Dear Connor(3 yrs, 8 mos) & Tristan (21 mo)

Dear Connor and Tristan,

The summer months have gotten busy, so in the spirit of multi-tasking, this month, I’ll be writing a letter to you both. I haven’t gotten our camera fixed and I’m disappointed with the other digital camera enough that I don’t bother taking pictures with it at all. Thus, I won’t have any pictures to post this month, unless I call all of the people that have taken pictures of you and request that they email me those pictures. This may seem like a simple feat, but it’s not, since I would spend anywhere from 3 – 30 minutes explaining how to zip or attach a multiple file to send to me and then spend the next 15 minutes explaining that a bmp is not a desirable file format. All of this occurs of course after I’ve spent 15 minutes fixing their internet connectivity problem.
By the time you are both reading this you will be older and Connor, I give you permission to smack your brother on the back of the head for banging our digital camera into the floor. Then the next time that you both see me, Tristan you may smack me in the back of the head for putting it four and half feet off of the ground, which is apparently accessible to one that is two feet tall if that one is ambitious enough to drag over a chair, climb up onto the desk and grab the camera from the computer monitor.
I’ll give you both this, you are ambitious. And you sure love each other. Tristan, the first thing you say in the morning is “Connor?” You repeat it every 3 minutes until he’s awake. And no, this doesn’t get on my nerves at all after an hour or so. Connor, you show your love to your brother by tackling him first thing, something that makes me a little uneasy, except for Tristan’s squeals of delight.
Connor, you translate for your little brother too. He calls his blanket his “gankie” and you always explain to me that he’s saying blanket… in Spanish. In fact, this week just about anything that your brother has said that’s intelligible you’ve explained that he is speaking in Spanish. Lucky for you this reminded me that I needed to put my learn Spanish in your car CDs into my car so that I could go ahead and start learning Spanish. This is so I can either teach it to the both of you, or learn enough that I can swear at you, venting my frustrations in another language, saving you both from years of therapy. I hope you use the money that you’ve saved to put your Dad and I in the finest nursing home available.
It’s been a busy summer so far. I was hoping on multiple beach trips this year but it hasn’t happened so far. We are working out what we can, but I’m religious about my yoga class which is one of the reasons that we are so busy. Twice a week you go to the child watch, while I get my exercise on in the morning. I’m also working one day a week which leaves us with two days to run errands during the week. One of those is grocery day. The other is OMG where did my week go, I have six loads of laundry to do day, which is also known to the two of you as, Hang Out in the Shower for a Bit and Then Run Around the Upstairs Naked for a While, Day. You wouldn’t think that this is an exciting time for the two of you, but you are both quite fond of it. Once you are finally dressed, (Connor sometimes with three shirts on) you play in Tristan’s closet for a while, closing the door and making a club house, giggling in the dark with your flashlights or finding new and exciting things to climb on together.
Tristan, sometimes you run around with a pair of Connor’s underwear on your head. You think this is hysterical, which amuses me because it actually IS. You’ve seen your brother do it a number of times when a hat wasn’t available to play dress up with and you are happy to follow his example. There is nothing that makes me happier than watching the two of you playing together smiling and giggling and occasionally stopping to hug and kiss each other.
There may be times in both of your lives where you feel like no one loves you. Of course, Mommy and Daddy always love you both more than you would ever know, but never forget how much you love each other. You may fight, you may walk separate paths in life but the kind of love that I see you have for each other, never goes away. No matter, who took who’s, Hot Wheels Car.
I love you both.
Mama