It’s fiesta time again. My little ThingOne is turning Six. SIX! Can This be possible? didn’t she look like this just yesterday?



In the blink of an eye she’s finished kindergarten and poised to become a first-grader, but not before a blow-out summer! So it’s fiesta time again, time for charcoal and lighter fluid, for burgers that are too big for the buns, goodie bags full of useless junk that ShortThings find priceless. Water balloons.....what is it with kids and water balloons? Wait a minute what am I saying? Water Balloons rule! I love water balloons, except when I have a phone or a camera in my pocket, but that’s another story. Now, ThingOne’s name is not Donna, but her Birthday always brings out more than enough Prima in her. She can’t help it, all that excitement, the adrenaline coursing through her veins( or maybe that’s sugar?). She gets a little, let’s say, entitled. For one day a year we quash it a little less, but remind her that if she wants people to come next year, and wants kids to play with her the rest of the year, she should be nice to them, that usually works.

This event takes weeks in the planning. Her birhtday being in July takes a little extra legwork because you can’t send invites through the school channel. So we have to round up email addresses and go the evite route, which works quite well I might add. It’s quick-ish, easy-ish, cheap, and environmentally friendly! As with last year it will be outside, which is a gamble with the weather but it looks favourable so here’s hoping. I am not a seasoned briquette barbecuer so that’s always interesting. We secured a covered picnic area this year so our guests won’t melt. Last year the only spot left was in the middle of a field, with no shade, on the hottest day of the year. Nuff’ said. I have to say, given that it’s in the middle of the summer, we always get a good turnout. I’m told we throw a good party, maybe that’s why they keep coming, it’s certainly not for my cooking.

Once more into the breach dear friends......

Tags: Kids, Parties, Birthdays

Let me set the stage. “ThingTwo is showered, slathered in skin cremes (excema), and dressed with hair in an up-pony to keep it out of the way while I deal with ThingOne, before we move out to the spot where we dry and brush the hair. I am still in my boardshorts, soaking wet. ThingOne is reasonably capable now and can get herself dressed with a minimum of help. I start to untie the string on my shorts and ThingOne nudges ThingTwo and whispers ”We’re going to see Daddy’s butt.” Instantly all attention is on me, but whatever, I have to get changed right? So I do the quick dry off of everything not covered and drop my shorts and grab my underwear. As I am pulling them up, ThingOne giggles and says to ThingTwo “ Look! we can see his penis!” and ThingTwo immediately reaches out grabs me and exclaims “I GOT YOUR PENITH!”............ I swat her hand away while trying not to fall over (my underwear are still halfway up and the floor is slippery). I yank them up and reach for my cargo shorts and before I can get them on, again with the grabbing and the “I GOT YOUR PENITH!” Again I swat and turn away still struggling to get my shorts up, before I can get them up she gets the third and fourth grabs and exclamations in and all the while ThingOne is laughing uncontrollably and I can’t keep a straight face to say STOP! or NO! with any kind of authority.

ThingOne did not do this kind of thing at this age, she looked a bit but never progressed to grabbing. I knew I should have remembered those snacks....

Motherhood is not without peril either. I recall a story Sugarmomma tells about ThingOne and a public bathroom. ThingOne has always had quite a strong vocabulary and we have always been advocates of anatomical correctness. Those Potty training books that say shit like “and you have a pee pee for making wee wee.....” just piss me off, I always changed the words on the fly. So anyway, Sugarmomma and ThingOne are using the public bathroom, momma pees and then stands up to finish and THingOne Shouts out “Mommy, you have hair on your P-Gina!”. I’m told there were stifled snickers from the stalls on either side. You know you’ve got stories, go on, ...spill.

BBD.

Tags: Pain, Self Preservation, Kids, Contact Sport

Fathers are for rough-housing right! I have two girls, and both of them love to play rough with me, and I love it. I love to have them crawling all over me, nothing makes me feel closer to them. The smiles on their faces and the squeals of deilght are intoxicating. It is not without it's dangers however, and for the unaware it can be downright painful. I play with my kids quite a lot, so I'm always "on guard" and I think being a man comes with an extra heightened sense of self presevation, if you know what I mean. So I always find it moderately amusing when one of my kids inadvertently lays the smack-down on some unsuspecting adult who decides to get in the ring with them. Let me reiterate, I have two GIRLS, both of which have a combined weight that barely tips the scales at 60lbs. They are light, and slight, so not visibly an outward threat. This is what makes them so dangerous, their dainty stature and shining faces deceive their targets into relaxing and WHAM! They strike like sledge hammers! The other factor is they are relentless, they just keep coming. I haven't figured out yet how to turn that off without tears, but I'm working on that one.

