We've been having trouble with our boiler lately. Dave is pretty sure he knows what's wrong, and has ordered a new part, but until it arrives, we have to reset the boiler sometimes twice a day. This isn't hard, but it does entail going into the basement, not exactly a convenient operation. And, he's out of town this weekend.
Tonight I had a lot of trouble with the boys before dinner. Julian had most of his dinner alone in the dining room (bad manners gets him kicked out), and I had to take Gabriel's favorite ball away to get him to finally relent after a minor conflict escalated. A sound spanking for shockingly rude retorts to me had less effect than storming outside with his favorite ball to throw it into the garbage can, it turned out.
After dinner, they were peaches and cream, partly because they were fascinated talking about the horrible oil spill in the Gulf. We talked about what oil is used for, how it gets from the ocean into our cars, and what effect it has on all the fish and plants and animals. There was a photo of an oil-drenched bird on the front page of the newspaper, and they were both riveted.
I hated having to cut this conversation short, but Katrina was already upstairs ready for her bath. Julian had a little more to finish up, so, incredibly, Gabriel volunteered to give Katrina her bath. He even said, "I've done this before Mom!"
And so Gabriel went upstairs, persuaded Katrina to get undressed, took her ponytail out, got the bathwater started, and got her into the bath. That's when he discovered, as I had about 10 minutes earlier, that our boiler was off again. I wasn't worried that he'd put the water on too hot for her anyway though. He did come down to tell me the boiler needed to be reset, which I'd just done, then went back up to continue tending to her.
When I got upstairs, Gabriel had just finished washing her hair, and was combing it. "I just have to brush her teeth, then she's done Mom!" he exclaimed proudly.
By then our hot water was coming back, though it was pretty toasty outside tonight and the water being a little colder wasn't a problem. What a change from before dinner though. I love this nurturing side of him, he's so tender to his sister.
But I sure am looking forward to Dave and the boiler part arriving!
6/4/2010
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