Dog Mama

The one thing that Bjørn (Kory’s second cousin) wanted to see more than anything else while here in the Northwest, was where Boeing makes airplanes. He is a pilot, so his whole life revolves around flying. Lucky for him, Boeing gives tours at the Everett plant, which is the largest building in the world. It’s an impressive sight even if one doesn’t have an affinity for airplanes. So Kory loaded up the van this morning with Bjørn, Inger, Tobias and Kaleb, and they headed south. The six year old twins, Jonas and Markus, were not tall enough to go on the tour, so I offered to watch them for the day. Inger insisted she should stay home with them, so as not to burden me with the responsibility (they are a bit feisty at times), but I assured her that I’ve been able to raise Kaleb so far to date without serious injury to either one of us, so I should be able to handle the twins. I could see the concern on her face, but I knew she would also enjoy the Boeing tour, so I insisted. Besides, Everett has one of the best Children’s Museums around (thanks in part to huge donations by Boeing), and I figured there isn’t a kid in the world that wouldn’t enjoy that place.




We all left the chill of the beach house this morning under a thick layer of fog, and drove to Everett. My role as “dag mama” (pronounced “dog mama,” what Norwegians call baby-sitters) had officially begun. I had heard stories about the twins, but never spent any time with them before. Kaleb had renamed them when we lived in Norway from being “tvillingene” (“those twins”) – to “tullingene” – a word he made up from the base root “tulle” which basically means “mischievous.” It was a clever description because it’s appropriate and it sounds a lot like the word for twins. They do have a reputation, but it didn’t scare me.



The twins loved the Children’s Museum, just as I thought they would (see photo of them – Markus is milking the cow, Jonas is giving the cow milk). I brought along a book, expecting to have a few minutes to myself like I did with Kaleb, while he played, possibly for hours on end in one exhibit. That was my expectation anyway, but the reality of it was quite different. Where Kaleb would play in one area non-stop, the twins were good for about five minutes. They zipped from room to room faster than I could find a place to sit down, so I couldn’t take my eyes off them. And with two of them, they didn’t always stick together, so I had my work cut out for me. Fortunately, there was no way for them to escape the museum, so I never panicked, but they did keep me on my feet. They had a great time though, as I’m sure they have never experienced anything like it.



I thought we might be at the museum the bulk of the day, but they were done in an hour. I still had a little time to kill before we met up with the rest of the gang for lunch, so I stopped at a discount store and let the boys go shopping. They told me their grandparents had given them money to spend in America, and they wanted to spend it, but they didn’t have it with them. I explained to them the concept of a loan, so they were happy to use my money in the meantime. It was so funny to watch them shop. They grabbed a Ben-10 toy off the shelf with, “I’ll take one of these, and I want one of those.” Their arms were bulging with items and things kept falling to the floor and they’d bend over to pick one up, and another thing would fall. Finally, I offered to carry things for them, but it kind of took the fun out of the process of watching them. And they were very concerned, not about how much money they were spending, but that one of them had picked out one more item than the other so they had to get the same number of items. I couldn’t tell who was who, but one picked something he didn’t even want that much, just to be sure the other one didn’t have more things than him. It was all pretty cute, and it made the car ride afterwards very quiet as they each removed all their toys from the packaging and began to play with them.



Since things were going so well with the twins, at lunch I suggested Inger , Bjørn and Tobias stay at the mall with Kory and go shopping, while I take Kaleb and the boys back to the cabin. I could tell the boys were anxious to have time to play with their toys, so everyone agreed it was a good idea, except Kaleb. All he wanted to do was sit in a library all day and read, so I dropped him off at the Stanwood Library on the way back to the beach, and he was happy. Kory picked him up several hours later when they returned.



I stopped at the dollar store on the way home just to let the boys buy a few more things to play with at the cabin. The sun was out by the time we got back so they headed down to the beach (see other photo of them and the low tide). One of them just sat for hours piling mud up on a stump, happy as a lark. The other played for a while, then cleaned himself off and sat quietly inside, putting together one of his lego toys. My friend, Gail, came by for a visit and we sat on the deck, drinking lemonade and talking for hours non-stop without a single interruption. It was so relaxing and calm. No one else was around, and I felt kind of guilty for how easy it was, since all the expectations were that I was going to be exhausted by the end of the day, taking care of the twins. They were perfect angels. Lucky me.



When everyone came home, all the boys had another mud fight, which spiced things up a bit, but no one got hurt, so that was good. We had a wonderful BBQ salmon dinner out on the deck, while watching the tide come in and the changing colors in the evening sky. I love how the pale blue turns to a soft pink as the sun begins to set. It’s a little sad our time at the beach is coming to an end, but we still have many new adventures that lie ahead.