Seamus has his last party today at his Nana and PopPop’s house. It’s been all birthday all the time for the last week. I think he’s pretty well saturated. I still don’t do little kid parties. Although, I saw a kid semi-enjoy hers for the first time this weekend. Seamus was invited to a party from his friend at preschool (she invited the whole class). Even his teacher was there. “I hope she’s getting paid” was my first thought, perhaps indicating that I should not be a preschool teacher, since I view it as onerous work rather than a fun job. I wondered about that for awhile.
The kids played on the park, and the birthday girl fought off other kids (including her big sister) from the merry go round by declaring, “No, I get as long of a turn as I want; I’m the birthday girl!!” I was impressed, thinking, now if we can encourage her to stand up for herself the other 363 days of the year, we might have a pretty good shot at asking for equal pay, women in the legislature, and more.
Seamus has not figured out how to milk the birthday for anything more than cake. He was pretty excited to have a vanilla cupcake, with warm fruit and whipped cream. For his birthday at preschool, he took in strawberries and whipped cream. He told me, “Mama, some of the children did not want any whipped cream with their strawberries.” He was pretty astounded that anyone would pass that goodness up. He wouldn’t tell anyone he was four until it was actually his birthday (the woman at the grocery store said Happy Birthday and asked him how old he was).
We gave him some train set supplies for his birthday, he’s been very into building elaborate train tracks and enacting whole stories as part of the set up. It’s pretty fun to play along.
My parents came up for his fourth, we spent a lot of time swimming in the hotel pool, Patrick and I got away for a really fun kayaking on the Potomac trip. Seamus fully enjoyed lighting and blowing out the candles 15 times. He also had a party with his Grandude and Grandma at their house. We use party in a loose way–it means any event where you get the attention.
I’d love to say more about the kayaking, the Junot Diaz lecture I saw yesterday, and my trip to Polyface farm today, but those will have to wait, because the boys are up and clamoring for breakfast.
Academic Leigh Speaking 