Pickle-icious

Vivian is very little for her age. Today, I think she had the first experience of ever exerting dominance over another living creature. She certainly doesn't have that luxury at home with her older siblings. Henry bowls over the poor baby at least once a day. She's resilient. This morning was another sunny, but brisk, morning. Such days are my favorite, and I almost can't stand not getting outside. We've been taking long walks, and I LOVE this weather. Vivian loves the great outdoors too. She often says, "OutSIDE!!" After we dropped off Henry at gymnastics, (which, by the way, he keeps calling "ballet class") I drove Evelyn and baby Vivian to a park with a large pond and playground. Vivian was in Heaven. She kept saying, "Honk! Honk!" I think my child would have picked up a goose had I let her get close enough. As it was, she kept following them, and they kept honking and moving away from her. She controlled the show, and she was very happy about it. One of my favorite things Vivian does these days is express her joy. Sometimes when I hand her "night-night" (her blanket) or give her warm milk, the angel will smile and say, "Happy." At the dentist's office today the women kept coming to the waiting area from the back to check out Vivian's cheeks and blue eyes. She was a hit with the ladies.

I asked Henry during a recent walk what I do that makes him happy. He said, "Play cars with me. Make me warm milk. Make me oatmeal with cinnamon." I have three Henry stories to share before I hit the sack. First, he said, "I'm going to marry you when I grow up, and when I grow up, Daddy's going to grow little." Next, he copies his big sisters and sings his version of a funny song to me. It goes, "Mommy and Daddy, sitting in a tree, K-I-S (pause) T-U-V." Just typing that made me laugh out loud. He thinks he's so clever with that one. I about ended his cleverness when I found him standing inside the lowest drawer of his highboy dresser just as he jumped out of it. My girls were never so dangerous. Finally, yesterday the children played in the yard as I made lunch, then I let them have a picnic. The baby dropped her pear slice in the rubber mulch of the playset. Henry's hands were a mess, and he told me, "Mom, we're digging for coconuts." He held a jar of acorns.

Okay, this one needs prep. There is a children's storybook with the title Pinkilicious. It is about a youngster who sneaks too many pink cupcakes and....(yes...you guessed it) she turns pink. All of my kids like the story. The little girl tells it, and the voice is great. Evelyn is our art girl. She is constantly, and that is no stretch, CONSTANTLY making projects. She lives to create things with paper and glue and tape and anything else she can find...trash, scrap ribbon, feathers, rocks. The list is long. Well, during one recent endeavor she managed to turn her foot green. It stayed green after the shower she gave herself. Robbie was teasing her about it, and he said, "I think Evelyn must be Pickle-icious." Olivia and I LOVED Daddy's joke. Man, did we laugh hard. I love Robbie's humor, and that was his best quick thinking line in ages. Evelyn found no humor in it. She got mad about her green feet and the pickle comment. I think Pickle-icious may stick. If she's sour, then I'm going to bring it out again.

Olivia has now had two piano lessons. Robbie wanted her to practice more this evening, and she was mad about it. She left the room in a huff and then sat down to play her songs some more. I told Robbie that it was ironic that we knew she was mad, yet she couldn't sit down and bang out some low down tune. Instead, the little song was light and sweet and high. It didn't match her attitude one bit. That was a blessing for us.