Author: suburbandaddy

Careful What You Wish For

I encourage my kids to ask questions. I make a point to stop what I’m doing to give them explanations they can understand.

“Where does snow come from”, “How do airplanes fly?”, “How does Santa go to every house in one night”, “How many points do you get for a touchdown”.

These are very important questions that I’m happy to answer. I enjoy the challenge of coming up with an answer they can understand.

Then there are questions you don’t want to hear.

We were driving home from school one day. All 3 Things were in their seats, watching the TV, quiet and tired from their day. Thing 2 broke the silence, out of the blue, and asked a question.

“What’s a pussy?”

Umm. Gulp. My mind was racing for an answer. I stalled. “What did you say?”

As innocent as can be, “Pussy. What is a pussy?”

Then, I realized what they were watching on the TV. Sylvester and Tweety Bird. Sylvester is a cat. A PUSSYcat.

Whew. Dodged that one.

Cold Turkey

Last night we embarked on Phase II of the great migration in preparation for Thing 4. Last week, Thing 2 moved in with his big brother. Other than staying up late talking and playing together, it has gone remarkably well.

Yesterday was to be the day Thing 3 moved out of his crib and into 2’s old room and toddler bed. He didn’t want any part of it and desparately wanted back to his crib.

SuburbanMommy suggested we have him sleep in the new room but in the crib. So I started to wheel it over. Except it wouldn’t fit through the door. So I took the door off. Then I couldn’t get the crib past the railing and had to backtrack back to the original room.

All the while, Thing 3 was crying while watching me take his beloved crib out, flip it upside down and all around, probably traumatizing him to the point that he’ll be the only Kindergartener who sleeps in a crib.

Bottom line: we caved.

Today I took a different approach. I went for cold turkey. I’d rather have a few days of hell than weeks of a slow, painful, drawn out transition.

Incredibly, it actually worked. Once he realized there was no going back, Thing 3 embraced the new room and bed, and he was sound asleep before long.

Now, if only potty training could be this easy.

True Partners

Since moving into the same bedroom a week ago, Thing 1 and 2 are learning about sharing and partnership. So far the results have been pretty good. Each is sharing his stuff with the other.

But we adults know the true test of any partnership is to put your money where your mouth is. Go into business with someone or buy something together and you’ll learn the true nature of your relationship.

That’s exactly what happened yesterday. Thing 1 desparately wanted to get Wii football. But he didn’t have enough allowance saved. So I suggested he see if Thing 2 would put up half the money. Together they had enough to cover the cost. We counted out the cash and took a trip to Target.

So far so good. They are taking turns playing. And they’ve learned a valuable lesson in how money works.

We’ll just see what happens when one of them gets tired of football and wants to trade it in for another game, but the other partner doesn’t want to sell. So one has to buy out the other’s share. But he won’t have the cash up front so there will be a payment plan, financing, and maybe collections for delinquent payments. I can see Thing 3 as the debt collector muscle. “Pay me now or I will hit you with this Buzz Lightyear”

Is That Poop In The Pool

There are not a lot of options for keeping three active boys occupied in the winter when it’s 14 degrees with the wind chill. So I made the difficult choice to take all three on my own to the rec center pool.

It is certainly no small undertaking to get all of them changed in the locker room, get a swim diaper on Thing 3, chase after them in the pool, then dried off and dressed again. But when the weather is this cold, it’s necessary. We got changed, stuffed all our stuff into a locker, and headed to the pool.

After just 20 minutes of fun in the pool, the lifeguard whistles blew. Adult swim? Really? Then the word quickly spread. There was poop in the pool at the bottom of the slides near where we were playing. Pool closed for at least 45 minutes. Game over.

Thing 3 was a prime suspect. Come to think of it, he hadn’t had his usual dirty diaper that morning. I checked his swim diaper and it appeared clean. But like JFK’s shooting, we can never be sure.

Starting The New Year With Change

We are starting this new year off with some changes. Today Thing 1 and Thing 2 officially start sharing a room.

Thing 1 will be on the top bunk, Thing 2 on the bottom. Each has their own designated side of the closet, their own set of drawers and separate shelves for their stuff. But it will be an adjustment for kids who have always had their own room.

The biggest wildcard is how bedtime will go. Thing 1 goes right to sleep with the light off. Thing 2 stays awake and plays with action figures, or just talks out loud to himself, with lights on, before falling asleep each night. It will be a source of friction.

Sleeping in a real bed will be new to Thing 2. He has been sleeping on his “couch” on the floor with a sleeping bag for as long as I can remember. Not because he didn’t have a bed. He just likes it.

Finally, to make room for a Thing 4 in a couple months, we are also moving Thing 3 to 2’s old room. For him it will be a move from crib, where he is safely contained and unable to cause trouble, to toddler bed. The thought of Thing 3 roaming free at night is a little scary.

Can’t Wait To Try KneeBouncers

KneeBouncersI just learned about a cool website called KneeBouncers. It looks absolutely perfect for Thing 3 because he is always trying to use the computer like his big brothers, but he only ends up clicking the wrong buttons and hitting the wrong keys.

KneeBouncers gives babies and toddlers the opportunity to play on the internet, without the use of a mouse. Loaded with games, little kids can make magic happen on the screen with any tap on the keyboard. All the keys do the same thing, so they can’t mess it up. Brilliant!

I especially like that the site was started by two dads. Reading their story, I know exactly where they are coming from. A third child that tries to keep up with their older siblings, gets frustrated, and causes trouble for everyone? Sounds a little familiar.

I will be trying KneeBouncers this weekend with Thing 3.? We’ll see how it goes.

What Do You See?

What do you see in this picture?

You probably see a normal, well organized shelf full of toys. In fact, it’s from Thing 1’s Kindergarten class. But that’s not how Thing 3, a troublemaking two year old, sees it.

I stopped by the Kindergarten classroom, which was empty, to get Thing 1’s jacket. Thing 3 was with me. I got the jacket while he explored the rest of the room. There is a lot of interesting stuff in a Kindergarten room, especially to a two year old.

We were only there a few seconds. That’s all it takes. Thing 3 saw the same normal shelf and thought it would be fun to dump everything on the floor. So that’s what he did.

Do you see the largest bucket with about a thousand teeny tiny Legos? He dumped that one on the floor first.

In the movie Unforgiven there is a line “When confronted by superior numbers, an experienced gunfighter will always fire on the best shot first.” They have a sixth sense about them.

Thing 3 went for the bucket which would do the biggest amount of damage first. I now know exactly how this incident happened.