week ending may 20, 2007:

Week ending May 20, 2007: This week the kids and I bought a Father’s Day present for Casey and I told them not to tell him because it is nice when presents are surprises. Casey came home from work that evening and the first thing Chloe said to him (in a stage wisper) “shhh… I’m not supposed to tell you that we bought a Father’s Day present for you. It’s a surprise.” Also this week we planted our first ever vegetable garden. I’d been meaning to plant a garden (I’ve been “meaning to do” about a hundred other things too) but never got to it. Then Bubbe said she had started some seed and would we like some seedlings? She gave us 18 vegetable plants, 5 herb plants, and 12 marigolds (to keep the bugs away). So, we spent all our spare time this weekend tilling a patch of back yard and planting. The kids were really excited about it and “helped” with the tilling for quite a while. Each of the kids has gardening gloves and Alex’s has Garfield on them. Alex kept mixing up the words and saying that he was helping me with the “Garfielding” instead of the gardening. Earlier in the week the kids presented me with some challenges in trying to answer their questions. Alex realized that he has testicles separate from his penis and while I was on the phone with a girlfriend, Alex came out of the bathroom naked with a handful of scrotum and said “Mom, what is this big thing called?”. My girlfriend also has a son and so I asked her. She said the kids call them “balls”. Later I told the story to Casey and I said that I remember kids calling them “nuts” and I didn’t want to tell Alex the wrong thing. Casey said that when Alex goes to school the kids will tell him what they are to be called. Chloe’s challenge to me came when we were looking at the old family photographs that we have in our stairway. Chloe was asking who each person was and when we got to my Dad’s mother I said “that is Granddad’s mommy, she is called Nana”. Chloe said she wanted to meet Nana and I said she couldn’t because Nana is in heaven. Then Chloe made the most amazing leap and said “who’s going to be my Mommy when you go to heaven?”. She’s so young to have to worry about things like this, but I think I convinced her that there will always be people to love and care for her.