A day in the life of Middle Duck

How can you make "being in the middle" a good thing?  

Hudson does.  

He is the stuffing in our Oreo, the gooey cheese between the grilled bread, the peanut butter between the Ritz crackers at Christmas time,  he is the 7th inning stretch, the fireworks during the Superbowl half-time show and he is all the cars in between the engine and caboose.  

He is my Middle Duck.  

My spirited, adventurous and highly perceptive almost four year old who keeps us all really, really busy (and on our toes) all the time. 

With Hayden starting school and Hadley being the baby, Hud doesn't get all the blog time he rightfully deserves.  So I thought, in honor of the little guy who has become my new right hand man during the day, I would give you a peek into his going-ons...

Here are just a few snippets:

Me:  What are you up to Hudson?  

Hudson:  Making a package for E. (his friend)

Me:  What are you putting in it? ("it" being the gallon sized Zip lock bag he was holding)

Hudson:  Carrots and a muffin.

Me:  Maybe you shouldn't give him the old carrots from Hayden's lunch.

Hudson:  Why?

Me:  Because that is germ-y.

Hudson:  Oh.  Okay.  Can I use a safe kid knife? (butter knife)

Me:  How come?

Hudson:  I want to cut E up some fresh carrots.

Peel them and cut them up he did...

Then he picked some toys out to put in the "package".  He had Hayden write him a note for E.  Then he delivered the package.  All by himself.  

Hudson will ask almost every day, "Is today an adventure day or a nap day?"  Since Grandma left for home and things have gone back to "normal" we have been having way more nap days than adventure days.  This does not please Hudson, as he much prefers adventures over naps.  One morning last week he did manage to convince me (constant whining can make you cave in ways you never imagined) to take him and Hadley to the beach in the 1.5 hour window of time we had between Hadley's first nap and her second nap.  We packed a lunch and played at the beach.  For me, it was A LOT of work for 35 minutes of actual beach play.  For Hud it turned out to be an adventure day AND a nap day.  There he is below, all beached out and headed home for nap.  

Hudson has three favorite at-home activities:  

1) Snuggle Story Time.  That kid will sit and listen to books for an hour.  He just soaks it in.  Has been like that since he was an itty-bitty.  

2) Art.  He creates, creates, creates.  Most of his current works include paint, glitter and copious amounts of glue.  That is until Hayden taught him the "little dot of glue holds a lot" song.  Since then Hud has attempted to use more restraint in the adhesive department.

3) Science experiments. Which lately I have made him do outside and tend to include dirt, water, leaves, sticks and whatever he can sneak out of the kitchen.  Yesterday he made a "fly trap" on the back patio.  It was a Tupperware bowl (that had been sneaked out of the kitchen), filled to the brim with water and heavens only knows what else.  He spent almost an hour out there trying to get his water to gunk ration just right.  When the neighbor kid found out what it was he replied:  "That is not a fly trap, that is a fly repellent.  'Cause not even a fly is going to want to go near that."  Hudson disagreed.  I stifled a laugh.

Peanut butter and jelly is our standard lunch time fare in the Honeycutt house.  Hudson has adopted his brothers' ridiculous habit of asking for the crusts cut off.  I oblige most days.  (Remember what I said above about whining and parental motivation??? ... well, crusts are one of those things in our house.)  I was in the kitchen finishing my own lunch, when I came in to sit down and found that Hudson had managed to turn his regular old lunch into a party.  Because apple juice with an actual apple wedged over the side of your cup is ALWAYS more fun.  Always.  

I have found that when I make time to actually sit at the table with Hudson to eat lunch with him, we have our best conversations of the day.  

Hudson got a super big treat last week when his buddy had to stay home from school for the day and his momma went into work.  It was the best surprise play date Hudson has ever had!  He could not believe his luck.  He and E played non-stop, with no fighting, no crying, no arguing for almost three straight hours.  It was amazing.  As they were winding down for naps I turned on the Magic School Bus for a bit.  This is how I found them.  Apparently when you are three years old, pretending you are a two headed caterpillar is a really a good time.  (Bonus fact:  Inside that tunnel I found just about every toy from the toy bin! Who would have guessed?)

Hudson recently helped me color rice and noodles for some art projects.  I had to quick hide the rice because I found that he was eating it raw.  I shouldn't have been surprised though, because he ate almost all the dyed spaghetti noodles we made the week before.  He soaks the raw noodles in a cup for about an hour, strains them in a colander and then eats them.  Strangest, most hilarious thing I have EVER watched.  

I still haven't decided what we are going to make with the dyed rice.  Anyone have a suggestion for us??

Me:  Hud, please empty the dryer and put the clothes in the basket.

Hud: Okay.

10 minutes pass... and he still hasn't come out of the laundry room...

Me:  Hudson, where are you?

Hud:  I am sleeping.

I find him in the laundry room, snuggled onto a piece of warm underwear, fresh (and clean!) from the dryer.

Me:  What are you doing?

Hud:  It was so warm and cozy I wanted to sleep.

As you can imagine, Hudson stays busy and seems to be enjoying the one on one time we get these days during our "Home school Preschool" as we call it.  But when 2:00 rolls around you can bet he is ready for his "Bubby" to come home.  The other day after school he just crawled into Hayden's lap and said he wanted to cuddle.  Hayden didn't seem to mind.

Maybe the best part about being in the middle is that at the end of the day there is always someone to be cuddled and always someone to cuddle you?