My youngest is a will o' the wisp...

whoosh, like the wind he disappears.  A flickering light over the marshes... luring strong men and maidens to their doom... He runs from grandparents, fathers, from Sunday School teachers on a hunt for seashells and so many more... so many more...
a lot less funny and yet more worrying than that ridiculously annoying gingerbread man. 
Luckily, or un-luckily, depending upon who you are... he is usually trying to find his mother, because while he is a willful runner, he is also freshly entered into the mama's boy Hall of Fame.   He can't go to sleep unless I am in the room, can't watch tv alone even... yep.... can't tell you how much I look forward to this phase moving on... and i know there is a time coming when he won't even sit on my lap for a dollar, or slather me with kisses all over my elbow when I bang it... i know this is coming.  but I am tired of talking about his ability to bolt at church, I am tired of watching DJ Lance.  (more than tired, but I am trying not to swear.)
Short of breaking his legs (which would only serve to give me heavier lifting...) I am not sure how to curtail the bolt.  hinkypunk.

Other than that, I am battling morose, yet again. So here is my required list of gratitudes, to battle the morose:
1.  I CAN hold my own interest when building structures with the above-mentioned runner, and that is good, because he can build things all the livelong day.
2.  Drove down to the water yesterday after dropping the runner at school...ate a muffin while watching seals bob around.  How many times in life does one write that?
3.  January sunlight is like a popsicle in July.  lights up all the corners with its magical drips..
4.  Laundry machines in my very own house. laundromats, a thing of my past...
5.  blanket forts.
6.  raw almonds.
7.  scotch tape. unstuck. potential in bloom.
8.  pad thai.  i am so glad that it exists. i am.
9.  Put 'Goonies' on the Neflix list.  oh my, i am excited to see it again...
10. tea with honey. lots of honey.