Me and My Shadow

Harvey has been quite the little companion lately. He's going through a little (a lot of) seperation anxiety, so he's pretty much under foot at all times. He's basically with one of us all the time during the week except for the 2 1/2 hours he's in the nursery at church. This past Sunday---fail. We dropped him off and he cried after us. He's never done that before. I left my cell phone number with them and figured they would call if he was totally crazy. I figured he would cry for a minute, forget about us and start playing with all the new people. I mean, this is the child that I take to story time that crawls up in other mother's laps and pulls up on their shoulders to play with their hair. Cute for now, creepy in a few years buddy. I kept checking my phone (which was obviously on silent) and never saw anything. After Sunday school, I noticed I had a missed call from about 30 minutes earlier from a number I didn't know. Automatic guilt because we both knew Harv was freakin' out. We walked in the door to the children's wing and we could already hear him screaming. We got to his room, and he's sitting in the corner with a dad beside him, screaming his face off while all the other children are staring at him on the other side of the room. Everyone was a little freaked out by him. As were we, really. You could see the teachers breath a collective sigh of relief when we showed up and took him out. Apparently he cried off and on (mostly on) for the entire 2 1/2 hours. So for the next few weeks, we're supposed to stay in there with him to help him adjust. We'll be going to church just to sit in the nursery and not actually go to church. Sounds productive.

And, I'm really thinking we need to try a little harder to get him in a Mother's Day Out program in the fall. I tried before and they are all full. I think it would do this boy some good to be away from mama during the day just for a few hours a week. Good for mama too. :)

Today he was my little "helper" all around the house. Today we cleaned, cleaned, cleaned and he fell off of/bumped his head on/smashed his fingers in everything possible. Amazing little helper. He cried at first when I started to vacuum (which also has never happened before), so I tried to put him in the Moby carrier on my side. Nothing like 26+ pounds of dead weight literally hanging off your side to make you really break a sweat. That didn't last for long. So I put him back on the floor, and his love affair with the vacuum was rekindled. We've been vacuuming around him since he was little, so he's not scared at all. He watched me as I went room to room, "helped" me mop, played with my duster, found random junk on the floor, and topped the day off by helping with the laundry. Pretty sure he's going to be like most children that are obsessed with the dryer. He pretty much climbed right on in. Whatever keeps him entertained while I'm working is fine by me. Just try not to injure yourself----again.

Here are some recent photos of our little shadow.


Harv and Mary Helen at the zoo. Quite the pair.







He already wants to be just like daddy. I think we're going to have another piano player (we already do, kind of).

And his other favorite past time---the 5 o'clock news. Really, that's what he's watching. Up close and personal. While banging on the DVD player. And getting in trouble. Again.