It's funny how pushing out a baby, and handling three children all day every day, and knowing in the ins and outs of car seats and diapers and the odd truth of how your kid throwing up or pooping on you somehow isn't as gross as anyone else's vom or poop -- none of those make me feel quite as much like a Real Mom as homemade jewelry that looks super homemade yet I actually don't mind wearing in public.
Or being subjected to the public reading of a survey of your kid's impressions of you.
Or a coffee date with a sweet boy who produces a card with a poem inside, and it's actually the best poem ever written, which is just a pure objective fact.
Or a fancy* mother's day tea party brunch while sitting in a chair approximately an eighth the size of mah ass.
*very loose definition
I roll my eyes at it all, but somehow it does make me feel like a Real Mom.
Also here is a picture with Charlotte because my lands, I'm not That Mom who would leave one kid out. Simmer down with the pearl clutching.
Nathan is seven and a half. SEVEN AND A HALF. (I keep waiting for the age that won't give me all-caps wide eyes, but we haven't hit it yet.)
My sister pointed out this week that being seven and a half means he's halfway to driver's ed. (I told her to shut her damn* mouth, because obviously.) (*I used a different word.) (Not a better one.) (Not the one you're thinking though.) (I digress.) (Parentheses!)
Anyway, he is growing up and I'm trying not to do any mom math in my head or I will realize it's all going to fast, and I will panic. So instead I will just think about the here and now. So, some things about Now:
Nathan is growing, yet ever-smaller for his age, still wearing mostly size 6 clothes (the same as Anneliese!) but he is suddenly eating everything in sight, and asking for more, and he ordered a Korean steak taco at the smoothie place the other day, and I don't even know who he is anymore, is what I'm saying.
No, no. What I am saying is I think we are expecting a growth spurt any minute now, and maybe he won't be the smallest in his class forever. (Or maybe he will. He is also one of the very youngest. Mark was also the youngest and the smallest, so... it could happen.)
He is very into planes and ships and designing and building lego vehicles of any kind - flying and sailing and driving alike. He will read fiction with some coaxing, but mostly he reads biography after biography, even of people he has never heard of. (What?) He watches video footage about aviation and what causes plane crashes, and seems undisturbed, yet won't watch the Little Mermaid because Ursula terrifies him (see also: the first five minutes of Tangled).
He loves whales and space and geography - asking questions about countries and languages and poring over the giant world map on his ceiling (yes really) and the world atlas book my dad gave him for Christmas. (If you know my dad, that's the least shocking sentence in the history of ever.)
He and Anneliese remain best buddies, and he is jealous for her attention when she and Charlotte are feeling particularly chummy on a given day. He does his running club at school on Friday mornings, and is fast, but besides that he isn't super into sports. He sings in children's choir at church (a solid fifth-ish below everyone else, not that it matters) and still plays his cello, better and better all the time. He is a baby hoarder, squirreling away bits of paper, and pieces of toys and random... stuff that he thinks he might want to build something with.
(The other day he told me he was bored -- well, he started to, and then I reminded him if he says he is bored I will find some extra chores for him to do -- and so he went in the recycling bin and got this starbucks cup and built... a boat? I think? THIS IS SO NATHAN, Y'ALL.)
He is a kid who wavers between extreme chattiness, and not knowing how to say what he wants to say. He writes and draws a lot.
Here is some information about the Queen Mary 2. (Why, what does your seven-year-old obsess over?) You can choose whether you like or don't like the information. Complete with a hand-drawn thumbs-up, because he is a Child Of The Era. (I always circle "like." Duh.)
His obsession with this ship oddly makes me miss my Grandpa Schnack. They would have had so much fun being boring together. Truly. Grandpa would have delighted in him.
Here is a Japanese battleship, complete with WWII-era Japanese naval flag (?) (we are fully living in the age of when our kid knows more than we do about the stuff he's interested in).
And yes that's me on top, sitting on a lounge chair, reading a book. I mean... at least I get to go to war? (What does this say about what he thinks of me?)
He is known to bring random notes downstairs to us, that sometimes do or don't make any sense.
He also has an old phone of Mark's, which he can use when he asks permission. He has had a gmail account for several years, and he uses the chat app to "text" people which is usually pretty cute.
Well, usually pretty cute. Not always.
