Boobies

Around our house these days, its boobies all the time. It is suddenly the doodle bug’s most favourite word. We’re all boobies. Everything is a boobie. Its a noun and a verb. Did you know you can boobie something? You can. This evening he said to me, “Papa, boobie your boobie with a boobie!”

At times it gets to be too much.  Sometimes, its just really damn funny.

Apparently he and a friend of his at school started in on the boobie train. I asked if other kids were talking about boobies all the time, and he said, no, just the one friend. I can’t image a whole class talking like this.

The cool thing about this is that this is a kid that has had a history of being one little serious dude, partially due to an undiagnosed medical issue. When we visited friends, their kids would be doing silly crazy kid things. Our DB would be the stoic one looking like he would rather be working on a PhD thesis. In this obsession with the word boobie, he’s showing some pretty awesomely normal silliness. And for that I am grateful.

While we haven’t talked about it, my wife and I are certainly not stomping on it. At times we need him to stop (visits to the grandparents, par example), and for the most part he has been cooperative about that.  Let’s just say we’re picking our battles carefully.

My best judgement says it will pass on it’s own. Or, as the doodle bug would put it, “It will boobie!”

Driving through snow

As I was making it up the hill on Dufferin Street, my wheels spinning despite the new snow tires, it totally hit me. I couldn’t NOT make it.

You see, between 7:30 and 4:30 today, a ton of snow fell on Toronto, and the drive to pick up the kids was pretty bad. The worst spot was the aforementioned hill. Cars were getting stuck, poor sods with no snow tires had no chance and had to turn back. One guy put his hazards on and bailed on his clunker right at the steepest spot making it that much more exciting for the rest of us. Snow AND obstacles. How nice.

I have to say I did a risky thing. Instead of waiting my turn to go around on the left hand side of the abandoned vehicle, I took the inside track between te car and the sidewalk. The snow was deeper and the room for error was less. But I figured the new tires would get me through. I went on pure gut.  Luck was on my side and I shimmied my way past and on up the hill.

But as I was doing that, it really hit me. I had to get through. I mean I had no choice. The kids were at school, waiting to be picked up, and I had to get here. If for whatever reason I couldn’t make it in my car, I would have been in a really bad predicament. It would have taken me at least an hour to travel the final few kilometers. I probably would have had to walk. The kids would have been miserable, hungry, tired, and would have had to walk a long long way to the bus stop in a frigid blizzard to get back to the car. Not my idea of fun.

Its not that often that you get hit with a situation where if it doesn’t work out, some fairly major implications come to pass. This one would have been fairly short term, but pretty intense with its ramifications. In my cozy North American life, I am so rarely inconvenienced in any considerable way, and I take it for granted that I can get where I need to and give my kids what they need.

So I’m pretty grateful that I had shiny new snow tires and got lucky and could get to the school in time.  I felt absolutely victorious as I pulled into the drive. And my close call put my desire to be there for them into a unique focus. In that moment I really saw the depth and intensity of that desire. And that’s a pretty cool thing to get to have a sense of. Just how much I love those boys.

Taking it on the Chin

A few weeks ago the Wee Bear had a fall at the park. A bad one. We had just finished tobogganing, and were on the jungle gym. His mitts had gotten wet so he had his hands in his pockets.

As he went over the little bridge, and made his way up the small incline, his boots slipped out from underneath him. With his hands in his pockets he couldn’t put them out to brace his fall. He went down right on his chin.

It was one of those falls that you just know is bad. Not the kind where you can dust their pants off and away you go.  At first I was thinking he may have bitten his tongue or cheek or had some kind of concussion. After checking all that as he screamed his little head off, our friend who went tobogganing with us said, “It looks like he cut his chin.”

I looked, and did he ever. It was split open almost an inch long and very deeply. Luckily is was not bleeding badly, but I knew immediately: this one needed stitches.

So after tracking down his mom, who was shopping with the car, we met up and went off to the hospital. About 3 hours later (not bad, really) the WB had his chin neatly glued up and we were on our way home.

Its been about three weeks now, and the glue has come off (really cool stuff by the way), revealing a smear of a red line that will eventually be reduced to a scar. Luckily its on the underside of his chin, so it won’t be visible unless he’s looking up.

