How to get rid of a soother... if you're Erinn Bosch.

So, I was doing some reflecting last night... at around 2am... for an hour... while my sweet little 2.5 year old Isaac was screaming and sobbing in my ear that he couldn't find (and I couldn't find) his "foofie."  Now, for those of you who haven't met my children, the "foofie" is the word he chose for his soother.  Elijah called it a "soosey" and by about 15 months he was screaming whether he had it in his mouth or not so we tossed it out, end of story. 

Isaac has not been so easy to convince in terms of parting with the beloved "foofie."

All this "pondering due to a child screaming relentlessly in  my ear" came rather conveniently timed, after a mom in the Mothers Opposed to Boredom group referred to parents of children who are between 2.5 and 3 with soothers still as "bad parents" and said they aren't willing to "invest" the time in their children to take care of them.  Now I thought, SURELY the founder of MOB, was not a "bad parent" persay... was I?  Obviously, as a stay at home mom who started a group dedicated to taking our children and doing awesome fun things with them, it wasn't about "investing time" in my case.  Then I realized that if I was a bad parent it was NOT related to the "foofie" but rather the time I said the "f" word in front of Elijah and he repeated it at daycare in front of me.  Or perhaps... oh it's a long list, I don't need to go through now. 

Bottom line is, I'm NOT a bad parent, and realistically I just couldn't figure out HOW to take the "foofie" away.  I had tried once before.  It was gone for two days.  Isaac didn't sleep, I didn't sleep, he WAILED for his "foofie" the entire time.  I'm not joking - he was relentless.  So much so that I finally gave up and just said "TAKE IT, TAKE YOUR FOOFIE!"  When you shout "foofie" at a two year old, it only makes you sound silly.

So six months passed, he is fully daytime potty trained and dry most nights.  He dresses himself and feeds himself.  He drinks from a big boy cup, and doesn't sit in a high chair or booster seat.  He may be the same size as my 1 year old, but by golly, he's a big boy!

HOW would I get screamy mcFoofie pants to give up his "precious?" 

Then it happened.  The screaming.  The whining... the sudden all day need of the foofie came back.  Then the "bad parent" comment (although I never chimed in on the thread because I wasn't actually offended, I do have a love/hate relationship with soothers)... then the 1 hour night scream-a-thon last night.  I'd had ENOUGH.

Isaac woke up this morning and I stated "NO MORE FOOFIES!  FOOFIES ARE FOR BABIES!  IKEY IS A BIG BOY!"  We talked the entire day about how grown up Isaac was, about how he doesn't need a soother anymore because now he is all grown up.  We prepared all day for the inevitable.... BEDTIME.

It was a breeze.  He was ready.  He felt like he had "grown up" today and that because of this sudden change in himself, he could let go of the "foofie."  I layed with him in bed and told him over and over how proud I was that he was so grown up without a foofie. 

We snuggled and he was snoring in no time, after laying in bed beside me whispering "no more foofie, Ikey all grown up."

Even Dora the Explorer would do a victory dance for this celebration!  "We did it, we did it, we did it HOORAY!"

Inspiring "Community" in Your Children

So generally I find that people think I have lost my mind for whatever reason.  I like to roll with it, since it then becomes the new "normal" and nothing I could do or say after that seems to be really all that strange to people who know me. 

This is where I start talking about weird "grassroots" social work-ish type things I like to do with my kids.

I'm really into "community" and supporting others.  That's kind of my freaky little hobby.  I like driving all over creation to pick up Community Kitchen's "Good Food Box" to make it available to people in my community, or finding ways to help people get connected with local farmers who are selling their food items.  I want to make sure everyone eats good food, and eats it because it is cheap, and awesome and available. 

So what better thing to do than teach the kids this craziness at the ripe young ages of 3.5, 2.5 and 1?!?

