early bird & crazy fish

it's currently 6:32 am and i have been awake for nearly an hour, compliments of my chipper early bird, piper glory, who's insisted for the past few days that between 5 and 6 am is the perfect time to poop her pants.

but it's SO not.

(side thought: her behavior the past week or so begs the question- are ALL little girls some degree of high maintenance? some level of demanding, squirrely, determined, or impossible? i know that girls and boys are inherently different in some ways, but for you mamas with girls and boys out there- are girls WAY harder to deal with, or is it just me??)

i might as well take advantage of this early start, though, with a cup of tea, and a nice early morning blog. it's already 60 degrees outside, which determines that today i'm going to take elias and piper to the beach at watson pond. i have yet to do this solo. i feel pretty confident, except for the fact that my son thinks he's michael phelps (who is an outlier, by the way) and i don't have any "coast guard approved" swim gear for him. (swimmies/floaties are not approved flotation devices. whatever...) so if the lifeguards are there, they're going to kindly ask me to take his swimmies off. they'd rather he drown than wear unapproved swim gear. because that makes sense...

clearly they they don't understand that my son, ever since he could, runs full speed for ALL water, all the time, and he's a total unafraid menace...in a puddle, kiddie pool, big pool, lake, and especially at the beach. he's jumping in, waves knocking him over, salt water in his eyes, and the BIGGEST smile on his face imaginable. he's been jumping into my parents pool since he was 1, and last summer, at 2, he would jump in by himself, no help, and swim around. with his little floaties, of course.

almost completely fearless.

which can be SCARY and a tad UNNERVING. (just not to lifeguards...)

truth is, i pretty much love his fearlessness. he's a good fit with my crazy bartlett genes because i'm not ever worried about him. i find that mostly, elias makes other people nervous, but not usually me. moms pace around nervously glancing from him to me, wondering if i'm going to continue letting him do whatever he's doing. it's funny. since he's always had the propensity to be dangerous, so we've just taught him how to safely climb/teeter/jump/scale/reach/stack/etc. it's much easier than trying to keep him off off away from things. he's equipped with innate skill and coordination, so if he doesn't think he can do something, he'll always shoot me a glance like "i don't know about this one mom. what do you think?" and i'll give him a nod and a wink.

right now i'm kind of imagining him in the water at watson's, diving around, doing his stunts, while piper eats sand, splashes maniacally, and tries to leap in herself, carrying on the menace legacy. this girl...whew, i might be more nervous about her. the more i write this the more i'm wondering if i need back-up. hahaha. it should be...complicated and interesting.

what i don't imagine is that i'll be laying on a towel, reading a magazine, and relaxing. that would be what i would have been doing, say, 4 years ago. and i'd be all tan, and up on fashion trends, and drinking an iced coffee. but today? i'll be juggling kids, making sure no one drowns, feeding sandwiches full of sand, lugging gear, overseeing sandcastle constructions, monitoring sand throwing and splashing, packing and unpacking...

and you know what...it will be great. especially in my cute new bathing suit :) so 1950's. love it!