I've gotten terribly behind on my Tuesday/Thursday morning blog-time.  Sleep has taken priority.  We started staining the deck today.  We are blessed with a ginormous deck, yet, this means kind of a curse when it comes to staining/painting it.  The weather forecast looks good for the next several days though, so we thought we better jump on the chance!  I also got the office painted in the last two days!  Anyway, that's the latest on the house projects.  Now, moving on...

So far, we’ve met MANY of the neighbors who live on our street, and I gotta say, I’m pretty impressed.  Don’t get me wrong: we had some WONDERFUL neighbors at our old house, and we miss them a lot, but we certainly hadn’t met as many people as we’ve already met here. Everyone’s been super friendly AND they’re planning a “welcome to the neighborhood” block party for us in a few weeks!!

One thing we’ve all been a bit anxious about is meeting kids in the neighborhood.  The boys have been REALLY hoping for some playmates.  Last week, Kayli and I walked over to the mailbox.  I saw a couple of boys (looking about Matthew’s age), down the street from us.  They seemed to be carrying some sort of neon yellow and orange nerf-squirt gun situation.  (The only kind of play-gun that I’m OK with).  I quickly returned home, and called upstairs to the kids, “Boys! Grab your weaponry!”

We walked down the hill where I kinda-sorta-somewhat chased these other boys, yelling and waving, “Boys! Hey, boys! Can we talk to you?!”  Now, any kid knows not to talk to strangers but I was hoping that the entourage of three children (and the fact that I look pretty “mommish” – without being matronly, I hope – would convince them that I was neither scary nor dangerous).  I was right.  They stopped walking and waited for us.

We found out that, ironically, Roman (who lives down the street from us) went to the boys’ same elementary school last year and would also be new to Newcastle come September.  He’s a year older than Matthew and just as shy and (I can say it ‘cuz I’m his mom) socially awkward.  Trying to facilitate conversation between two quiet-awkward 8-9ish year old boys was tricky.  I tried things like: “Legos.  Discuss.”  When that topic petered out I whipped out the almost always boy-friendly: “Star Wars.  Thoughts?  Do tell.”  Eventually I ran out of boy topics and conversation was lagging. 

Roman, quickly sensing an awkward silence, said, “Well, nice to meet you.  See you at school!”  I could see the disappointment in my boys. (The deflated, sagging shoulders and slight frowns gave away their sadness at the realization that a spontaneous playdate was NOT going to happen).  I explained where we lived and told Roman (and his visiting cousin Adrian), that we were around this summer if they wanted to play.  I pointed out our house and we sadly parted ways.

When we got home, I tried to cheer the boys up with a snack of yogurt and graham crackers.  It didn’t work much.  Then, mid-way through yogurts, I heard a timid knock on the front door. I opened the door and saw Roman and Adrian standing there. 

Adrian, the more outgoing boy, said (and please read this with the cutest-yet-nerdiest 8 year old boy voice you can possibly muster), “Yes, we’d like to know if you’re boys can come out for an EPIC BATTLE.” 

"Boys! Get your guns!”