My dear, darling

Emmett. Two beautiful things happened yesterday that I never want to forget.

Story Number 1. Emmett my little light.

Emmett's preschool teacher, Ms. Tannie, came up to me after school and said "Elisabeth, I want to tell you what happened with Emmett today. He came up to me and said Ms. Tannie, I don't know what to do. My friend Phineas doesn't believe in Jesus and when I told him about Jesus, he said that Jesus was silly". Ms. Tannie said "Emmett, you've done your part. In the Bible it says to tell people about Jesus and you did that. Now what you can do for Phineas is just pray".

The backstory to this is that I heard the whole conversation. Emmett and Phineas were behind the couch and I crouched down so they wouldn't see me. Here's the real conversation:

E- "Phineas, I wish you would believe in Jesus and I pray for you that you will."

P- "I don't believe in that. I think it is just silly".

E- "NO Phineas. It's not silly. Jesus loves you very much and you will go to Heaven if you believe in Him".

P-"Well i don't know. I think Jesus is kind of silly".

E-"NO Phineas,He's not. He's not silly at all. And maybe when you grow up you will believe in Him and I will keep praying for you".

(silence)

P-"Okay Emmett. But can we play now"?

E-"Okay".

And they started playing without any problem at all.

My darling, sweet little boy. His gentleness and conviction is something I am awed by. I adore Emmett. And he is a strong, strong Christian. I remember the day he told me that he was.

Story Number 2. Emmett my little defender.

Emmett and his friend were here and I play this game with them. I tell them they LOVE something (that they'd otherwise be indifferent to) and they tell me they hate it. Usually, it's about my dress. I'll say "You love my dress" and they'll say "We hate your dress!" and I say "You love my dress so much you want to marry it" and they'll say "No, We hate your dress so much!" and it will go on and on, with me "misunderstanding" them.

Well, yesterday I decided to switch it up to my singing voice. I started singing very loudly in bad opera style saying "You love my voice" and they said "No! We hate your voice". And I sang louder and said "You love my voice so much you wish you could take a picture of it and hang it on your wall" and they said "No! No! We can't stand your voice". It went on for about two minutes and Emmett's friend whispered something to Emmett and told him to tell me what it was.

Emmett said "We don't love your voice and we are making fun of you".

Now let me interject here, that I am keenly aware that Emmett and his friend are the cool kids at school and, for a brief second, I felt ganged up on and like how a picked-on kid might feel. But it lasted about 1 second. There was a second though that I did feel that way.

Emmett's friend yelled "We don't love your voice" and Ethan got scared because of the loud sound. I said "Okay guys. I think Ethan's getting upset" but just as I said that, Ethan started smiling. So I said "Well, I guess he's not upset" and Emmett said "Mommy, I'm upset" and his eyes were full of tears.

I said "Okay Emmett, come into the living room and let's talk. And he followed me in and I said. "Are you upset because you were making fun of my voice"? and my baby, my sweet little boy full of tears said "Yes. I don't want to make fun of you". I hugged him, fighting back my own tears and said "Emmett, what you are saying feels good to my heart". We went back to the kitchen and his friend said "Emmett, what happened? Why were you crying?" and Emmett said "Because I don't want to make fun of my mommy" and his friend said "I don't like that game either".