Perspective has so much to do with things.

I often find myself trying to teach at least Aiden about having a positive attitude. I'm not sure if it's a learned through teaching thing or not. I know he may be too young to get there on his own if he is naturally bummed about something. Over time, hearing it often and leading by example I am sure it will sink in the way other things tend to. That's when repeating yourself a thousand times becomes worth something. Knowing I'll have to repeat them a thousand more times, times two can be a little deflating but perspective tells me it will be worth it after the 3,000th time, give or take a hundred.



We love this Dogwood tree outside our front window. The one where we have hung our bird feeders, Christmas lights, plastic eggs, a bum at Halloween, and all our birds visit. The one Aiden has recently started to scale and I remind him how when I was his age? I fell out of our popcorn tree. My back landed on a rock I think and knocked the wind right out of me. Is the same thing going to happen to him? I know I should let him climb. I tell him my story so he knows it's a possibility and to use care. A neighborhood black cat has been seen climbing this tree too. Trying to catch a few of our birds (Aha moment from one day last week, "Brady, please put that piece of a bird down and go wash your hands!") We sometimes retreat under this tree on a blanket with or without a book when we need downtime or shade. When we look up we find a whole new perspective from underneath it.

Days with plenty of sunshine like these make bright perspectives easy.





This little guy made us happy to be able to catch an up close look at when we spied him walking across our blanket and book going somewhere in a hurry. Little did we know he was walking his last steps which I guess was why he was walking. The boys noticed him on our stonewall a short while later, belly up.



It doesn't take much to change a perspective. Good to bad or bad to good. Today was all cold and rainy. We'd be stuck inside all day. Which is fine. Aiden was especially not beat down by the rain even though it meant not being able to ride scooters with his (twin) friends who were coming over. Five boys inside. Can make you want to run for the hills but they didn't. They play well together without causality. The only one who did make me want to run was the littlest one. I mentioned he was in a boot camp right? How can a little boy be so terrible at times? He's in the (first of many?) testing his boundaries stage. I was never home with any of my guys at this age so this is definitely new to me. He wants to be held but isn't content being held. Wants to eat but not anything you want to give him. Wants to play with things he can't play with. Wants to go outside when it's 50 degrees and raining. Wants to stuff his whole fist in his mouth among other things because he's getting teeth no. 13-16 in. He's not wanting to take more than 1 nap but should. Wants to climb on the couch of course... All for 2 hours while you have guests. Fun. We should do this again soon.



Another, this time nightly perspective I see daily here.