My boys accompanied me today as we toodled around dropping off eggs, picking up Good Food Boxes and delivering smiles and sunshine.  Oh, no, it wasn't that way at all.  They woke up on the wrong side of the bed today.  They were yelling at each other just to make the other cry, they pinched each other, kicked each other and threw things at each other in the van.  They coughed all over the baby, and by the time I got home I was so relieved that I didn't have to get into the vehicle again that I sighed a great sigh and was mildly thankful that the next big delivery was a month away. 

That said, I know I'm teaching my boys how I feel about supporting a community.  The best part of all is that the community I am supporting is amazing and thankful and spreading the word!  People are kind and excited.  The lady at the Library gave the boys awesome stickers while they waited for me to unload the truck.

Even though my kids had an awful day (despite being super cute at the Community Kitchen main depot location while they played in the bed of the truck while we awaited our order), they learned about what the Good Food Box is, and when we got home I taught them how to make homemade lemonade.  (All Elijah talked about was lemons on the way home - in between kicking his brother and stealing the other one's soother.)  We ate a delicious dinner of fresh veggies and dip, and they SCARFED it down. 

My highlight of the day was while I was getting one of the Food Boxes for a neighbour, Elijah came outside with one of my Mothers Opposed to Boredom business cards and said, "here!"  I see him wanting to help.  I hope it sticks.  Maybe not as much as his mom, but it'd be cool to see him have the heart of a "real community oriented guy" as an adult.

I have noticed lately that if I drop something I'm carrying or have to leave something on the doorstep to make a second trip, Elijah is now quick to grab it and at least try to carry it to the vehicle for me.  He does it without me asking, and I think that is possibly the coolest thing ever.  I always thank him times a hundred.  I don't want his hard work and kindness to go unnoticed! 

Only time will tell, but in the meantime, I'll hope that next month's delivery is more of a direct trip with less time in the truck for the wee ones.  After all, I don't want to torture them, I just want to help them be giving, loving community oriented people.

For more information on the Good Food Box program in Calgary or a depot near you - please see their website at http://www.ckpcalgary.ca/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=53&Itemid=60

Kids Say... Well, you Know What They Say!

I might have wanted to crawl under the washing machines at the Laundromat today… or perhaps at least hide behind them. Our washer is broken so we have made a couple of trips there recently. A gentleman with a sombre expression was there with us today, and Elijah quickly noticed him. In fact, the second the man walked in, Elijah saw and immediately said;

“Mom, why is that man sad?”

“Elijah, I’m sure he’s fine, he’s doing his laundry, you can say hi if you want to but what you are doing is not polite.”

Distract, distract, distract... (but it's not working....)

“I don’t want to say hi, and no mom, he IS sad, look at his face, see, look at his face, he IS sad!”

Now I’m starting to panic, Elijah isn’t easily distracted if he really wants answers and he was convinced this man was sad and he needed to know why. The man really did look sad, but I think it was just the way his face was. How do you explain this to a 3 ½ year old when you are only a few feet away from the person Elijah is talking about without offending them, and embarrassing yourself, and without increasing the questions times a hundred!

“Elijah!!! Look at my eyeballs, what you are doing is rude, stop. Got it?”

“Ok mom.”

Silence.

“Mom, why is that man short?”

“ELIJAH!!!”

Trying to find ways to blend into the wall….

I think it’s safe to say that most kids have this issue at one point or another. They say something totally zany and off the wall and you want to poke your own eyeballs out. I’m trying to find a healthy balance between stopping the behavior in the moment to avoid having to deal with the crazy tension of the situation, allowing Elijah to be inquisitive and curious (what an amazing quality, and already picking up on emotions so clearly!), and teaching him how to handle himself “according to societal rules” in the future.

My many requests to stop because it’s rude or impolite fell on ears that were just not willing to hear that. Elijah had an honest and innocent question or two and he didn’t understand why they were inappropriate! What a fine line we dance when we have to teach kids how this works… I know my curious contender will be at it again the very next time he sees something that intrigues him. He just can’t seem to hold it in. I just am hopeful that I can find the best way to help him understand why we don’t do this sort of thing!

