A place for everything

She wanted to organize her closet, so I pulled out my label maker and taught her how to use it.

When I returned, in addition to finding she had labeled each of the bins her toys live in, I noticed she had also labeled her toothbrush, her toothpaste, her soap dispenser and her toilet.

"Look how organized I am!" she announced.

I may have created a monster.

He comes by them honestly

I don't hand out bandages all that easily.

The kids know the rules. If it's not bleeding, it doesn't need a band aid. (Those things aren't cheap, you know!) You have to be pretty banged up to get bandaged in this family.

But Jacob? He earns them almost daily. We crossed stitches and a cast off our list long before he turned two. Band aids hardly seem like a big deal anymore. There's just no stopping this kid.

It makes sense, when you think about it. Have you seen the nonsense he has to keep up with from those two crazy older siblings of his?

We pretty much live in survival mode around here.

That was easy

It was the most anticlimactic transition to two wheels ever.

He begged and pleaded for a solid week for us to remove the training wheels, and each time, we told him that if he'd wait until the weekend, Daddy would help him learn to ride his bike.

We just knew that taking off those training wheels would mean hours and hours of chasing him up and down the street, stooped over, holding onto the back of his seat to keep him from teetering to one side or the other before he got the hang of it.

That's a big commitment. One I was not willing to undertake with a baby on my hip.

So he waited, and eagerly stood watch as Daddy finally pulled out his tool box and removed the training wheels.

The two headed into the road, looked both ways, and Caleb climbed up onto his big boy bike, checking behind him to be sure Daddy had a good hold on him so he wouldn't fall. He pushed the peddles around once, then once more, and he was off, with Daddy stooped over behind him, hands firmly gripping the back of his seat while Caleb gained confidence and stability.

And then, just like that, it happened.

As Caleb's feet pushed the peddles around more and more quickly, the role of the bike-holder-upper became less and less critical.

I watched as his dad let go, and my four-year-old peddled off down the street after his big sister, totally unaware that he was doing it on his own.

He's already proving himself a force to be reckoned with. Abby has tired of inviting him to race her to the cul-de-sac and back. It took only a a few occasions of being lapped by her younger brother to take the fun out of the competition for her.

Now they simply ride, much too fast and much too fearlessly, in my opinion, up and down the street until the sun goes down or I offer them popsicles to bribe them to come inside. Caleb is loving his newfound freedom, and Abby is loving having another big kid to ride with.

The training wheels are officially a thing of the past for Caleb. He's unstoppable now.

Decaf amphibians

If you can think of a way to spend a morning that is more fun than hiking and hunting for frogs and tadpoles, please, let us know.

But I don't think you're going to convince the kids.

And the stop at Starbucks beforehand? That was totally altruistic.

What would the kids have kept their frogs in if mom and dad hadn't polished off a couple of mochas on the way there?

We all scream

Ice cream is good.

Ice cream dates with Daddy are better.

Selective hearing

We were trying to wait patiently for Abby to finish up at VBS. But waiting patiently does not come easily to the four-and-under crowd.

We sat in the balcony, in the back, so as not to be a distraction to the other kids and parents. Because my kids can be a little distracting sometimes.

Levi was craning his neck around me and trying frantically to climb out of the baby carrier on my back to see what was going on. Jacob was making a bridge out of pencils in the back of the pew in front of us. And Caleb was testing every square inch of the pew we were seated in to see which part was the "squishiest." (And I use the term seated lightly.)

I was convinced my eldest son was not paying a lick of attention. I could be certain, because my vocal instructions were apparently totally inaudible. The crawling and wiggling continued, despite my warnings to the contrary.

Gradually, the music quieted. My children's laughter did not. I did my best to shush them, but found that I had become not only inaudible, but invisible to them as well.

Then the leader spoke up from the stage below us.

"Let us pray," he announced.

I was suddenly aware of the total lack of movement next to me. I looked over to find Caleb completely still and silent, head bowed, eyes closed, hands folded in his lap.

He stayed that way for the duration of the prayer, then said his Amen and resumed his wiggling.

This kid never ceases to amaze me.

Play with your food

"Mommy, you know what?"

What, Jacob?

"I tell you something!"

Tell me.

"Look at my chicken nugget! It's a big big muscle!"

Well, look at that.

It sure is.

Slow and steady

If you've ever tried to pick Caleb up, you know what I'm talking about. He's solid as a rock. Bumping into him is a little like running into a brick wall. He's nearly 40 pounds of solid 4-year-old muscle.

It made sense to us when he was a baby and threatened to eat his weight in finger foods and whole milk. But how he manages to maintain his physique these days is a mystery.

In the Dinnertime Olympics, he brings home the gold for dawdling at the table and slow eating.

Perhaps because he never stops talking, or perhaps because his little brain is always coming up with some new idea, Caleb can't seem to finish a meal in any sort of reasonable amount of time.

I think that creative and clever mind of his is to blame. Where I saw a slice of pumpkin bread and some raspberries, he saw a dump truck. So of course he had to build it to make it easier for the rest of us to see.

This kid's going to be an engineer one day.

A break in the rain

Are we happy it finally warmed up and stopped raining so we can play in the creek again?

Yeah, you might say that.

Thrifty

If I had known what a huge hit this toy was going to be, I might not have wasted so much time bargaining with the owner of the thrift store where I bought it almost five years ago.

In my defense, I could not have foreseen one day having enough kids to play with all four sides of the thing simultaneously.

I'd say that was $6 very well spent.