* Today was the day for Nana to return to Miami. We went out to breakfast together before heading to the airport. I had a feeling Nixon was going to take it kind of rough, so I was accidentally prepared. Yesterday, Mac and I were at Target when we saw a plush Skylander dragon toy. Nixon is obsessed with this particular character since he got one as a happy meal toy a few weeks ago. After a little discussion we bought it, but stashed it in the back of my car so Nixon wouldn't see it until we were ready to give it to him.
As he was freaking out at the airport, we dropped Nana off curbside so Nixon stayed in his car seat, Mac handed his mom the dragon and let her give it to Nixon as a good-bye gift. Instantly soothed the raging beast that was Nixon! It's not always about getting credit for buying an awesome toy for your kid, sometimes it's knowing the toy you bought was exactly the right thing to make a situation a little easier for your child.
We were not even a mile from dropping Nana off and Nixon says "I miss Nana" quietly from his car seat. I look in the mirror and he's hugging his dragon as he says that. It was exactly what he needed.
* Sometimes other peoples kids give you an opportunity to teach your own child to be a better person. That happened tonight during a family walk around the park near our house. The short story is we watched as a young child, around Nixon's age, was unsupervised and threw a softball at 2 ducks in a small pond nearly hitting them both...I mean mere inches from striking them with the ball! I got very concerned (and did say quite loudly "Are you kidding me?!?" though obviously no one cared) and wanted to march over to the children, but instead after Nixon asked why I was upset, I talked to him about the importance of being kind and caring to all animals, not just our pets. Especially wild ones who are in their own home (like the ducks were on the pond) and asked him if he would like someone throwing something at him in our house. He said no, because that's mean and it would hurt. I went on to explain that outdoors is the animals homes and it's just as mean to throw things at them in their homes, even if it is outside where we are allowed to throw things, because we don't throw things at animals. Ever!
He asked why those kids did that and all I could say was, sometimes other parents don't tell kids to be kind to animals. But it's important to be kind and nice to all animals.
That was about all his 4-year old attention span was ready for.
* Nixon spent about 20 minutes before he went to bed "packing and unpacking" a box so he could "go back to the airport". Apparently (or at least according to Nixon) we're flying to go see Nana soon and Nixon wants to be prepared. I'm not ready to tell him that's not happening, he can have happy dreams of airplanes and Nana tonight.
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