Sadness in my "mommy heart"

It makes me very sad when I realize that Charlie still thinks of Rainrock as "Mommy's house". I often find myself praying that my being gone for 3 months has not done any lasting damage to my precious little guy. I cannot begin to imagine what that must have felt like for a 2 year old to have his mommy just "disappear" for 3 months. And I will never forget that night 4 months ago when I put him down to bed knowing that I would be leaving before he woke in the morning and I would not be back home for a very long time. I held onto him in the darkness of his little bedroom and silently sobbed. I cried my tears into his sweet, blonde hair and thought how unfair all of this was for him. He would wake in the morning and I would not be there and he would not understand. He had no idea how drastically his world was about to change. It's almost too overwhelming for me to think about now.

Fast-forward 4 months:
Just the other day, we were playing in Charlie's bedroom. Shawn, Charlie and I were all pretending that we were at YaYa's (grandma's) house. I needed to go out into the kitchen to do the dishes, so I stood up and said, "Bye-bye, Charlie, I'm going home now!" I started out the door and turned around to look at him, and what I saw broke my heart. Charlie had this look of absolute terror and sadness on his face, a look that was way beyond his 2 years of age. Shawn and I were both looking at him and realized at the same moment that he thought I was saying I was leaving again, going back "home" to Rainrock. My heart sank. I went over to him and hugged him tightly and I reassured him, "I'm not leaving, Charlie. I'm just going into the kitchen to do some dishes. I'm not leaving you." And as I loaded the dishwasher, the tears welled up in my eyes. Lord, please protect my son. Let him know that he is safe now with his mommy and I will not ever leave him again.

In other news, we've been having lots of messy...errr..."creative" fun around here lately. Oh, how I love to explore the world through Charlie's eyes! It seems like he's learning a hundred new things every day.

Here he has decided to see just how many bowls he could "messy up" with his yogurt:

Yup, mission accomplished. He "messied" them all up real good:

Here he has made a nice pot of "soup" out of his box of raisins and my crockpot (no, I didn't give him the crockpot to play with, he went into the kitchen and got it himself):

Coloring in one of his new "learning" books. The Dollar Tree ROCKS, these books are awesome - and just a buck!

"Painting" (with little animal figures being the paintbrushes) on a big piece of "paper" (a pillow):

Watching a video with Daddy:


This is one of my favorite Charlie things - he's getting the "lint" out from between his toes. He's gotta do this at least once a day. He takes of his socks, plops himself down, and spreads each chubby little set of toes apart to get the lint out. And he often asks for help getting it out. Kinda grosses me out, but it keeps him happy!

Lint-free and happy!

We slept in and missed church. Ooops. So we decided it was a good day for a picnic at the park instead:

"QUIT taking my picture, mommy!!!"

The Chunkster

I'm over at Christine's tonight and she's got a bunch of old pics and videos on her computer. I found a few of Charlie that just crack me up.
He was SUCH A CHUNK. Oh my.

Here's one of Charlie trying to eat his feet - I think he was about 3 or 4 months old. If you listen close, you can hear he's doing a whole lot of snorting in there, too.

And some pictures:

Charlie (left) and Blake (right) - consider that Blake is technically a week OLDER than Charlie!

I like this one mainly because Blake looks slightly psychotic and Charlie looks like Chris Farley...

There are no words...(but look at those THUNDER THIGHS!)

I just like this one, it reminds me of how fast they grow.

A more recent picture of the silly boys
Ellie "holding" Charlie - Ellie was about 2 1/2 and Charlie was about 4 months.

Thought I'd throw this one in just for fun. :)

Ooops...

