Unpacking has been chugging along.  We moved in to our house last Friday, and my first priority was getting the kids rooms set up for them, which was pretty easy to do (except for not having the hardware to Mr. B’s bed…good thing he likes camping, as he slept on his mattress on the floor).  The kids now have this ginormous playroom, which they gladly enjoyed TRASHING on Friday as their aunt tried to get things out of boxes.  It took me over six hours last Sunday to get this

 to look like this:

They have been warned, I will slap a lock on that door faster than Linsay Lohan will end up back in jail if the room ends up like this again.  So far they’ve done a great job of keeping it fairly clean, and I’m grateful that it does have a door I can close.

In the middle of all the packing, the kids were itching to get outside to play and meet some kids.  There’s a no-fence policy here in Dublin.  It’s kind of nice that when you look outside you see wide open space.  At the same time, there are no real boundaries between the yards.  A neighbor told us that the kids will stop short of the property line and talk to each other as if there’s an invisible fence there, which I think is a very funny image.  But I think it also means that if you like your neighbors, it can potentially expand your yard space, so, BONUS!

Mr. B is a happy, social kid.  He loves talking to complete strangers, everyone is a friend.  I love this about him, I love how open and sharing he is with other kids his age, wanting to show them the book he has or get them to play with him.  I don’t ever want him to lose that. 

However, the kids we’ve meet here so far are, I don’t know…shy?  Sour?  Stand-offish?  You’ll say hello to them and ask them what their name is, and they’ll murmur it, then just stare at you.  Mr. B or I will ask them questions and they won’t really answer.  What is that?  It feels like we’re on a Manhattan subway, for goodness sake!

Mr. B had seemed to hit it off with a neighborhood kid a year older than him (who for the sake of anonymity shall be called Kid).  The night before our moving truck arrived, Mr. B started chatting with this kid (at first B was asking questions and this kid was just staring at him, then they found the common ground that is LEGO’s and Star Wars and became friendly) and they took off playing on the swing set together.  It appeared to be going well.  As we were walking back in to the house, Mr. B said to me “I asked that kid if he would be my friend, and he said Yes!” and I smiled and thought, “wow, that was easy!”  The next day when our stuff arrived, Kid’s mom was gracious enough to let our kids play in her backyard with her kids.  Kid is a little rough around the edges, but he’s also a year older.  Kid has a sister that’s Miss P’s age, so all four of them were running around our yards, and it felt like kid heaven. 

The next morning Mr. B wanted to play with Kid, but we never saw him outside and had other stuff to do.  That night, at pillow talk time with Daddy, Mr. B told Jon that Kid had hit him the day before when B wouldn’t get off this scooter right away (while it was moving), and then said some other mean things to him.  B was a bit sad that his immediate friend wasn’t as nice as he hoped.  And then, he said the cutest/saddest thing to Jon.  Mr. B suggested that he put up signs around the neighborhood asking if someone nice would be his friend.

God, it broke my heart.  However, we’ve only been here a week.  Things will happen.  I’ve been having conversations with B about how this is hard for Mommy and Daddy as well.  We’d all like to make friends, but it might take time. 

The next day, we splurged and joined a gym.  Y’all, this gym is AWE-SOME!  Not only does it have a ton of cardio machines, about 80 classes a week ranging from yoga to hip-hop, but it also has a child care center for the kids, a fantastic indoor leisure pool, and an equally fantastic outdoor pool with two huge water slides.  A perfect way to spend the summer.  Miss P is too little, but Mr. B had to do a swim test if he wanted to go down the slide.  25 meters.  Without touching the sides or the bottom.  I wasn’t sure how good of a swimmer he was, to be honest.  But he DID IT!  The first half of the pool I felt confident about, but as he crossed the halfway mark and  was still going strong, I got excited.   P and I ran down to the end and cheered for him, yelling and jumping up and down as he finally reached the side.

The look on his face after he got out?  Priceless.  Puffed up with pride.  And that moment right there washed away the stress of the past couple of days.  I wish I could bottle that moment up and keep it forever.