The Monkey Barrel

Archive for July, 2005

I went to the pool yesterday with mom, dad, and Luke. They were very impressed by my new skills. I can cannon ball, swim like a shark with my hand on my head, do the dead mans float, float on my back, swim from one side to the other without touching the bottom, and swim underwater. I’m still not strong enough for the deep end yet, but my new floatie makes me feel like SuperJohn. Luke thinks I’m funny when I kiss his feet, and he got his first pruney toes yesterday on his first trip to the pool. He doesn’t mind when I splash him, but mommy yells a lot when I do. Dad is awesome, he throws me in the pool and I come up gasping for air. He swims under the water too and tries to sneak up on me to scare me, but mommy always tells me when he’s close. I love the pool. I even know how to spell it cause when mommy wants us to go there she spells it to daddy and thinks I don’t know what she’s spelling. But I know, p-o-o-l spells pool and I yell ARE WE GOING TO THE Y MCA POOL, and mom laughs because I’m so smart.

It was a mildly eventfull day in the life of the Arters boys yesterday. John learned to count by tens to one hundred. Of course, he needs help remember to start out with 10, but I’m pretty impressed. Today we went bowling and John scored a 77 on the first run and a 95 on the second with four spares altogether and two strikes. I think he’s the only kid I know who still managed to gutter a ball with the bumpers up. Who knew that bowling could be a full contact sport!!

Yesterday the grand master Luke decided to roll over back to front. He laid there startled for a full minute then realized he was on his stomach and immediately began to protest by whining at a pitch only dogs can hear. I righted him and he tried for a good half an hour to accomplish this new trick again only to be frustrated into a deep two hour sleep. He has been sleeping up to 10 hours at night but mostly 8 hours starting like clockwork from 8-9p.m. God bless that baby. I believe he’ll be our chatterbox. He wakes up with so many things to say and at incredibly high volumes. I wonder who he gets it from ……………….

Berry juice dribbles
Down over your chin
A red sloppy grin
Smiles and giggles
Pick and cram
Berry stained hands
Row upon row
Green capped joy
Strawberry pickin little boy

Pumpkins to pick today
A very serious duty
What shall I wear??
Rolled sleeves and shiny clasps
Denim blue
And sturdy shoes
Who’s coming home with us today
You must be round
Fat and orange too
Muddy shoes, dirty elbows
Hay in pockets, socks, and hair
And a great round,orange piece
of childs gold

Evidently when you’re five you don’t outgrow the inherent need to draw on walls to display your art. Last night I found a nice pencil sketch on the outer wall to John’s bedroom. Very neetly he printed his last name first, then his name, and then a picture of himself. Then later after tucking him in, I was walking to his door and found a suspicious crayon lying behind his door. Lo and behold when I opened said door, there on its interiors was a mural of sea life in green and blue crayon. I have never been so torn between yelling at him for doing something he knew to be wrong and wanting double over in giggles at how spectacular the picture was. Today he’ll learn what it is to clean up his own mess, thanks to Mr. Cleans new magic eraser sponge. So beware all you mothers of wandering pencils and missing crayons, you could be next….

John

You’re smile is full of promise
The promise of mischief
of laughter
Your eyes dance with the light of it
joy tucked in the corners
boyhood dreams shining
A face to behold
Full of youth
Full of John

Luke sleeps

Dreams are dancing in your eyes
Sleep soon to come
Eyelids fluttering
Dimples peeking
drifting on to dreamland
Angels whisper in your ear
Coos rise to greet them
Tiny fingers curled in satin
A contented sigh
my little man sleeps
7/10/05

A Photograph

I took pictures of you today.
Captured moments in time
They will live young forever
You will not
I snap photos trying to frame
The innocence in your eyes
The laughter in your smile
The joy in your heart
Brief shots in time
That forever remain
Reminders of who you were
And promises of who you’ll be
I will always be your mother
You will always be
My sons
My boys

I don’t know how we managed it, but we’ve produced two of the happiest children on earth. Luke has gone from being the grumpiest little newborn, to a happy, chatty baby boy. He positively squeals and screams in delight when he talks to us. He loves to be on his tummy now and looks up to find John and I and pounds his face down into the quilt with shreaks of joy when he finds us. He’s rolled over a few times but hasn’t made it a consistent thing yet and he always has this look of shock on his face when he accomplishes the goal, like he doesn’t know whether to laugh, cry, or be really, really afraid.
John is drawing the most amazing pictures. He can draw crabs, squids, people, transformers, flowers, fish, trees, apples and the list goes on. He has quite an imagination but most of his pictures are either under-water scenes or things being blown up by lava or hot flames. He’s desperate to draw words so we’re teaching him small three letter words to draw. Kindergarten is only a heartbeat away. I think his teachers will be really impressed.

Yet again, at 6:30 a.m., Luke woke us up this morning. All that laughing and squeeling and gurgling really disrupts my sleep. Can