Parenting Practice...

I think I've had a variety of experiences to prepare me for parenthood. I have a brother who is quite a bit younger than I; I have had a lot of overnight babysitting experience- some for weeks at a time and for children with special needs; I was a nanny for two families after college for a few months before I began my permanent job; and this past weekend I stood in the pouring rain for two hours with a 4 year old.

My cousin, Nicki, was in town to run the Chicago 1/2 Marathon and much to my delight she brought her oldest daughter (my goddaughter), Skylar, with her. We had a blast. We had a "sleepover" on Saturday night complete with pizza and sleeping bag, and on Sunday we headed out to watch Skylar's mommy complete the 1/2 marathon. There was just one caveat. It was raining so hard and had been for so many days, that weather service issued a flood warning. Full streets were closed and people were literally canoeing out of their homes. And we were standing on Lake Shore Drive in head to toe rain gear yelling, "Go Mommy, Go!"

Skylar was a complete champ! We got her all geared up and loaded her with donuts for extra energy (we had to wake up at 5:30am). She started out the morning begging to dance in the rain without her hood, and wanting to play hide and seek from Jason, but ended the day on a bit of a soggier tune.

We came up with many cheers both for her mommy and for the other runners, and explained how when mommy ran by, we could only wave and cheer to show her we were proud of her, but that mommy wasn't going to be able to actually come over to us and give us hugs and kisses. (there were 16,000 people running the race.) We made it past the "yes you must wear your hood" conversation and the "it's important that we stand behind this white line" conversation. And other than the 5 total seconds when we actually saw Nicki run by we played lots of fun games including "I spy". Skylar is completely hilarious and purely entertaining and I love every word that comes out of her mouth and every second that I have the privilege of spending with her. If my child is as fun as she, I will be overjoyed.

About half way through the race my other cousin (and Nicki's sister), Amy, came with her husband, Ryan, and their two children, Avery and Anthony. We laughed a lot and took pictures of who would actually do this with a 5 year old, 4 year old, and 2 year old. Although we were completely soaked head to toe, we had a good time and were very proud of our runners, Nicki, and my friend Molly also ran the race for charity. And, we were very proud of the littlest cheerleaders. They were all so great!

At one point at about the 1 3/4 hour mark Skylar said to me, "Johanna, I just can't take it one more second. I need to be dry!" My sentiments exactly, Skylar. Luckily Skylar had an extra change of dry warm clothes in the car so we were able to get her changed while we waited for Nicki to meet us after the race. And, after warm showers we all enjoyed a barbecue back and Jason and my place. It was a great day, and a ton of fun. And definitely one for the practice books. :)