Girl Detective

Lenore Skenazy has a new book, Free Range Kids : Giving Our Children the Freedom We Had Without Going Nuts with Worry, reviewed at STATS (link from Arts & Letters Daily):

Skenazy shot to startled stardom when she allowed her nine-year old son to ride the subway alone, then wrote about it in her column in the New York Sun. Cue lights, camera, daytime talk shows. Skenazy was branded “America’s Worst Mom,” a title she now sports proudly, and one that has inspired her efforts to persuade other parents to give their children a taste of the freedom they had growing up “without going nuts with worry.”

Her central thesis is this: life is good, people are mostly good, and kids are both hardy and more capable than we think. In fact, she explains, we’re living in what is “factually, statistically, and luckily for us, one of the safest periods for children in the history of the world.” The problem is that everywhere we look, we’re told otherwise. Which is why, perversely, in the safest of times, we’ve become the most neurotic parenting generation in history.

I was thinking along these lines earlier this week. My 5yo son Drake is in a day camp, and one day a week the teachers take the kids to the neighboring water park. Drake’s been doing this for weeks, and loves it. Then a mother of a new kid wondered if there was adequate supervision. I had a brief moment of worry, then self correction–he loves it, there are teachers, and there are lifeguards. And, I like the break I get. Enough.

It’s hard enough to regulate my own tendency to worry. It’s even more difficult when other parents worry more, or when I get the stink-eye from other parents who clearly don’t think I worry enough.

I’m discovering a lot of life lately can be answered simply with, “Lighten up, already.” I’m trying to do just that.

Yesterday I posted about an experience I thought was ironic. Today, I told 3yo Guppy to take a nap while I tried to finish my chapter in Infinite Jest before taking my own nap. Guppy whined, cried, and made such an utter pest of himself, saying he wasn’t tired and just wanted to play quietly downstairs, that I gave in.

This is what I found on the couch when I came downstairs after my little lie-down:

Any idea how hard it is to read Infinite Jest, in general but the section about Eschaton in particular, while being pestered by a 3yo? For example:

Uninitiated adults who might be parked in a nearby mint-green advertorial Ford sedan or might stroll casually past [Enfield Tennis Academy]’s four easternmost tennis courts and see an atavistic global-nuclear-conflict game played by tanned and energetic little kids and so thus might naturally expect to see fuzzless green warheads getting whacked indiscriminately skyward all over the place as everybody gets blackly drunk with thanatoptic fury in the crisp November air–these adults would more likely find an actual game of Eschaton strangely subdued, almost narcotized-looking. (327)

And but so, I think Guppy’s nap is annoying, not ironic.

Every time one of our boys has spun around till he got dizzy and dropped (and that’s a LOT of times) my husband G. Grod said we should watch Parenthood again. We finally did, and he was right. Watching it as a parent is an entirely different experience. It’s full of cliches, yes, but they’re cliches because they’re true, and there are so very many funny/painful moments of recognition.

Interestingly, while the fashions and especially the hairstyles look twenty years ago, the basics haven’t changed–moms and dads worry about money and getting laid off, overzealous parents try to bully their kid into achieving, other parents try to deny their kid needs special ed, ne-er do well brothers show up when they’re not invited, and more.

Steve Martin is funny as the dad, but it’s not surprising to find he didn’t have kids of his own then (not sure if he does, now); he seemed to be straining a bit. But the movie is full of pleasures, like Jason Robards as the patriarch, Mary Steenburgen as Martin’s wife, plus glimpses of the very young and already talented Joaquin (fka Leaf) Phoenix, and Keanu Reeves.

One of the creators’ favorite segments is the roller coaster speech, since they show it several times in the extras, which were entertaining.

[Gil has been complaining about his complicated life; Grandma wanders into the room]
Grandma: You know, when I was nineteen, Grandpa took me on a roller coaster.
Gil: Oh?
Grandma: Up, down, up, down. Oh, what a ride!
Gil: What a great story.
Grandma: I always wanted to go again. You know, it was just so interesting to me that a ride could make me so frightened, so scared, so sick, so excited, and so thrilled all together! Some didn’t like it. They went on the merry-go-round. That just goes around. Nothing. I like the roller coaster. You get more out of it.