So the other night, when I was tucking him in, I had the kind of moment when you realize you are going to remember something. That this mark on his chin will be something we will talk about in years to come. “How did that happen?” someone will ask. “Oh, let me tell you the story…” we will say.

Old post, but worthy of reposting… The Little Red Hen (Revised)

Ok, so I wrote this on an old blog and I wasn’t able to import my old entries to wordpress….  This one is worthy of a re-post.

The Little Red Hen (Revised)

I can remember my father reading me “The Little Red Hen” when I was a kid. He use funny voices for the cat and the duck and the pig and made my brother and I laugh. It was with much fondness that I purchased a copy for the Doodlebug when he was nearing a year old. And he loved it. I eventually made up a melody to sing the words to so that I wouldn’t be bored from the repetition.

But wouldn’t you know, that Little Red Hen is one passive aggressive little fowl! I mean really – she keeps asking her so-called friends (who seem completely dissinteresed) to help her, without any indication that she’s feeling the least bit annoyed by their refusal to help, and then whammo, when they come for a slice of bread she hits them with a whack of stored up resentment. You can hear the snide-ness in her voice when she says “no! weeee will eat the bread!”

It got to the the point where I couldn’t stand to read (or sing) the ending anymore and had to engage in some literary revisionism. Now that the Wee Bear is getting into story books, I have to review my alternate endings.

I always thought that if the Hen could just make it to a couple of therapy sessions she might have concluded with something like, “No, I’m sorry Cat, Pig and Duck, but I’m feeling resentful right now because I put a lot of work into this loaf of bread and don’t want to share it. In fact I shouldn’t have asked if you wanted some in the first place.” There. She takes responsibility for her actions and feelings. My Sons get a nice lesson in naming emotions rather than a lesson in anger and manipulation.

Or, the Hen could be up front about her expectations when she asks for help. Instead of asking obliquely “Who will help me…” why doesn’t she name names? “Hey, Cat, if you want some bread later, why don’t you help me plant these seeds, huh?” Suddenly I’m teaching my kid about being direct, planning ahead and negotiation.

Or sometimes, I just let the lazy friends get some of the Hen’s bread. “Sure, says the Little Red Hen, we will all eat the bread! But you missed how I grew the wheat, cut it, threshed it, ground it and made bread out of it all by myself. It was the coolest thing. I am sure proud of my bread! Another slice, dear Pig?”

Not that reading the actual ending will turn the kids into huge giant ogres. I made it out of childhood ok. Now where did I put that self-help book I was reading?

Pepperoni?

Last night it was the Wee Bear’s turn to catch me off guard. Kids are always surprising you, but this really tickled me.

So yesterday, my wife and the kids picked me up from work and we decided to go to the Loblaws near my work for what we affectionately call a “grocery store pick-nick.” They have a Marche-style restaurant in the store, and its a great way to practice restaurant behaviour in a very low-risk environment. The Doodlebug loves it because he gets to have his favourite food – french fries and ketchup. The Wee Bear is a different beast. He generally is open to more food options, but lately his pallate has been a little, or a lot, depending on the day, closed off. He’s hitting, unfortunately, that 3-year old closing of the gates in terms of trying new foods. In fact he’s been like many kids this age, who start wanting the same thing every night. In his case, it happens to be cucumber salad. Not a bad choice if you ask me, but cucumber salad at home is way different from the cucumber salad at the Loblaws. So I wasn’t sure what to expect.

Well. Wasn’t i just blown away when the Wee Bear spied the pizzas over in the far corner and proceeded to shout out “I want pizza with pepperoni!” What? Pepperoni? Never ever have we had pepperoni pizza. My wife and first child are, to my own chagrin, die-hard cheese-pizza lovers, and having grown up into it, the Wee Bear never complained. (I usually opt for an extra slice laden with peppers, chicken, mushrooms, etc.) But to suddenly hear such an enthusiastic request for pepperoni pizza, well, shiver me timbers. Here’s a lad after my own pepperoni-loving heart.

And while I was a tad concerned he might not eat those circular slices of yumminess, well, he snarfed them down like a only a seasoned pepperoni pizza lover could.