And sometimes just super exciting, as Mark is learning.
And sometimes really legitimately adorable.
And yes, like every other kid his age, he is into Minecraft (thanks Uncle John) (no really, it's fine -- cute, even) and he not only plays the game, but watches other people playing the game on YouTube. AND watches all manner of toy review and project/craft videos, and then got the harebrained idea that he should... do one himself?
So many questions. Is where/how to get that template not an important part of the instructions? Why not color the eyes before folding it? And WHY SO MUCH TAPE FOR THE LOVE. (He could use some time-lapse here also.)
(Please know, he is so proud of this. Really super duper pleased.)
(This all happened with Mark's help one night while I was at choir. I came home and it tickled me so much I cried.)
My child! Who spent years staring at adults, mute, when they asked him something. Who even now hates when people watch him or call attention to him or even laugh at his jokes... wants his own YouTube channel? Talks to the camera as if it's the most normal serious thing in the world? I don't even know, y'all.
Growing up. It's weird.
Happy half birthday, you quirky bright sweet wonderful child.
There is not much exciting to tell about it, but it was actually a lovely sort of low-key day. I slept (somewhat) late, had a morning choir rehearsal, had a sweet brunch with Mark and the kids, spent most of the afternoon snuggling and reading, which is exactly what I wanted, and then went on a fantastic date to a vietnamese-asian-something-type seafood restaurant in Chapel Hill.
"Charlotte told me what to write," Nathan explained (rolling his eyes).
A lady in choir made finger cookies, which were FAR to reminiscent of the snow adventure horrible finger situation for me to actually stomach.
We also shopped some for a new wedding/engagement/anniversary/whatever ring, to replace the one I lost on the cruise this spring. I can't make myself pull the trigger just yet, it's a weird mix of exciting and lovely and also SO SAD (no ring will ever be the one he put on my finger at our wedding) but there is one that he loves that we feel good about, so that will probably be happening soon.
Oh! And my dad sent me flowers as per his tradition.
I'm sure a lot of dads send flowers on their daughters' birthdays, but I'd like to think my flowers make me smile more than other people's, because the whole thing started when I was five and my dad brought home apology flowers for my mom but since it was my birthday I assumed they were for me (red roses! HA!) and I guess my dad couldn't bear to tell me they weren't, so he went with it, and then the next year I was so excited/expected to get flowers again that it turned into a Thing. And he's sent flowers for every single birthday since then, including the two years I was living in Europe on my birthday. There is something really fun and adorable about your dad tracking down a florist in a foreign country to wish you a happy birthday. (The internet was not then what it is now, y'all. Just trust me. It was a sweet and impressive feat.) Anyway it's a fun tradition and it makes me smile every. single. year.
(I just went and looked, and somehow this a story I have never told in a blog post before, WEIRD WHY NOT ERIN?)
Also! Marky got me a Kindle paperwhite! I am new to the world of e-reading, so y'all tell me what I need to know to become a kindle person, okay? Right now I'm not a kindle person. But I can be! I want to be! It is better than packing stacks of books when I travel, for sure! Right now I mostly only use kindle as a phone app, for reading trashy romance novels. Smut, basically. So a real kindle is like my version of big-screen smut! Yeah I said it. Anyway it's beautiful and I want it to be for more than that so help me!
And the size of this thing is just perfect. So much smaller than a tablet, so much bigger than a phone. It's like... a BOOK! (Duh, Erin.) (I am easily impressed.) The size sort of delights me.
A fun part of my new kindle was texting with Kelley in India for pointers on connecting it to my library account. What, doesn't everyone contact your friends in the third world to help with their first-world problems? (Yes, yes actually, we do.)
Anyway. I digress. Happy birthday to me! And yes, the leaves changed just in time.
We took advantage of the pre-snow snow day a couple of weeks ago to go pick out new glasses for Nathan, whose old ones were getting a mite small. He found some he liked, and even though I am still getting used to how much older he looks in them, I like them too.
But really. So old. How is this my baby??
Unrelated to anything (except maybe to getting older? kinda?) he also came home from school with this completed "how-to" assignment on jumping into a pool:
His schoolwork is all, oh jumping in the pool is easy. You just get a pool. And jump in it. I can do that. Is he for real? He absolutely cannot do that. (I mean, not by himself.)
