Sevens and a Couple Other Things

I was tagged by Katherine to make seven lists of seven (OK, I asked for it - it was too interesting to pass up!), but I have a couple bits of running commentary to make first.

One, I read a post here on the 26th that cracked me up, all about "when you know" certain things. Well, today I have two to add:

You know your standards of personal beauty and hygiene have been sorely compromised by motherhood when the receptionist at the dentist office tells you that you smell nice and it absolutely makes your day, even though it's embarrassing to admit that it's just your new soap (Magnolia Blossom from a B&BW sale).

You know that your son is indeed your child when he tells his dad that he has relapsed into wetting his pants regularly after a near-perfect potty training experience, (notice the quotation marks - they're Cal's own words)"because there isn't a chart anymore." Oh, the perils of minor obsessiveness - the list-making, the necessity of charting progress - that get unwittingly passed down to three-year-olds who don't miss a trick.

Part of this insatiable appetite for order that Calvin inherited is a habit he has had since he was about a year old of putting things in lines. He lines up trucks end to end across our sofa; he doesn't stack blocks, but puts them in great lines across the expanse of his bedroom floor. (These lines have sometimes been killer at nighttime wakings if they didn't get picked up before bedtime.) I've heard this lining up thing is a phase that every child goes through, but it has been Cal's longest phase so far, and I'm pretty sure it's to do with genetics.

(I can say that I'm glad the roaring and biting phase didn't last as long. I finally figured out it was Cal's clever way of meeting people by engaging them in a game of "Lions / Dinosaurs," so we had to have a lesson on introducing oneself and asking someone if they'd like to play...something less carnivorous. But see there? Why do useful things like that need to be consciously taught, but the OCD traits I've been trying to tone down in myself just show up, of their own accord, in my innocent baby?)

Anyway, not too long after he started talking pretty well, Cal brought a piece of paper and a marker and two Matchbox cars to me and said something like, "Make parking." It took me a minute to interpret, but then I realized he wanted a parking lot for his little cars. Unbelievable. So I drew him a little grid and he was off to park them. Well, he STILL regularly asks for parking, only now he brings a ruler along with him when he asks (straight lines are important, you know). This is the parking lot from yesterday:
And while I hope that I am not still handing out stickers and marshmallows for going pee when he is ten, I think I will be a little sad when he doesn't need me to "Make parking" for him anymore.

And now....(drumroll)...my Se7ens...

7 Books I Love:
1. Great Expectations (Charles Dickens)
2. My Antonia (Willa Cather)
3. The Little House on the Prairie Series (Laura Ingalls Wilder)
4. A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court (Mark Twain)
5. Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen)
6. Cold Sassy Tree (Olive Ann Burnett)
7. The Scarlet Pimpernel (Baroness Orczy)
8. Only seven? But I must include the Thesauraus and the Scriptures…

7 Movies I Can Watch Over and Over:
1. Sense and Sensibility
2. Persuasion
3. While You Were Sleeping
4. You’ve Got Mail
5. Chocolat
6. Somersby
7. Steel Magnolias

7 Things I Say Often:
1. That’s not a toy!
2. Come back here!
3. 1 – 2 – 3 …
4. Ehhxcellent.
5. Oh, come ON!
6. Nice.
7. OK, in five minutes, we’re going to…(the only way to get Calvin to come in peace.)

7 Things I Love About My Spouse:
1. He loved me first and wasn’t afraid to tell me so (and he still tells me all the time).
2. He knows a fair amount about just about everything.
3. He stands up for what he knows to be true.
4. He adores our children.
5. He is passionate about his work.
6. He is both sensitive and sensible.
7. When I am with him, I am “home.”

7 Things I Cannot Do:
1. Sleep through an entire night. (My babies have for some time now, but I can’t anymore!)
2. Stop biting my fingernails.
3. Get used to humidity.
4. Speak Chinese.
5. Ride amusement park rides that go in any kind of circle. (But I heart roller coasters and can ride them indefinitely with nary a barfbag in sight.)
6. Watch Teletubbies or Boohbah.
7. Ignore the misuse of: they’re, their, and there; it’s and its; to, too, and two; plural s and possessive s.

7 Things I Want to Do Before I Die:
1. Go back to Ukraine and see my peeps again.
2. Write a book that gets published and that people read and really like.
3. Become a good, efficient, consistent, unfrazzled housekeeper.
4. Learn to row crew.
5. Do a Jane Austen tour of England and spend a week in Greece just with David.
6. Learn to paint floorcloths.
7. Unbury my piano talent.

7 People I’d Like to Hear 7s From:
1. Angela
2. Tess(did you already do this one? I didn’t think I had read it from you yet, but let me know!)
3. Anyone who wants to…Tell me in a comment and I’ll add you here!