Good boy

Braeden and milk.  He loves that stuff.  He must have the most calcium rich bones in America.  Quite often I start to put the milk away and Braeden gives me a look like I've wounded him and even though his glass is brim full of milk, I set the jug back down by him because he wants more.  At one sitting he eats a few bowls of cereal with milk, then he drinks a few tall glasses of the stuff and I keep going back to the store for more.

If Braeden is home, this is the situation.

Monday at dinner we were drinking lemonade except Braeden who was pouring himself a steady stream of milk.  Then I realized that was the last jug.  I cut him off and put it back in the fridge.  Adam said he'd go to the store for more.

We were sitting on the deck later and remembered about the milk run.  I maintained that the boy who drinks all the milk should be the one to go buy more.  Braeden said he would go but he wanted Adam and me to go with him.  Braeden alone with his parents is his favorite.

So we went.  Adam got distracted looking at steak and Braeden said, "Hey, if I'm good, can I have an ice cream cone?"

Which made me laugh.

When our kids were little, I would offer them a treat at the grocery store if they were good.  For example, the day Mark reached over on the shelf (from his perch in the shopping cart) and grabbed a bottle of syrup and hurled it to the floor where it broke?  He didn't get a treat that day.

(Sometimes I miss having toddlers.  Sometimes I don't.)

Bribing them with one treat helped quell the tide of wanting everything sugary in sight and it also helped curtail the whining.  I would say, "If you're good, I'll get you a treat."

Now they hardly go to the grocery store with me, but it hasn't been so long ago that Braeden has forgotten that being good=treat.

And ice cream cones at Macey's are $.59.

After Adam and I both laughed at Braeden, I said, "Go ahead and get an ice cream cone.  You have money."

"Yeah...but..." and he gave me that look that is heart melting to my mother's heart.

"OK," I sighed.  Then I tried to keep up with his long legs as we left Adam to ponder the steak choices and we walked over to the ice cream.

I was tired and couldn't stop yawning.  Braeden kept trying to make me laugh and then he got out his phone for a selfie of us.  I told him to put his phone away because him taking my picture did not equal him being good.

But he doesn't listen to me.

This is me at 10:30 p.m. in the ice cream line at Macey's with my boy who despite everything, is pretty good.

Last night he had his final interview and his mission papers are submitted!  I am working on tamping down my feelings of noooooooooo and wahhhhhhhh with feeling grateful he's worthy to go and that he wants to go.

He's a good boy.