The speech is sappy as hell, and I’d dismiss it, as Martin’s Gil does in the movie, but on further reflection, I think it works for me. Parenthood _is_ like a roller coaster–the waiting, the tedium, the long boring parts seem to take forever, and the actual fun stuff happens so fast it’s gone almost before I can enjoy it. Even so, I like roller coasters, and for most parts of the day, I wouldn’t trade in my kids.

(But this morning, when 3yo Guppy was crying, then stopping, then crying, lather, rinse, repeat, for the most ridiculous reasons, I did consider calling the hospital and inquiring whether he was still under warranty.)

We’d held off on Toy Story 2, saving it, literally, for a rainy day. I hadn’t seen it since it was released, so I was eager to see if it was as good as its reputation–many claim it’s one of the few films sequels better than its predecessor.

After Woody’s arm is ripped, he’s relegated to a high broken-toy shelf with a squeaker-malfunctioning penguin. When the penguin is put in the yard-sale box, Woody tries to rescue him, but is instead “captured” by Al of Al’s Toy Barn. Woody finds he has a past as a television star, and has to figure out where his loyalties lie–with new friends or his old ones.

I’m a big fan of the first Toy Story; it’s stood up to multiple viewings with the kids. So I was suspicious of the sequel’s ability to surpass it. I was pleasantly surprised. The the animation, the music, the voice talent, the layers of story and the many in-jokes (genuinely funny and not just cheap pop culture throwaway gags) made for a lovely afternoon with our little family cuddled on the couch.

I could, of course, have been unfairly influenced because 3yo Guppy let me snuggle with him for nearly the entire movie. But I think my favorite moment was when Al drives from his office to his apartment–catty-corner across the street. 5yo Drake looked indignant. “That’s not far; he should have walked!”

Apparently he DOES listen to me, even if pretends otherwise.

I am nervous, though, about the sequel. Third movies tend to break franchises, not make or better them. There are a few exceptions, though they likely prove the rule. I can think of The Bourne Ultimatum and Harry Potter 3. Others, anyone?

Wite-out on the floor
Dries quick, the shape of a fish
Curse you, Guppy boy.

It’s been nearly a month since 5yo Drake’s preschool ended, but our summer activities just began. I registered both boys for swim lessons. Drake had fun; 3yo Guppy did not. Drake also started a summer day camp at one of the local parks today.

Bigger changes are afoot, though. Drake, previously a very picky eater, ate arugula last night. He LIKED it! And Guppy got up in the middle of the night to get his own cup of water, rather than crying for me to do it. Then today Guppy used the restroom, unprompted, twice.

I’m under no illusions that things will progress in a linear manner, but it IS nice to have some positive change.

A friend recommended Your Three-Year Old: Friend or Enemy? by Louise Bates Ames and Frances L. Ilg to me when Drake was three, Guppy was one and I was losing my mind. Time passed, things with Drake became a little less fraught, and I didn’t get around to it. But with some of the recent, frequent struggles with the previously agreeable Guppy, I decided to look up this book. I hadn’t forgotten its memorable, and apt title.

This is an honest book, as its title might suggest, though the authors are quick to answer the title’s question at the end of the first chapter: your three year old, despite evidence to the contrary, is not your enemy. It covers child development, comparing three and three and a half year olds to two and four year olds, while also acknowledging that all kids are individuals and on similar but different timetables. Three and a half, they note (the age that Guppy is closest to) is extremely difficult. Tantrums are normal, and struggles with basic routines like getting dressed, meal times and bed times are constant sources of conflict.

