Misra Family Hebdomadal: Luke's Adventure to the "Waddy"

Buying flowers. Luke insisted on carrying them all the way home.

This last Monday was Memorial Day, and we started it with some nice, peaceful pictures of Luke buying some flowers and then decorating veteran graves at our local cemetery. What the pictures don't show is how crazy Luke was that morning. While we saw the tombstones as beautiful and solemn reminders of those who had lived before us, Luke saw some awesome rocks for him to climb on! And as for the flat tombstones and not walking on them... yeah, that was a battle we lost. But hey! We're continuing the tradition and it was a great reminder for us of life and death and what it means to sacrifice.

Thank you to all who sacrifice and serve

That evening we had a really fun BBQ with some friends! Luke was cute and liked the kebabs Marinda had gotten for them. It was also a noteworthy night because Marinda had the maiden voyage of her new S'mores Maker! At first we thought it was just a hot coil, but later Marinda figured out that the grate you put on the top isn't just decorative, it bends the air into a more focused column of heat. Yeah, Marinda's life has gotten significantly better!

Luke wants to be a big boy like Daddy!

Luke has started counting! And not just counting when we ask him to. Now we'll see him counting his cars, the shoes, or sometimes even his food. Sometimes we can't even see what he is counting, but there he is counting away! How he counts is pretty funny though. It goes something like this: 1, 3, 2, 6, 7, 8, 7, 8, 16, 6, 8, 7, 8, 7, 8, 17, 6... Marinda is excited because she read in a child development book that it is a perfectly normal for him to count like this. The next step is to start assigning only one number to each item, and then figure out the whole order thing.

Luke playing "sleeping" where he buries himself him pillows and blankets
and declares to Marinda and Amit that he is "sleeping"

On Wednesday Marinda had a crazy adventure with Luke. She was feeling down that day and decided she needed a fun date with Luke, so she took him the Magnuson Playground. They had never been there before and Luke was having fun running around. They had been to the water front many times before driving around on the roads, and Marinda thought that Luke would like it. Thinking that it wasn't that far, she asked if Luke wanted to go to the water. That got him really excited, but instead of it just being a field and a hill away, it was two big fields and one giant hill away. But once Luke had set his mind to see the "waddy" nothing could deter him from his goal!

So with their water bottle and great strength of character, they embarked on this great journey. At the top of the hill Luke was able to finally see the Lake Washington and the clear (long) path before him. He started to run, and said to himself the entire way down the hill "almost there, almost there." It was a heartening moment for Marinda, as she thought about perseverance and working towards your goals. When it is in sight, instead of focusing on how much longer you still have to go, you should start running instead.

When we finally made it to the water, Luke taught Marinda a new lesson on courage. The beach is really just a collection of stones, and Marinda could tell that Luke really wanted to touch the water, but for some reason he was scared to go out on the stones. So with Marinda standing a foot behind him, Luke began to slowly, oh so slowly pick his way onto the stones towards the water, sometimes retracing his steps when fear would win out, but always trying again, this time moving a little closer. Finally, his toes touched the water (he was wearing open toed shoes) and with a big grin wasn't afraid anymore.

Soon it was time to return to the playground, and with Luke on her shoulders (Luke was pretty worn out by this point) Marinda carried him back. When they got to the giant field she let Luke down and he ran free to his hearts content. Marinda felt free herself, standing there in the open with low flying birds darting past her and her happy little boy. When they got back to the playground, Luke climbed up to the tunnel slide, and then sat there. He had never gone down a tunnel slide before, and though he understood the concept and saw other children riding it down, he couldn't bring himself to enter into the unknown darkness. It was only when Marinda called up to him through the tunnel, her voice calling to him to come to her, that he let got of the bar and slid down to her waiting arms.

This post has actually been written from one of the Heb's satellite offices in Strongsville, Ohio (note to bad guys, our neighbors are watching our bunny and the house, so don't even think of trying anything). Luke was a very good boy for the first little bit of the trip and we even got him to sleep for about an hour during the four hour flight to Chicago. But for the last 2.5 hours he fell apart - and Marinda felt like the most frazzled, unraveling mother in existence. She was positive all those put together business women in their high heels and pressed suits were just looking at her with frayed hair, frumpy clothes and desperate look that they didn't miss much from skipping the whole motherhood thing. Marinda hates being seen as a typical stereotype, and it just added to her sense of failure. Despite all this, they made it to Cleveland and are now in the safe care of Amit's parents.

Luke just had fun climbing on everything in the Seattle Airport Playground.
Fyi children are amazing. There were some older kids there
and within three minutes of meeting each other
had already organized themselves into a game of hide and seek.

Awww... Look at that little angel! Sleeping on the flight like such a good little boy

So far this trip Luke has played outside a lot, fallen in love with the fire truck Amit's parents got for him to play with here, and a fun trip to the park to play on the tunnel slide there. There never was a little boy that was so intensely loved by his grandparents. Amit and Marinda have also loved the almost spa like conditions, with AC, long hot showers, and deliciously prepared meals. Marinda is also loving catching up on her Indian Soap Operas since last January. Since when did Jaalal and Jodha start getting along anyways!?!?

Behold the splendor and glory of my minions!
(Luke told us that they were in the parking lot to go to sleep)

Today we went to the nicest ward on the planet over in Lorain, and then over to a friend's house for dinner where Luke had a great time playing with his Rohit Uncle and Rahul Uncle. We're looking forward to spending a nice week here and having Luke get to know his grandparents a little better.