Boy was I surprised. And man, I can’t wait till we order pizza again.

Why do kids like to scream?

The thing is, is that when there’s two of them, if one starts to scream, just for fun, the other one starts too. There they are in the kitchen, smiling their silly little faces off, screaming as loudly as they can. I mean, really loudly. But that’s the game, right? Who can scream the loudest?!

I do faintly remember enjoying screaming when I was a kid from time to time. It sure looks like they are having fun. But HOLY FECK!! Its like nails on the blackboard times ten!

And what do you do about it, really? Start yelling even louder? S T O P  T H A T  S C R E A M I N G !   There can’t be a more futile moment in parenting. And if you start after them, well, then they just take off down the hall, screaming all the way, and you’ve got a grand of game of SCREAM CHASE happening!

Oy vey. It’s all very six year old craziness.

Its times like that when I really have to “go zen” and not get caught up in my own aggravation and be open to other alternatives than shutting down the scream fest. Maybe there’s a better place to scream than others like the back bedroom that’s no attached to the neighbours. The basement? Maybe we could have “scream time” where we practice for next years halloween.

Come to think of it, it might feel good to let off a yawp or two.

The Best Question

Every once and a while, the wee bear (tho’ no longer so wee) asks a completely obvious question. We’ll be hanging out in the kitchen and he will ask,

“Is this our house?”

Sometimes we’ll be driving in the car and he’ll ask the same question about the car.

“Papa, is this our car?”

At first I thought he was just being silly, but he asks with such earnestness, that it made me think about the question a little more. Being a student of Zen made it all that more interesting, because, it really is all about looking at the moment with the fresh eyes of “beginners mind”. His certainly has a beginners mind, and when he asks, I look around with a suddenly deeper appreciation and gratitude for what indeed we have. Compared to most people in the world we are unbelievably lucky to have the house and car that we have. They are not luxurious by north american standards, that is for sure. But on a global level, man are we just golden. Furthermore, as the economic woes and earthquakes and monsoons have taught us lately, nothing is a sure thing. All “this” could change in a flash.

“Papa, is this our house?”

I do believe it is, sweetie. Wow. Aren’t we some lucky ducks?

Birthday Party – Home Baked Mystery

Its hard to believe the Doodlebug is 6. His birthday was last Wednesday, but his SK class party was today. Now these days kids parties seem to be anywhere but at someone’s house these days. There are jungle gym places, theme restaurants, play spaces, you name it, and they pretty much do the whole shebang – themed entertainment, games, cake, and party bags. Even Starbucks for the grownups. The benefits are obvious, no prep, no mess. My wife also pointed out the fact that most parents don’t want 20 kids running around the house like maniacs, or having to plan activities for said wild bunch.

So the fact that we had a party at our house must include the fact that there were only 6 kids total. We still had the massive clean up and prep exercise. That I can handle. But I must say I was absolutely befuddled by my wife’s request to come up with an activity for the kids when they arrived. Couldn’t i just send them to the back yard and close the door? An activity? Really?

I honestly think I am a good dad, but, that would be a dad of 2 kids. Not SIX. And suddenly, my respect for teachers and daycare workers skyrocketed, because I realized that I had absolutely no clue what to do. None. It was indeed a mystery.

Thankfully, it turns out that the doodlebug’s claim that he is a detective has pretty substantial merit. When asked what to do when the kids arrived, he simply said, “We’ll go to the back yard and play monster tag! And since its my birthday, we know who the monster is going to be!” Well. Imagine that. Monster tag. Mystery solved.

The final resolution came when the kids all played “the case of the missing cake”, a clue searching game that the DB conceived of entirely on his own. After playing at the park, we came back to a cake plate that was suddenly missing the fabulous homemade chocolate cake with bright blue icing and white polka-dots. One the plate was a clue directing the kids to the garage, then to the slide, etc. etc. and finally back to the kitchen where the cake had magically re-appeared.

I can only imagine that with more kids, the day would not have gone so smoothly. So in the end we were a little lucky but also very pleased that the party was indeed home-baked. We were all outside almost the whole time, enjoying a beautiful day, instead of stuck inside some entirely moderated big game room. And I got some help with some awesome mystery solving.