The Harrowing/Heartwarming Parent Moment of the Week

I was sure that this was going to be one of those calm, boring, seven day segments that offered up lovely moments with my family but few natural disasters that one could blog about. I was going to site our marvelous zoo trip as somewhat harrowing. You know the six hours of driving and the 1.5 hours waiting in line for the zoo shuttle, and the crowds and all the potty stops and the time we realized that one of the boys had un-buckled Sweet Boy #3’s car seat and we had been zooming down the highway at 70 mph. But in all honesty the zoo was a glorious adventure, hazards included and so I am glad to feature it as a heartwarming moment of bonding with the cousins and Grandma Judy. We rode the zoo train, and sweet boy #3 put his hands over his ears for 35 straight minutes lest the steam engine whistle again unexpectedly. We saw mechanical dinosaurs and big bugs and fighting bats and sleeping tigers. Glorious.

We did have a few hazards though. “Greedy One” the squirrel that the boys have been feeding their sandwich crusts too, ate through our window screen and rampaged through the house while we were gone as the hunky hubby does not cut the crust off of his sandwiches.

We played in the creek yesterday and Sweet Boy #3 had to be rescued out of the watery depths twice. One time he was leaning way over and plunged in head first. All I heard was a big splash and when I pulled him out he had gravel in his hair from where he landed on the bottom. It is about 2 feet deep, calm, and very fun, but does give a mother a nervous tick after several of those sudden plunges.

And then I made the mistake of giving the gift of glue. The boys earned prizes during school and wanted their own bottles of glue. Within a few minutes of receiving them, Sweet Boy #3 had completely emptied the glue bottle of Sweet Boy#2 onto the living room carpet and bean bag couch. Many tears followed. But I did manage to stop the threatening brawl before it began, unlike earlier that day when Sweet Boy#1 bumped into Sweet Boy#2 accidentally, it hurt him and so he burst into tears, roared, and thundered after his older brother, grabbed him and proceeded to pummel him with fierce 4-year-old fists until I rushed to contain the madness. Don’t worry though, they are friends again. It takes all of 5 minutes to patch things up. Thank God for little boys!