Gymnastics

We just got back from gymnastics.  We have to attend at six o'clock so that all three children have their classes at the same time, since despite how close they are in age, they are each in a separate mixed-age class.

Emerson has gone to gymnastics since he was 14 months old, and I figured since he was climbing everything in sight, I might as well put some climbing equipment under his little feet.  He is full of enthusiasm to be back again.

Buttercup is having her first experience with a real teacher and a real class of her own peers.  Her enthusiasm translates into trying really hard to follow all the directions, and very little physical capability of doing just that.  This could not be more opposite of the last time I parenting through the toddler class!  When she gets to the frog area, she is precise in remembering that she should ribbit, but it is only sheer statistical probability that some of her many, many jumps actually propel her in a forward direction.  The balance beams are accomplished mostly because she's holding my hand, and as soon as she has that anchor she starts looking around the gymnasium to see what her brother and sister are doing!  Today she was supposed to "drive a car" (hold a circle like a steering wheel) which occupied both her hands while she balanced.  She moved exactly one inch with each step, and then she very very carefully matched her color of steering wheel with the color of cone at the end of the balance beam, which it took her several moments to gather her feet together and step off of.  Buttercup is the child who is the bane of every toddler boy, having fun doing all the obstacles at top speed and energy!

Hibiscus has energy.  She has energy, and she has a great deal of strength in her long legs and wiry frame.  She also has flexibility, that makes it look like all her limbs can go in their own directions.  What she lacks, is any kind of planning or mental control.  So basically, she is like a giant rag doll, sprung out from a huge slingshot, and aimed at the trampolines or parallel bars.


Then this was the conversation that ensued on the way home.

I don't remember how the conversation in the back seat got to this point, but Hibiscus laughed that she was going to throw wraps at me when I died.  Emerson replied that that wasn't very funny.  And that when I died, he was going to make a bed with glass sides, so he could go and look at me every day.  And he was going to keep the bed in his house so he could look at me every day because he would miss me so much.  Hibiscus said she would cry if I was dead and she looked at me.  Emerson said he would not ever, ever cut me open and take out my heart and things, and Hibiscus agreed that she wouldn't cut me open either.  Emerson was going to look at me every day.  They agreed that in order to get a skeleton, you have to cut the dead body up and take the bones out, and they weren't going to do that.

Emerson said, in a loving and secretive manner, that if Hibiscus didn't get married, she could come in his house and look at me in the glass box every day too.  Hibiscus said she would cry and cry if she looked at me because she never wanted me to die.  Emerson said he would look in the glass box and see how beautiful I was and how much he loved me.

Hibiscus suggested that possibily she did want to get married.  Emerson said if she married someone else, some other person, someone else, then she couldn't come in his house every day.  Hibiscus started to get annoyed, and replied that when she birthed a baby, she wasn't going to let Emerson come see either.  Emerson said if she married someone else, she could come to his house to see me in the glass box maybe one time.

I suggested that I hoped that when they were grown up, they would still be a loving brother and sister and be welcome in each other's houses.  Just like we went to Gramcy's house sometimes.

Emerson immediately offered that Hibiscus could come and look at me in the glass box every Sunday after church, which coincidentally exactly the same schedule on which we visit Gramcy's house.  Hibiscus said he could see the baby she birthed, too.


And that was our evening at gymnastics!