Teaching

Friday was one of those great mommy days. I let all my responsibilities outside of motherhood sit on the back burner for the day and I spent the day like I wish I could spend all days. We got up in the morning and we went to the blueberry farm for the third time this year and came away with about 15 pounds of blueberries. I love berry picking and have successfully passed that love down to my eldest. I can hardly wait until Pee-Wee loves it too, but he's well on his way. I introduced him to the joys of eating right off the bush while you work, and he seemed to be a big fan of blueberries too! Yum!
We came home and Buddy asked if he could ride his bike while I got lunch ready. BUT, he insisted, he didn't want to use training wheels anymore. Buddy's best friend had just learned to ride a bike the day before and while Buddy hadn't shown a whole lot of interest in biking up to that point, I decided to take them off. Now, I must say, Buddy doesn't really have a real bike. He's been using a tiny bike that belongs to my parents. And it doesn't have any brakes. No wonder he didn't have much interest.

I warned him that if I took the training wheels off, they were never going back on. Buddy didn't mind. I admit, I had absolutely no confidence in him. If you saw how he rides with training wheels, you'd understand.

The first few minutes were a disaster. He had no concept of balance, but he was persistent. And 45 minutes later, with me teaching him to start and with me holding him steady, he was getting the hang of it. He could only ride a few feet, but I was impressed nevertheless.

Saturday we spent the day outside doing yardwork and Buddy practiced here and there. And then this morning he begged to go out and practice yet again. I had a million phone calls to make, so I told him he could practice and I'd watch, but I couldn't help. A few minutes after we got outside, he was riding solo! So needless to say, I've been on craig.slist today looking for a bike so he can actually ride one that fits him. And so he doesn't have to pedal so fast to keep the little bike moving and balanced...
So back to Friday. After bike riding, we decided to go to the pool, where we continued to work on his crawl stroke. Simply amazing and very fun, I might add. Between him and Michael Phelps, I kinda want to teach myself to swim now.

We've also been working on reading and spelling. I've opted not to send Buddy to preschool this year because I love teaching him myself (even if it infuriates both of us at times -- mostly him). He has a long way to go before he learns to "read," but wow it's fun to work on it and see the look on his face when he gets it.

There is an interesting phenomenon with raising children. I had a yearn to be a mother, not even realizing what I wanted out of the experience. But now that I get these precious opportunities to teach my children, I know exactly what makes this so great. And this is just the tip of the iceberg. I could go on and on about our teaching moments concerning the more important topics -- adoption, the Holy Spirit, as he calls it, and dinosaurs. But I'll save all that for another post.

In related news, Buddy was asking me what class I teach at church now. I told him I don't teach a class, I'm the president.

Oh, yeah! You're the President of the United States now!

Boy does he have confidence in me! And that's a scary, but humbling thought. This whole business about earning a child's trust is so much more rewarding than I could have ever expected.

And just so I don't leave little Pee-Wee out, he's learning so many things every day too. He's been learning to pull himself to standing position and (gasp) I've been encouraging this. Only because it's so cute and he laughs when he pulls himself up. I can't help but clap and say yeah! Even though I'm going to regret it when he's walking sooner than I'd like.