Son, Oh Son.

Sometimes I joke that God gave me just one son because he knows what I can handle.

We have a certain night of the week in which Evelyn finishes ballet class, Olivia has to be at ballet class, and Henry (and his friend with whom we carpool) must be at a local park for soccer all at the same time.  This creates a major challenge, and our timeline must be precise to insure timeliness.  At the exact minute that the kids were supposed to load into the van, I heard a most tremendous crash inside the garage.  It sounded like the whole house shattered.  I opened the door to find Henry with his eyes wide and his mouth open in utter disbelief.  Glass, loads of it, was shattered all over our garage floor.  His soccer ball was on top of our glass recycling bin, and he had accidentally pulled the entire tub full of glass off a four foot high shelf.  It crashed down, and by the grace of God did not cut him.  My first question was, "Are you hurt?"  When he shook his head no and apologized, I said, "Get in the van."  I was totally calm.  Thankfully, I had parked in the driveway, and the garage door was shut.  We had no danger of glass in those tires.  I then made the dreaded call to Robbie, as he was heading to his parking spot in the garage, and explained that the entire area was covered in shattered glass.  When I texted a picture to my friend, she got a good laugh and responded that it looks like we drink a lot.  I imagine I will always associate the sound of breaking glass with this event of Henry's childhood.

Henry started piano lessons in February after pleading to receive them like his sisters.  This requires practice time at home.  The girls use the keyboard too, and if they put their sheet music over Henry's piano book then to him it has disappeared forever.  He's not great at searching for missing items.  I was making dinner one afternoon at the start of piano practice time.  Henry appeared in the kitchen in a rage, insisting that his piano book had been hidden and demanding that I find them.  I was busy, and I didn't like his bad attitude.  I said, "Son, do you think Jesus spoke to Mary the way that you are speaking to me?"  He immediately responded with, "Mommy, do you think Mary helped Jesus find things when they were missing?"  I had to laugh at his quick wit, but his quip required additional reprimanding.