Saturday, October 31, 2009

Halloween Gators

A while ago, back in the summer, I asked Will what he wanted to be for Halloween. He said he wanted to be a football player. This amazingly remained the same for months! I thought "great" this will be easy he can be Wabash player and I can go over to the bookstore and get a jersey, right? WRONG! They don't make Wabash jerseys for 3 year olds, go figure? Every other college has small jerseys but none for Wabash... so next on the list.

Some of you may know that we have a connection in Gainesville, Fl. My sister and brother-in-law are closely associated with the University of Florida (Go Gators!) Sorry, reflex action! Low and behold for Will's birthday they sent him of all things... a Gator jersey and not just ANY Gator jersey but a "Tebow" jersey! Whoo hoo, Halloween costume back on track! Because of Aunt Lisa and Uncle Bob Will is well versed in all things Gator. He knows the song " We are the boys of Old Florida" almost as well as "Old Wabash", he knows the "Rama Jama" cheer and my sister's personal favorite "It's Great to be a Florida Gator"... oh... and he can CHOMP with the best of them. And he can pick Tim Tebow out in magazine photos! All in all he is as big a Gator fan as a three year old can be. So moving on with the costume assembly. I figured that all I needed were football pants (check) and a helmet. Joe found the pants in a dress-up Colts uniform set and a Colts helmet. What I did not think about was that there is not a huge call for "Gator orange" paint in the midwest. I spent many hours in lots of home improvement stores looking for the correct orange. With a little help from some tinted primer I was able to paint the helmet and the Gainesville group provided the script helmet sitcker. We are set to go.

He wore the costume for the first time last week to the Children's Museum party and we added one more detail that apparently, for Will made the costume- eye black! I was instructed not to write the Phil 4:13 that Tebow writes on the stickers because Joe did not want to invite those sorts of conversations so we chose "Tebow Time" Will LOVES the eye black ( a proud dad moment) He looks at himself from all angles in the mirror in our room and then proclaims himself "really cool". That's really what we were going for a cool, fun costume! And I bet he will be the ONLY Tim Tebow this Halloween in Crawfordsville. Oh yeah... and just to finish out the look we have a Heisman trophy for him to carry and Joe, well.... Joe is going to be Urban Meyer... his costume you ask? A UF (Go Gators!) baseball hat. I can only do so much!

Sunday, October 25, 2009

Letters

Ever since Will has begun preschool he has become very interested in letters of the alphabet and spelling. I am happy to see that he is making the connection between the two and is also showing signs that he is interested in learning to read. Yes, I do realize that he is only 3, and is not ready to read, but the interest and understanding that letters of the alphabet are somehow connected to words on a page makes me happy. Anyway, I digress.... Will and I were playing together with his magnetic letters and he finds the letter "W". Immediately he point it out as a "W" and asks me to make his name. Then he spells his name for me, "W-I-L-L" I told him that was correct his name is spelled W-I-L-L! He waited a minute then he said, " I like the W best." "Great", I said, " I like the W as well and I am proud that you know how to spell your name Will, W-I-L-L!" He waited a moment and then said, "Not Will, Mommy. I like W best. Just call me W!" I began to laugh and then very firmly told him that under no circumstances is anyone in THIS house going to be using "W" as an actual name. His name is Will NOT "W"! some day I hope to be able to explain this conversation to him and if I am good at my work... his response will be, " Thanks, Mom! I couldn't imagine if you had called me "W". People might have thought that I was actually named after him! YIKES!" That is if I have done my job in counteracting all opposing influences.... HMMMMMM.

Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Birthdays are .... ugh!

As I sit down to wrrite this today I am not in the greatest frame of mind. Today is my 40th birthday and while I am happily listening to Will use his "yackuum" cleaner all over the house talking to our dog, I am reminded of just how... well...

My mother was almost 40 when I was born and that does make me feel better as I see her still very active, with exercise classes, maintaining their home, and generally running the house (the way it has always been). My dad is also quite active at 85, but let's face facts, he never ran the house and never will!! On the flip side my husband Joe's parents were 40 when Joe was a Junior at Wabash College and his brother was a freshman at Butler University. Wow, just Wow! And we have a 3 year old!!!!

In the past months I have been referred to as Will's Grandmother more times than I care to admit and have been asked if I have a son the the Wabash football team I suppose that is possible.

