The Wave

Summer has begun around these parts(doing happy dance complete with baton twirling) and I’ve been kind of MIA.  Sorry, just settling into this wonderful time of year!  My favorite.  I’ve burned the calendars and thrown out the alarms!  Not that they were doing me much good anyway, they don’t work if you forget to pay attention.

I am up before the boys this morning and wanted to join Arizona Mamma’s great meme.

This week, it’s hit home to me that I am the adult in this crowd.  For better or for worse. 

I think my oldest makes a much better adult, but he’s 11 and is just not ready to have that torch handed to him yet. 

So, here I am.  The MOM.

You know you’re a mom when your bathing suit has a skirt.  Heaven help me.  It’s a public service.  Nobody wants to see me bent over digging on the beach without a  little extra fabric.

And you know you’re a mom when you’ve perfected “The Wave.”  And I don’t mean the one that you do when you pass a cute boy on the beach in your “pre-skirted-tankini days.”  No ma’am, this is not a bikini wearing wave.  (You may do this one in a bikini if you are genetically blessed or work out really hard, and if that is the case, pull your beach chair waaaay north of me) 

This wave, the mama wave, is the one you do, mostly from your beach chair.  It’s the one that tells the kids they are out too deep.  The one that alerts them that they need to come in a little, or they’ll be in time out.  It’s often accompanied with a three count.  And for emphasis,  a little, “I’m getting out of this chair” posturing. 

The “wave” also works for “come back this way,”  when the current is pulling them and they’d end up  blocks from where they started, if you were not waving.

Then there’s the wave and point.  It signals that if they don’t move, that old geezer on the boogie board(who is currently experiencing child blindness) is going to run their little five year old self right over.

I hope in the next few days, the water will warm up enough for me to do more playing and less waving.  But, for now, I’m the old lady in the skirted tankini making wild hand gestures and slathering sun screen on squirmy children.   

Waving in a skirt.  It’s how I know I’m a mom.

Have a great summer!