Through my childs eyes...

Lately as I observe Brayden and listen to him play when he thinks I am not...not only is he exploring this new world everyday, but he is slowly teaching me how to see life through his perspective. 

For example...the roof on his little Wonder Pets schoolhouse is just that...a roof.  Yet Brayden calls it "upstairs" and pretend walks all of his little characters {that he so loves to pieces} up the roof and lets them slide down the center hole all the while saying "weeee-fun!"

He actually believes that when I blow bubbles with my hand and soap while he is in the tubby that Mommy makes "bubble magic".

He thinks the houses on our street and others are "castles".

He pretend plays "scary monster" and pretend whines and begs for us to help him from said monster ;-)

 {he really loves this game-seriously}

He uses his potty as a stage and my hair brush as his microphone.  He stands on it in the center of the livingroom and proudly says "hello everybody-how doin'" and sings and talks up a storm as we clap and pretend to be his audience.

He plays under the covers and says we are camping in the tent.

He tells us his belly is talking {another game we play}, and pulls up his shirt while looking at his belly and says "what belly?"  "what?"...and giggles at himself.

He finds joy in brushing his teeth because we sing a fun song while we brush.  He pretend spits into the sink like Mommy and Daddy.

In the tubby he pretends he is white water river rafting {another game we taught him} and yells "whoa, whoa...oh no...hold on Mommy" as he paddles and splashes all over the place ;-)

He thinks Wubzy and Ni Hao live at Walmart.  He loves to go there and asks us we as we pull in there a few times a week "cited Mommy? cited Daddy?"  {are we excited?}  We give him a few toys to play with in the cart as we shop and he asks them "ready guys?" as he situates each little stuffed animal next to him in the cart.  When we get close to leaving we tell him it's time to put the toys back so they will be here next time we come and he nicely hands each one back to us to put on the "shelf" he says!  He then also knows that means he gets "yellow-browns" which are M & M's.  I hate to always get him snacks, but it beats buying $20 toys everytime we go shopping I suppose.

He loves to play tea party at the diningroom table with measuring cups and my tea pot.  We pretend drink and he says its "elicious" and "yummy good mmmm".  We pretend eat cookies too!  He loves to order things and will point his finger to his cheek and he says "ummm I'll have"....

He's convinced when Daddy says he wants ribs that he is sooo getting tickled. 

He knows it's a good buzzerboo when it makes an awfully loud noise ;-)

He eats his apples with a fork in them, {although he has never seen a candy apple}.

He perfectly inspects his lucky charms and picks out each and every "mellow"...leaving the puffs alone for us to eat.

His little motorcycle he rides on is most definately his "cycle bike".   {sickle bike as he says}

He pretend talks on the phone to everyone in our family.  He holds conversations that go something like this...

{as he's holding the phone up to his ear}

Hello?

How doin'?

nuh-uh...wow really?

Oh.my.gosh...no way

really?

Are you kidding me?

yes...yes...I guess.

Okay, bye!

Ron says he is imitating my phone conversations ;-)  ha ha!

The lamp is a playground with his little people and lets them slide down the legs of the lamp.  He tells them the laptop is a shelf...and periodically makes them play peak a boo from behind the screen as we are on the computer.

His imagination is soaring.  He interprets things in a beautiful and imaginative way.  He has his little friends hug eachother and asks them if they are okay?  He is genuine, he is inquisitive, and he is funny. 

He can tell by just looking at us if something is wrong...even in our best efforts not to show it.  He has really good intuition.  He feels out his surroundings.  He is curious and compassionate. 

He is teaching me to look at everything with a new set of eyes.  We can control how we percieve situations in our lives by changing our previously learned views of things.  Yes..it's much harder as an adult to change the way you think or feel about certain things, but seeing life through the eyes of a child can offer an immense amount of knowledge if you let it. 

Everything can be a playground if we choose to see it that way sometimes.

We can loudly shout weeeee whenever we choose too and do it just to enjoy the ride of life we are on sometimes as mundane and hectic as it can be.

We can eat with our fingers and put forks in our apples if that is what makes it easier for us. ;-)

We can look at a roof as though it's not just the top of something, but stairs to something better.

Our ride of life can be full of paddling and big splashes...irregardless of the mess it might make.

We can pull up our shirts and ask our belly's "what?" and try to listen to that inner voice so many of us ignore. ;-)

The world can be our stage if we weren't afraid of the reaction we might get from the audience.

We could all giggle at ourselves and play more.

We can dig out the good stuff and leave the rest in the bowl if we want to.

We could believe in magic.  We could accept things that are different rather than question every previously known ideal.

We could trust our surroundings more, and learn to love what we have, not long for what we don't.

I know that although I am trying so hard to shape this little guy of mine in just the right way, that he too is doing his own shaping of us.  He is adapting to life as we adapt to his.  He forces us to be people we would never have been prior to having him in our world.  It's amazing what I see when I look at him.  I see who I once was as a child.  I see who Ron once was as a child.  I see him acting like us, using the same voice inflection, or the same facial expressions that we use.  I see the things that we have taught him coming out in his personality.  It's him...it's us...it's everything we have been and it's everything he will be and more. 

It's him, happily forcing us to see life through his eyes, his world, through a more simple, optimistic and beautiful new perspective. 

It's him.

Thank you Brayden...I love you.

-Mommy