Thank you, Santa.

Can the world just stop so we can catch up?

Eventually, I will post about the past two weeks. For right now, I just want to give a shout-out to the Big Man in Red, to whom I owe a great debt.

We have been (once again) finding our selves in serious contemplation of leaving Will on the steps of his Grandparents’ house and running for the border. In his highs and lows of development, he recently hit another Very Low Low. Back to having accidents. Biting his nails (not that this is ever stopped, but we noticed it getting worse). Talking in a baby voice. Being incredibly defiant, even having a few crying, stomping, kicking episodes — which were rare to begin and had seemed a thing of the past. Then Emmy pointed out that Ana had begun doing many of the same things, something she chalked up to the situation with the death of their teacher’s husband. (Lightbulb: these were all behaviors mentioned on that handy social-work provided form.) I sort of thought Will had handled it, talked about it, and was okay. Don’t boys tend to move on faster from emotional situations? Maybe not. Either he is acting out from confusion or stress, or he’s regressing at each birthday. Both are distinct possibilities.

Nevertheless, we had company (Paul’s Mom, my parents, my Brother and Sister-in-Law). We had a birthday party. We had a lot of stuff going on. And then, Saturday afternoon, we started to put up the Christmas Tree.

This is where Santa comes in. Will began to ask about presents and Santa and presents. The perfect segway for parental warnings of good behavior, lists of children who do not behave, and keeping to the straight and narrow for a bountiful Christmas morning. Presents from Santa seem to be quite a motivator, because we have had some really nice, helpful, sweet moments with him in the last day. Let’s hope it’s a sign he’s moving on into territory befitting to what Will tells me is more suited to a 4-year old. (He says 4-year olds don’t whine, hit, bite, cry, talk back, act defiant, or have a bad attitude.) Cheers to that!