Today we went to the library downtown, known in our house as “The Big Library.” We have one up the street from us that we will bike to on occasion. Personally, I love doing that. It is something I dreamed about being able to do as a child. Ride my bike and get books at the same time was the idea of heaven for a tom girl, book lover like me.
The boys like doing that as well but “The Big Library” is their favorite place. For one it is indeed big. It has moving stairs, aka escalators. And the biggest draw of all, they have scissors. They have pieces of recycled paper, glue sticks, crayons and the much beloved scissors. B could stay there forever. J loves the puzzles and the huge over sized stuffed animals that every child in Cola Town has loved as well. Thank goodness breastfeeding sets kids up with immunity systems of steel.
Oh and of course they have books. Lots of books. I love that they adore books. It is hard to see if you are doing things right as a parent much of the time, but with this we have done something right.
B cracks me up now because he has realized he really can’t read the words on the pages. We used to give him books after we finished reading to him for him to read to himself and he would quietly sit and look at the pages and pretend to read. Now when we tell him that, he will cry and say, “But I don’t know what the words are saying, I need you for that.”
J will still read to himself. He loves animals so most of his favorite book have animals in them. You will here from his room, “At the zoo, they bite!” He says that for every animal, on every page, in every book. Mostly he is right. They are at the zoo and most animals do indeed bite.
Today on the ride to the library B and I had a conversation that went mostly like this:
Me: There is the hospital where you guys were born.
B: Why did you go to the hospital? Did the firemen come for you?
Me: No, Daddy drove me there because that is where the doctors helped deliver you.
B: Was I in your tummy?
Me: Yes.
B: How did I come out?
Me: Well, I pushed you out of me. It was a lot of work but worth it.
Pause
B: Mommy?
Me: Yes?
B: I love kittys.
J: At the zoo! They bite!
You edited out the funny part. As I learned this week from Lester Laminack, good writers take risks.
I was trying to save our son the future humiliation of how the conversation included exactly where on my body he came out of. Plus I always use the real names for things and it might creep people out. But now that you called me out on it, he might as well be humiliated.
My BB now talks about when he was in my tummy, but hasn’t asked yet about how he got out. I have contemplated telling him that he came out through my belly button.
this totally cracked me up!