Mornings with Mama: Cotton Balls

When you have little boys, you learn to keep certain things up high and out of reach--chemicals, toilet-bowl brushes, medicines--to keep the little boys safe. Over the years, I've learned that you can also keep certain things up high to avoid catastrophic messes that little boys can make. Like lotion. Liquid soap. Folded towels and sheets and pillowcases. (Unless you like folding things twice.)

This particular morning, my little boys found a bag of cotton balls in the bathroom. Certainly no danger in that. But I was shocked to find that on the catastrophic mess 'o meter, it ranks up there pretty high.

Oooh. Fun, fuzzy cotton balls!

After the cotton ball discovery, everything becomes a blur.

Daddy is home, too. See the feet? I'm surprised he didn't want in on the action.

As Jacky grinds the fibers into our BLACK interim carpet with his feet, I wonder if Daddy is googling how best to clean up a cotton ball mess.

Yes, such a mess. But oh, so much fun.

Thank goodness for vacuum cleaners. And tape.

Mornings with Mama: Fort Building

Okay, I admit it. Sometimes, I wish I had a daughter. Yesterday I watched as my neighbor helped her daughter sew her first skirt. It was delightful.

Sometimes, I wish that was in my future.

It's not in my future. I have two boys. And a husband who, well, would be against his boys wearing skirts. Sewing them, maybe. But wearing them? Unlikely. And there's certainly no fun in making and not wearing.

I'm not giving up, of course--there's lots we can sew, and have sewn, and plan to sew, me and the boys. And with a mama like me (stay-at-home feminist/Women's Studies graduate/quilt lover-maker-designer/make-something-out-of-nothing soul) you can bet my boys will be in touch with their feminine side. (Meaning their sewing side.)

So I'll continue to encourage an interest in sewing, yes. That's where I can be creative, imaginative, and inspired; maybe my boys can reach that through sewing one day, too. But I'm assured that you don't need a needle and thread--and you certainly don't have to be a girl--to create, imagine, and inspire. My biggest little one did just that this morning.

Need bricks and mortar to build a fort? Malarkey. All you need is a nursing pillow, some painted, half-painted, and unpainted blocks, and selected items from your treasure bowl (on the left).

The fort's fleet.

Even the ghastliest winged bat-thingy monster enjoys a little color--preferably in the form of batik scraps left over from a Craftfail-style sewing project.

Hands eagerly pile on a flurry of treasure-bowl contents (including leaves from a front-yard bush).

Ah, I finally understand why he insists on saving the bothersome tags we cut out of his shirts.

Creativity, imagination, inspiration. It's all here. No sewing required.

Mornings with Mama: Markers

Charlie has discovered the joy of markers. The joy of paper. The joy of colors. The joy of body art.

A little red.

A lot of blue.

And a teeny smidge of purple.

Mama, can I have a bath now?

Yes, peanut. And I want to thank you right here and now for not putting the markers in your mouth. Yet.

Mornings with Mama: Cooking

It began with the styrofoam packaging that came with Bretty's new computer tower (underneath the pot and pan). When he saw it, Jack imagined a stove. Just like that, a chef was born.

A little of this and a little of that.

A quick change into a chef's uniform. (Uniforms always being made from jammies.) The concoction moves from bowl, to pan, to pot.

A sprinkle of something special into a serving bowl.

A drink is offered to cleanse the palate.

And, with a variety of side dishes to accompany the main dish, I sit down to breakfast for one.

The result of another creative day in the kitchen.