Archive for the ‘Kid Speak’ Category
Friday, April 25th, 2008
I spend a lot of time reflecting on my personal and professional goals, trying to figure out who I am and who I want to be. When we’re all rushing around through life we tend to define ourselves by career, by parenting choices, instead of viewing ourselves and our gifts as a whole.
On this issue, we could learn by the example of our children. My kids still aren’t hampered by convention. They’re open to the idea that their lives can be filled by doing all the things that they like (or think they will like). To wit- this morning’s “What do you want to be when you grow up” conversation.
6: “When I grow up I want to be an artist, a football player and a dad.”
4.9: “When I grow up I want to be a doctor for animals and a haircut girl.”
3: “When I grow up I going to be, um, …. a swimming teacher, a dumptruck guy and Santa.”
Posted in Kid Speak | |
Friday, February 22nd, 2008
I glanced up the stairs as I flipped pancakes this morning, and saw Kong, who’ll be three in a couple weeks but hasn’t outgrown the nickname he earned two years ago, standing at the top, blood running down his cheeks.
“Oh my goodness!” I exclaimed, running toward him to inspect the damage as chocolate chips smoked to the griddle. “You have blood all over your face!”
I quickly paged through possible causes in my head, casting blame on his siblings, checking out his fingernails, as I wiped superficial streaks of blood away with my papertowel to reveal long pink scratches down both cheeks. “What happened?”
” ’snot blood, mom. It’s my whiskers,” he insisted defiantly, apparently unaware of the bloody streaks.
It took me a minute to interpret the response, but recognition slowly settled in.
“Can you show me what you used to shave your whiskers?”
“Sure,” he shrugged, taking me by the hand. He led me into my bathroom, opened the drawer and pointed to an old razor. “I just use daddy’s shaver.”
Perhaps I could just cage him until he’s 30?
Posted in Kid Speak | |
Sunday, January 20th, 2008
I don’t have a lot of memories from Kindergarten, but I do have some. I clearly recall that my teacher, Mrs. Farley, a sweater-clad grandmotherly woman with curly red, teased hair, had filled our classroom with personified letter balloons (Mr. M, Lady L and the like). We spent a lot of time learning about Mr. M who made muffins and Lady L who loved lions. We drew shapes. We talked about colors. And, if memory serves me, we devoted a good chunk of my 1/2 day class period to drinking milk and eating a cookie.
The Kindergarten students of today, it seems, receive slightly more advanced instruction.
Friday, 6 came home with a picture he’d colored of “Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.” Because, as he explained, “Monday is Dr. Junior’s day.”
What a fabulous opportunity, I thought, to take the lesson he’d learned in school and expand. And so I started in on what I thought would be a terrific, age-appropriate Dr. King lesson.
“You’re right,” I explained as all three kids listened intently.
“Martin Luther King taught us all about how important it is to treat people the same.”
I continued to my captive crowd. “He was a very important person in helping to tell people that they shouldn’t judge each other by how they look and that it’s what inside that counts.”
6 looked at me quizzically. “Actually,” he said in a tone of slight annoyance, “there used to be all these laws saying that black people couldn’t do things. And there were a lot of signs everywhere about how only white people could be in restaurants and places like that. But Dr. King got the laws changed.”
“That’s right,” I said, a little speechless as he continued.
“But then he was shot because some people didn’t like him. And do you know where they killed him, mom?”
I paused briefly, and ran the song through my head just to be certain … early morning April 4 … “Memphis?” I responded.
“Yeah, in Tennessee.”
Apparently the academic life has changed a bit in the last nearly 30 years.
“So, who wants cookies and milk?”
Posted in Kid Speak | |
Friday, January 11th, 2008
6: So, dad, was there a lot of damage to grandma and grandpa’s house?
Hubs: I’m not sure yet, bud, but everybody’s ok. That’s what’s important.
4: Is grandpa ok?
Hubs: Grandpa has a couple owies, but he’s just fine.
6: Did he stop, drop and roll?
Hubs: He must’ve. Yep.
Kong: Did three firemen come to grandpa house?
Hubs: I don’t know how many, but the firemen did come, yep.
6: Grandpa must have called 9-1-1, just like he’s supposed to.
4: No. Grandpa’s kinda old. Old people just use Life Alert.
Posted in Kid Speak | |
Wednesday, November 28th, 2007
As any mother knows, the little moments of reward, the ones between, sometimes even during, the Frustrating Exhausting Overwhelming No-Breaks days, can doctor a mom’s spirits in a blink. A sampling of mine from the last two days:
My kindergartener, now writing in typical vowel-free phonetics, (a rush all its own), wrote me a list of “chores” yesterday. The last one was “Olwos eat brkft before worc.”
When I dropped 4 off at school, I bent down to kiss her on the cheek, but before I got a chance to tell her to have a good day she said: “Hey Mom, don’t forget to smile today.”
As I was trudging up the stairs to help Kong go potty, he yelled “No, Mom I DO IT MYSELF,” and slammed the door. A few minutes later he peered out from behind the corner of the door, dimple gleaming and eyes asparkle, then threw the door open to reveal he had completed the task AND pulled his own underwear and pants up.
“Ta-Da,” he said.
Posted in Kid Speak | |
Monday, October 29th, 2007
I bring some gifts to the parenting table. Unfortunately for my children, neither crafting nor cooking are among them. Projects that combine the two leave us all cold and hungry. I want them to learn these things. I’m just not the best person to teach them. In fact, I’d rate my artistic talent just slightly lower than my math and science aptitude.
Nevertheless, when holidays approach, guilt usually drives me to attempt projects I normally avoid. Today, in honor of Halloween, we made “monster cupcakes.” (more…)
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