Anyone with small children that are still not yet in school but have past the toddling age, knows that you do not take your eyes off of them when playing physically interactive games. This is just asking for a knee or two to the forehead. Even during story or cuddle time, the defenses should still be on alert, wary of an unprovoked full-arching reverse head-butt. ThingTwo is now at "That Height" and of the belief that running full-tilt at me hands up and head forward is just the "funnest" thing in the world, and will do so when the mood strikes her. ThingOne likes to "cuddle" but is incapable of sitting still for more than three seconds at a time and thus I sit in the "Forearm block" position in anticipation of a wayward elbow or an errant knee. She is also especially skilled with her footwork in both the "climb into the lap" and the "climb up the front and backflip dismount" manouevres. Dads especially will appreciate this last one, "The Chest or Armpit Hair clutch". This one comes out of nowhere, is almost impossible to defend against, and is both excruciatingly painful and dangerous on more than one level. The child is usually perched in some precarious position and so letting go of them or reeling away in pain could lead to more serious ramifications making it imperative that you suck it up and endure the torture while it lasts. The other thing is that crying out in either pain or anger may scare the child making things worse and let's face it, making you look like a big ol' sissy.

I would like to invite others to add to the list of ShortThing Defense Tactics, let me know what moves your ShortThings have that routinely catch the rookies off-guard, and remember:

Pain Heals, Chicks dig scars, Glory is forever.

Tags: Kids, Physical Play, Self Preservation

I don't mind doing laundry, I really don't. I find folding laundry oddly satisfying, somewhat meditative. I think part of it is the closure. It's something I can start, and finish. Which is a rare thing with a couple of short things running around. It's also something I can do without thinking about it, which allows me time to think about other things, while looking busy and focused enough to fool them into doing things for themselves once in a while. It's not unlike dishwashing (which I also do a lot of), but dishwashing has the added bonus of wet hands.

I want to pose a question. What is it with 5 year olds not being able to take off their clothes without leaving every single item INSIDE OUT? I don't believe they do it on purpose, but then wouldn't Murphy's law permit that once in a while something would remain right side out? Also, now that I do virtually all of the laundry, I can say this out loud. Ladies please, what's with the used tissues in the pockets??? I understand you get runny noses but, why keep the evidence? More incredibly, how do the tissues still manage to make it into the wash and then all over everything in the dryer, when you have NO POCKETS in your clothes!?? I've been doing this for a while and I now know to check the pockets, but when the pants have no pockets, where are you hiding the tissues? Could someone shed some light on these mysteries?

Tags: Winter, Laundry, Kids

I'm not concerned with the scientific validity of the idea, weight vs. strength, vs. endurance, vs. flexibility, vs....... I just love the story. As I write this my five year old has her upper body balanced on the kitchen table, and is extending her lower body out to a fully horizontal position repeatedly, while eating toast.

I found a link that discusses this story here and I was surprised by the tone of the conversation. As someone who chases two small children around all day I have to say, while I do my best to anticipate their needs and keep half a step beside them, there is no way I could match their activities or the pace at which they do them. I have suggested on numerous occasions that someone should invent a Toddler Wheel, as in hamster wheel for children, and then attach a some batteries to it and harness the power created. My wife keeps telling me that that would be cruel, I kinda think they would have a ball. Like those merry-go -rounds they used to have at playgrounds, who didn't love those! Hook up some kind of power converter and voila! cheap power. Ok, Ok, kids aren't cheap but you get the idea.

After being at home full time for over a year now I like to think I've learned a few things, how to function on 4-5 hours of sleep, fruit juice and orange juice are NOT the same thing, and sometimes it's better to just let them wear their pajamas.

Tags: Kids, Athletes, Strength

Now let me say, I like Neil Young, but I'm not a zealot. I can't listen to him for hours on end, sometimes I can't even make it through a whole album, but when the time is right, he does the trick.

So when I finally sat down, after making lunch for ThingOne, ThingTwo, and BestFriendOne, cleaning up from said lunch, lulling ThingTwo to sleep with a round of "Clues Clues" (Blue's Room) while ThingOne and BestFriendOne amused themselves downstairs, Neil came to mind. The "sitting" lasted about 30 seconds before the awakers were looking for a snack, and deciding that they were done playing downstairs and now the vicinity of the sleeper seemed like a much more inviting place to be.

Tags: Neil Young, Sleep, Lunch, Kids