I just removed my first (of most certainly many) splinters.  If you ask Patrick, I removed a giant piece of wood from his hand.  If you want to know the truth, it was probably about 1mm by 2.5mm.  Tiny.  But to a tiny kid himself, it was monumental.

This rite of passage, and the official start to our "outdoor season," I'd like to believe, leads me directly to this.  It's as if Erin Jo lives in my walls.

Boys in my House

Author: Erin Jo Kilmer

There are boys in my house - and Spiderman shoes

And 200 papers in various blues.

There's Bob (he's a builder) and Thomas the Train,

There's a fireman coat to wear in the rain.

They have cars on their shirts and frogs on their hats

There's a glove and a ball and a red plastic bat.

There's dirt on a face and a smudge on a nose;

Grass stains on knees and sand between toes.

There's bathtime at night with bodies to scrub,

And when we're all done there is dirt in the tub!

There's bandaids and bruises and curious bumps,

There's smiles and laughter and sometimes there's grumps.

There are odors most icky; there's boogers so green

 There are more yucky things than I'll ever get clean.

There are piles of laundry; there's stories at night;

There's bedtime and bathtime and dinnertime fights.

There are cars and there are trains and there are books about trucks

There's Scoop, Lofty, Dizzy, and Travis, and Muck.

Sometimes there are bugs, and sometimes there are frogs;

Sometimes they are lions, or dinos, or dogs.

There are cute little vests and darling neckties

Dragged right through the mud - oh what a surprise!

There's running and climbing and jumping and falling

And laughing and crying and hugging and brawling

And rolling and losing and finding and creeping

 And whining and stealing and sometimes there's sleeping.

There's tantrums and time outs and extra loud noise -

There's love in my house, shaped like three little boys.