It's a beautiful week in the Pacific Northwest. We have a 14-hour drive to Utah coming up soon, and while I'm nervous about how it will go with a baby and a 5-year-old (not TOO nervous since we have survived much worse when it comes to road trips), it feels like a gateway drive. If we can pass this roadtrip test, weekend adventures will seem a lot more accessible than they have since having our Baby Alice 6 months ago. With summer around the corner, that will be a good feeling.
I will be doing multiple blog posts this week, so with not too much to report on from this last week, I will touch on the highlights in the captions to these pictures:
The Risk Backstory: Jared taught Jack the basic rules of Risk several weeks ago. Jack had been obsessed with playing board games with us, but we were getting tired of checkers and chess and Bang! We decided to add Risk to the repertoire (mostly because I knew he'd keep very entertained playing with the little Risk guys like tiny soldier toys). Sure enough, he loved it and wanted us to play it with him for several days. Eventually we got sick of it because he didn't really have the rules figured out and, let's be honest, it's an extremely long game. Too long for more than once-yearly play in my opinion. So we hid it away until he forgot about it for a while. Well, this weekend he remembered and wanted to play again. We told him we'd play it for a Saturday family game night. Jared's parents and brother were going to stop by so we tricked them into staying to play. It was a bonafide Risk night, and Jared's dad does NOT go easy on the little guy (for the better--I go easy on Jack way too often because it makes the game go faster and keeps the mood lighter). He made sure rules were followed and it turned into quite the game. When Jared's Dad wiped Jack out and took his cards, Jack handled it well but I could tell he was a little heartbroken so I told him my borders were open and he could join my team. The game continued until we called a truce at 10 p.m. and got Jack to sleep, much past his bedtime. He really had the rules figured out by then and had the best evening.
He was VERY grumpy the next day. The grumpiest he's maybe ever been. We got home from church and he was so tired that he couldn't function beyond moping and falling on the floor, but he couldn't stop thinking about Risk and begging us to play with him, and he flat-out refused to take a nap even though he knew he was exhausted. I even laid down in his bed with him, reading books and rubbing his arm and trying to get him to fall asleep. No dice. He just kept whining and begging me to play Risk with him. Eventually I told him, nicely, that me and Jared would not be playing Risk with him unless he chose to take a nap and woke up in a better mood, because we didn't want to play with someone who was just going to be snapping at us the whole time. That's not fun. He still was firmly in the "no nap, only Risk" camp. So I told him he could play Risk during his quiet time with his stuffed Bunny and Foxy, who often join him in games during his quiet time haha. He thought about it while I went to grab the game, and by the time I came back upstairs he was sitting on the top step with his stuffed animals, deep in thought. "I'm sorry Mom," he said. "I'll play Risk with my stuffed animals." Then he gave me a hug and got all set up in Jared's office. I set his quiet time timer for 90 minutes, and when it went off he ignored it and kept playing for 3 more hours. Jared went to check in on him at one point and he said, "I just want some alone time to play this with Foxy and Bunny." Incredible. He flipped a 180 and was his happy self the rest of the day. I even agreed to a shortened version of Risk with him after dinner and really enjoyed when he'd attack me from "Afghani-stand" (Afghanistan) or "Indoor-nesia" (Indonesia). I love that kid so much.
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