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| Maizie Mae 7 weeks old |
We have had a new grandbaby on July 19, 2012. This time our baby, Melissa Sunshine, had a
baby girl, Maizie Mae. That gives us two
boys – Holden, age 14, and Max, age 3 plus a baby girl. Holden has always been the studious one. Holden is fun but quite quiet. Holden comes
and stays with us every summer. Holden
turned 15 on Tuesday and now we wonder how many more summers he will want to
come stay with us. Max is just the opposite from Holden. When Maizie was born, Mike was already at
Missy’s visiting and I joined Mike a week later. It was a long week having to wait to see
Maizie for the first time. We were both
so very excited to come to be wih our new granddaughter but the entertainment
of our three year old is amazing. I use
the word amazing because I said “Maizie is amazing” and for about 2 hours every
sentence spoken by Max had the word amazing in it. One night the two boys rough
housed on the living room floor. You
have to understand Holden. He does not
like anything dirty including his brothers feet. If the feet have touched the
floor since his last “tub” they must be dirty.
Max and Holden were on the floor and Max kept coming up to Holden and
put his foot up on Holden’s shoulder. He
wanted to put his foot in Holden’s hair.
This is a great way to make his big brother just a little crazy. They rolled around and laughed and
giggled. It was so great because having
had only girls myself, I always thought only girls giggle. Apparently not.
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| Holden, Max and Maizie, Day 1 |
Now, I wouldn’t want anyone to think we aren’t paying
attention to Maizie because we held her every minute we could. But at that point, holding her and staring at
Maizie was about all we could do. That
said, we were enjoying our entertainment from the boys. A few weeks before Maizie was born we were
video chatting with the kids and Max said “I am so embarrassed”. We asked why and he answered “I am so
embarrassed”. Mike asked him what he was
embarrassed about. He answered again “I
am so embarrassed”. We then heard his
mother in the background saying Max learned a new word but doesn’t know what it
means. That kind of follows his standard
on our video chats. All of a sudden Max
will say “I have an idea – I’ll be right back”.
He takes off only to return to talk and then say the same thing - “I
have an idea – I’ll be right back”. It
cracks us up because we never have been able to tell what his idea is. He is a kid with big words and big
ideas.
Holden was amazing when Max was born and is no less amazing
with Maizie. Just like with Max, Holden
will sit and hold Maizie, humming to her for hours so she will sleep. He can quiet Maizie more quickly, sometimes,
than Mommy. Like I said, he did this
with Max too.
One afternoon we were getting ready to go out. Max decided he wanted to choose what
he wore. The shorts were fine but the
shirt was one he had worn to Stone Mountain when Bumpa took Max and Holden on
an adventure to Atlanta earlier that week.
Mike calmly said they should look at the shirt. There were 2 chocolate stains and one ketchup
stain. He relented and wore his Tampa
Bay Rays shirt but not until he announced several times that “it’s just not a
big deal.” Missy said he has picked
those words up from her. She said she
tries to pick her battles and says it when she needs to.
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| Maizie - 9 days old |
We took the entire family to a Chattanooga Lookout baseball
game. Max LOVES baseball. I am not a big baseball fan but having Max to
watch at the game was worth twice the price of admission. Max kept an eye on the mound and the player
up to bat. When it was the opposing team
he shouted to the batter “You’re going down buddy” and pointed his thumb
down. He begged the players on the field
to throw a ball to him. Next time he
goes he plans to take his new baseball glove with him. Max is a social butterfly as well. He also loves blondes. There was a woman with her husband and two teenage
son’s just two rows in front of us. When
the boys got up to go somewhere, Max went down and took the seat next to the
blonde. He told her his life history,
and since he had only three years to cover, I think he went over it twice. He
has done a lot over his three years and every day is something new. He showed her his “war wound” from where he
got a shot the day before. When I arrived
to meet Maizie for the first time, Melissa was just leaving to take Maizie to
the doctor for another bilirubin test.
Max wanted to join us so I told him I would get him a shot. I thought it would be a deterrent but he
wanted a shot. Who knew? When the shot was over he got a great round
spot Band-Aid. That made a war wound to
show the lady. He checked out her jewelry and kept her entertained until her
sons returned. The one who had occupied
that seat let Max keep the seat and he sat a row behind Max. The blonde said she really had fun with him.
One day Max wanted to have an empty spray bottle filled with
water. His Dad said that maybe later he
would fill it. Max took the bottle
apart, looked through the clear bottle part like it was a spy glass then took
the spray trigger part and tried to shoot the TV. Then Max removed the straw from the trigger
and used it for a musical instrument and marched around the room. Water? Who needs water? Like I said, Max is pure
entertainment.
