a little everett blog about the pool

We spent the whole afternoon over at my aunt Chloe's super big pool.

I'm graduated to super big pools now, or didn't you know?

Mom slathered me up with so much sunscreen, I'm lucky I didn't sink from the weight of it on my baldie head. I had my trusty alligator floatation device though.

And a pretty firm grip on Mom's bathing suit.

If I was going down, I was taking her with me.

little family

One of our songs:

 

Under the covers, I make a tent
It’s my world that I invent
Without you near me, no adventure
I want you to be home
ba na na nah na nah
Under the table, nobody’s there
Under the ceiling, under the stairs 
A funny feeling, my head is sleeping 
I want you to come home 
ba na na nah na nah 
In the morning 
I’m waiting for you 
To come back home 
where are you?
Take everything, my ipod 
Take my keys, take my flare, take it all 
Take my shoes, I’m riding solo
My memories, take all my photos 
Take my clothes take my clothes my tight blue jeans 
Take everything

-Chappo

mush

I'm gonna do it.

I'm gonna write a mush post.

Sometimes it's just nice to write about how you're lucky.

+

You know what's really been sinking in for me lately? That Everett is so blessed happy.

I remember, when he was barely two weeks old, an old lady came to the house with an unbaked squash casserole and asked me, "Is he a good baby?"

I lied to her and said, "Yes!" but on the inside, I was afraid that he was bad. Just look at him, I'd tell Mike, he cries a lot and seems angry at me.

Colic.

But I didn't know that.

When you are that full of the baby blues, your mind tells you differently. Your mind whispers that your baby hates you. Around that time, someone who had mothered a newborn with colic herself told me, it's okay to resent your baby for not letting you comfort him.

It was scary to hear that. Really scary. It was like the heat of something I was standing on the edge of.

So yes, it's taken me almost eleven months to be completely certain in my head that Everett was just hurting, that he was not a bad baby, that he's really a true flirt, a happy-go-lucky guy, and over the moon with love for me.

I pinch myself still. I'll never not be thankful.

But he's also pretty volatile, more so than other babies I've noticed, and he may always be that way; but he swings as sharply in the other direction too--laughing first and louder than they do.

He'll never not laugh if you want him to. He'll never not smile at a stranger.

So there's Everett.

And there's Mike too.

Last night we were in bed watching Mike's favorite movie. He was laughing and telling me, "Write that down! That is a good one-liner! Whoever wrote this movie was in my head!"

You know what it was? As Good As It Gets. You know the one, with Jack Nicholson, who plays a crotchety old man who says what he wants when he wants and tries to hide that he's all soft on the inside?

That's Mike, you guys. He'll be the first to come home bitching about something stupid somebody else did AND the first to do something secretly nice for that person. It's why I love him.

Nobody believes in me more than Mike.

He'll turn to me sometimes and say, "Everett's gonna be so proud you're his mama." It's so nice, it makes my chest nearly burst.

Sometimes we sneak into Everett's nursery at night to spy on him because it's been close to five hours since Mike's seen him last. We take a flashlight and just stand there making emo faces at each other, communicating without words things like HOLY SHIT WE MADE HIM and IT CAN'T BE COMFORTABLE SLEEPING LIKE THAT. And then we give each other a fist bump.

We're so typical about this stuff it hurts. When Mike comes home at night, we exchange notes about what we saw Everett do that day.

"Did you see him stick out his tongue?" like it's so epic. We even know it's not epic, but it still is, in a way. We know his whole story. We'll be the only ones who ever do. We exchange these notes because we're the keepers. When he's older someday and he loses his way, he'll be able to find it again in us.

play

I ran across this little short film on Twitter earlier today.

If you have a spare 11 minutes, you won't regret watching it. It's something very close to my heart--a child's right to his own imagination.

I watched it with Everett in my lap. When I started to cry/laugh, oh, around minute 6:07, Everett started to courtesy cry/laugh with me, looking excitedly back and forth from my shrimp eyes to the phone in my hand where the movie played.

I squeezed him tight and thought, "Yes, this is what I want for you."

7:48? Don't even play with me right now. I bawled.

I showed it to Mike too. At about 5:03 he looked at me with a scowl and a tear, and he said, "Why do you show me this shit just to make me cry?"

I'm just pleased I didn't cry a whole minute longer than him. Softie.

Thing is, I love how all these grownups respected a small child's desire to imagine. That's a rare thing. I say that even having lived in the teaching world for a while. Even teachers will scoff at a kid who wants to plot, build, and reach higher than they ever will.

"Oh he's just a kid," they say.

I hate that.

It makes my chest burn just thinking about someone saying that about Everett.

When we were kids, we were home-schooled and subsequently bored of out our minds for years. That also meant our imaginations were fiercely cultivated.

I had a secret world under my bed. Behind my bedskirt, you could find everything that was important to a little girl: a flashlight for reading, a book too mature for me, snacks, a $20 bill just in case (which my brother later stole from me...rats!). Nothing special, just crap I gathered up from around the house and called my own.

I liked that the grownups didn't know.

I liked that it didn't really have any bells and whistles, so that besides the $20, it held no interest for pesky little brothers, and I could dwell there unbothered for most of the day.

Also, when the fall would come (and Chloe's dad still likes to tell this story on me), I would take the garden rake and gather up all the fallen leaves into piles, then into lines, then into a sort of blueprint for an imaginary house. Right there in the front lawn.

I'd bring out all my important shit from inside and put it in the "rooms" where I would sit for the rest of the day. I'd troop out each morning with all my shit and take it back inside before bed. Chloe's dad says I've never been so mad as the day he had to mow the lawn...and my house! down.

I pretend like I don't remember, but I do.

That was my entire childhood. Plotting and building and making a place for myself. I can only hope it'll be Everett's too.

ten little birthday planning things

I need to disappear to my happy place right now.

And that is planning a birthday for my little boy who just yesterday it seems we were calling "Bump" and wondering vagina or penis, vagina or penis?!

Remember that? If you've been reading that long, you get a sticker.

Now, you probably won't see most of these things at our party, but it's the feel I'm going for.

{a confetti tablecloth DIY}

{a glitter cake monogram}

{a balloon for each year}

{a good invitation}

{picture party favors}

{a freaking awesome cake}

{the perfect gift}

{snacks for the hungry}

{straws with stripes...so what's new?}

{a good theme}

About that last one...Mike made fun of me for wanting a theme. 

I threw out lots of ideas. Airplanes! Caterpillars! Mr. Bear! (Everett suggested that last one)

But Mike scoffed. "Oh God forbid we choose the wrong theme. He may not make it to two." 

Giant eye roll. 

Don't worry, that's just his way of making sure he doesn't get enlisted to help blow up balloons or anything manual-labory like that while I'm in LAST MINUTE I'LL CUT YOU GET OUT OF MY WAY THE GUESTS ARE ALMOST HERE mode. 

Because, you know, I do that.