First published in 1985, it’s somewhat dated, but the basics still apply. Note, however, this is NOT for parents looking for detailed science, and it might offend some attachment and homeschooling families. The authors offer no magic advice, just sympathy with a dose of realism. They recommend getting support from babysitters and daycare providers so parents and kids get a much needed break from one another. Distraction at this age, is better than discipline. Above all, they note, is just getting through the day with both parent and kid as unfrazzled as possible.

Today, for instance, I signed the boys up for swim classes. 5yo Drake went off with his teachers, but 3yo Guppy got in the pool with his group, but stopped, refused to go farther, and kept hollering for me. I tried to convince him to join the other kids, as did two of the instructors. Then I gave up, and got a refund for the class. He’ll probably be ready some other time, but it wasn’t this morning. It certainly wasn’t worth a power struggle over something that’s supposed to be fun.

I saw the new animated feature from Pixar, Up, earlier this week with my nearly 6yo son Drake. I cried three times, he was scared about as many times, but overall we enjoyed it. One of my favorite fleeting moments of parenting is sitting in the dark with Drake, watching a movie and hearing him laugh with delight. I love sharing that moment with him.

In addition to the balloons, old man and pudgy boy featured in the ads, Up has a delightful dog and bird, both of whom often steal their scenes. It’s rated PG for good reason, though. There are some scary chases, both by dogs and up high, and a cruel villain with a gun. In general, I think this is better for school-aged kids (I was glad not to have brought 3yo Guppy) and not for kids afraid of mean dogs, guns and heights. Also, I opted for the 2D, not the 3D, which I think would be better for kids older than Drake.

While it’s no Wall E, which I thought one of the best films of last year, and perhaps Pixar’s best yet, Up is still very good and worth seeing. It’s beautiful to look at, and has stuff to appeal both to kids and to adults, without resorting to the cheap pop-culture references of Pixar’s low-rent imitators.

I wrote last week about my 5yo son Drake, and our struggles with some of his behaviors that are typical of kids on the autism spectrum. At that time, I tallied three steps forward and two steps back. I might have known I was jinxing myself.

The day after, Drake found one of his digital watches and spent most of an hour singing tuneless nonsense words while he timed himself. I was surprised at this not because it’s a new behavior, but because it’s been gone for months; he used to do it frequently at home and at preschool. Additionally, he’s having more extreme outbursts of temper. If I tell him no, he will sometimes throw himself to the ground, crying and screaming at full voice, at home and in public. These are both regressions, and disheartening after the cautious optimism about progress.

When we saw one of his teachers the other day, he smiled, but would not speak to her. Later, though, he said, unprompted to a friend, “Hey, I want to introduce you to one of my friends. I don’t know if you know him.” Then today I got a progress report from school. He overcame some problems he was having in music class. But he never initiated play with another kid. It feels like every step forward is negated by one step back.

It’s silly to keep score, even if events were quantifiable. And it’s hardly useful for me to pin hope and despair on fluctuations in his behavior–he’s growing and changing all the time. So I’ll celebrate any progress, and remember it usually comes with a regression in something else, so I shouldn’t be alarmed. That approach typifies my sense of parenting, one I’m not always able to enact, though I do keep trying: Enjoy things when they’re good, and don’t flip out when they’re bad. Or, in the newly fashionable phrase, “Keep calm and carry on.”

My elder son, now-5yo Drake, was not a sleepy baby. Newborns are supposed to sleep around the clock; he didn’t. Drake was alert all the time. He slept rarely, and for short intervals. He didn’t sleep through the night until he got his own room at just over a year old. It was, as many can imagine or empathize, a source of stress.

I followed all the advice for Drake: bedtime ritual, warm bath, dark bedroom. Yet for the first six to eight months, I couldn’t put him in bed unless he was asleep. Even then, as I gingerly laid him in his co-sleeper, then his crib, I’d slowly back away, muscles tensed in a combination of fear and hope. About half the time, he’d start to cry and I’d have to go through the whole comforting/singing spiel again. So whenever I saw a movie or television scene of a parent going into a child’s room, stroking their head, and talking to them, I started to rant. That was ridiculous, unrealistic, romanticizing, etc. etc. Kids didn’t sleep that soundly. There was a reason someone advised, “Never wake a sleeping baby.”