Missy, Maizie and Max flew in for a visit a week ago
followed by Phil and Holden who drove down the next day. Funny, but they found out that their car did
not fit 3 children, especially when one
is 6 foot tall. No matter how many ways
they tried to configure the two little ones’ seats, Holden has space for only
one butt cheek on the seat. Any way you
look at it, riding 10 hours on one butt cheek would be horrible. This meant when they were all in Tampa they
went looking for a mini-van. That meant
Phil drove home and allowed our daughter and three children to stay with
us. We haven’t had a house full for a
while and it is fantastic! Imagine 24/7
entertainment. All Max, all the
time. Maizie and Holden are great too,
but once again, Max steals the show all the time. He plays on Holly’s and Mike’s iPad and wants
to have us play too. If one of them
isn’t available he hits up Holden for his iPad.
Max is very concerned if Maizie cries and tries to sooth her
by kissing on her cheek or her tummy. Max
is a ball of energy, though and full of questions. How do I know he is full of questions? Because he says “Mimi, I got a question”
about 30 times a day. You very sweetly
say “what’s your question?” and his answer is followed with something like “ I
watched the Wiggles today”. Okay.
(Sarcasm is not heard in writing but the word okay came with a lot) He is so cute and adorable you just can’t
help but laugh a little every time he says “I got a question.” Holden said he had no idea where he got this
question but it wasn’t long before we knew.
Holden says “I have a question” about 10 times a day. We just hadn’t noticed it before.
On Saturday we left the house at 11:00 to go to Mazzaro’s
Italian Market in St. Petersburg. It was
wonderful. We had such a great time at
the Market. Shopping and lunch in the
best place in the Tampa Bay area. The
amount of people that go through there on a Saturday is unbelievable. You take a number for ordering meat, one for
ordering bread, one for getting coffee, one for fresh made pasta and one for
ordering lunch at the deli. Sounds
horrible but they are so well organized and so fantastic. Their Raisin Bread is
worth standing in line several times over.
Toasted Raisin Bread from the Italian Market with two kinds of raisin’s
is great with a little brown sugar or cinnamon and sugar or even just butter on
it is so yummy. Lunch was wonderful. Holly and Holden had meatball sandwiches and
the meatballs were each about 4 inches across.
Holden accepted the challenge and ate it regular style. Holly used a knife and fork to eat the
meatballs and bread. Max ordered Pizza
and ate two bites then became Mr. Cranky-Pants.
It didn’t matter what was said, he would not be consoled. Next stop, Aunt Jane’s. Of course Max fell asleep in the 4 miles it took
to drive between Mazarro’s and Jane’s.
Holden stayed in the van with the sleeping Max and air
conditioning. What a difference a nap
made in Max. He was better but not but
not good enough to go to the baseball game so the game was delayed until Sunday. Isn’t it nice that there are baseball games
several days in a row for a series? The
next day they went to see the Ray’s play.
This is Maizie’s second baseball game.
Holden went to his first baseball game when he was 6 months old, Max at
about a year old when he was just starting to walk. Maizie, at less that 6 weeks, had been to two
baseball games.
Just before Missy drove back with the kids they spent a
weekend at Busch Gardens and Adventure Island.
I met them after their day at Adventure Island at Steak and Shake. Max had been playing a game with Aunt
Holly. They were picking new names for
themselves every day. The day they went
to Adventure Island Max was calling himself Carmen and Holly had picked
Emma. They never could get Holden to participate. He was almost 15, remember. Picking a new name would be way beneath
someone Holden’s age. When Max would ask
him what his name was, he said his name was Holden. This went on for the entire day! By the time I met them at Steak and Shake
Holden was tired and frustrated. I
arrived just in time for Max’s second wind.
He decided to name Holden “Barbara”.
I think you will recognize the fun in the picture as Max kept saying
Holden was now “Barbara” and Holden kept saying his name was and always will be
Holden. I know you will easily see his
funny character in the photo.
The visit with Missy and the kids lasted for a month. It was fantastic. There are more stories I could easily tell
but I plan on keeping them to myself so I can use them as leverage when they
are older. I love having the grandkids
close. It is hard having that part of
our family 10 hours away but we have found that video chats keep us close. We love talking with them as often as
possible. Every step in being a
grandparent is just as new as every step as a parent. Holden turned 15 last Tuesday. He will finish high school soon and begin
college within the next year. Max will
get older and we look forward to his achievements, just like we did Holden’s. What I really look forward to, though, is
going through the time when Maizie is 3 years old and everything is a wonder
again. Just thinking about how blessed
we are makes me smile in anticipation.
