As of late, our family unit is looking a little bit smaller, about twenty-five percent smaller, to be exact. With the older boy being a high school senior who works and has a girlfriend, more and more dinner conversations, outings, and movie-watching evenings include only Jim, the younger boy, and me. It’s weird. We’re in the final six month stretch: the older boy will be away at college starting this fall. While I look forward to this next major transition because it means that he is one step closer to being the independent adult we have been raising him to be, of course there is a bittersweet taste to it…
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All Stuck Up And No Where To Go(ggles)
Children go through all kinds of attachments as they grow up. We parents make most of the decisions regarding whether these attachments are okay, normal, weird, cute, funny, disgusting, or otherwise. For the most part, as long as our children aren’t in danger, we let it go or even encourage. After all, if it makes them happy… As babies they might be hooked on the pacifier. As they grow a little older, a special stuffed animal or a blanket might seem like an extra appendage. Of course, some kids suck their thumbs. Older still, and a child might carry around a doll, a car, or another sort of special toy.…
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He Can Call Me, Anytime.
When the younger boy was toddling around, he didn’t call me “Mom” all the time. He called me by my name on occasion, because that’s what he heard other people call me. Of course, we had to teach him that, to him, I was “Mom”. We didn’t actively encourage him to call me “Melisa”, BUT… …it was adorable when he did it. I vividly remember him calling me from upstairs: “Muh-liCH-uhhhh!” (he said it with the “Ch” sound that you would recognize from the name Johann Sebastian BaCH or the LoCH Ness Monster) Those days seem like eons ago. So many life experiences have come and gone since then, more…
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Note To @Zoeyjane: I’ve Finally Made It!
There is always much ado about Mommy Bloggers and their propensity to discuss the details of every bowel movement belonging to or coming out of their children. As the mother of two teen boys, I have never dabbled in discussing the topic of poop because they were teens when I started blogging and…frankly, YUCK. Also, might I state the obvious by saying that not only do my boys never discuss their bathroom habits with me, but I don’t want to know AND wouldn’t share that with the internet public. And then, the other day, I found out that by having teen boys who–probably–do poop (everyone does, you know) and are…
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Date Night
Last night, the younger boy took his girlfriend to a movie. Actually, I took them both to a movie, since they are fourteen and need a chauffeur in order to go anywhere further than the edge of their respective neighborhoods. I asked him which movie they were going to see, and he replied, “New Moon.” I marveled out loud at how nice a boyfriend he is, to agree to take her to see that, and he replied something along the lines of “I know.” I dropped them off, and as they walked away from the car towards the ticket office, my mind traveled back to a movie date I had…