Birthday! starring ... Xavier!

My birthday is coming up. Xavier asked me the other day, "Mom, how old will you be on your birthday?"

Teasing him, I replied, "I'll be old, Xavier."

"Oh," he said thoughtfully. "I guess you'll die soon, then."

"Not that old, Xav," I said quickly.

"Will you be waiting for me in heaven?"

"Not that old, Xav."


We got a visit from my friend Tania the other night and her husband Mike. Aunt Tania brought over some belated Christmas and Birthday gifts for the kids. One of the gifts was a Lite Brite cube (for both kids), but Gwen had already received one for Christmas. Xavier asked Aunt Tania, "What will you do with this now?"

"Well," she answered, "I'll exchange it for a new present and bring it to you next time I see you."

"When is the next time you are coming?" he asked. "How about tomorrow?"


On New Year's Day, Xavier got up a little later than usual (6:45.) Anyone who knows Xavier knows that he gets up at 6:00 (or, if he can swing it, earlier) every morning, even on the weekends. My light-sleeping husband -- who is a saint -- almost always gets up with him.

On New Year's, Xavier climbed into bed next to me while Adam was getting dressed to take him downstairs. When he reached for Xavier and tried to pull him out of bed, Xavier whimpered and tried to cling to me.

"Xavier, Mommy needs to sleep in," Adam told him.

"But I tell you what," I said to Xavier, "From now on, in 2007, I will get up with you on Sundays, and we'll let Daddy sleep in."

Every day since then, the first thing Xavier asks me in the morning is, "Is it Sunday?" And the last thing he asks me when I put him to bed at night is, "Is tomorrow Sunday?" Of course, when Sunday actually arrived, he slept in until 6:30, then climbed into bed with me and fell asleep until 8:00. We might have slept in later if his snoring hadn't roused everyone else in the room ...


Gwen went to the hospital on Friday to have some allergy testing done. She was very brave, dancing around the Outpatient check-in area (which took, of course, 40 minutes), and she only whimpered a little when they ran the test in Outpatient Laboratories (Total time: 5 minutes.) We'll find out next week what her results were.

As we hurried to the van to pick up Xav afterwards, Gwen made the observation, "I've never been here before!"

"Yes, you have," I replied.

"When?"

"You were born here." She thought that was pretty funny.