Every so often, the Monster surprises us.

Yesterday was Gymnastics – we’re working on trying to get him into more of a narrative mode, so we do a lot of talking to him about his schedule, to see if he can’t start picking up on what day it is, et cetera.  Of course, it was also St. Valentine’s Day, so his school had that stuff going on…

I’m really not terribly much for the day – not because I’m not horribly romantic, but because it’s a saint day.  (We have a similar holiday in the summer, Tu B’Av.)  Still, his day involved hearts and the like, and lest my wife end up having as a conversation piece with her fellow moms that I didn’t buy anything, I do usually buy flowers for her.

Because I had the Monster with me, I involved him in the whole thing.  I gave him the choice while we were driving home from gymnastics – did he want to go home, or did he want to buy flowers?  This was even more important because he’d been insisting on our way home that it was time for dinner.

“Yes,” came the answer from the back seat.

“Go home, or get flowers?” I asked, repeating the question, keeping to the credo of offering specific choices.

“Get flowers!” he insisted.  Of course, he immediately got upset when I turned the car so we could go stop for flowers, but once I reminded him that he wanted to get flowers, he quieted down.  He was very good in the parking lot with holding my hand while we walked into the store, and ended up in front of the flower case.

“So which flowers?” I asked him.

“Get flowers!” he insisted, and went straight for a batch of red roses down towards the bottom of the case, where he could reach them.  “Red flowers!”

That’s my kid, the romantic…