So here I am, sitting around, looking up fun places to go out to eat in Portland for our anniversary...(suggestions, if you know of any...?).
Kinda bored.
Kinda lonely.
Kinda craving coffee (nothing new).
Kinda wishing I had some girlfriends to hang out with.
Ho hum.
Yawn.
And suddenly I get this random text message from my brother-in-law, Mike's phone: "Hey, are you coming?" I'm thinking, "What? He must have texted me by accident." So, I text back something like, "What are you talking about, crazy?" - hoping this will give him the hint that he has texted the wrong person.
A few minutes later, I call over to Christine's to ask her a question and Katy answers the phone and informs me that Christine is out at Starbucks with some friends from church. Shoot! That's supposed to include me. Ooooops. That "random" text was her asking me where in the world I was - she had Mike's phone. Doh! Well, now it's almost 9 and they are probably wrapping up.
Sorry, guys (Christine, Andrea, Leah, Jen, whoever else was there)!!! I'm super bummed I didn't get to hang out with you all - I really was looking forward to it. :( Maybe next time I won't be such an airhead.
Mars

Being right never felt so...wrong.

Recent conversations in our home:

Charlie (pointing to the blue chair): "This is black, mommy."
Me: "That chair is blue, Charlie."
Charlie: "No, it's black."
Me: "It's blue."
Charlie (getting very upset): "NO! It's black. It's black, mommy. It's black. It's black, mom. It's black. It's black, mama. It's black. Black, mommy. It's black. It's black."
Me (in an atempt to get him to stop repeating himself): "Okay, okay, Charlie. It's black. The chair is black."
Charlie: "No, mommy, it's BLUE!"

Charlie: "You're a snake, mommy."
Me: "Ssssss. I'm a snake."
Charlie: "No, you're not a snake, mommy. You're a kitty."
Me: "Meow. I'm a kitty."
Charlie (visibly frustrated): "NO! You're not a kitty, mommy. You're a goggy (doggy)!"

Shawn (noticing that Charlie has gone pee): "Oh, Charlie, did you pee?"
Charlie: "No, daddy, I go poo poo."
Shawn: "You went pee."
Charlie: "No, daddy. I go poo. I go poo poo. I go poo, daddy. Poo poo."
Shawn (in an attempt to get him to stop repeating himself): "Okay, Charlie. Okay."
Charlie (adamently): "No, daddy. I go POO!"

Shawn (after Charlie had let out a big toot): "Oh, you tooted, Charlie!"
Charlie: "No, I burp."
Shawn: "You tooted, silly."
Charlie (angry): "NO, daddy, I BURP!"
Shawn: sigh...

"I a kitty, Mommy. Meow."

Charlie lives in his own little world of imagination these days. A warning, though: it comes with rules, and most (okay, ALL) of the time I am deemed "wrong" when I try to enter into this world. Charlie is most certainly the boss when he's imagining. So, I just sit back and watch him and occasionally get "ordered" to participate in one way or another.

Ever since picking him up from spending a few hours with Ellie and Blake yesterday, I haven't seen much of my little boy. I've just had this cuddly little "kitty" with me everywhere I go. Every time I call him "Charlie", he corrects me and reminds me that he is not Charlie, he is a kitty. When I went in to get him from his nap yesterday afternoon, I was greeted with the stench of a "freshly pooped" diaper.
I said, "Charlie, did you go poo-poo?"
And he says, very seriously, "No. Kitty go poo-poo, mommy. Meow, meow."

I love, love, LOVE this stage. I didn't know it could be this fun to just sit back and watch his little brain come up with all this stuff. One of my favorite things is when we sing, "He's got the whole world in His hands". Charlie comes up with all the various "things" that God has in His hands. Things like lions & tigers, and mommies & daddies, and blankies & binkies, and "Burp" & Ernie, and little bitty babies & BIG HUGE BABIES.

Yesterday, Charlie was playing with this little remote-controlled dog. Shawn asked him what his puppy's name was, and he answered, "Jesus". Isn't that sweet? Then he got frustrated and chucked "Jesus" off the end of the bed. Well, we're still working on some things with him...

Today, Charlie and I had lunch with my friend, Devonna, who happens to be a police officer. Devonna brought Charlie this shirt, and I wanted to take a picture of him in it for her, but of course he had other plans.

Finally got one, though! Thanks, Devonna!