A Tale from the Justin Bieber Note Book and Other Weekend Shenanigans WITH KIDS!

One of the best parts of being an instant parent are the moments when it all comes together and you realize that you are living the best life...you're creating new family traditions and introducing your new kids to this new family culture and they like it! You teach them about hindus and they are curious. You introduce them to people from other countries and they act confused but eventually consider them friends. And all the while, they are teaching you how to be a kid again and let go of expectations and go with the flow (something kind of hard when it's all so sudden!)

This was one of the best weekends.

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K1 (8 year old manchild) & K2 (7 year old girliegirl)are constantly making crafts in their room from the drawer where I chuck all the leftover art supplies. This is nice because it gives them some autonomy and it provides all kinds of fun surprises for us. K2 came out of her room the other day with a full-on dog costume made out of tissue paper(she calls herself BUNNY) and set up shop in the kitchen where I was making dinner. Then k1 joined her as the family cat and they both demanded cat/dog food. I put it in bowls on the floor because I DON'T tolerate animals at my table. K2 proceeded to wear the costume everywhere we went that night and with some urging from JR, hung her head out the back window and wagged her tongue at delighted cars beside us at stoplights.

These kids are so creative and independent and funny. They must get that from me (haha!)

BUT WAIT! THERE"S MORE! The best thing we ever bought K2 was a little dollar store Justin Beiber notebook...Church would not be nearly as fun without the constant stream of love you/hat you notes (that's "hate" but in 7 year old parlance). It won't be long before she stops spelling so phonetically and stops writing the sary ("SORRY") notes and just hands me the teen-angst-you-are-not-my-mother hat notes.

Here's how it went down - We were celebrating K2's birthday on the weekend since we wouldn't be with her on her actual birthday. I made the requested barbie mermaid cake (you know the kind with the doll IN the cake) and she and dad took a special trip to toysrexpensive and picked out her dream toy...A moxie girl with a fake fish tale that "swims" in water. Seriously, can someone explain the obsession with mermaids? Sunday, she "accidently" brought the doll in her church bag and when I wordlessly took it from her and gave it to JR to hold, the notes a-started flowing:



My response was a little manipulative, I realize. I shouldn't have brought up the cake but I was feeling slightly desperate. Like, LOOK! I"M NOT MENE! I MADE YOU A CAKE WITH A DOLLAR STORE BARBIE MERMAID ON TOP!
Then I bore my testimony and I cried while I was up there, because well, that's what I do. I think K2 thought I was crying because of her and that makes me feel sad because I wasn't! But this response makes me laugh. You probably can't see it very well, but she drew me a cat without fur...you know, one of those ugly sphinx cats. We were watching "Too Cute" as a family the night before and she got super defensive when JR and I said that the furrless cats were obscene. She knew I would laugh at this picture. That's love...

And then...with much better penmanship and technique (prity ples!), she regained her focus. In case you can't read this it says "culd I huld my marmad prity ples" and when I said no...instead of hat-ing me, she said BLO, BLO which neither JR nor I can decipher. But I'm MENE again, this time with an E at the end and some flowers to take away the sting.

I know that this time of under-spelled hat notes and pretending to be a dog in public will not last forever (man, I really hope not or we've got bigger problems) and I'm trying to enjoy every minute instead of worrying about whether I'm doing it right. I already missed the first 6/7 years of their lives and believe me, I feel it sometimes when they do something funny and I wish they had learned it from me. It's painful sometimes not to be able to take credit for the good in them but I'm not going to let worry ruin my chance of being able to influence the next round of delightful awesomeness. I'm really lucky to know them and I have a lot of catching up to do!