It's barely 6am and I've been up for an hour.  Doing what?  Being crabby.  If I knew that waking up with Lewis at 5, 4:30, 4am would mean I got to finish "work" earlier I probably wouldn't be so crabby right now, but we all know that's not how it works.  I'm still going to be working at my job until 8pm.  And even after 8pm I'll still be on call all night. 

Many of these super early-rise mornings have been quite productive for me.  I've made bread, I'll empty the dishwasher or clean something else, sometimes I watch a show…  But today I'm just pissed.  If I'm going to wake up this early I want it to be to do something just for me!  Like exercise or meditate or read.  Waking up two hours before anyone else in the house just os I can do more of what I do all day long feels like punishment.  I'm tired and almost, just almost able to resist smiling at Lewis, the smiliest baby in the world.

I actually thought about counting the number of times I hear “Mama?” in a day, but that seemed too daunting so I thought I could do a minute-by-minute average, but I lost focus.  Lately it seems like I’m hearing “Mama?” more than ever!  Every sentence, every observation, every utterance seems to start, or just be  “Mama?”  Over and over and over.  Sometimes, many times, my patience wears and I slip and say, “What?!?!”  

Lew crawls, etc. from Ben Garvin on Vimeo.

Let it be noted that Ben cropped some of these pictures so they are not all Art’s compositional choices. And the one of me in the green sweater was taken by Ben. He forgot when he was making this nice collage.

It was so cute when I picked Art up from school. Six little kids were running from room to room with Miss Wendy saying, “He’s not in here! Where is he? Have we looked in the refrigerator?” and they would all go into another room together. And guess who was leading the pack? Art! He’d say, “Miss Wendy! Miss Wendy! Let’s look under the table!” I thought to myself, “I’m using this against him the next time he says he doesn’t want to go!” The boy was having some serious fun with everyone. Well, I won’t really use it against him, but it sure was great to see.

While he was running around with everyone he had in one hand the small picture of myself I had cut out for him. Wendy said that he kept it in his hand much of the day and every once in a while he would look down at it and then keep playing.

The kids were all running around looking for the Gingerbread Man. Wendy had hidden a paper cutout of a gingerbread man on the front desk and they were all trying to find him. After they found him they started heading over to their coats. Another mom had arrived and Art immediately started telling her that they were looking for the Gingerbread Man. “He’s pretty tricky. You might have to look for him because he’s pretty tricky,” he said with his head cocked over to the side and a that’s-just-the-way-it-is face. He didn’t even notice or care about me and Lewis standing right next to the mom he was talking to, and then he said, “He’s pretty tricky, Mama.” Then he washed his heads three times and drank from the drinking fountain a hundred times. When I finally got him out of there he said, “I want a drinking fountain at home. Can we have one?” When I said no he thought about it and said, “Next time I go to school I can drink from that fountain again.”

Next time he goes to school. We have definitely turned a corner. I’m happy for him and preparing to have him cast me aside over the next few months in favor of his friends. It’s possible so I’m preparing. I’m also preparing to hear, “I don’t want to go to school!” on Monday, just like I heard today.

I wouldn't pay $4 for this loaf of bread, but we did nearly finish it the night it was baked.  Third try this weekend!

(When I made the first airless solid loaf Art said, "I like this bread!"

Well, we got a new little point and shoot camera today. I shot Art, he shot us. It takes movies, too, so look for more of those coming soon!