Boy Cousins

 While we were at Grandma's house, three other boy cousins were visiting as well! For nearly our entire stay, David got to see cousins come and go, but Trey, Drew and Cade were there nearly the entire time we were. If I am drawn to move back to the lower 48, it is primarily so these relationships can develop. I want David to be around the goodness of his cousins.

Drew and David quickly bonded over their love for the piano. Both of them have a creative flair in their playing, and they got a few duets going that sounded like they had potential.

David was only a month in to formal piano lessons when we left on our trip, so he easily accepted Drew's tutoring of chords and rhythm. Drew is good at making things up, and I have to say that he raised David's "creative" play a few notches by showing him a few things. 

David also learned just how fun a sand pile can be. Again, these boys stretched David to design and create things he wouldn't have done on his own. It was wonderful to see the synergy David pulled from being around the other boys.

If anyone in the world can inspire child labor, it is Grandma. One afternoon I was at home with Alina while she napped. Grandma took the boys with her to get the oil changed on the van. When they came back, I heard them before I saw them. I heard excited yells and whooping. Then the four boys appear in her backyard, racing each other to the very back of her lot. I wondered if they had been told about a golden egg back there. Nope, just Grandma's ability to rally her troops to work happily. They were heading out to go pick weeds in the volleyball court. They looked like most kids do when they go to Disneyland--their enthusiasm was amazing! Could have fooled me that all that excitement was just to be the first to fill a bucket with weeds. 

Another project they worked on with her was clearing her water fountain of weeds. The tale goes that David was about to pick up a black widow during this project when his cousin stopped him. I'm grateful we didn't have any casualties from the work project--just happy boys soaking up sun.

School goes with us when we homeschool--but luckily, it's not all book work. Without giving too many details, let's just say there was one less pest eating Grandma's gardens by the time we left town. (Almost 2 less pests, but David got overly anxious to pet the second one they trapped, and opened the trap, only to have to tell Grandpa later that the sought-after pest escaped. Ummm. Sorry Grandpa.)

And there was an up-close lesson on dissecting. Nothing he would have found in a kindergarten classroom, that's for sure! But so educational for our bright boy that always has questions rolling off  his tongue. He's showing me his prize, and telling me about all the parts he sees. I'm trying to stay engaged with his conversation while taking a picture, but not really interested in getting too close to his specimen.

I purchased a science kit to learn about minerals for David's homeschooling, but when it came in the mail I could see that it would be over his head.

Having three older cousins to do the work with him was just the right combination to keep David engaged, and the enthusiasm bubbled around the boys and spilled over onto one another.

More on this in another post, but Grandma also helped each boy make a diorama of salt dough, depicting a different part of the Easter story. We have the last supper, the garden, the cross, and the empty tomb.

Oh, how we laughed at this scene!! The aunts (Dacia and Shayla) took the boys on a date to go get ice cream. Before they left, Grandma held a powwow with the boys to remind them how to act on a date. She told them that they were going out with the some of the prettiest ladies they would ever meet, and they needed to act like gentlemen. "How do you act like gentlemen on a date?" David sat in a sunburned stupor, but the other boys piped up to contribute their share. The 12 year old said, "You open their doors." The 9-year old said, "You wear nice clothes." And the 7 year-old shared his sage advice: "You don't play chubby bunny." Immediately after the powwow was done on the couch, the four boys snuck around to the front door (trying to be quiet and sneaky, but failing miserably as they tried to find their shoes) and rang the doorbell to pick up their dates. I think the evening only got better from there, from what I hear.

One of the most perfect arrangements of the week was that Grandma was watching her neighbor's chicken coop while she had grandsons to help her. It was the trek of the day, to go over and collect the eggs, feed, and water the chickens.

We estimated that over the course of two weeks, this group collected about 200 eggs. We ate omelets, french toast, deviled eggs, and boiled some up for dying for Easter. Would you believe that the day that we left town, I saw Grandma walk in to the house with her groceries. She had none other then 2 dozen eggs--store bought! The days of collecting the eggs were over for her, and somehow the appetites she fed that week kept up with the dozens of eggs they had collected. 

Such a perfect chore for this group!

David has very few opportunities to be around other kids his age for extended periods of time. The week spent with these cousins was an absolute Godsend for our boy. The cousins were confident enough to hold their own with David's personality, and the interaction was very congenial. These boys were patient with David, and excellent examples of goodness. I am so grateful that David got to learn things from these boys that I couldn't teach him myself. Just being with other boys that knew how to roll with the punches and keep the fun going was a tremendous blessing. I am sure that the interaction with these cousins, as well as the memories they made together, are some of the key reasons I felt inspired to bring David along with me and extend my trip. My heart is so full of gratitude for the experiences David had with them.