We have had lots of talks about it since, and I will keep on him about it.  Someone I spoke with this evening mentioned that she had her daughter apologize when she had a similar offense.  I like that idea, I could say something like "Elijah you probably have hurt this man's feelings."  Elijah usually is willing and ready to apologize if he thinks he has hurt someone.  The man was able to hear me trying to talk to Elijah and sort the situation out but I was clearly flabberghasted.  I had never had to deal with this before...

I can just hope that he has or has had kids of his own or at the very least understand that kids tend to say.... well, we all know what they say!

Toddler Proofing - An Ongoing Nightmare!

This morning I woke up to the sweet smell of the oven. WHAT? THE OVEN?

Cue panicked jump off the couch (yes I was sleeping on the couch), and shout to the kitchen where I heard MUCH giggling.

This is not something you want to hear at any point but this is what my 3 ½ year old said. “Mom, we’re just putting chocolates and paper in the oven!” Just in case I didn’t get it the first time, 2 ½ year old mockingbird repeats it.

I ran to the kitchen which was only about 10 feet from where I lay resting a little too soundly on the couch but I couldn’t get to that kitchen fast enough! Apparently, since they had been at it a while.

With chocolate all over their faces, and in the oven, which was set to 350C on convection and turned on… they were having a grand old time.

Thankfully the oven had hardly started heating up and neither of them was inside of it, which crossed my mind as I ran through a list of all the awful things that “could have” happened.

I swore in "exclamation" (oopsie!), I almost cried, I was quite distraught, which caused Elijah to cry and go directly to his room and Isaac to ask “why” 8000 times when I quickly said “you never never never ever touch the stove without mommy or daddy!!!” in my most “I mean business” sort of voice.

I know neither of them really got the full reason why it wasn’t ok. We felt that the stove was hot inside, we talked about fires (their aunt and uncle recently went through a house fire and Elijah especially talks about it a lot still.). I tried really hard to explain everything but I know cognitively they are not ready to understand it to it’s full extent and it is my responsibility to protect them from this danger that had never even crossed my mind.

In the same way that I put special covers on the outlet plug ins, a baby gate at the top of the stairs, and car seats in the van, I needed to come up with a most excellent plan to keep the kids out of the oven.

First I had to figure out how my children determined how to turn on an oven with a rather complicated system. They would have had to press “convection bake” followed by 3 - 5 - 0, and finally “start.” None of these buttons are that close together that it would be easy to figure out. Were my children evil geniuses like Mega Mind?

Fast forward to end of day.

Chase came home from work and we chatted about the experience of the morning. I asked him how he thought they’d figured out what buttons to press. Chase said, “uh… they helped me bake something yesterday and I let them push the stove buttons.” BINGO! One time being shown and they remembered.

I wasn’t upset with Chase over this one. He taught me two valuable lessons via the kids.

1. We need to be on the ball as parents. There are risks EVERYWHERE, and we need to control as many as we can in our own house. I was doing my job in the day to supervise the kids, but I did not take all the precautions necessary to safeguard my house and children in the night. I sleep on the couch to ensure I get up as soon as they do, but sometimes, as I learned today, even that isn’t enough to do the trick.

2. Our children are amazing and wonderful creatures! Imagine that, being shown ONE TIME, and they remembered a complicated system of buttons to start the oven! Let that be a lesson to us that we have an incredible job teaching these beautiful little people everything we know and helping them to find ways to learn everything we don’t know!

What I do know is that my kids know how to set the oven on convection at 350C. I guess they want to learn more about baking. What a learning opportunity for “safe oven use.” I have some work ahead of me to “re-toddler proof,” but in the meantime, I’ll be unplugging my oven at night.

Melted chocolate anyone?