Sugar and Spice vs. Puppy Dog Tails

After a long wait at the doctor office Ethan really needed to move (no gestational diabetes btw-fudge here I come). We went to the park with my niece, Paige-20 months, and my sister-in-law, Christa-age not disclosed. Ethan and I arrived first. After 10 seconds on the swing he wanted down. He made a beeline for one of the jungle gyms and tried to climb up the slide backwards, which he did by the way, and I was very impressed. When he gets to the top of the jungle gym he sits in a puddle of dirty water and then puts his face in it. He looks at me in shock and disgust. "Yes, Ethan, that is yucky. Yucky." He slaps the puddle as if to make it pay for tasting so bad. Enter Paige. Ethan climbs down the jungle gym as fast as he can to say hi to his cousin. Paige comes prancing toward us in a pink dress, white socks, black patent leather shoes, a pink bow on top of her head, and pink sunglasses. She immediately heads for the swings that Ethan has rejected. Once her mom has her in the swing she grips the ball she brought ferociously as to protect it from Ethan's hands. Ethan runs the other way and proceeds to explore all the playground has to offer. 30 seconds digging in the sand, 5 seconds on the teeter totter, 10 seconds for the big kid swings on my lap. He hunts for something else to do. I point to Paige who is still sitting serenely in her swing. Christa is standing 6 feet away in the shade. This looks like an ideal situation to me. "See Paige? Lets go see Paige." Ethan runs to the swings. Something about the situation he finds funny and he laughs. He darts over to the tallest slide in the park and begins to make his way to the top. I follow after to make sure he doesn't fall. Christa and I are close enough to chat now and we are discussing schools, I think. I notice Ethan is diving head first down the slide. "Ah! Christa! Can you catch him at the bottom?" Christa graciously runs to the slide and catches Ethan before he lands headfirst into a dirty pile of water on the end of the slide. This gives Ethan an idea. He begins to take fist fulls of sand and pile it in the dirty water. Christa and I stand back in the shade as Paige sits in her swing calmly, still clutching her ball, and Ethan puts sand on the slide. Out of the corner or my eye I see him putting sand down his shirt and laughing about it. Ethan runs over to the tire and tries to figure out why it is supposed to be interesting. It isn't. He goes back to digging. I look at my little boy, wet, dirty, and smiling. I look at Paige. She is as pretty as when she came. The difference between boys and girls hits me. "Can you believe you are going to have TWO boys?" Christa asks. No, I really can't sometimes. "Its really going to be something." I say staring at my dirty happy little boy. Christa and I decide it is really hot and we should take them to get something to eat. "Ethan, lets go bye-bye." He runs to the car at full speed, trips, and gets back up again and runs to the door of the car. He tries to open it. I think being the one to open the car door symbolizes power to him. I hear Paige screaming at the top of her lungs behind me, "NO!NO!NOOOOO!!!" as her mom is putting her in the car seat. I guess moms of little girls have issues, too.