Dear Jacob: March 2008

Oh Jacob. You are too much lately to just say 'Dear Jacob'. This month you get an 'oh', as in 'OH BOY'.

You are too much these days. I take my eyes off of you for a minute and you're into something completely new and fascinating, like say, packing a huge bag of all your clothes and most important tools because you're leaving for Florida in the morning and you won't be back for six years. You're going with Bob and some of the machines. The bag ends up by the front door where it sits all week because I'm not allowed to touch it. I have to be sneaky and take out clothes as you need them. And then, eventually one day you're onto something new and I take advantage of the bag being temporarily forgotten and can finally unpack it. Although many times I've jumped the gun and gotten in trouble and lose a little trust from you.

One of your other things lately is rearranging the furniture and moving around different objects in the house as you see fit. You get these big ideas of how things should be and then just act on them. Consequently, I can find anything in this house when I need it anymore. I have to be sneaky about fitting those things back into their original places as well.

Some days you just get so hyperactive that all day long we're telling you to stop yelling, to keep your voice down. You yell at the top of your lungs about everything. In your pretend play, at the dogs, when you're outraged by something or just when you get excited about something. Oh my God it's the most frustrating thing. We have to scream at the top of our lungs to be heard over you so we can tell you to stop yelling. And then you still don't stop. And when you do, five seconds later you're yelling about something else. The yelling also usually accompanies the running around like a maniac. Holy crap spring can't come soon enough.

Lately you're all about your friends coming over to play, but you never want to go anywhere, always dragging your feet about it. It was taking all my energy to get you out the door, and it's not like I have much energy left after getting myself ready. About halfway through the month you switched and all at once it's ok again to go places and you're the same happy kid you've always been. I think this has largely to do with the class that I was taking and the fact that it threw off your routine. Actually, until that point I was sort of unaware that we had a routine. Maybe not so much as in a schedule, but in our own little way. And within a week of my class ending, and things getting back to normal around here, you were suddenly back to your old self again.

Although I say you're back to your old self, one annoying behavior that has remained is that on some days you act as if nothing ever goes your way and you whine about it. You can go on for a long time whining about a certain thing, but on the upside I'm sort of building up an endurance for it because I can go longer and longer now just ignoring it. This avoidance method doesn't work all the time and often I just have to do something to shut you up. That usually involves taking a privilege away. The privilege loss works to quiet you, but you're also learning from it. Somehow you've gotten the idea that it's a two-way street in that regard and you try to take privileges away from me. This is pretty funny.

My class ended just in time because that's when Daddy's busy season started up at work. In addition to all the crazy stuff at the college, Daddy's been working on two different jobs simultaneously, one a bathroom remodel and the other just a paint job. This is the time of year we hardly ever see him because he's working 12-14 hours each day. When your daddy is home, you spend most of your time attached to his body in some way, most usually on top of his head, or on top of him in some regard. You guys love to wrestle. It's all you ever want to do with him now. That and play "Eat My Ear" or it's companion game "Eat My Nose" - incase this is not self-explanatory it's where you make us pretend that we're eating one of your body parts. Fun.

I can really see your spiritual development occurring in these last couple months. About once a week on average you do this freaky thing where you suddenly state out loud the thing I am thinking about at that moment. I mean you don't announce what I am thinking, but you voice aloud the same thing that is on my mind. Last week we were in the backyard playing on one of the nicer days and I was looking around at all the leaves leftover from last fall thinking that we should rake them up and burn them in the fire pit. From the other side of the yard you came over and asked me if we could have a fire in the fire pit. The last time we did that, or even talked about it was last summer, so it's not like it's something that happens a lot.

Also, you and I talk to each other about our dreams when we wake up. Most of yours seem made up on the spot, but sometimes you talk about them unprompted, and you get the idea of dreaming and appreciate hearing what I have to say about my dreams. And you really love talking to the baby, kissing the baby, hugging the baby. Anything to do with the baby. People seem surprised to hear me tell them that you totally understand what's going on and what's going to happen when the baby is born. I don't think it's such a huge step for a kid like you. From the beginning I knew you'd want to be at the birth and I decided that was ok with me. So that's the plan for now, and incase you change your mind or get scared them we have a back up plan. But I think you can handle it.

Speaking of the baby, you wanted a girl for the longest time, but then you bounced back and forth between boy and girl for a while. Finally you settled on wanting a boy. Somewhere along the line you got the idea that if we have a boy he too can become part of the work crew that you and Daddy make up. Then you decided that it would be a good idea for me to have eight children all together, all boys. Then you'd have a really big work crew. And the only acceptable name for this baby is Bob. If that baby should happen to be a girl, I am to name her Wendy. When I argue that I don't like those names for the baby you tell me that it at least has to be a name from Bob the Builder. We'll see about that.

So overall this month, you've left me wondering who's really running the show around here.