Good 'Ol Harry

As parents it is our job to warn our children of the dangers that surround them. Don't touch the stove when it is hot, don't put your finger in the electrical outlet, don't eat yellow snow! But do we go to far? Are we so worried that our children will get hurt that we inhibit their curiosity? I am sure there is a nice balance somewhere. Not that I have been able to find it.

My sons room is the hottest room in the house during the summer and the coldest in the winter. So, last winter we bought a child and pet safe space heater for his room. We turned it on at night as we did our bedtime routine. No big deal. Well, this winter my son is now 3. We realize he touches everything. So my husband and I give our warning to our son, "no touch". We told him how it gets hot and that is dangerous. Then we said our prayers, kissed him goodnight, turned out the light, and walked out of the room. Now, I have mentioned in my other posts of how perfect my son is. This includes bedtime. Usually my husband and I walk out of the room and we never hear a peep out of him. Not this night. Five minutes after we left his room he is screaming and crying. It was heart wrenching. I go in to settle him down. I lay him back down and give him a kiss, then I leave. Again, five minutes later he is crying his little head off.  I go back in and ask if he wants me to rock him. Of course, he says yes. As we are rocking he is still crying, very abnormal. Now I am starting to worry that something is really wrong. And through a tear stained face, my son looks at me and pleads with me to please turn off danger.

I have never felt so awful in all my life! Basically my husband and I put a monster in the corner of the room, turned out the light and said goodnight. Looking at the heater now I can see the glowing orange light that looks like an eye.  It also oscillates back and forth, turning on and off with a temperature gauge.
The next day I made sure to let my son know that the heater is NOT danger. It is kid safe. It is not hot to the touch and if he knocks it over it will turn off automatically. He was not convinced. How can I convince him that now it is ok? Yup, we named it. Harry is now a member of the family. My son will sometimes pet it like he does our cat. He isn't allowed to pick up the cat, so he equates the cat with the heater, I mean Harry.  Remember all that danger out there? Maybe we make a bigger deal out of things than what is really necessary.

Tough Love

Remember the good old days? When times were tough, but people were tougher? Neither do I, but I have been told this my whole life. How many times have we heard the stories of when our parents were growing up they had to walk to school in ten feet of snow up hill, both ways? I always thought this was impressive considering my parents grew up in Florida.

Now I have a child and I find myself thinking that he has it so much easier than I ever did. My parents didn't bring me hot milk first thing in the morning. We didn't have a dvd player in the car, we had to bicker to amuse ourselves. However,I realize that is the goal of every parent to provide a better life than the one they had growing up. But, I am sure I am bordering on spoiling my child. It is so hard not to! He is so cute and sweet. I never knew love could exist like this. I am completely smitten with my only child. I don't consider this a flaw, per se.  But I can see how I might be disenfranchising my precious baby boy. He is a bit timid. I find myself having to encourage him to do the things most other kids do naturally.

Most boys are more than happy to climb on anything they can find, then at the highest point, jump off. Oh no, not by son! More than once I have tried to get him to jump off the sofa to no avail. He simply will sit down and slide off the edge. I know I should be happy about how cautious he is, but I am not. I want him to throw caution to the wind and go crazy!

To get back to the point. Let me set the scene. I was going to fix lunch and asked my son to get up on his stool. We have a table that is counter height. He is not able to use our chairs that we have because they spin. So, he sits on a stool with no back, but stationary. After lunch usually I wipe his hands and face with a wet cloth and help him get down. But not this day. No, I decided if he can get up on the stool by himself, then he can get down by himself. So I just stood there. I informed him if he wanted down then he was a big boy, just jump. That's tough love. He fussed for a bit, then realized I actually meant it. Then he did it! He jumped down! I was so excited, for a nanosecond. On his way down he hit his chin on the table and bit his lip. He screams, I panic. I gather him in my arms with his blood drooling out of his mouth. I was able to see that there was no permanent damage.  I now realize there is a reason he didn't want to jump down by himself, he couldn't. Tough love, yet another bad idea.

The meaning of Christmas

We all do it. We sit there at the playground looking around at all those other children, thinking, I am so happy my child isn’t that way. My child is polite and courteous. Just look at him, he never pushes or hits. He always waits his turn to go down the slide. I am most certain he just took off his jacket to lay it over a puddle so that little girl wouldn’t get her feet wet. I love the way he glides around the playground, hovering just inches off the ground, quite angelic like. I must be a good parent to have raised such a wonderful kid, right?

Then why do we have those stupid ideas? Let me set the scene. It is just weeks before Christmas. My son has just turned 3 years old. He is just now getting the concept that there is such thing as Santa. He sees all the presents under the tree, and of course, they are mostly for him.  He also understands that presents are the best thing in the entire universe, they mean NEW toys.  I am starting to think he is not getting the true point of Christmas.  So, we head to the Toys R Us. We buy his cousins their presents and bring them home to wrap them.  I am excited to teach my darling son that Christmas is about giving, not receiving.  If he learns this early in life it will make him a better person, with a kind heart.  You see, I really am a good parent, right?

So, we get home and proceed to remove all of the treasures from our bag.  I get out the wrapping paper ready to wrap! I look over and my son is trying to pry open the box of crayons that we have bought for his cousin. Now, I want you to realize how ridiculous this is, because my son must have a million crayons not 3 feet from him, but these are NEW crayons.  I try to reason with him that these are not for him and that we are going to wrap them so we can GIVE them to his cousin.  And, without any warning, World War III breaks out in our living room.  Wrapping paper gets ripped, the crayons get stepped on, and a total and complete fit gets thrown. It was a really good one too! Needless to say my lesson in giving turned out to be a lesson for me! Three year olds do not understand giving, it is not in their nature. However, they do understand time out.