Ewan Wins the Jonah Look-Alike Contest
Jonah Ewan
{Again at Washington & Lee with the Lee chapel behind us. }
Ewan's three older siblings imbue him with more personality than he has words for. His face tells me he could be four-years-old, but his little tongue is still grasping at sounds that make words. Ewan has speech therapy twice a month. Miss Cheri comes to our house and we talk about techniques and games that encourage communication and articulation. He's made progress - he has stopped calling me Daddy, and finally whines for Mommy instead. Only if there is no Daddy around, because if Daddy is around Mommy doesn't exist.
This parent dichotomy brought on self imposed trauma for Ewan yesterday afternoon when Matt came home from work. Heartless Matt went to the bathroom and shut the door with Ewan on the wrong side of it. I was on Ewan's side offering comfort but he wanted none of me knowing who was on the other side. Ewan screamed, pounded on the door, sobbed, yelled "Daddy" over and over again.
Within a few minutes he evidently tired of his own histrionics and finally quieted with his forehead resting against the door in a completely defeated posture. After a moment he turned looking for some distraction or consolation. Still uninterested in me he opened the dirty clothes hamper to see what treasure might be lurking inside.
Eureka! Ewan pulled out the pajama bottoms he had been wearing earlier in the morning while eating breakfast. He hunkered up into the corner and began prying off the bits of dried oats and popping them into his mouth one at a time. There he sulked and snacked until Matthew emerged to rescue him.
This is what we call self reliance.
Ewan is a happy child. His siblings love him and include him in most of what they do. He wants to be with us and he wants to play. When he settles into a fowl mood he makes himself heard by continual screaming. Like most good parents we try nearly anything to stop the shrill shrieks. Occasionally we let him watch the LDS Youth 2012 theme song, "Arise." He almost always jollies immediately and sings along or dances.
Here is one such occasion.
6 comments:
All of your children win the Jessica lookalike contest.
I love the video. I love the singing. I love the hula dance. I love the foraging in the hamper. What children you have.
Oh, the precious grandchild I do not know. And I am focusing on his fowl, as opposed to foul, mood. How evocative!
Oh grief, did I write 'fowl'? I am glad you can interpret my typo evocatively. He does have a bit of an obsession with birds, but his 'fowl' mood definitely looks different than his 'foul' mood. One is charming - the other not so much.
And now that we have brought to light my mistake I'll have to stay my twitching little fingers that want to go back and fix it. Fowl it is and fowl it shall remain.
Your children are wonderment and joy! Bring them post haste and we will have lovely times together!
Ewan is such a cute kid!!! I love that "Arise" video. We showed it to the youth a few months back. It always touches me. By the way, the Young Women still miss you. We had a goodbye party for Alyssa, who turned 18 and is now going to the singles ward (I miss her so much!), and all of the girls reminisced about you and how they wanted to kidnap you and bring you back to Utah.
There is a long list of people who want to kidnap you. I am on it.
I give you permission to correct your typo. It's never too late. In fact, I just corrected a typo from a blog post I wrote five years ago.
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