A May Day 5-4-06

A May Day

I have decided that May is one of the most beautiful months here in the grand state of Michigan. June is gorgeous too...the weather is a bit nicer, but May has the feeling of new life. Everything comes alive and the trees and grass are a hue of green that, in the right light, almost takes your breath away. This is a picture of our backyard off of our deck. It was yesterday morning...I love morning in our new house because the sun streams into the kitchen so we get to eat breakfast while bathed in sunlight. It also streams into our bedroom so we can't sleep late, but who would want to sleep late and waste a beautiful morning like this? Plus, Landon's room is on the other side of the house so his room stays dark (meaning, he usually sleeps longer!) How much better could we have it?

Tuesday was Landon's first swim lesson. He had another today. It is a class for 1-3 year olds, so he is definitely one of the older kids. He did pretty well the first day although I think he would rather just swim around and not have the structure of the teacher. Today he learned to blow bubbles in the water and also learned to climb out of the pool using a ladder. That was his favorite part...he loves to climb! As far as the real swimming goes, however, he is not very interested (surprising since Jon and I both LOVE to swim!). I noticed something about myself while at swim class today. I noticed that while I always said I would not be a competitive mom...I am. I saw all of those other kid kicking and waving their arms and getting praise for it and I wanted Landon to do it too! I wanted him to be the best swimmer in there. As the half hour ticked by I kept having to remind myself that he is is 2 and while maybe one day he will be an expert swimmer or maybe he won't like it at all...it doesn't matter. Each child is better at some things than others (as are adults). It is my perfectionism again...and it scares me. The last thing I want to do is let that leak over onto my children. Obviously this will need to be a great area of prayer and constant monitoring, because I don't ever want my kids to say that their mom ever thought something wasn't good enough. Everything Landon tries will be an adventure...some he will do well at, others he will not. So we have swim lessons twice a week for the next three weeks. I am sure he will progress...and I pray I do as well .

Last night at dinner Jonathan and I were talking and he said, "A penny saved is a penny earned." Just after that, Landon piped up, "That's right Daddy!" We were laughing so hard...and he was pretty proud of himself for saying something so funny. I love the proud little smile he puts on.

Landon loves birds. He stands at the window numerous times a day watching them. The other day he told me that the birds were eating. I asked him what they were eating and he said, "Flowers and grass." I decided to tell him that only birds eat grass and flowers...Mama and Landon don't (I didn't want him to copy the birds and start eating my flowers!). He then said, "Not Daddy eat flowers either....only birds." I think he got the point...although from his sentence structure he may have this weird idea that his daddy eats birds...I am not sure.