Along for the Ride

With the exception of early-meeting days, I take Gavin to daycare almost every morning.  It's been part of my Mommy duties since I started back to work after maternity leave with him.  Since Ryan gets off work so much earlier than me, it just made sense that I would drop-off and Ryan would pick-up.

I used to loathe it.  I mean, come on.  Drop-off with a separation-anxiety-prone baby and toddler is no fun. Especially compared to the savior that Ryan got to be at the end of every day.  Morning car rides were filled with an inevitable build-up of anxiety and tears until we reached our destination, where Mommmeeeees and Nooooooos finally bubbled over like a volcano erupting.  I'm exaggerating...a little.

As Gavin's gotten older, morning car rides have become one of my favorite parts of the day.  Tears have turned to conversation, and anxiety into imagination.  The kid is funny.  The kind of laugh-out-loud, unexpected funny that you generally see from a 2-year-old.  Most of the Gavinisms I post every month come from our morning car rides, as do some of my very favorite memories with him.

Last week, he pretended the mini etch-a-sketch we keep in the car was an iPad.  He drew picture after picture and then told me to "push start" every 5 minutes.  When we got to daycare, he gave it to me and said, "You can play with this at work, Mommy.  Be careful.  Don't break it."

This morning, we spent the car ride playing pretend football.  Gavin threw the pretend ball in the air for me to catch, and when I "threw" it back, he'd "catch" it and kick his legs like he was running, and then yell, "TOUCHDOWN!"

I adore that time with him every morning now.  It's time that's just ours.  And it's time that starts both our days out with laughter, fun, and best of all...silliness.