{Nathan wanted to write a post for "his blog" (????) several weeks ago and he wrote this but I never got around to posting it. And now it is colder here than it has been in twenty years, so it's a good time for a dinosaur wearing a scarf, right? Right.}
Hi its Nathan. i made a pickshur of a TYRAANASAURUS REX if it was alive today
evryone whoud be runing for there lives!! Becuse it was GINT! and sharp teth.
i have a stuft tyrannasaurus rex his name is Rex and i sometimes i call him
rexey and i allways sleep and play with him he is speshle too me. and tiger is too. and from amezon and i got a plush spinosaurus that means stuft anemal. his name is spino he is speshle too me too!
no one nos if they got cold but if they wared a sckarf it wud be so funney!
Tyrannasaurus rex and spinosaurus are the biggist predoters. i love trex and spinosaurus they are my faiverte dinosaurs.
{1-3. Y'all. I somehow didn't get anything actually posted in the whole month of December. Despite having several things mostly written and waiting on pics. So. Let's play catchup, shall we?}
Okay so here is how our November rounded out:
-- We played outside because fall is lovely.
-- Bowden got fleas. Apparently there is an epidemic of med-resistant fleas in our part of the country, particularly in urban/suburban areas where the only fleas breeding with each other are fleas who somehow survived the meds everyone uses, creating some super-resistant class of fleas. Y'ALL. I CANNOT. SO GROSS. I will not detail all the pain of fighting this, because it is boring and complainy, but just picture me on hands and knees crying brushing borax into the carpet, and then covering everything with insecticide, then paying three million dollars to our vet for fancy meds, then scrubbing out our vacuum cleaner, and you'll have the idea. Oh, and then repeat that because those b!tches came back. AGAIN. SO GROSS.
-- Our vet recommended that we take Charlotte to the doctor about the fleas -- she is the one covered in bites, which is pretty typical considering she is our bug magnet in general, and also closest to the floor where they live etc (SO GROSS), and even though they don't like human hosts or transmit disease, I guess ingesting the bugs themselves (and more specifically their fecal matter) (HOW MANY TIMES CAN I SAY *SO GROSS*) can cause problems, and toddlers are the most apt to do that kind of thing, or something -- but it turns out our appointment was dumb because they don't actually DO anything for her unless she presents with symptoms of worms or whatever, which can take several weeks (someone remind me of this in a month if I mention she has a fever or won't eat). But. The children did play and read nicely on the floor for a solid ninety seconds in the doctor's office, so that happened.
(After that it was a sh!tshow, so I don't plan to take all three of them together again anytime soon.)
-- We watched Daniel with a LOT of babies in my lap.
-- Another Nathan lost his phone which shouldn't be particularly blogworthy except he also lost his wits about it (no judgement, if it's true that you don't know the measure of the man til he can't find his phone, then I don't want anyone to witness me having lost mine either) and after several hours of stress and withdrawal, I got reeeally lucky in between dishwasher white noise and kiddie chaos, and a second of silence happened right when I was walking by the couch, which was right when someone was texting him or something, and I heard a wee buzz.
I called it a thousand times and dug through the cushions and eventually realized it was IN THE LINING OF THE COUCH and short of unstapling the leather from the frame, I wasn't sure how to get it out. Turns out all I had to do was turn the couch upside down and climb under it.
Only one spatula and one coat hanger were casualties of the rescue effort. (My kids thought it was HI-larious. I'd do it again in a hot minute. Not just because I felt like macguyver. Hey I take my kicks where I can get em.)
-- Nathan wrote another book. A hymnal of sorts. Behold the inside, and try not to melt, because if there is anything more precious than children's handiwork, it's children's handiwork about Jesus, WITH MUSIC NOTES and also a page about dinosaurs because obviously.
-- Oh and we had a really lovely Thanksgiving. Mark had to work that night so he slept most of the day and Another Nathan helped me cook, and then we all ate together in the late afternoon. (Before a Friends thanksgiving-episode marathon, and combing through black friday ads, of course.)
We made a turkey in the crock pot which is apparently a thing you can do, and we had Mark's beloved cranberries, and pretzel chicken, and made a delicious peanut butter frosting for the traditional Thanksgiving dessert: birthday cake.
So, here is a cute thing Nathan has been doing recently: writing books.
