Feeling the love

I think Cupid may have loosed an arrow in the general vicinity of Eliza lately. She is full of love.

On Thursday when I warned Eliza that she had an appointment with her pediatrician, she asked me if she had to get shots. When I told her no, she smiled dreamily and said, “I think they just want to love me.”

She created her own Valentine for me on our kitchen table a few days ago. And I literally mean ON the table.

(I thought about gifting her a heart-shaped piece of a Magic Eraser in return.)

A few days ago when I told Eliza “I love it when you share,” she responded happily, “I love it when you make me food.” As if both of our actions were equally elective. (Do Cupid's arrow pricks leave visible marks?)

I remember Sage saying some funny things about love, and when I checked my blog archives, I found it was exactly two years ago today that Sage monologued about love.

If boys are made of snips (whatever those are) and snails and puppy dog tails, my girls are made of sugar and spice (or maybe just more sugar) and all things pink and glittery. So it should come as no surprise that they love Valentines Day.

But it never surprises me when Sage and Eliza decide to decorate something. I found this scene on their bedroom wall.

(Note the decorative square of the toilet paper, as well as the carefully labeled "ball" of toilet paper.) Eliza explained that they were "making the wall prettier."

And before we leave the subject of what little boys are made of, I must mention that during the entire hour of Cub Scouts this last week (which happened to be about knives and whittling) I wondered if I actually have a class full of aliens wearing 9-year-old boy masks. I, who have never used a pocketknife before, didn’t know what to say to the boys who had cleaned fish or cut into raw elk with their knives. Following that enlightening discussion I sent the boys out back for a nice vigorous whittling session on a block of soap, while I called the bishop and asked to be released.

Actually I only daydreamed about being released. In reality, I just kept wondering what snips were and don’t these boys know that they might get hurt if they jump off my playground?

That’s love, too, right? Protecting 9-year-old alien-boys from imminent death? Maybe Sage and Eliza can help me make Valentines this week for all my scouts, with the rules of knife and swingset safety inscribed in pink glitter glue on the front.