Monday, April 27, 2009

The life of a Catholic toddler...

My little button, Henry, has improved his Mass behavior such that he's come with me for the past couple of weekends. My goal is to take him every week, but there have been a few stretches of time such that bringing him was impossible. *Parents of young children the world over breathe a sigh of wistful camraderie* Crying and carrying on, throwing of sippy cups, defiant disobedience, melting down while forcing body to go limp = all ejectable offenses from Mass. At least with this mommy. But since Easter Sunday, he's proven himself a bit, and so this weekend, we packed him up and headed to mass. Instead of our regular parish, we decided to mix it up a bit and go to a local, gorgeous basillica. Much road construction on the journey made us a few minutes late (pet peeve of your CL, sigh) so we had to grab any seats that we could, which ended up being those in between section pews where the aisle is right in front of you and you have no kneeler. You know, those seats :) Immediately, after we had, as clandestinely as possible, made it to the pew, and joined in the opening prayers, Hank announces "I HAVE TO GO POTTY." Once we sit for the readings, I sent him off with Mike to the bathroom. Blissful, uninterrupted time commences. And then Henry returns...

"I go'ed potty." Fabulous. For the most part, he read his books (Scooby Doo; not exactly pious, but hey, what can I say? Whatever keeps the dumpling reverently quiet is good with me). He climbed around on the pew and my lap a lot, playing with my hair, which I hate, but again - the quiet thing. He was quiet, so I let him be. He makes a haphazard sign of the cross at the appropriate times, puts the money into the collection basket, and loves to shake hands at the sign of peace. My child is a young Catholic prodigy :) His favorite part is going up for communion, even though he went up only to spy on the running baptismal font rather than receive the eucharist. All in all, he earned a B for his performance. Not bad at all.

This morning on the other hand, somebody woke up on the wrong side of the toddler bed. He burst into tears at my choice of outfit, and sobbed for 20 straight minutes. "Henry, honey, this is not a negotiable issue...You *have* to wear pants. You can't go outside in only your underwear." "But I wwwwaaaannnnttt tttttooooo!!!" Fun times.

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