S is spiders and sweet boys or my Spit and vinegar Alice

The number one job of parents is to worry:  are he kids growing enough?  are they getting adequate sleep?  are they going to climb into the fireplace and get stuck to a mouse trap (maybe another day I'll share this fun story)?  are they playing nice...blah blah blah.

Back in January, I got called as Laurel adviser and as such have been reminded of how absolutely terrible it is to be a teenager.  I never want to do that again (good thing I don't have to).  I keep picturing my kids as teenagers and then I worry more and more and more.  There are terrible, horrible things out there that weren't out there when I was in high school.  And I don't know how to keep my kids away from them. And so I worry.

Rex is sweet.  Almost too sweet.  The kind of sweet that is almost naive.  He likes to follow rules and be part of the in-crowd.  All of these traits could be good--unless he decides to follow all the unwritten rules of deragned high school children.  I worry that he'll get sucked in to their nonsense and will be too tender-hearted to know how to stand up for himself.  I'm afraid he'll get crushed.

Back at my parents' house--Rex with Great-great Grandpa Rex's hat and cane

And he's done with this little photo shoot.

Alice is all spit-and-vinegar.  She knows what she wants and she will have it no matter the physical harm it may cause her (thinking sticky mouse traps).  She doesn't move for people.  She doesn't follow directions.  She stops doing something as soon as you notice she's doing it (for 3 prayers she folded her arms until I noticed that she was doing it, now she refuses).  She's determined.  She decided when she was 6 months old that she wanted to learn how to walk, and now she does at 10 1/2 months.   Next, she wants to learn how to ride a bike.  I worry about her rebelliousness just a bit.  I worry that she'll kick against the rules and turn the other way.

Alice's new thing--bringing me books and then plopping down on my lap to read them

What I see most often of Alice

Greg and I were discussing this the other day, and decided that the best way to parent our children is to convince them that we are not the enemy.  Now I just have to figure out how to do that.