In the next town over from us there is a children's museum. We have an annual pass that gives us the opportunity to go as many times as we'd like for free. Now that is worth cheering about so.....Hooray!! We regularly frequent 'Eureka' particularly in Winter when I would actually rather chew my arm off than play outside. The boys love it and it often kills a few hours when they're stir crazy, thus saving my sanity. Plus it's all educational so I can feel smug about my parenting choices. It really is win-win!
On our last visit we went on a Saturday which I generally try to avoid due to the fact that a three and one year old are generally treated like skittles by the much older children. Fortunately this Saturday they were having a 'Bollywood dance event' so most of the older kids were engrossed in that, as were most of the fathers who were happily watching the scantily clad ladies gyrate on stage. Pah!
Somehow during this visit we came into close proximity with a lady and her daughter. She was immediately annoying to me and try as I might wherever we went there she was. Without even speaking to her I came to the knowledge that she was an older parent visiting her even older parents with her only child, five year old Emily. (I did mention we were in close proximity plus I'm what I like to call inquisitive!)
Anyhow the museum is educational and I personally think kids learn best when they're having fun. My boys favourite part is the real world part where they get to play in a kid size bank, post office, garage and supermarket. They love it. We don't generally do things in the right order I let them take the lead and should a teaching opportunity arise I take it with both hands. My number one objective is that they have a good time. (With a little dash of sanity saving thrown in just for me!)
My number one objective and Emily's mum's number one objective were clearly poles apart. We met them first in the kids size 'Mark's and Spencer's' they had already been to the bank to get a 'reasonable' amount of money to go to the supermarket. On arrival Emily went straight to get a trolley and attempted to start piling her trolley high with goodies. (Plastic vegetables weren't an option as Eli already had every single one in his own trolley!) Her mum intervened. Explained that hey weren't there to play and that shopping is a serious task and Emily needed to choose five items to make a healthy meal. Emily looked disheartened and appealed to her mother who insisted she get on with the task in hand. So she did. She came back to her mum with five items, her mum looked at what she had and told her that those five items were far too expensive. They only had five Eureka pounds from the Eureka bank. She then went on to explain at great length about budgeting and the downward debt spiral that results if we spend over our designated budget. The whole speech got me panicked it was so brutal. The whole time my boys were happily filling and emptying their trolleys and I was happy to see them happy. Thoroughly depressed about the 'downward debt spiral' I moved on.
We next went to the garage. The boys were happily playing in a car each. Thomas was changing a tyre and Eli was filling his car with petrol. Then Emily's mum arrived. Emily went straight to the cash counter to play with the till. She was immediately redirected because it's not realistic to go to a garage and pay before you have even bought anything. So her mum set her another mundane task that took all the fun from playing. Eli had filled his car with petrol and instead of going straight to pay (gasp!) he went off and left the garage (Clearly a future life as a criminal awaits). Emily saw the pump was free and asked if she could go buy petrol. Her mum declined and explained that people that don't follow tasks through to the very end don't do very well in life and end up disappointed eventually. So Emily carried on with her task to the very end. (Obviously I rolled my eyes at my mum every time the Nazi mother spoke. Little things like that make me feel better.)
Next was the Post Office. Emily came in and said she wanted to 'PLAY' in the Post office. Not to worry though her mum was on hand to explain how life isn't about playing. It's about learning and learning isn't supposed to be fun. Learning is serious.
Soon after we left. I couldn't help feeling she was seriously wrong. I actually came away feeling much better about how I parent my children. Downward debt spiral and future life disappointment obviously pending I'm just happy my kids are happy.
Wednesday, 5 March 2008
(Over)Parenting?
Sunday, 2 March 2008
Happy Mothers Day to ME!
They made me cards at church in nursery ! (Well Rob didn't he's a bit too mature for nursery!) Saturday, 1 March 2008
The Bad Parenting Chronicles: Episode 3
I may have mentioned previously that Thomas has a tendency to be a tad dramatic. I am fully aware he has inherited this from me. (I am not completely ashamed to admit that I have drafted in my finely tuned brain a plan of action should anyone break into our house at night when Rob is away on business. I almost had to use it once when I was awoken in the night by what I thought was a burglar jingling keys but was actually a bee rattling around inside our living room lampshade repeatedly.) The weather has been unusually blustery lately and we have a telegraph pole at the end of our drive, this pole is huge! A wooden pole tens of metres high holding up telephone cables for us and our neighbours. When you look at the top of the pole on a windy day it is blowing around somewhat but is so obviously safely rooted in the ground. I was getting the kids into the car one morning and it attracted the attention of Thomas who was a bit concerned by it moving slightly in the wind. I reassured him and off we went wherever we were going.
That evening when Rob got home from work he stayed in the car for a while finishing up a phone call in peace, the boys kept looking out to see if he was coming in yet. It was still windy and Thomas noticed the telegraph pole swaying slightly in the wind again. Full panic set in that it was going to fall down crushing his daddy in the process. Now when I say he became hysterical attempting to save his dad from an untimely death I am not being in the least bit dramatic. His adrenaline clearly kicked in because he managed to shrug me off easily and I couldn't pull him off the door that he'd managed to unlock and open amid screams of frenzy.
