eight nine is enough

A former employer of mine once asserted the "fact" that men are unable to watch children alone because they just don't have the same patience level that women have. As you already know, I have respectfully chosen to disagree with him, not out of spite mind you, but instead because after knowing myself for almost a full twenty years now, I have come to the realization that I possess the patience of a lobotomized tortoise. Certainly, you say, everyone has a breaking point to where their patience runs out and they just snap. To those, I say, let us put this to the acid test by inviting nine young boys ages five to six on a cold and rainy Saturday for Elijah's birthday party to see if the case holds true for me.

Ok, lets tally up the score here; hmmm, five break downs, three of which resulted in tears...the decibel level of a Shuttle launch at ground zero... screams piercing enough to shatter diamonds... all delightfully enhanced by a chocolate cake shaped like a giant blue Lego, and yet Mr. Steve and Mrs. Nadine's sanity steadfastedly remains.

Yes, Nadine and I hosted the party of a lifetime this past Saturday in celebration of our little man's sixth birthday. Fortunately all the kids were very respectful and at least tried to use their inside voices when reminded to do so. They all seemed to have a good time and got a chance to play some really fun games with one another. One such game was sent to Elijah from his Auntie Stephanie in NC and was called Hyper Dash. The kids loved it and it gave them a chance to run around like crazy monkeys for a little while. Another of the the crowd favorites was a contest to see who could get the most clothespins into a jar while dropping them from bellybutton height. With the way the kids would holler at every falling clothespin, you would have thought they were watching Tiger Woods attempting to make up lost ground in the final day of the Master's Tournament at Augusta (I know it's a weak analogy but I'm attempting to be topical...typically.)

The young boys were not the only ones thoroughly impressed by the clothespins in the jar game. Amelia, convinced that the game held some deeper message explaining the purpose of human existence, has not let the plastic mayonnaise container and wooden fasteners out of her sight since the contest ended. Every few steps she will dump the pins out of the jar onto the floor only to pick them up and place them right back in, one by one. Once she has collected them all, she stands up and sets off in search of the next great place to empty and refill her jar. (Come to think of it, she may be much wiser than I originally thought. Her modern day parable of Sisyphus may be the most poignant and insightful allegory ever presented to this fine institution. Bravo, Amelia. Bravo.)

Feelings of utter amusement were not the only kind spawned here today over the jar, though.
Mr. Zachers, upon seeing Amelia continually wandering around the house plopping her jar down on the carpet became somewhat jealous today and decided that he'd had quite enough of her showing him up. After airing a couple brief grievances Zach popped up on his skinny little fours, crawled over to the jar, and got it for himself. Wait, what? Did you just say...?

That, I did. Zach is, of today, a crawler.







...and on Friday, Amelia and I went to COSI where I took this self portrait. Fun with Fun-house mirrors.