Spontaneity

 Liam, Alex, and Charlie are rambunctious, busy boys. I have a variety of age-appropriate, diverse activities and games planned for them twice a week when I babysit. Fridays are park/splash pad/ swimming days. Public pools cannot get enough life guards, so we will be using the collapsible kiddie pool more than we'd like this summer. 

Sometimes I have to be spontaneous and come up with something off the cuff. This was one of those moments. After they'd successfully and cooperatively built a four room fort frame indoors with those sticks and balls, these were left overs. I made sure the sticks were secured into the holes in the hard balls to make putters, and I took a bucket of ping pong balls outside.

There is a sewer grate in our long driveway. Their goal was to land in the grate. Alex was the champ. Liam broke a few balls with his strength, and Charlie pounded and pummeled the hard solid plastic balls and concrete diligently trying to make contact. They had half an hour of exercise, fun and laughter.

Spontaneity is important in this world. Out-of-the-box thinkers take a round-about way to achieve the same goals as others. My husband says I am the only person he knows who can destroy one good thing to make another. Well, yeah...

My life this summer

I have lived a long and healthy life, so far. I have been blessed immensely with family, friends, a job I loved right up until the end. And now in my later years, I am so happy to be a great grandma to these three little adventurers. Alex is 4, Liam is going to be 8 next week, and Charlie is 3. They bring me so much happiness, and wear me out. I am teaching the littles and having summer fun with all of them.

These guys love the great outdoors. I do, too. I like to sit on the patio, (almost always a breeze) and read a book. 

Liam thought he would be bored at our house, but he said his first week with his brothers has been more fun than he could imagine. I led a summer day camp for school age kids for 15 years. He is amazed at how 'fun" I am and how many good ideas and games I come up with. LOL 

I believe a little dirt never hurt. Kids need to use their entire body and all their senses to explore and learn. We discovered a wonderful playground with a splash pad for all of the boys. That will be our Friday go to. If it were up to them, they would be there everyday. 

Yes, I get tired and stressed, but I am blessed. Today I am celebrating my 73 rd birthday. The boys will be celebrating their birthdays in June, July, and August. It is going to be a wild summer. I am fortunate to have the stamina, mind, and good health to handle these tigers. 

The littles are "reading." I placed a picture of a pig and pie on a paper. Then below the pics I wrote: The pig ate a pie. They touch and read. Of course they are reading the pictures (rebus reading) but they are very proud of themselves and interested in how letters make soumds and sounds create words. Literacy is so important.

Thank you for your visits to my blog. have a great week.

Long hot summer

 Life sure has a lot of big scaries!

Climate change, mass killings, hurricanes, forest fires, war ...

But three-year-old Charlie is not afraid. I told him not to ride his bike past the sewer in the

driveway. He declared, "Don't worry, Nana, if somebody tries to get me and sqoosh me, I'll squirt 'em!"

His year younger brother, Alex, took his Dawn dishwashing bottle (filled with water) and said, "This is my diesel fuel," and he gassed up his bike. Gas prices, talk about a fright!

Charlie had to use the bathroom and took off quickly. He came back looking dejected and said, "I didn't have to go. I just had gasoline."

I have all three boys, three times a week this summer. Here they are finger painting with shaving cream. Lucky for them I taught PreK for four decades, and for 15 years I taught summer day camp, 5-10 year olds. Liam is seven and impressed by my games with candy prizes. I have lots of ideas and tricks up my sleeve. It is going to be a long hot summer.

He's no Ninja! He's my hero.

Today I turned the corner onto a side street and saw a dinner plate-size, yellow-bellied turtle in my lane trying to cross the road. I stopped the car. Bill who has a bad back, achy knees, and uses a cane, said, "You are going to cause a wreck over a turtle," before he slid out, bent down, and plopped that big guy in tall grass far from the road. He's no teenager. He's no mutant. He's no Ninja, but my honey is MY HERO!

When I was small, baby turtles the size of quarters or half-dollar coins, could be purchased as pets from dime stores. Sales were discontuinued when it was discovered they carried samonella.

When my son was about eight, he rescued a box turtle from the country. We named it Speedy, because that critter could make it to the back gate in a flash. A few weeks later we returned it to the original spot. it never did its job anyway. We watched a water bug climb out of the sewer and over Speedy's shell.

Don't relocate turtles to new areas, even if you think their current location is odd (unless it is obviously hazardous, such as a busy parking lot). Moving them to an unfamiliar location can subject them to foreign diseases and parasites that they lack a natural immunity to, so that should be avoided.

