The'y Growing up so Fast

A conundrum which I am sure so many parents before us have faced before.

The old cliché “they are growing up so fast”

But even more the frustrating when you want to capture these fleeting moments.

So much is happening. Blink and its gone. Did it really happen?

Two weeks ago, I wanted to write “Emmett will be up and crawling soon.” He had the army crawl down, he could get up on all fours and then cry in frustration because he was frozen in space unable to move forwards or backwards.

Now the “bulldozer”, he’s all over the place. Nothing stands in his way. He just moves forward; over toys, people, through chairs, heading towards what ever has caught his eye.

We can’t trust him in our bed by himself anymore. He races to the end, not even peering over the edge to contemplate, just continues and would disappear if you didn’t grab his leg at the right moment.

And what has caught his eye? Most of the time it is some object that will allow to him to pull himself up. Precariously balancing, not knowing what to do next, sometimes not caring so fixated on the “object” of his focus. And sometimes plopping back down.
He doesn’t rest, he won’t let you rest, until you have got him in bed, then you can crash.

Vacation? Did we have one? From 7:30 till 8 at night they had us in check, then we collapsed.

I’m not complaining, this is a fascinating time. There are so many developments to watch on both ends. The strange phenomena…We can’t wait for Emmett to get out of this phase or that phase, to be a little more independent. On the other side, our daughter is moving too fast in that direction.

I’m such a proud father to watch as she makes these jumps and yet sad that that little piece has just left. Stella makes her own way. She watches, explores and does her thing.

There is a zip line on one playground we go to. The first time, I lifted her on to the seat and ran behind her. The second time, as I was steadying the seat, Stella grabbed it with two hands and hopped on. She told me to let go and she was off on her own. She even tried to bring the rope back for the other kids and made it is far as her little arms could reach.

The following week we were at the same playground. Her cousin who is one year older was climbing all over. I told Stella to watch how Lea was doing it. Two tries later and she was swinging around like a monkey.

She is processing and trying to figure things out on her own which funnily manifested this week. Stella is fascinated with the character Lola Langohr. This from the sandmänchen series. She has to watch it every night. (thank you youtube!) Lola is a sleuth and solves people’s problems. When the light bulb goes off, she dances around and exclaims “Ich hab sie, ich hab sie, ich hab die Losung gefunden”. (I got it, I got it, I found the solution). This is how Stella reacted the other day when she figured out something that she was wanting to do.

I’d have to say part stubbornness and part craftiness, if she wants something she’ll figure out a way. From bringing the stepstool from the bathroom to see out the window, to figuring out how to lay the cushions so she can jump on to them to many other things. This is not limited to doing things but also to having things.

She is a wheeler and dealer…let the negotiations begin. It is amazing the arguments that she comes up with. If she doesn’t craft a good enough argument however, she can loose which will cause her to flip.

We’ll see how her negotiation skills hold up as she enters the next stage of her life. On the first of August she will enter Kindergarten (our preschool). There are 18 kids in her group, 13 of which are boys. It’s time, she needs the stimulation, but I am a little apprehensive on what she will pick up. We’ve been joking that we need to send her to an anger management class. Being surrounded by boys isn’t going to help her hitting, pinching and kicking problems.

I can now relate to my cousin. I temporarily lived with him and his family when I moved back to the states. His kids were roughly the same age as ours are now. I remember him telling me “you know, they don’t tell you about the terrible threes. Otherwise you wouldn’t have kids.” I thought it a strange comment those 8 years ago but now I can totally relate. And I will admit at times I have had similar thoughts.

It is amazing how in a matter of 0.001 seconds a kid can turn from nice and sweet to an absolute terror. During my company summer picnic this year, Stella had a tantrum as we were readying to leave. After chasing her through the entire complex, I caught her in front of a colleague who has kids of the same age. He smiled at me and said “I am so glad we are not alone”.

And take that as consolation…everyone goes through this, and my heart lightens when I see other parents struggling because I know, we’re all in this together.

Have you ever heard of Cookie Monster? Well we’ve got an apple monster. Still with two teeth our youngest likes to munch. He’ll munch on bread, cereal, cucumbers, bell peppers and just about anything else that you give him. His all-time favorite however is apples.

Open up some apples in his presence, you’ll witness an interesting transformation. His eyes will get as big as cue balls, his jaw opens wide. No matter where he is, he lunges towards the box like a wild dog foaming at the mouth. And grabs as many apples as he can get.

He shreads the apples to pieces. gobbling them up like cookie monster, leaving in his wake a path of destruction, apples that once where and will never be again.

And so ends this chapter in the Bunny Chronicals. Time is flying and there just hasn’t been enough to write, but I hope I’ll have more time to write more and more often.