(I promise not to do this kind of thing all the time HAHAHAHA I can't even finish that thought, I make no such promises, I am a mom and I have a blog so I will be telling alllll the cute things.)
His elective this quarter (yes, he has electives), after some disappointment at not getting into a group piano class (story for another day) is a writing class, and we think this has somehow made him feel empowered to write All the Books.
One night he crept down out of his room at like 10:30, after (apparently) being very busy for hours at his desk with printed coloring pages, scissors and crayons, talking something about hey mommy daddy I wrote a book, and like any excellent parents, we were all, mmmmkay buddy sounds great GO TO BED.
Well, come morning, we found this gem (gem I say!) stacked and gluesticked and stapled together:
And then another:
And then there was an informative booklet on dino predators, with this as the final page culminating his thoughts:
And another book after that, and another. He wrote one for Mark about about a stegosaurus fighting a spinosaurus. He wrote one for Another Nathan about an allosaurus fighting an ankylosaurus (I think?) and one about an apatosaurus being bigger than a house -- so yeah, there is a theme to this series, you could say.
And then there were several books on airplanes:
(I like Plans better. I would read a book about Plans. I love Plans. Let's make Plans!)
Apparently he is also a librarian, and here are his "Dinosaurs Books Choices" if you would like to check one out from him:
My favorite part of it all is that colorful spinosaurus towering over the fallen t-rex. I cannot not laugh. CANNOT. Every time.
When he wins his first Pulitzer I am going to be really glad I scanned this crap in.
We are back from Chicago and it was faaaaabulouuus (Oprah voice) and I will post pictures and tell all about it soon.
But for now, Nathan has given me permission to share some of his emails (!!!) which I have been bursting to do ever since we set him up with his own gmail a few months ago.
It occurred to us when we were touring schools for him for next year that lots (most) (almost all) of those first grade kids have some computer proficiency. And even though typing will probably be outdated by the time he is in high school, we still didn't think it was a bad idea to get him familiar with how a keyboard is layed out, how to click with a mouse (haaaaa speaking of technology on the way out) (kids these days unfailingly try to swipe at screens, y'all know that right?) (he already rejects the regular mouse in favor of the track pad on the chromebook, which is set up to scroll like a phone -- upside down from how a mouse scrolls... if you have never noticed that, you will now), and ANYWAY we decided any practice at spelling and writing and forming words and sentences is a good thing.
So, he emails now. The cutest funniest most awesome emails to ever land in my inbox, if I'm being honest.
He has a set list of pre-approved people in his contact list, so he can type their names and send email to them. His gmail is linked to both mine and Mark's accounts too, so we can keep an eye on things from our phones really easily. And he doesn't know his own password. I am maybe more protective than I need to be, but this is new territory so we are taking it slllooooowly.
Several times a week, during alone time, he tells me he has some emails to send (each one takes a small eternity) and he works on it quietly while I read my feedly and twitter and such. (Oh my quiet hours and internet my precious). He sends random thoughts and random pictures and lots and lots of affection.
He is adorable, is what I'm saying, but since he said I can share some notes, you don't have to take my word for it.
His very first email:
from:
Nathan Goettsch
to:
Grandma
date:
Tue, Apr 9, 2013 at 4:29 PM
subject:
HI
Hi Grandma
I Love yuo. i Can Email THat is my fervrit part. Wial Yuo email me?
Love Nathan
And then he learned that we could attach pictures to what he wanted to email about. That day he won a pencil in Spanish bingo was something else.
from:
Nathan Goettsch
to:
Daddy
date:
Thu, Apr 25, 2013 at 2:48 PM
subject:
Re: hi
Dad I want to SHO you some Thing
I wone a pinsul
in spinsh have a good Day at work
Love Nathan.
from:
Nathan Goettsch
to:
Ashley
date:
Fri, Apr 26, 2013 at 2:07 PM
subject:
Re: Hi, Nathan!
hi Ashley I Love you too. I ate Piza at school for Lunch. I wone a Pensul in spinsh at school Yestuday I want to sho you Some Thing a picsher ov my pensul!
I Love you! i Lik yur shurt! love Nathan.
from:
Nathan Goettsch
to:
Grandpa
date:
Fri, Apr 26, 2013 at 3:12 PM
subject:
Re: Hi Nathan
Grandpa i ate Piza for lunch what did you et for lunch? i Love you i hope you ar Having a Nise Thime!
i wone a pensul in Spinsh! Mommy takd a picshr!
love Nathan.
