I don't have time or energy to go into full explanation of what kind of kid Cade is. Only Chad and I fully understand. Our parents have had glimpses of life with Cade from watching him. And our babysitters know a little bit. But until you spend time with him, it's just really impossible to understand how one little person can be so absolutely destructive and so conversely absolutely lovable. It's an enigma.
In the last few months, he's pulled pictures (screws, anchors, and all) out of the sheet rock in his room. He's torn strips out of the cute, baseball wallpaper border by his bed. He's made tiny, stegosaurus horned-shaped holes in his walls. He's figured out a way to loosen the blades on his ceiling fan. He's even managed to tear his ENTIRE closet door clean off the hinges.
He's three. Three...
That's not the reason for this post, though. I just needed to tell you that because it's funny and so you'll understand why we had to finally take the crib/toddler bed out of his room.
The crib is one of those convertible cribs. It starts out as a crib, converts to a toddler bed and then, if you so choose, into a double bed headboard and foot board. My parents gave it to me when Pearce was born. It's has gone through four babies.
The other night, Cade came out of his room really screaming (which is unusual, because he generally laughs when he hurts himself). Stone came with him and told us that Cade had been sitting on the top of the toddler bed and had fallen to the floor. There was a fist-sized knot on the back of his head. We made the decision that it was time to get rid of anything in his room over 2 feet tall.
We dismantled the crib and placed it's parts in the garage. We made the decision not to keep it and to put it out on the curb for the magic curb elves.
And here's the real reason for this blog post - at least this was the original idea (I realize now that my digression has become a secondary topic). I called Pearce to come get the crib and take it out to the curb. He came into the garage with just jeans and socks - all slouched and angsty-looking with earphones in his ears and the cord trailing to his jeans pockets. I watched him begrudgingly take the pieces of his crib out to the curb and I had one of those moments.
He chewed on that crib when he was teething.
He climbed out of it in his diaper to come ask for a glass of water.
He poked toys through the slats and then cried for them.
He used the rails to teach himself how to stand.
He reached out his arms to me from that bed.
And now he was carrying all of it's heavy pieces to the curb with his mop of hair flopping in his eyes and his 13-year-old look of disgust at the thought of doing an actual chore.
You know I don't get sappy that often, but I'm telling you; I'm sure I creeped my teen-aged son out when he came back in the house and I was smiling goofily at him. He stopped, took one earphone out and said, "What?" I said, "That was your crib. And you just carried it out to the curb. Don't you think that's something?" He rolled his eyes and smiled at me while shaking his head.
"Oh, mom."
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