Adorable News Alert

My phone rang last night as I was making dinner, and I didn't recognize the FL number. The little voice on the other end asked, confidently and in a not-quite-big-boy voice, "Hello, can I speak to Anika please?" Ani was standing next to me trying to shuffle the Go Fish cards, because I'd promised her I would try to play a game or two while the food was cooking. "It's for you!" I said, smiling. She grabbed the phone and said, "Hi, daddy!" Then she realized it wasn't her dad and her grin grew from her ears to her toes. "Who is it?" I asked her, realizing that I should have been the one to ask. She looked up at me, grinning like a girl whose friend has just called her mom's cell phone for the first time. "Ethan!" she announced, then started pacing around the house like I do when I'm on the phone, laughing and asking if he wanted to go with her to the pool on Saturday. She had asked me a few weeks ago if I knew that her friend Ethan lived in Kendall Square, too, and last week she wrapped up one of her ultra-rare Shopkins in a post-it note on which she'd written his name.

Ethan's mom and I answered some questions over speaker phone (We live in building 8; yes on Saturday at 10 would be fine) and then the kids wanted to video chat. I saw his little freckled face and toothy grin and he showed Ani the video game he was playing, and they both showed each other their respective rooms and fidget spinner collections. I could hear them both laughing and then she ran to me and asked how to spell Saturday. They had switched to texting, because he wanted to send her a picture (it was a baby picture of him and his mom - say it with me, awwwww). Then she wrote, and I quote, "I will miss you Ethan [heart emoji] [poop emoji]"

Anika told her dad about the phone call and Armando asked, "Is that the same Ethan whose name is on my car?" Apparently Anika had traced "Ethan" and a heart into the dust on his car door yesterday.

I cannot even, guys. I cannot.even.handle.it.

In other growing-up-too-fast and adorable-ness news (because we all know the real news is too depressing right now), my youngest has two new obsessions. One is the slides at the playground. But not going down the slides, mind you - he likes to climb up them. Shimmying up the sides like a little diapered monkey.

The other is this Marc Anthony song, which he asks for like this: "mama, vivir la la?"

Then there is Mr. Reni, resident entomologist and gardener-in-chief.

While the other two are mastering ninja-like moves on the monkey bars and shimmying up the slides, my big-hearted middle child is busy watching ants, moving sticks and pieces of shredded tires from the playground area to help build a trail for them to follow. He brings them bits of leaves and food and places rocks around their nests. He has also taken to planting "seeds" on the volleyball court, watering them and checking on their growth every day. Last week he came running to me in tears, because the leaves of his "plant" (some sort of a weed that frequently gets pulled out of the court) had fallen off and he was devastated that it had died. We talked about how hot it has gotten, and how plants need a bit more water and shade than this one had enjoyed. I promised him lots of seeds and planting opportunities once we get to Wisconsin, and had to help him find more "seeds" to "plant" in the volleyball sand.