kiwords

I usually try to end school by Memorial Day. Start after Labor Day, done by Memorial day, that's just plain how God intended it. However, what with the whole "adding another human being to the mix" deal we've got going on around here, we're not quite done with school yet.

Correction: we haven't completed all the work I want to do. We are SOOOO done with school.

Every school day finds us in the same places. Tre sits at his desk, alternating between inspecting his toenails and despairing that his history outline STILL ISN'T DONE. Max wallows on the couch, amidst a sea of books and papers and pencils he has lost, and draws pictures in the blank spaces of his workbooks. Raphael is everywhere else in the whole house, bouncing around, crawling under his desk, climbing on the kitchen table, balancing on his tummy on the gliding ottoman, showing me the tricky hop/spin move he just figured out, and periodically bursting into tears because he WILL NEVER FINISH THIS MATH PAGE. I can be found somewhere, pinned under a nursing baby, muttering, "Yes you can too finish that outline and/or page, it would help if you just started, seriously, just start. Write ONE THING," and "Raphael SIT DOWN."

Little known educational fact that I just made up: the reason there are so many school trips and field days toward the end of the school year is so that the teachers won't eat the children.

Today I was in the girls' room, changing Sophia's diaper, and I overheard the boys talking as they "worked" in the living room.

"Hey," Tre said, managing to spare a moment from the toenail/despair cycle, "remember last night? When I let one loose? And it was like - four seconds long!"

There was hearty laughter and congratulations all around.

It's not that I'm so uptight that I can't handle some happy fart conversation, lest it sully my sea-shell ears. It's just that this was the FOURTH TIME the boys had felt the need to discuss Tre's Very Special Fart from the night before. I mean, REALLY.

"OH, for heaven's sake," I said as I walked into their midst with a fresh-diapered baby, "it was PASSING GAS, not a major cultural event. STOP, ALREADY."

They ducked their heads and snorted. I deposited Sophia on her blanket on the floor, and stalked off to wash my hands.

Sheesh. They are such BOYS.

As I washed my hands, Sophia realized that I was not HOLDING HER, AS MANDATED, and she proceeded to fuss. At the first irritated cry, all three boys called back to her.

"It's okay, Sophia," Raphael crooned from the floor under his chair.

"Awww, what's wrong, little squinchy?" Tre wanted to know.

"Don't worry, Sam," Max said. Sophia's initials spell Sam, and so that's what Max calls her.

Like a chorus of tree frogs, they peeped at her, and I listened from the next room.

Oh my. They are just...SUCH boys.