Wanted: "Toy Mommy"

Dylan said tonight that he wanted a "toy Mommy."
I had asked him if he would like a special prize when, after he turns 3 next month, he gives me his pacifiers. Because "Big boys don't use Big Soothies."
He's game. He'll take a toy Mommy.
"What is a toy Mommy?" I asked him.
He spread his arms wide to show me how big it was. Then he said his toy Mommy "makes noises."
"What kind of noises?" I asked.
"Like 'Don't say 'stupid,''" he answered.
"And my toy Mommy puts people in time out."
Oof. We had had a rough day. Two time-outs each for each boy. (Two punching episodes, one spitting incident, and a screaming freak-out over maple syrup.)
In between time-outs, we swam, ate Fluffernutter sandwiches made with gourmet peanut butter, and played in the sprinkler. We had banana pancakes shaped like animals for dinner. They were declared "the Best! Pancakes! Ever!"
But at the end of the day, the negatives had made the biggest impression. Sigh. We'll try again tomorrow.
I suppose I should be happy he wants a toy Mommy at all. And if that's what it takes to assuage the Big Soothie hand-off, I better start shopping.
Either that, or he can keep Big Soothie until he's 17.

Pass the spaghetti

Tonight, we had spaghetti for dinner. As I plopped a wad of stuck-together noodles on my plate, Blake told me to "throw that at Dylan."
"Why?" I asked him.
"It will be fun," he said.
"No," I said.
"When I am a daddy," he said, "I will be a fun daddy."
"When you are a daddy?" I asked.
"Yes. When I am a daddy."
Amused at the thought of him in a food fight with his future children, I pushed the conversation.
"Will you be a daddy to little boys or little girls?"
"Little boys."
OK, just for fun....
"Who will be your little boys' mommy?"
"You can be!"
Alright, so it wasn't so fun, afterall.
"Well, if you are a daddy to little boys, I would have to be the grandma," I admitted.
"You know, Mommy, some families don't have a mommy. There can be two daddies. So that can be me and Dylan."
If that's what you want, Blake, you might not want to throw spaghetti at him.

Overheard at the dinner table

First, an unpaid product endorsement: The Kaboost has changed our lives. The Kaboost is basically a booster chair, but it's not a seat. It raises the chair from the floor a few inches so a small child can sit at the dinner table with the rest of the family. This is the single-best children's product I have bought that worked as it was supposed to and solved the problem we were having.
Our problem? Mealtime mayhem. And it's over. My kids now sit and eat. Dylan, who needs help getting down from his boosted chair, even asks, "Mama, me be 'cused, pease?" when he is ready to leave the table.
And tonight, before the boys asked to be excused, we had one of those priceless conversations that I quickly made notes of, so I could write it here, and then reread when they are teenagers and I need a boost myself. It went like this:

Blake: Mama, if we had a lamp with a genie in it, and you got three wishes, what would they be?
(Yes, we've seen a lot of Disney's "Aladdin" lately.)
Me: I would wish for someone to come to our house every day to fix our dinner, so I didn't have to cook and could play with you instead.
Blake: What's your second wish?
Me: I wish we could go to California for the whole summer.
Blake: What's your third wish?
Me: I wish you and Dylan and Daddy would be happy and healthy until you lived longer than 100 years.
(Wishes not listed in any particular order, of course.)
Me: What would your three wishes be?
Blake: I wish today were Valentine's Day. I wish I were controlling a remote control helicopter with two rotors. And I wish I were the best photographer in the world. I will take the world's best pictures. All the other photographers will be my followers.
(Awesome!)
Me: Dylan, what would you wish for?
Dylan: 'Copter with remote control and two rotors.
Me: OK, what else?
Dylan: 'Copter with two rotors!
Me: You get three wishes. Do you wish for anything else?
Dylan: Remote-control fire truck.
Me: One more.
Dylan: A prince.
(OK, maybe too much "Aladdin.")
Me: You want to be a prince?
Dylan: No.
Me: Oh, what do you want to be?
Dylan: I want to be Dylan!

Good. I want you to be Dylan, too. And Blake can be some sort of photography-cult leader. I'll be very proud of you both.

Planning for the future

A recent conversation with Blake, 4.

"Mama, do you take naps in kindergarten?" Blake said.

"I think you have some quiet time. But in first grade, there's no more quiet time. It's all work." I told him.

"First grade is after kindergarten. Then second grade. Then third grade, fourth, fifth. What comes next?"

"Sixth."

"Then seventh, eighth, ninth, 10th. Then are the grades are over."

"No," I told him. "Then 11th and 12th, and then college."

"What comes after college?"

"It depends. You could get a job or go to more school like medical school or dental school. It depends on what you want to be."

"Well, I'd really like to be a super hero. A super hero needs a cape and a suit. The kind of suit depends on the kind of superhero you are."
I wonder where he can major in super heroism....

The My Gym disaster

"You know, sometimes it takes a couple of weeks. If you'd like to come again next week for free, I'll be working."
The My Gym girl was trying to be nice. She could see I was disappointed. But I wasn't really listening to her.
I was watching Dylan, who was playing nicely but completely independently. He was at the basketball hoop. The ladder. The trampoline.
Close to a dozen other kids and their caretakers were seated in the center of the room, singing songs, doing exercises and having fun at the direction of another My Gym instructor.
"Circle time yucky!" Dylan had said when it was time to sit down together.
So he didn't sit down. He didn't even seem to notice that an organized activity was taking place. He just kept doing his own thing.
"Oh, we don't need to come next week," I told the girl. "It's like this everywhere we go." Don't you know about us? It's a small town. We're the ones who can't even go back to the library....
I followed a few steps behind Dylan as he played. I tried not to hover or pressure him to join the group. He passed behind me, and I turned around slowly. And then he was gone.
Gone! In a room of at least 24 other people, he had vanished.
I called his name. No answer. The other adults were watching their own children. No one even looked my way.
The entrance to the gym was gated, so it was more likely he headed to the back. I called his name near the bathrooms, in offices, down a hallway. A woman changing a diaper ignored me. I went back the gym and didn't see him. I again went to the back of the room and the diaper-changer said, "I think he went in there."
"There" was a single-stall bathroom with a full, heavy wooden door. It was locked.
"Mama, I want out!"
Whew.
"Dylan, you need to turn the button on the handle."
"Mama, I can't."
The nice My Gym worker couldn't open the door, either. She had no key.
That's when the fire alarm started blaring. Strobes flashed all over the building.
"He pulled the emergency cord near the toilet," the girl said. So that's what happens when you pull that thing.
"It's loud, Mama!"
The My Gym girl and I opened every cabinet, looked in every closet, searched every desk, looking for a key or screw driver or sledgehammer. She called the franchise owner and the fire department.
No help came.
After about 10 minutes, Dylan understood how to turn off the alarm. Once it was quiet, we talked him through how to unlock the door. The whole thing lasted about 20 minutes. Once free, he ran straight into the gym and wanted to ride the zip line.
But he didn't get to. Class was over. As we were leaving, I heard the nice My Gym girl giving the sales pitch to another mother who had been there for the first time.
No one tried to get us to join.
I wonder what would happen if we took her up on her offer to come back, just one more time, for free?