Wolves and Babies

I found the most touching tender mercy in my day today.  I was going through Justin's cubscout book, determining what all he needs to accomplish to finish up earning his "Wolf" rank.  I was checking off in the back of his book the various requirements.  While I have gone through his book previously, I had never scrutinized the "Arrow Points" section towards the back, knowing that it has been more important to get him going on accomplishing his task of Wolf, since he can't receive any of his arrow points awards until his Wolf is complete.  But I wanted to check off what arrow points had also been earned.  And then I saw it.  Adam's signature in three sections of Justin's book, under the Arrow Points--under fishing, camping, and in learning phrases in Spanish.  It brought me to tears, as I knew these three areas would have been the most important things to Adam.  Fishing and camping were the only things Adam cared about learning in when he was in scouts, and it just made me smile to see his signature all over these sections--he had signed them right after going camping with the boys in June.  I'm so glad that they had that one last camping trip together.  I remember being worried for bad weather that night, that there were thunder storm warnings out issued in this rural area they went in northern Nebraska that weekend.  I remember Adam asking me to text him back and forth to let him know if conditions were changing so he knew.  I remember being worried, as things were bad that night and his cell phone reception wasn't too great.  But they had found this low lying area, near a giant granite rock that somehow kept them dry from this storm, that the major storm passed them just fine.  Adam specifically wanted to go to this area because it was (what he termed) "real fishing" for trout, his favorite (in addition to salmon fishing with his grandpa).  He thought that fishing for bass was pointless and very un-fun.  I loved that in Justin's scout book he had Justin write out "rainbow trout" in the section that asked what fish they caught.  If I remember the fish story right, I think they only caught one or two tiny rainbow trout, so they didn't have trout to eat for dinner--they had to throw them back.  My poor kids.  They're going to have to learn that chicken is the "other fish."  Fish.  Yuck.  I don't do fish.  Salmon occasionally if someone else prepares it REALLY well....but generally, yuck!

Tonight Spencer (seemingly) out of the blue asked "Mom, where do babies come from and how do they grow?"  I was very unprepared for that question as I was cooking our dinner of scrambled eggs and cinnamon toast.  I looked over to find Spencer with Justin's mini-encyclopedia, turned to the page titled "How Babies Grow" with pictures of a uterus, and pictures of babies and various growing stages.  Justin seemed to think he had all the answers (yes, this turned into quite a family discussion).  It was a very simple discussion, one I had feared I would be squirming about, but was surprisingly easy.  We (Adam and I) had discussed with Justin these things before, but I wasn't so sure how Spencer (he's only three afterall) was going to interpret and take in all this information.  We talked about babies growing, mostly.  Spencer was bothered that we grow organs, that our arms and legs and heart and all have to grow, and that we look, well, weird when we're only 1 inch in length!  But mostly, he was very interested about the umbillical cord, it's role of nutrition, how it goes away, how it stays connected in utero, etc.  He asked what it looked like.  Hmm, I had to think how to describe it to a 3 year old.  I could tell Justin that an umbillical cord contains one vein and two arteries and he'd understand that, but how to tell what it actually looks like?  I told him it reminds me of the end of a balloon.  Well, of course this brought on new discussion.  "I want to SEE an umbillical cord!"  Thankfully, I actually have in print a few pictures (a smallish alblum) from when Spencer was born (yeah, one more item for my to-do list, print the 3,000 pictures from the past 11 years and put into albums for easier accessability....there IS a downside to digital cameras!  I don't ever print off our pictures!!).  I got the album and was able to show Spencer his slimey brand-new self, with his umbillical cord.  I noted in the pictures that Adam wasn't such a good picture taker, but there were a couple shots of his umbillical cord.  As I remember, Adam got to help "clean up" the cutting of his cord--something that I had also wanted him to be able to do with Carson, but since Carson had trouble after he was born, that didn't happen.  Anyway.  What a funny mix of discussions we had tonight!  Spencer took the encyclopedia to bed tonight to read some more.  He's going to be a smart cookie just like his big brother, and just like his Daddy.  It's just a bummer that I'm having to do ALL the explaining around here.  I told Adam that he'd have some of this responsibility.  Good job, Adam.  You ducked the throwing of this hymn book too.