Christmas Eve Prattle

What kind of compliment is "You're still really pretty." Hrmph....

I was out last night with Lea doing some last minute stuff at Target. Steven was gifted a microscope at his grandmother's, a duplicate of the one we gave him; so I needed to return it to the store and try to find a replacement, another appropriate gift for him. Lea helped me pick out something, some sort of thing that he will hook up to the computer and play games with it. I'm not certain what it does and really, it goes against my decision not to get the kids any computer stuff, but I thought it looked pretty creative since he has the ability, I think, to sort of create his own games from it. I could probably have investigated it a little further, figured out it's specific purpose, but when Lea said, "He'll love it, Mommy" that was good enough for me. Plus, the little plastic dude attachment had a skull printed on his black mask, so it looked pretty cool.

Anyhow, while I was there I ran into Nicholas. We had spoken by phone just a few minutes before and I told him I was heading to Target. He said, "I'm looking at Target right now." He was in the parking lot in the car of one of his friend's mothers, out picking up some things with the family. She took him shopping for Lea and Steven which was nice of her to do. So when I was inside the store, in the toy aisle, I turned around and there was Nicholas. My son. So. Yeah. I liked running into him in a place I didn't expect to see him, especially since I didn't see him all day. He is off doing his thing, I'm off doing mine. I'm grateful to meet up when and where the Universe sees fit to let that happen. I love being his mother all the time, but I love being his mother when I am surprised to see him and he seems happy to see me. He is laying beside me right now, at first cuddling up against me while I listen to music and write, but then pulling away, but letting me scratch his back. He is finding his own way away.

The littler kids finally opened their Christmas Eve presents, I have photos. I'll post them another time. But, we buy them jammies and a stuffed animal of some kind wrapped to open and ...well here, I'll show you the kind of critters we found for them this year:

http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=48148

Lea saw one of these for the first time at a craft show where we went to to see this friend's doodads and thisandthats she makes:

http://www.myspace.com/creatrixjane

So anyhow, Lea dubbed them "Moogles" and begged for one for weeks. I was able to track down the artist with a little help; and she, the creative young monstermaker, custom-made a couple of special monsters for Lea and Steven.

Lea calls hers, ofcourse, Moogle; and Steven calls his Google. He says he calls it that because it knows everything....hmm... The myth of Google. And one day Google became God when the image manifested itself into form and no longer contained as a cursor in a rectangled box....

They also opened their new pj's, but I was off on the size for Steven. I bought him feet pajamas that are a little too small and he says they squash his balls. He said that to me, "Mom, these pajamas squash my balls." I told him we would get some new ones this week.

So, Steven has been wearing a Santa hat for 6 days, only removing it to take a shower and sleep. He says he can't believe people don't believe in Santa.

We were looking at a Grandfather clock at Aunt Louise's last night and listening to it 'bong...bong....bong....' and curious, he said, "What makes it do that?" And I said, "There is a little monkey in there with a stick hitting a gong." And he said, "Really?" I said, "Uh-huh..." And so a half an hour later it bonged again, and he came over and whispered to me, he said, "Mommy. I saw the monkey." And I said, "You did?" And he went, "Really." And I was like, "Cool, how big was it?" and he went, "About this big" and gestured with his little hands about 5 inches apart.

I suppose I will have to find him a old, dead, grandfather clock to take apart so he can really figure it out for himself. I might be tempted to put in some little "monkey" bones garnered from a chicken carcass, and lay them under the pendulum, but I won't....