Rob came in and attempted to rationalise that the pole was going nowhere but Thomas remained unconvinced. We had repeated outbursts of hysteria and concern that the pole would either knock our house down or hit daddy (apparently he had little concern for either mine or Eli's welfare) until he fell asleep cuddling Rob. We were certain the episodes were fatigue induced so let him rest a little. Rob tried to lay him on his bed but he woke up and expressed his concerns that we were in danger (at this point I was slightly anxious that maybe he had some visionary gift and we were in actual danger and so had to go peek at the pole for myself to make sure it wasn't endangering us!) he decided he would be most safe if he laid in bed and whimpered on and off. (After all that is the best course of action in any crisis, he certainly had his drama head on.) We hoped he'd sleep it off and it'd all be forgotten the next day. Little kids are resilient like that, thankfully. (Counting my lucky stars that he slept through our earthquake at 1am that night!)
But not so! Rob tried a new approach of taking him outside to push the pole with Daddy to show that it was too sturdy to be pushed over so it wasn't gonna just fall over. This would work for an hour or so then we'd have to repeat the process. It was a particularly lazy day for me so I had to go out several times in my PJ's to push the pole to assure my child of our safety.
The next day Thomas had playgroup and because Sunday is Mother's day they had several Mother crafts on offer for the kids to try. One was a cookie which they stuck a big pink icing star on and put it in an envelope to give to their mum's. Obviously Thomas couldn't resist the lure of the deliciously decorated cookie and failed to give it to it's intended recipient and proceeded to eat it in the car on the way home. When we pulled onto the drive he gave me his cookie, I made the assumption that he'd had enough of the super sickly icing. As I got out of the car and went to the other side to open the door for the boys I tossed it in the bin. As I opened his car door hysteria had set in again, he needed to give the pole a good shove to check on the safety of our home and family. When he was sufficiently convinced enough to stop crying he asked for his cookie back. Turns out he didn't give it to me to throw away he gave it to me for safekeeping while he monitored the safety of us all. I had to explain his beloved cookie was now in the bin. What followed was a devastation worse than if both our house and daddy had got squashed. He was so upset and I felt so guilty I half considered rescuing the half eaten cookie from the bin. What kind of a parent throws away their son's cookie while he attempts to establish if his loved ones are in total and mortal danger?
Well, in my defense if he'd given me the cookie as I anticipated in the first place the whole incident could have been avoided.
Haircut From Hell
Check out the hair on this guy! As an infant Eli had this olive complexion and tres dark hair that secured him the affectionate nickname of Asad from my in laws. Then one day his hair started getting curly and unruly (courtesy of the Uttley family) and he was no longer referred to as one of Pakistan origin but instead as a child of Italy. Which I vastly preferred!
On a recent trip to get him a haircut (of which there have been many) he seemed somewhat disgruntled. The girl assigned to Eli I suspect had very little experience with children in her whole two years working experience. The minute she started cutting he started muttering some objections. At first quietly gradually increasing in volume. Every time he would object she would stop and wait for him to compose himself and then continue. When I insisted she really didn't need to do that and that we should just get the ordeal over and done with as quickly as possible she looked at me like I had eight heads. So she continued to leisurely cut his hair. Five minutes in he'd well and truly grasped that if he objected enough she'd put the scissors down and he's be saved from any more haircut torture. Ten minutes in when she'd cut about 6 hairs in total I had to insist that she just carry on regardless of his objections. She looked uncomfortable about it but she did as I asked.
So I wrestled with Eli (I actually think he might be stronger than me already!) while she attempted to cut his unruly mop while he screamed and screamed and SCREAMED. It was embarrassing but fortunately they had no other customers and the only other people there were two other staff who appeared to have the combined age of about 21. So I sat there in the chair attempting to immobilise my toddler who was behaving like we were trying to rob him of his Samsonesque powers.
About every 20 seconds when Eli would wrestle a hand free he would hit the hairdresser and shout "NO!!!" before resuming to full screaming mode. During this visit I considered leaving about 3,653 times but seeming as I knew I'd have to pay regardless I was committed to getting value for my £6! Until a lady came in who had been to the bakery 3 shops along and happily told us how she could hear his blood curdling screams while she ordered her lunch. I was defeated. His hair was about 70% cut which was better than nothing so I paid and left. I tried my best to make him look presentable when I got home. He of course resisted. Let's just hope he looks cute with Samsonesque hair because I am certainly never enduring a repeat experience of that.
In future I'll just inviest my £6 in chocolate and put a hat on Eli! Win-Win!
Should Never Have Asked
Thomas and I were playing a good game of snap yesterday. Well as fine a game of snap as you can play with a 3 year old who disregards all the rules and insists that Chick Hicks and Mater are a pair regardless of any attempts to convince him otherwise. Eli wanted to join in (roughly translates as Eli wanted to destroy everything) but Thomas rejected his attempts and said he couldn't play because he's a baby.
Eli is 21 Months, he's gigantic. It's hard to consider him a baby anymore. So I explained that Eli really isn't like a baby anymore and that maybe we should get a new baby. Thomas was all for it. I asked if he'd like a girl baby or a boy baby to come live with us. His preference was for a girl. So I asked what name he thought she should have. I didn't expect his reply to be anything particularly normal because after all he is only three. He pondered for a very long time, I half expected him to say Neve. Neve is after all his best friend.
Instead he said, "Helicopter!" Looking very pleased with his idea.
"Helicopter isn't really an name though is it Thomas?"
"OK, get two babies and we call them Buzz and Woody!"
I don't know which appalled me more the future thought of Thomas insisting we call our offspring Buzz or Woody (which are at least names!) or the thought of actually having twins! Maybe I'm happy with just my two kids after all!
