CLAIIIIIIIRRRRRRREEEEEEEE!

Today was soccer "graduation."  The kids got little medals for playing.  Joshua spent most of his last soccer practice lollygagging in the field, but I still cried when he got his medal.  Claire is right handed but left footed, so maybe someday she'll be a great soccer player.  Only time will tell.

Right now the kids are playing the Wii.  Claire is playing left handed because her "favorite hand" is too tired.  She still managed to beat Joshua and me, by quite a bit.  Joshua is frustrated.

Claire is on my mind today, as I can no longer enter her bedroom.  The mess is starting to spill out into the hall.  She sleeps on a mound of stuff.  This does not seem to bother her in the slightest - I cannot understand.  I asked her to clean her room; she spent an hour in there.  When she came out, she was wearing different clothes and a tiara.  Her bedroom looked as bad as ever. She's only 5 - is it wrong of me to give up?  She doesn't share a room (for a multitude of reasons) so she's only torturing herself (and my peace of mind!)

Claire did come out of her room with a handful of pennies.  She showed it to me, and then said she was going to save some of it for an American Girl doll, and give the rest to someone who needed money.  She then looked at me, and said "I heard you say you're running out of money. Here - buy whatever you want!"  She took the money upstairs and put it on my dresser.  When she came downstairs, she sat on the couch, and said, very matter-of-factly, "I am very generous. It wouldn't fit in my piggy bank anyway."

James is now 2 1/2, so I have decided it is time to say goodbye to binky.  Gone are my uptight, judgemental days, where I looked with a disapproving eye at the mother of any toddler with a binky.  Thus far, it has not been worth the fight.  The problem now is that James has binkies hidden all over the house, so every time I turn around, I find one in his mouth.  When we got home from soccer this morning, I noticed him walking up to the house with binky in his mouth. Who knew he had one hidden in the car? I pulled it out, and he preceded to plop himself face first onto the grass and scream.  Being how he is the third child and not the first, I stepped over him and went into the house.  When he was finished, he came in.  After his nap, he went to another hidden binky, but since he was well rested, he didn't protest when I took it.  He said "You need a binky, Mommy?"  Sometimes, I do.