So the Story Goes

The short story:  I find Sydney, who is naked, huddling and crying hysterically in a sleeping bag.

The long story..

I had floated the idea of a camp over for Sydney's friends, Nora and Bennett, during the beginning of the summer, and it all came to fruition on Labor Day weekend.  So Nora, Bennett, and their father came over bearing tents and sleeping bags, and as soon as the tent was erected, the kids disappeared into some wonderland of their own.

The campout was successful, for the most part, with both kids deciding at the last minute to sleep with me in my small tent rather in the big Coleman six-person tent, and the night passed and the morning came without incident, and all was well.

Then we adults got busy, as we are wont to do, and, based on yesterday's self-baby-sitting performance, spent less time than we perhaps should have looking after the children... or perhaps we thought someone else was looking after them... or something, but in any event, what I finally got out of Sydney was this:

Nora asked Sydney if she wanted to take off her clothes and, for some reason, Sydney said yes.  Sydney and Nora and Bennett all played for awhile thus, Sydney sans clothes, until Sydney apparently wanted to put her clothes back on but forgot where they were, and also, apparently, forgot that there were more clothes waiting for her in her room in the house.  Then, forgetting about the clothes problem, Sydney and Bennett decided to play a game with a sleeping bag called Who Can Get Out of The Sleeping Bag, which involved getting into the bag, zipping it up and then cinching up the top.  It turned out that Bennett could get out of the sleeping bag, but Sydney could not, and so Bennett went to find an Adult, but said Adult didn't really understand what he was trying to tell her.

This is how I found Sydney, naked, upset, and stuck in a sleeping bag.  All par for the course on a Labor Day weekend, right?

The Five Year Old

Sydney’s birthday falls during the week this year so we had her birthday party on Saturday. She invited just a few friends from her school and a bunch of relatives; and since it was an unseasonably warm day for April we had the party outside. She wasn’t fooled though—she knew she wasn’t five yet. Today is the day that she is five.

Sydney the five-year-old can brush her teeth and get dressed without being told (although she doesn’t always). She can jump rope and dance ballerina-style. She can sometimes do math if she’s not thinking about it too hard. She can write hers and her sisters’ names. She can play Go-Fish but doesn’t quite get the concept of Connect Four. (Oh well. There’s still time.)


Sydney the five-year-old requested that all of her friends bring their favorite dress up clothes, so we had a green lantern, two fairies, one adult in a pirate hat and three cowboy/girls. Sydney’s presents included a fairy queen costume, a Spider Man mask, and Indian Princess costume, a bow and arrow and some pirate gear. On the morning after her party, she came down with her Indian Princess costume on over her Buzz LightYear pajamas, and wanted to go outside to practice shooting arrows before we had breakfast.


To Sydney on her fifth birthday:

May we have many more exciting adventures.  I have no idea what’s coming next.

What Child is This?

A friend of ours came over the other day to see the sugaring operation and brought his young son, Bennett, with him. Bennett and Sydney both go to the same pre-school, but they've really gotten to know eachother during the rides to and from their school. As soon as Bennett got out of the car, both kids ran into the house, upstairs, and were gone.

A little while later I went upstairs to check on them and found Sydney's door closed. I didn't hear anything so I knocked and opened the door, only to find no children in the room. Puzzled, I stared at the empty room for a bit until the strains of an enthusiastically untuned guitar came wafting from the closet. I closed the door.

Normally Sydney is very attached to myself and her father and while she will at times play by herself, or, on off occasions, with her sister, she'll pretty much insist that we be a part of the action. But when her friend comes over a whole different Sydney emerges. She's confident, she's feisty, and Things Happen.

While down at the sugar house I happened to glance out of the corner of my eye both kids walking purposely down our forest road with a box of cheddar bunnies in one hand and a play sword in the other.

"Where are you going, guys?" I yelled out.

"We want to see where the road ends," they shouted back.

I decided I better come with them.

By the end of the journey (a mile's walk in either direction) both kids were tired and complaining that their legs were going to fall off, but that didn't stop Sydney from somehow getting Bennett to carry the sword, the box of cheddar bunnies and her jacket, nor did it stop either of them from suddenly breaking out into a game of "police police"--a game where a police officer puts a driver in jail but the driver says he/she is a race car driver so the officer lets them out (I'll have to try that on our local cops someday)-- or from hopping from rock to rock in the spring stream for the rest of the day.

When it was finally time for Bennett and his father to go home, Sydney burst into exhausted tears. She would not be comforted by the fact that she would see Bennett the very next day or that we all promised he could come back to her house very soon. She morosely followed my husband, Bennett, and his father back up to the driveway, where the two adults got to talking and the two kids immediately found Something To Do.

When I got back up later, I found a small Chinese guardsman statue nicely decorated with balls, a scarf and various sticks. Sydney was calmly watching Sesame Street. "Nice decorating you did there," I said to her. She barely glanced at me. "Yeah," she said, absently.
Oh good, the Sydney I know is back.