I spent the whole day with my two beautiful children. (I kind of had no choice.)
We started off by going to yoga. This was challenging, because, although I’ve taken my daughter a few times and she can totally hang (I don’t know why I said “hang”, I mean she can get through a regular grown-up yoga class) my son has never been and I was worried he’d punk out, which he kinda did, but we got though it. He actually did really well. A big thank you to my AMAZING teacher Carrie who is the the nicest, bestest yoga-teacher-person on the planet. She welcomed him with such warmth and enthusiasm and gave him a hug at the end.
Next we went out to breakfast. Jack was set on getting cinnamon bun pancakes like last time only they didn’t have them. They had peach cobbler pancakes. He wasn’t willing to accept this reality but ultimately conceded. They both got them and when the food arrived Nora tasted hers and said, “Oh my God, where have you been all my life?!” Where does she get this stuff? (Probably from some teen Disney movie she shouldn’t have watched.) Jack was happy…until he realized there were things on his pancakes. “Oats. Yeah, that’s because they’re peach cobbler pancakes. Okay?” No. Not okay. So, I of course surgically removed them. I ate the rejected parts off his plate cause it looked so good. I kind of have to agree it was gross. Also, a word of warning: peach cobbler pancakes don’t sit very well on top of Huevos Racheros with spicy chorizo.
Home to change to get ready for “the dirt track.”
Let me back up. My kids have bikes that they hardly ever ride. Which is my fault, really. I never suggest it and never take them anywhere they can ride. They can ride around our neighborhood but that gets old. Last night we were at Old Navy and Nora got some clothes and Jack didn’t see anything he liked but HAD TO HAVE SOMETHING and I saw some light-up-skull-bike-tire-valve-covers. Awesome, right?!! I even put them on his bike when we got home and let him ride his bike in the dark to try them out. “The back one’s not lighting up anymore” he said. “Okay…” Somehow the skulls on the bike made him think about riding at the dirt track, (in the daytime). I don’t know… So, I said I’d take them to the park that’s under construction and totally closed to see if maybe the dirt track (a BMX-style “pump-track” with little jumps) was open and it was. Is it a little crazy that I packed the first aid kit? Jack rode the track with relative ease but Nora made it through with some encouragement and my constant yelling, “pedal, pedal, pedal, pedal, pedal, pedal, pedal!”
After a few times around the track with only minimal bloodshed, I suggested we ride over to the bike shop to look at bikes. They are due for bigger bikes but we kinda already decided we wouldn’t get them until spring. (Christmas and they can’t ride them, their Birthday and Spring and half of summer is already gone.) They immediately find the bikes they want and I spend the next hour explaining that were not getting them today. (Parenting rule # 1: don’t bring something up unless they can have/do it now. i.e, a pocket knife.) Somehow that turned into Jack wanting pegs. Pegs to go on his bike he has now. And I’m ALL FOR getting him a BMX bike but pegs are dumb. And most kids who have them just have them for show and my son is not going to be that kid. If he’s going to have them, I think, he should be able to do rail slides and bunny hops and other freestyle tricks. And then I remember he’s still trying to ride a straight flat road without wiping out. So I said “Maybe” and “Let me think about it” And “Let me talk to your Dad.”
When we get home, I said let’s jump in the pool. “No…” says Jack. “You’re hot and covered in dirt, I think you’d like it.” “Okay, I’ll jump in and then I’m getting right out and changing back into clothes.” They spent the next 3 hours in the pool. Pool time included: jumping in the pool holding hands, swimming in a way that looks a little like drowning, whispering/conspiring, pretending to be mermaids, finding a rope in the garage, tug-of-war, a high speed running version of tug-of-war while weaving-through-every-object-in-the-yard (with maniacal laughter), and spraying each other with the hose. Which gave me time to read September Vogue, eat popcorn and soak up the perfect weather and picture perfect day.
Nora suggested we go out to dinner. “Where do you want to go?” She said, “Sushi.” So we went out for sushi. They wore their leather jackets even though I said “It’s a bit much”. We ordered Tempura and Teriaki and Miso and Rolls. There was no complaining. It was heaven.
I may or may not have let them eat ice cream in my bed and stay up late watching “Camp Rock”.