A group of turtles is called a bale (ever seen a group piled on a log) or dole.

 

Tornadoes

This is three-year-old talkative Charlie. He is verbose, opinionated, informative, and a quick learner. He is spinning his brush, painting tornadoes and telling me everything he knows about them. 

Before he went down for a nap he said, "If you hear me say, 'OHHHHHH UHHHH' (big sigh) you'll know I'm up, okay?" He is a whirlwind of activity when he is awake. A cute little mini tornado.  

St. Louis and surrounding area experienced eight tornadoes Thursday, EF zeros and EF ones. Thankfully no death or major destruction. Damage to trees, cars, roofs. We are expecting a week of rain and storms. That is disappointing, as I had big plans for the boys.

Now, I'm expecting a lot of indoor activities next Tuesday and Thursday when Charlie and his year older brother, Alex, come for a visit. Life is filled with little disappointments. If we learn to handle the minor things we can be better prepared for the bigger ones. 

We had 91 degrees heat the other day. I put the boys in swim trunks.

"Where is the BIG pool? That little kiddie pool is too small." 

It served the purpose for water play and pouring. Making do is what we do.

Our neighbor invited the boys to swim in her son's and daughter-in-law's in-ground pool when she returns from vacation in two weeks. Excitement and disappointment all at once. 

The weather is too cool since the storms rolled through. But better weather will be here before we know it, and summer will be upon us. 

 

 

Moments in time

Grandkids growing up! Nicholas graduated last weekend and is destined for a good paying job starting next week. We are very proud of our instrumentation electrician.

Morgan graduated yesterday with a degree in psychology. She is destined for grad school and  pursuit of her masters in the fall. So proud of the hard work she put in these past years. Her last paper was on how music can be calming. She used Bill (her grampie) as a case study. She interviewed him on the phone and asked him to name 10 songs that had an effect on him growing up.

When he replied, "Tutti Fruiti," she laughed and thought he was joking. He named many other rock and roll songs which he loved to dance to over the years. He got so into it, he pulled the songs up on the internet and played each for her. He made her a tape of his old favorites from the 50's. 

This memorable moment made me smile, sniffle, wipe a tear, because the days are sometimes long, but the years have flown. Our knees are too bad for dancing, but we used to jitterbug all night long. The professor's comment was that music for Bill's generation represented social engagement and this generation has music at their fingertips and in their earpods. 

There were some memorable moments in Morgan's graduation ceremony. To begin with, the audience was asked to stand for the national anthem. Everyone stood. And waited. And waited. And waited. Technical difficulties... so we sang acapello. It was a moving experience. But not quite as moving as the older gentelman whose grandfather graduated in 1910, but his family had no record of it. Research proved he did indeed graduate from the college, and so the gentleman was presented with his grandfather's degree. He accepted it, turned to the audience and saluted. A memorable event, but not as memorable as what happened today.

Morgan's parents and brothers moved her out of her apartment and back home. She wanted to keep the fullsize bed she'd had while away, and advertised her single bed for sale. A buyer was coming at 4:00 p.m. to purchase it. So, her brothers sat it on the front lawn and pulled the moving truck in to the driveway. Nine of us helped unload the truck. Bill was the doorman. The young ones carried her belongings in. The house was filled with people coming and going.

Bill opened the door for a woman we did not know. (neighbor?) She greeted us and began walking around. Her husband followed. Asked if the barking dog would bite. We said no. He petted the dog. They began commenting about the furniture. Told the bed was outside, they said they didn't want a bed. 

"We stopped here because we saw an Estate Sale sign on the corner and figured this was the place."

We will laugh about this in years to come. "Grandpa let strangers in!" 

And so, a new chapter begins in the lives of grandson Nicholas and granddaughter Morgan.  We are thankful for family.    
 

Feeding the hungry

 I received news that moved me to tears. 

I contacted my first writing professor, 1979 (teacher appreciation week, you know) thanked him for a job well done, and sent him copies of Chicken Soup for the Soul books in which my stories are published. 

He said since I refused to accept payment from him, he has made a donation in my name to a worthy cause. Indirectly Chicken Soup for the Soul and I are responsible  for feeding Ukrainian people. 

No matter how small the effort, I can confirm one person can make a difference. 

I consider this HUGE. The monetary donation has been made in my name to World Central Kitchen. 

I am deeply touched by this gesture.