Precious Moments

One of the blessings and challenges of being a mother to three little ones is trying to appreciate and remember the precious moments that I share with them. This week there have been a few conversations that they've had with me that I want to record.

JAKE- Recently Jake was standing in front of the TV and repeating the word "AMO" "AMO" to me with an intense look in his eye. When he looks at me this way I know that he knows what he is trying to say and it kills me that I can't understand. After assuming that he didn't mean "ELMO" because he's never watched Sesame Street, I tried to distract him. This happened for days. Later, Luke turned on the Wii and Jake flew over to the TV! "AMO!", "AMO!", he was thrilled! So they each grabbed a controller and Jake pretended to play while Luke did. Every time they went to hit the ball, or bowl a strike Jake would repeat "AMO!" and exaggerate his body movements. It was then that it dawned on me.. he was saying "ALMOST!", which is what we say to him every time he is playing sports. Think about it, when kids miss catching a ball we say, "almost!" when they miss hitting the ball off a tee we say "almost!", etc, etc. Apparently he thinks sports are called "almost" and has also named the Wii that!

ASHLEY- I took her out to my friend's baby shower at Olive Garden last week and she was the only child there. She felt very special, all dressed up and enjoyed the night completely! When we got in the car to head home I set her in the backseat and she said "Oh! Thank you for putting me in my carriage!" I laughed. In her mind she'd been a princess the whole night!

Ashley has a little grandpa doll that goes with her dollhouse. His hips have cracked so his legs fall out all the time. Yesterday she caught me at a bad time and wanted me to put the legs back in and I said (in one of my less patient moments), "Ashley, the grandpa is dead. He legs keep falling out and he needs to be buried!" She walked off and I got back to my project. Then last night after being in bed for almost a half hour she came out to Tyler and I and timidly said she wanted to go get the grandpa. I said, "where is he?" And she said "outside" and headed to the front door. I thought, he is out in the front yard?! We followed her out and watched as she began to dig through the rocks. "I buried him", she said. I felt so bad! Soon, we had uncovered him, had a brief lesson on resurrection and Tyler got to work on a new pair of duct tape underware.

LUKE- He hasn't felt well for a couple days and had a burning up fever yesterday while we were out at Home Depot. As we stood in line I hugged him and said "I am so sorry that you have been sick, sweetie!" With his arms pulled inside his t-shirt and a sad looking, rosey cheeks face he said "mom.. should we tell Jesus?" I loved it. And of course we did.