Grandparenting Adventures

Babysitting 2-year-old Wyatt is always an adventure.  He hates being left here (or almost anywhere) and spends the first while crying for his mommy--complete with head-in-hands, covered-eyes wailing and many "Mommy" utterances.  Efforts to console and entertain are ineffective.  Ignoring him and going about the business of the day seems to work much better.  He loves tagging along and helping do real work.

Yesterday he helped gather eggs, piled brush on the burn pile, and helped sort the plants in the greenhouse, putting plant packs into the flats on the floor as I handed them to him.

Active play is a winner too, providing it's his idea and he's in the right mood.  He tried every activity on the swing set.  The slide was his favorite.  He never seemed to finish up the slide ride the same way twice.  Feet first with a little tumble following, landing on his feet and walking away, or plunking onto his backside--all were tried and found acceptable, except that the final backside landing had him rubbing the injured part and saying "hurt."  With my assistance, both swings, the monkey bars and the chinning bar were duly tested.

Wyatt is a dramatic child.  "Listen" he'll say, crouching slightly and cupping a hand behind each ear.  He grunts loudly while moving branches.  "Hebby."  Sometimes he holds a small branch aloft in each hand, marching along like a standard-bearer, before flinging both branches down on the brush pile.

Searching for the black chickens among the shadows of the rangy climbing Manhattan Euonymous vine is best accomplished by going as close as possible and then crouching down and leaning forward, eyebrows raised and eyes wide open.  Through the little binoculars Grant gave me at Christmas one year, Wyatt sees all sorts of things which he announces as he spies them.  Without binoculars, he sees 'moke on the horizon, from farmers burning off their pastures on a rare relatively calm spring day.

Another activity Wyatt dearly loves is chasing butterflies (flyflies).  Through his delighted eyes I saw many more butterflies than I had any idea were out and about this early in the season.  The child  can cover a lot of ground fast.  He runs in circles when necessary and turns and pivots as needed to follow butterfly flights.  He often looks like he's about to fall, but he hardly ever does.

In the highchair, eating his Cheerios breakfast, Wyatt needed a fly swatter to deal with the lone fly he saw in the dining room.  He said "Got it" if he thought he connected or "Where?" (accompanied by vigorous head-turning) if he was sure he missed.  Then he invented a little game.  With the flyswatter, he made small gestures toward objects within range and said "got it" every time he focused on one particular object--his version of "God bless you" or "I see your hand" during a closed-eye after-the-sermon invitation.

By the time his mommy showed up, Wyatt, wasn't so sure he was ready to leave, and I wasn't sure I was ready for him to do so.  He's a delightful little man--so much like his daddy at age two.  Grandparenting may be as close as it gets to being able to turn back the clock and indulge in parenting-light pleasures again.  It's a good gift.

*****************

The day after Wyatt was here, Hiromi and I took our two granddaughters for a morning at the Hutchinson Zoo and lunch at Long John Silver.  They are sisters 21 months and 3.5 years old.  It was the very first time we babysat both girls.  Arwen was here alone only a few times as an infant before her family left the country for almost three years.  We had never met Lucia until a week and a half ago when they returned for a 3-month stay.

It didn't take long to notice that these girls operate with a different set of dynamics than the grandsons do.  If Arwen used a purple cup here earlier, she laid claim to the purple cup this time.  If the pink shawl was tucked around her in the car seat on the way to the zoo, the same one was desired on the way home.  Lucia likewise chose "hers" from the four options the second time around.  I don't think the boys would have noticed or cared about these details.

I expected Arwen to be shy and cautious.  We didn't see much of that.  Instead, she was as fearless as Joel used to be (he's the child who climbed high up on the windmill ladder before he was two), and readily tried out everything climb-able at the zoo.  Lucia happily trailed along, content to try or not try whatever was available.  This was a lot like the child Joel too--an affable disposition.  Both girls could easily and cheerfully be re-directed when needed.

Arwen uses complete sentences and often asks questions.  Lucia readily puts several words together.  I can't wait to hear more of what they're thinking.  For now we're very pleased to be establishing a relationship with these little ones.

The girl grandchildren are outnumbered two to one in the Iwashige family.  If it weren't for Arwen and Lucia there would yet be no evidence that American Iwashiges are capable of making girl babies.  Thank God for this delightful anomaly.

Added later:

When the newly-arrived family made their first shopping trip to town, Arwen asked why "Daddy is his own driver."  Where they live, Daddy goes places on his bicycle, but if the family is with him, it's always either in a rickshaw, a CNG (motorized rickshaw), or a taxi.  Daddy does not own or drive a car when they're at "home."

Arwen also asked why we're going in the car when we went to the zoo.  "Because that's really the only good way to get there," I said.  In BD, many more options would have been available.