Tonight, Willem had two of his classmates and their respective partners over for dinner and football, which of course meant that my children had brain transplants and turned into attention-starved, uncontrolled-volume, mannerless screechy beasts. Everyone else thought they were cute and adorable and winning and winsome... but none of them have children of their own, so they have not been properly indoctrinated into the joy that is unattended play.

But it was a lovely evening. I cooked well, and yes as a matter of fact I DO say so myself, and better yet Willem did all of the dishes immediately afterward. Good company, nice people, and so on, and so forth.

There was an extra dollop of cuteness on Jacob after dinner. He decided he had to have everyone's attention so he wanted to perform a song he learned at school ("Ram Sam Sam," for those of you nonsense-word-lovers out there), but he also decided to get an attack of faux shyness at the same time. So he did all the hand motions for the song and explained, "I don't want to sing it. I want to think it." Cute, and seems to me like a tad abstract and advanced for a two-year-old, but what do I know?