Hey, Mom!

If I had a dollar for every time I heard, "Hey, Mom!" since Friday, I would have a lot of dollars.
Oh, Landen. God love him . . . and I so do I, but wow! I think he has broken some kind of record. Currently he likes to talk about his successes on the bicycle game on Wii Fit or ask me if I "renember" all sorts of random information he has acquired in his 6 years.
I take comfort in the fact that he will go far as a great communicator some day. Maybe he will be an announcer for Nathan's professional football games. (I predict Teresa will either be a cheerleader or a trapeze artist during the halftime entertainment.)
On this subject, I heard some discouraging news today. It appears our kids are normal.
I mentioned a few days ago that we didn't know why our kids had to screw around right at our feet all of the time. I was convinced not all kids are like this--and especially not the kids two generations back. It appears they are and they were. You just have to ask their mothers.
I asked my friend Jennie at lunch today if her (7, I believe) children were always at her feet when they were young. Sadly, she nodded and said she threatened to move all of her dishes into the toy room and their toys into the kitchen. Her husband Arvid loves to tell the story of her getting so fed up with at one person spilling his or her milk at every meal that she started one meal by throwing her glass of milk over her shoulder just to get it over with. All of their children stared in disbelief.
She went on to tell me that a relative of hers had nine children in nine years. They finally stopped allowing beverages of any kind at meals. Sometimes you just gotta do what you gotta do.
I actually find these stories encouraging--not discouraging. I seem to hold onto this ideal that today's grandmothers were somehow super human nurturers, cooks, menders, and gardeners. It turns out even they cracked under the pressure once in awhile.
One mom can only clean up so much spilled milk or hear "Hey, Mom!" so many times before she starts to feel a little crazy.
We are, after all, only human.