Some Time with the Squisher

This past week Simon attended his first VBS. While he was being such a big kid (gulp), Ian and I got to hang out together for two hours (times four days). I worried a little about how we would spend the time—not because I couldn’t think of anything to do, but because I felt all this (false!) pressure to use the time just right, and I was a little intimidated by all the possibilities. In the end, we ended up doing a little of everything I would have wanted to do—one day we played in the park, another day we went to the bookstore, one day we ran errands, and the last day we hung out at a friend’s house—and nothing that I thought I should do but really didn’t want to (that would be clean the house).

It was a lot of fun to let Ian lead the way. For example, walking from the Redeemer building, where we dropped Simon off, to the playground at Cooper Park—a walk of about a block—took close to twenty minutes. He had to stop and chase and be chased by his buddy Caleb. (I need to write sometime about how much I love the “big kids” at church. They are a great group of teenagers and almost-teens who love on the little ones and it is such a blessing.)

He also had to stop and look at all the little clovers and pick up sticks and point out trucks and helicopters and get sidetracked at the statue. He’s more of a wanderer than Simon was at his age, and not as good of a listener when it comes to warnings not to go one more step off the sidewalk. Little turkey.

We also got to hang out with some other little buddies (and their baby sisters) whose older sibs were at VBS. It was a little strange how much calmer things were at the train table without the three-year-olds. 

Seriously, way too cute.

I felt like I got to know Ian a little bit better this week. He’s definitely still the same sweet-spirited, laid-back, quiet kiddo that I know him to be, but I just started to see some nuances of his personality and his sense of humor that maybe I hadn’t had the chance to pay full attention to before. He’s just so full of Ian-ness, which is pretty terrific.