshmallows?"

"No, we're going to make Rice Krispy treats."

"But I don't like Rice Krispy treats, I like marshmallows.  I just want you to play Legos with me."

"Okay," I say--relieved that he's getting what he wants and I'm off the hook for making treats nobody is likely to eat anyway.

Then he opens the secretary and looks at my ten Madame Alexander storybook dolls that will ultimately be Elena's.  "Are these all for my sister?" he asks.  I'm afraid I detect a note of jealousy (what can I collect that a boy might like?) so I stop what I'm doing and introduce him to each one.

"That one is Elena!" Elena says, pointing to the one in the red dress we named Elena.

Nathan wants to play with them.  I hadn't planned on letting little ones play with them, but I tell him that he can pick one to play with, just him, because they are fragile and he knows how to be careful with fragile things.

He picks Dorothy and spends the next hour enacting the story.  We run around the house finding stuffed animals and less-fragile dolls to play the parts of the other characters.  He casts Harriet (a doll from Nana) with my voice-over as the Good Witch.

I had planned to clean the house and dress up like a witch to get ready for the party, but I let go of my plans for perfection and enjoyed the magical moments of Now instead.  By then, cleaning was not an option anyway--as Nathan's Legos and Elena's toys were scattered all over the floor.

Later, as he was skating through the house on socks, he told me that my kitchen floor was a mess--which it was, covered with marshmallows and leaves and assorted toys. Children tell you the truth, unvarnished.

But sometimes the definite truth of one week is abandoned the next.  For a couple of months, Nathan has been saying he doesn't like his picture taken, so I've tried to hold back.  Yesterday, he had a sudden change of heart and wanted me to take lots of pictures of him.

Elena is her own hundred-percent-Elena self.  When her other grandmother came, Elena wanted to show her around the house and apartment.  She opens the apartment refrigerator and asks Tita, her other grandmother, "What would you like to drink?  We have juice and water and these things Yenna likes..." (pointing to canned sodas.)

The house never did get spruced up; I'd barely gotten unpacked from my trip.  I never got around to putting on my witch's hat or make up.  But no one noticed or cared.

When Will donned some awful plastic rotten-teeth Margaret had sent for the party, the kids took it all in stride, no big deal.  When he attempted to give Veronica a kiss, she seemed politely less than eager to kiss back:)

Kids and grown-ups notice different things, I guess.