Hide and Seek

I hate the blog privacy issues have had such an impact around here.  It's a little embarrassing to admit, but having a few readers and the occasional comment has really provided incentive for me to keep the blog going over the last several years.  I started writing here to keep our family and close friends connected to the boys' changes as they grew.  It then became the primary way that I have recorded so much of their lives.  Lately, without my target audience, and with a few other changes in our lives, I find I've only written three posts all month.  I don't think I've written that little since I started.  (I'd have to check the stats to be sure).  Even if I haven't written, life has plowed full steam ahead.  I know I've let some details slip away by now, but there are a few I want to get down.  So now, with just a precious few readers (I'll get the rest of you back as soon as I can, promise!) I'll close the month of May with a story or two about my guys....

LO loves hide and seek.  Off and on for the last year he has enjoyed asking DH or me to hide while he finds us.  We have played outside and in.  Usually he has told us where to hide and then gets great pleasure out of finding us there.  I have encouraged his counting skills to expand by asking him to count to higher and higher numbers while I "hide" in one of about three places.  Now he can count pretty reliably to twenty, and I can take that long to hide behind the chair (where I don't really fit) AGAIN.

When LO was a much younger toddler/baby, I played hide and seek just the two of us by hiding his lovey or a toy and letting him search for it.  Tonight, NB did the same with me while LO played his way with Da.  It was so fun to hear the boys laughter, see their smiles, and know they were enjoying two versions of the same game.  It was like a flashback and flash forward at the same time.  It was also the stuff of memories.  Probably just for me and DH, but that's a good place for them to start.

Lately, LO seems to have reprised his love of the baby "hide and seek" game we used to play.  Either that or he's developing a more mature toddler version.  Perhaps the latter as he is now getting great pleasure in watching me search all over tarnation for needed objects rather than seeking joy in the his own search.  I always want to give him the benefit of the doubt.  My little buddy wouldn't really watch me look this long for that when he knows I need it...would he?  On at least two occasions that answer has, regrettably, been "yes."  About two weeks ago NB's hair brush went missing.  Now my boys don't really need a hairbrush.  In fact the one LO came home with from the hospital is still in use.  We have a couple of them, so losing one isn't that big of a deal.  Still, after several days without it, I started to get frustrated.  That's when I vaguely recalled LO saying "That's my hairbrush" to himself several days earlier.  So I asked, "Hey bud, do you know where NB's hairbrush is?" "No ma'am." he answered.  I believed him at first, but as the days went on, I started to wonder if he knew more.  Then I felt guilty for thinking he'd hidden it on purpose.  I waffled back and forth until, several days later, LO and I were in NB's room.  LO was where he could see what I was doing, but could not see what I saw.  I knelt and looked under the ottoman for something other than the hairbrush and LO said "what do you see under there...a hairbrush?"  "Yes, I do...how did you know? Did you put it there?"  "I did!" he replied proudly.  There it was confirmation that he had, for days, known where the brush was and enjoyed seeing me search in futility.  Funny as that story seems, he had lied to me and I addressed that accordingly. Shortly after that, I had left NB's shoe at a friend's house.  I thought we could do without it since he isn't walking yet.  To my surprise, I missed having shoes for him almost daily for the next week.  Finally, last Saturday, I went back to get the missing shoe.  When I returned home, I could not find the first shoe.  I looked everywhere, including under the ottoman.  No. shoe.  I asked LO if he hid it.  He said he had.  I asked where, he didn't seem to know.  I started guessing places, and he helped me narrow it down.  He thought it was upstairs in NB's room.  I turned the place upside down. No. shoe. Thursday (FIVE days later, mind you) I came home to be told that LO and Nanny K found NB's shoe in the Zingo game.  I definitely did not put it there!  I don't know how LO knows which things will be significant enough for me to search aggressively for them.  Maybe he doesn't and less important things are hidden and not missed.  There is definitely a trend here though...little brother's things hidden in places I'd never consider, and LO either forgets or "forgets" where.  This little version of hide and seek I could do without!

In the midst of these little shenanigans, Aunt L messaged me to says she's missing some important stuff.  She wasn't accusing anyone, but had we seen it, she wondered.  I really feel confident that our little Houdini wasn't the perp, but I'd feel a lot better if she found what she's missing.