The Art of Tact

Gabe is learning the art of tact. I never thought that was something a four-year-old was even capable of, but apparently it is. It all started because we’d been talking about the fact that if you don’t like dinner, it’s not nice to say that it’s yucky, because then that makes the person who cooked it feel bad. You don’t have to like it, but you can say something like “it’s not my favorite.” That is literally the only context we’ve talked about this in. And he’s come up with the rest of this...

The other day, I put some oils in my hair. Then he and I sat down to breakfast. Then he suddenly said “something smells stinky.” I asked him what was stinky and he turned his face away from me and then very sheepishly pointed at me.

M: I smell stinky?

G: It’s your hair.

M: My hair is stinky?

G: It smells like something I don’t want to eat.

I was impressed. As much as no one wants to be told their hair is stinky, it was still a very tactful way to handle it.

He was in the bathroom with me as I was combing my hair after a shower. I combed my hair out, but hadn’t done anything with it yet.

G: I think you should do something different with your hair.

M: I was going to put it up in a pony.

G: You should do that.

M: You don’t like my hair down?

G: I like it better in a pony.

Once again, he was full of tact and kindness. I was impressed. I didn’t expect that from a four-year-old. Also, apparently he has strong opinions about my hair???

In other news, Josy had his 18-month appointment this week. He’s perfectly healthy and up to 22lbs now. Gabe is up to 27, so Josy is definitely going to catch up with him soon... He does have a bit of a speech delay, so we’re going to get to work on that here soon. He can definitely hear us and comprehend what we’re saying and respond appropriately, he just doesn’t use many words other than the five he’s good at: huggie, bye, hi, boo and all done.

Funny Gabe moments for the week...

G: Mom, can you make me a Jake costume?

M: Maybe? I've never made a costume before.

G: Can you take your sewing stuff to work today and do it while you work?

M: No, I need to work.

G: But you could take a break. Work, sew, work, sew, work, sew.

G: When I'm a dad, I'll come over here and visit you guys. And maybe we can take a trip together to Florida to the pirates museum. 

M: Do you think your kids would like the pirate museum?

G: Yep. And you and my wife will have to crawl around and play with them.

M: You're not going to play with your kids at the pirate museum ?

G: No, Daddy and Josy and I will be playing and firing the cannons.

I found Josy like this. He may be ready for bed...



We dipped the bonbons in chocolate. Gabe was super excited and helped me dip 5 and then he got distracted by the movie. About halfway through he got scared that the pirates were going to get killed and refused to finish it, so I turned on White Christmas instead.

I had to assure him that there were no bad guys and nobody died.



We’ve been doing a Christmas countdown (I can’t call it an Advent Calendar because there is nothing advent-y about it at all...). Each day has a tea bag so every evening the three of us split a cup of tea and read our Bible passage. (We’re reading a chapter of Luke every day of the month. By the end of the month we’ll be through the whole story of Jesus.)

In the morning, Gabe opens up the calendar, to figure out what tea we’ll have. This morning he did it all by himself and told me he’d read the tea bag for me. He read “Green Town Tea.”



Well, that looks pretty close to me... (Also, that one was really good!)



He made a keychain at school and carried it around all day. It’s for opening up treasure chests. And yes, that is a monkey holding it to his pants.



I got Josy up this morning and when I went to sit in the chair to feed him, there was a lump already there. Apparently the lump was “trying to trick us.”

Silly, silly boys. But they are definitely the best.