It was around that time he started signing emails Love Nathan! with his signature exclamation mark, which... yeah. I don't even think I need to mention how perfect that is.
from:
Nathan Goettsch
to:
Barbara
date:
Sun, May 5, 2013 at 1:00 PM
subject:
Hi
Barbara I Have a CooL Mc Dolns Toiy
Barbara Wat ar you Doing Today!
Can you come to my tee BoLL Gam some time
Wile you Email me bak?
Love Nathan!
from:
Nathan Goettsch
to:
Mommy
date:
Mon, May 13, 2013 at 1:48 PM
subject:
Love
I Love you so Moch come to the MoLL it has Legos
can dad come to
I love you
love Nathan!
from:
Nathan Goettsch
to:
Mommy
date:
Tue, May 14, 2013 at 1:54 PM
subject:
Love
Mommy sometimie can we go to UncleBrads hose?
sometimie Love Nathan!
from:
Nathan Goettsch
to:
MrsV
date:
Sun, May 26, 2013 at 10:40 AM
subject:
Re: Hi
MrsV
at shcooL you ar a good teacher i cant belev it is ovr i want sixte thoznde mor days of shcooL!
i Love you
i Lik yur blue shortes they ar my fevrit
Love Nathan!
And then the emails got longer. And sweeter. And less shy about asking for replies. Ha.
from:
Nathan Goettsch
to:
Ashley
date:
Mon, May 27, 2013 at 3:20 PM
subject:
HI
Ashley i wen to the Pul and swimde i sapraed Anneliese and it was vare fun.
i am aL dun with shcooL we did not hav shcooL today i cant bleve it is ovr!
Wote ar you doing today at yur hose
i Hope you ar having a vare Nise timie!
Will you Email GMail me a picshur agN Sometimie?
i Love you!
so much
Love Nathan!
from:
Nathan Goettsch
to:
MrDavid
date:
Wed, Jun 5, 2013 at 2:05 PM
subject:
shos
Mr. David i want to sho you something it is a Picshur ov my shos
they ar vare cool do you Lik them? Will you bring som shos jus Lik min?
Some time my mom can git me a sangk olf shurt Lik yurs.
Wote ar you doing today? Will you Email me a picshur of wote you ar doing? i Hope you ar having a Nise Day!
Love Nathan!
from:
Nathan Goettsch
to:
AnotherNathan
date:
Thu, Jun 20, 2013 at 8:58 PM
subject:
Hi!!
Another Nathan will you send me a Email? Will you send me a picsher of war you aer?
it is the monten it is calde monchret.
Today i warde a purpul caler shert and DrZ warde one to! but he has the white butNs i Have the purpul butNs.
aer you Having fun war you aer? i Hope you aer having a vare Nise Thime.
will you Email me i rillee want you to
Bcos i rillee Love you! so much!
win you come hom i have a ise crem book mark we can go together to eat it! kupon.
i Love you! do good Sleping.
wer making a Love cak! do you memerbre that song! i singd it!
Love Nathan!
from:
Nathan Goettsch
to:
Marmie
date:
Fri, Apr 26, 2013 at 3:13 PM
subject:
HI
Marmie wial you Email me bak? i have Email now. i Hope you ar having a Nise Thime love Nathan!
And then he got it into his head that he should email about random factoids he gleans:
from:
Nathan Goettsch
to:
AnotherNathan
date:
Wed, Jun 26, 2013 at 4:21 PM
subject:
fish!! samN
Another Nathan
did you no that samN can swim up a watre fall!!
aer you having a Nise day
I Hope it is fun at church
Love Nathan!
And little goodnight emails when Daddy is on night shift are so crazy sweet.
from:
Nathan Goettsch
to:
Daddy
date:
Sat, Jun 29, 2013 at 3:54 PM
subject:
hi
Daddy have a nics nitie
we will have a nics nitie to
Love Nathan!
If you want a pen pal like Nathan, let me know and I will send you his email address. The subject line will probably be hi. And he will want to know what shirt you're wearing. Maybe shoes too. And will potentially request that you send him a picture of what you're doing. Be ready.
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