More from the series here.
Mine:
- I enjoy least the special kind of crazy you get when you don’t eat.
- I enjoy least your introverted kill-joy ways with disliking big, crowded, lively events until five minutes before we are due to leave when you finally ‘warm up’. The way you glare at anyone trying to be friendly with you (and how terribly embarrassed that makes me feel). The way you cling to me and get all jaded and cynical and complain about the event really loudly – how it is boring and stupid. The way you try to psych yourself up into bawling so we will be forced to leave.
- I enjoy least your foul moods in the morning.
- I enjoy least your need to argue with me over everything instead of just taking my word for it.
- I enjoy least having to come and intervene between you and your brother so often, particularly as it stops me from having the opportunity to get things done without him bugging me!
- I enjoy most listening to you read. I feel so proud of you and because you disguise your abilities so often when I hear you read properly I am always astonished at how far you have come. I don’t enjoy so much having to twist your arm to get you to do your reading homework – we have really managed to kill your love of reading by pushing you with the homework, we did a Montessori fail there, sorry.
- I enjoy most our conversations – you can be pretty fascinating, and the information you retain and reflect upon, so precise. You want to understand everything, no matter how complicated it is as long as you don’t feel like we are ‘teaching’ you something. Mostly you like to talk about art with me. Like the other day you wanted to know about the life drawing classes I used to do and now you try some of the ideas yourself with your drawing. You like to be taken to art galleries, to have time and space to do art yourself, to ask questions about art, to be given new materials and ideas to work with. I love that this is a passion that comes so much from inside you, I love that this is a glimpse into the future and who you will be.
- I enjoy most the times when you still curl up in bed with me and we fall asleep together – you and I and your brother. All my chicks in the nest, I tell you. I love that you love being described as a chick.
- I enjoy most seeing how much you love your brother, how intensely protective you can be with him; how you draw him on to your lap to watch TV, or you read him a story, or you gently teach him some Montessori activity, or you entice him into running around shrieking and giggling with you. How you get you both out of the bath and tell him to wrap his towel around himself when he walks up the hall and he never does. I love the way you to squeeze each other tight when you hug.
- I enjoy most our two extra days a week together. We are very nearly at the end of this stage, next year you will be at school five days a week and I will miss this extra time with you more than I can possibly imagine. We are such a great little team together on these days, getting through all my tasks, we find our rhythm and joke around together, and I love feeling so close to you again.
- I also enjoy most how confident and independent you are now with your friends, how you vanish off for playdates at your friends’ houses and how other times they come to our house and buzz around our place with you reminding me of big jolly families.
Bill’s:
- I enjoy least the way you are always declaring “this is the worst day ever”. (I wish my worst day ever was as simple as Nanna not making potato salad for dinner).
- I enjoy least the way you try to play Mummy and I off each other – your tiny little heart.
- I enjoy least that you need me to stay with you until you fall asleep every single night and I have no idea how to move you from this.
- I enjoy least that no matter how many felt pens without their lids I throw out I always find more on the floor.
- I enjoy least your inability to understand that the incredible amount of mess you make is anything to do with you.
- I enjoy most hanging out with you, we have some common interests now, for instance apparently we both wear what you call ‘BRONZE’ underpants. (BONDS underpants).
- I enjoy most that you do things I used to do as a child, like you catch a little caterpillar and keep it for a night, making a little home for it to stay in, and then you also know to let it go the next day.
- I enjoy most how close we are now. The other night at the school disco when you bumped your head really hard you ran to me for comfort.
- I enjoy most the way you like to talk about maths with me as you go to sleep. Mostly algebra at the moment.
- I enjoy much of your art. Like a room full of monkeys with paintbrushes, some of your art is amazing and some of it..
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This is by far one of the most endearingly gorgeous things I have ever read. What a wonderful idea and that both of you contribute. It’s very cool to see these lists from a mans perspective. How fantastic for Lauca that she will have this lasting impression of her evolution from both her mother and her father.
I am just really in awe of this loveliness right now.
My Five Year Old is exactly the same as number 2 (intorverets kill-joy ways). I go between finding it annoying and finding it sort of cool, because I’m often the same…
As an aspie parent with two aspie kids, I can identify with everything here. What I love most about you both is that you accept your children as they are and love them for what they do, even the stuff you say you hate cause it’s what makes them them.
Thank you for this comment. Such a nice thing to have noticed about this post.
I’m a newcomer to the blog, but added it to my reader and look forward to future posts, the ones I read today really resonate well. =)
[...] Why? Because it felt right to us to do it this way. Mijo likes nursing, I like sleeping. I loved knowing exactly how he was doing – never missing a temperature or need for medical care – by having him close. I liked the little cuddle buddy. I liked the family mindset – the nest with all the little chicks as bluemilk once put it. [...]