Frogs and Snails and Puppy-dogs' Tails...

We walked through the woods today, spending a beautiful (yet chilly) day in the great outdoors.

As we romped around in the "spooky forest" I asked Nathaniel if he wanted to find some treasures in the woods that we could use in a craft project later. In my head I was thinking Fall leaves, acorns, maybe some Indian Paintbrush flowers.

I was disappointed when he looked at me very matter-of-factly and said "No." To say the least, I was crushed.

This isn't the first time I've had my dreams cut down unintentionally by the independent thoughts of my 3-year-old. Growing up, I had certain ideas about what being a "good" Mom meant - teaching my children fun and interesting stuff, doing fun projects, engaging their little minds with activities and games and...

I had no idea how difficult that would be in reality.

I'm not sure if it's the pig-headed independence in my child, the different priorities he holds because he's a boy (digging in dirt vs. painting or paper crafts), the fact that's he's only three, or if it's something I'm failing miserably with, but I worry that I'm missing something.

If it is because he's ALL boy, or even if it's his strong sense of wanting to do anything other than what Mommy wants him to do, or whatever the reason, I'll do my best to accept that and try not to mourn the loss of my crafts and quiet time activities too much.

Afterall, if it weren't for my boy and his fantastic personality, I would never get the chance to do all the fantastically fun stuff we DO get to do instead.

Like inspecting caterpillars up close and personally...

or swimming in the dirt...

or playing with snakes...

Or checking out snails...

And once in a while, we do get to paint...even if it's with our hands and it only lasts 5 minutes before he's moved onto his next interest...

...like playing monsters and rescuing fairy princesses :)