M'hijo is a pretty cheerful baby, but there are times when he gets cranky for no reason. Lately he's
been doing a less traumatic version of the witching hour. When he was a newborn, he got
inexplicably cranky at around 4pm every day, or was it 5? I can't remember exactly but he would
get very upset and need total attention from me, handily just when I should have been getting
dinner together!
The last couple of weeks he's been doing the same thing, on a smaller scale (newborns are
way more dramatic) and the only thing for it is to take him outside. Nothing you can do inside,
short of maybe reading him some books or nursing him, is going to appease. But if I take him
out of doors, he's immediately happy. He'll sit on the grass and coo and contemplate the universe
forever. When he was younger I worried about him eating grass and sucking on sticks, but now I don't.
Even if he does munch down the odd blade, he doesn't choke on anything anymore, so I'm not
concerned.
The great thing about this is that it gives me time to water and do some gardening every day.
My mom says "That boy is a good Mexican" about his fascination with running water. I don't know
what this has to do with his Mexican heritage, but I'll take it!
If I'm wrapped up with inside activities, I might not get around to watering or deadheading, or
weeding, or what have you, every day, especially in August, but with M'hijo insisting on going outside
in the late afternoon, I get to putter to my heart's content.
