I’ve gotten very lazy about carrying my camera with me everywhere. It was easy when I just kept it in my diaper bag, but I’m enjoying a few months of diaper-bag-freeness before #3 comes and my camera just gets forgotten. Tonight I would have taken a picture of my boys with Uncle Tim. It is Tim’s birthday and they were helping him unwrap his gifts at Grandmama’s house. Billy was on trash detail–Tim and Ricky would get the paper off and Billy would gather up the scraps and trot off to the trash can repeating, “Trash, trash, trash.” A picture would have been worth much more than all these words!
On the other hand, no picture could describe the funny things Ricky says! Last year, I worked really hard with him to be able to recognize all his family members. We looked at pictures each week and he was excellent at recognizing everyone on both my side and Kevin’s side. Since then, my nieces have gone from blond to brunette and he is struggling with identifying which is which. Since these nieces are Tim’s daughters, they were at Grandmama’s house today for the birthday celebration. Melissa grabbed Ricky as soon as we got there and asked him what her name was. He told her something like “I don’t know. You’re one of the two girls. Melissa or Stephanie, that’s your choice.”
A bit later, Uncle Tim asked Ricky where his baby brother is. We’ve told him about the baby and he’s excited, but I prefer to keep the subject of my belly out of it. So, what did Ricky answer? “Oh, he’s still up in heaven.” Then my brother asked him where Grandpa Chet is. Ricky started talking fast and moving his arms around. He pointed to his face with both arms and said, “His face is up in heaven, but the rest of his body is in the cemetery” as he moved his arms down his body pointing to all of his body parts. I guess the face is somehow connected to a person’s spirit!
Oh, and because it doesn’t really make any sense at all, I want to remember what Ricky chose to give Uncle Tim for his birthday. This is my attempt at making Ricky aware of others and it may result in some interesting gifts this year. When I asked Ricky what he wanted to give Uncle Tim for his birthday, his first (and very quick, I might add) response was “A hungry, hungry hippo game.” I wasn’t going to be able to get that for today so I asked him if there was something else he’d like to give his uncle. He thought for a moment and decided on an orange. The fruit. So that’s what he proudly gave to Tim this afternoon — a nicely bagged and fresh naval orange!