On an average day it's not uncommon for my kids to make me smile at least a half dozen times. Of course there are always a few that stand out enough that you'll share it with the other people in your life so that they can smile as well. Here are a couple of Nicholas and Juliette moments that I've been sharing with family and friends.
It was a Saturday morning before Christmas and I was sleeping in because I was out late Friday night playing Ultimate. At around 7 AM my wife had told me that she was going shopping. Instead of waking up with the kids at 8, I slept right through until 10. By the time I went downstairs mom had returned from her Christmas shopping to find a complete disaster. Apparently if you leave a 2 and 4 year old to their own devices they can make quite the mess. At one point we asked Nicholas what he had eaten for breakfast to which he responded "Chocolate". Now, normally we don't have junk food lying around the house so I was a bit surprised by this response. Then I noticed an advent calendar lying on the floor. The word advent originated from a Latin word meaning 'arrival'. With the advent calendars, you countdown each day until Christmas by opening small compartments which hold a chocolate. Out of curiosity I picked up the calendar to see how many paper tabs he had opened to get to the chocolate underneath. Since most of the tabs were closed I assumed he had eaten 2 or 3 max but each tab I opened was empty. Nicholas had meticulously inspected every tab and found every chocolate in the box. Considering most of the tabs were closed he must have checked a few of them 2 or 3 times. I was amazed by his dedication, thoroughness and capacity for sweets (20+ chocolates in one sitting, he definitely take after his dad).
Last night I was eager to watch the Return of the King (the extended version) that I had received for Christmas but the kids were still awake. I decided to show them the ridiculously long yet completely non-violent ending to the movie as a compromise. Juliette, like anyone who is thrust in the middle of a storyline was asking lots of questions of who was who and what was happening. She really like the "princess" but when I asked her if she would have kissed the king at the coronation ceremony she told me that she would have asked him to shave first. At the very end when Bilbo and Frodo leave with the elves for a distant land never to return I saw Juliette's eyes tearing up. I asked her if she was crying and she grudgingly admitted yes. And it wasn't a little kid sobbing but a very quite and subtle tearing up that an adult would do during a sad movie. Of course Juliette hadn't seen the 10+ hours that led up to the point in the plot line for the Lord of the Rings but the combination of the sad music and the tears of the actors were enough to get her all teary eyed. It was very cute to see my little 4 year old have a very adult style reaction to a movie.
P.S. We saw the Incredibles with the family on Boxing Day. It is a great movie and should be seen by everyone especially couples with kids. Juliette loved it and Nicholas slept through most of it (as planned).
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