As I. look to the future I hope Will is able to keep me young.At some point I will embrace this age that I find for the first time in my life a bit depressing. I am hopeful that by the time Will is 40 that he will have accomplished far more in his 40 years than I have in mine, that many of the things that we worry about today money, diseases, wars etc... will be distant memories. I guess I will just have to wait and see.

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Explanations... Always Explanations!

So many people tell me some day I will look back and wish for these days. Really? Sometimes I find that hard to believe! I love my little "Will-Will" dearly, but seriously there are many things that he is doing current.y that make me think people just don't remember the age of three very well. That in and of itself gives me hope!



Lately.. one of Will's less than endearing habits is to argue any explanation. "Mommy, why is that guy mowing his yard?" Me, "Because his grass was too tall." "No! It is because he have walnuts in his yard." "Excuse me, what!? We do have walnuts in our yard but that is not why we mow the yard. We mow it because the grass grows too tall." "No, Mommy it is because of walnuts!" This can go on for some time and for many things like colors or types of trucks. The other day he insisted that the fifth wheel camper we saw as we were driving was carrying horses and cows. I am sure this is probably a sign that he is smart and thinking and will not be easily swayed by others opinions... but right now I would just like him to accept an answer and be happy with it.



While I am on the subject of currently irritating behaviors, Will's lack of interest in ANY of his toys is right there at the top of the list. He is usually busy with something that involves getting into whatever project, space, or square inch that I happen to be. This is ridiculous to the point of insanity (mine) because he has more than a few toys that include everything from stuffed animals to monster trucks and anything in between. In the past few days I have told him that his toys will be disappearing if he does not care for them and that Santa Claus will not bring new ones if I tell him that Will is a child who does not like or want toys. Honestly, I wonder if there really are children who don't like toys and don't care to play with them! Please say no.... please say no.... I guess it is time for me to get the "red phone"(an antique rotary dial phone with picture of a train engine) down to prove that I can indeed call Santa if I so choose. It worked for my first graders when I was teaching... surely I won't have to explain that, or will I?

Thursday, October 8, 2009

Apples, Apples, and more Apples

Yesterday we went on an annual trip to the Apple Orchard. It was a beautiful fall day... clear, sunny and just a bit on the cool side. Will was excited because we had to leave early, pick up Grandma and Grandpa Nowak and then head about 40 minutes down the road to the orchard.

I am not sure which Will enjoyed more, "pickin' the apples from the branches" or "We go play with the farm doggies, now?" He climbed trees, picked apples off trees that were absolutlely loaded with apples, played in the hay mow and selected several very interesting gourds from the bins. It was a great day! The only ones who were happy to see our orchard time end were the farm doggies because Will was convinced that they all wanted to play with him... not that he wanted to play with them.

He was soooo tired that he had a very hard time staying awake at the restaurant we went to for lunch. It is a funny tradition that we go to a place called Gray's Cafeteria for fried chicken or pork tenderloins. Not exactly a low cal option but I probably eat fried chicken twice a year so it isn't that awful. Will was intrigued by the cafeteria experience as well as the size of the restaurant. I am thinking that the fascincation with cafeterias will be short lived... ahh well.... he is only three and it was his first time.

Today at preschool they even did some stamp painting with apples and he was apparently able to retell his apple orchard adventures... he did a bit of embellishment when it came to the tree climbing. At least I know that they didn't really think that I would let him climb to the top of the tree "all by himself" and "throw" the apples down. I am, however quite happy that he remembered as much of the day as he did.

The weekend will bring yet another football game at Wabash so ... off we go to try out my new apple peeler machine.... hmmmm ... exactly how smart is this idea?

Sunday, October 4, 2009

Is This Normal?

Just a few minutes ago Joe and I were getting dinner ready and Will was playing with several of his toys which, surprise, includes a couple of dolls. Yes, Joe knows about this! A couple were mine as a child and one is a boy who wears work boots and a baseball hat! Anyway... he was pretending to cook at his kitchen and suddenly he turns to one of the dolls and says, "Enough!" he takes the doll's teddy bear and walks into our kitchen. Joe and I were standing at the counter. He looks at us and announces, " My friend is not being nice. His bear is in time-out!" Then he walks back to the doll and says, " You are still happy? I take 'way your hammer, too!" (this doll wears a tool belt).

Joe looks at me with a shocked expression... " Is that normal?" he asks. "Yes" I said, "don't worry. It is perfectly normal for him to exact a similar punishment on his dolls as we do to him. "

Let's just say that Will's behavior at Mass this morning.... less than stellar! I think he was looking for a moment to even the score at least in his three year old mind! Pretty funny...