When I heard Colin Powell’s comment upon hearing that President Bush was “sleeping like a baby” on the eve of war with Iraq. I laughed. Finally, someone had got it right.

I’m sleeping like a baby, too. Every two hours, I wake up, screaming.

But then, as so often happens, things changed. Around age two, Drake started napping for hours at a time, and sleeping soundly at night. With now-3yo Guppy it happened even sooner. I even sometimes find myself in the reverse dilemma from Drake’s infancy: I have to wake them, and it’s not easy.

I’ve made my peace, then, with the sappy parental bedtime scenes. I’ve had a few of my own. I _can_ go into their room, remove the books from the beds, kiss their heads, and pull up the sheets. When they’re lying there, abandoned in sleep with rosy cheeks, it’s easy to forgive a lot of the tumult of the day that went before.

Until the next day, that is, when the screaming and the hollering and the “MOM!”ing and the neediness starts all over again. But I’ve got most of a good night’s sleep to help me weather it.

My 5yo son Drake has always been a challenging child. “Oppositional” is what his pediatrician called him at the three-year check up. Every year I’d ask the doc about autism. Every year he’d tell me not to worry. Then at the last one, I pressed him. “OK,” he admitted. “Drake’s a little different.” The doc advised me to increase his playdates to improve his social skills, decrease his screen time, and increase his physical activity.

When Drake returned for his third year of preschool (he has a late summer birthday; I delayed kindergarten because of his social issues), he had behavioral problems. His teacher and I sought help from the public school system. After a thorough observation, the team confirmed what I’d suspected–Drake was “on the spectrum.” High-functioning Asperger’s syndrome is a good approximation, though the education team was quick to say it wasn’t a medical diagnosis, only an education term to get him help in areas of difficulty.

I haven’t written about this because it feels full of land mines. Am I pathologizing my kid? If I write about him, am I pimping out his problems? Many who know us make it clear–politely or not–that they think Drake’s normal and we’ve been hoodwinked by modern fear mongers into pigeonholing our child. I’m also wary of blithely announcing “my kid’s autistic” because I don’t want to trespass on the pain of those families whose spectrum experiences are much more difficult than ours. But not writing about it has gotten to the point where I can’t celebrate really cool things, and that, I feel, is a loss to Drake.

Since late fall, he’s had OT and attended a social skills class. His communication has improved, and his formerly frequent tantrums are fewer and less intense. Every week a short bus picks him up and drops him off; he’s unaware of the stigma about the size of the bus. Last week, he got off the bus, then ran back to a window. Two kids from his class were inside, waving goodbye and calling to him, all smiles. He responded in kind. It was a sweet, genuine moment, all the more so because I know these kids struggle with social interaction and friendship.

The social struggles begin at home. Like most kids, Drake fights with his younger brother, 3yo Guppy. For years, now, a typical pattern is Guppy will cry, then Drake will scream because he’s can’t stand the noise. This cycle might sound funny, unless you’ve endured it as many times as I have. Eventually, at my urging, Drake would leave the room. At 3yo, though, Guppy still cries and screams a lot. A few times lately, Drake has followed my advice and tried to make Guppy feel better. He does this by quoting lines by the Swedish Chef from Boom Comics’ Muppet Show comic. That makes Guppy laugh, and the tantrum gets defused. It’s a bizarre, but hilarious, solution to the problem.

Another change got noticed by a friend. After a recent playdate, the mom sent me an email with the subject line, “Drake ate food!” She is well aware of the struggles I’ve had over my picky and painfully skinny little boy’s eating habits. That day, though, he ate everything she offered for lunch: sandwich, veggies, fruit and more. Amazingly, the trend holds with us, too. He’s sampled foods he formerly shunned, like tacos, spaghetti, salad and tostadas. He devours edamame from the shell. He recently pronounced something spicy but awesome. With food, as with the school bus waving and the Swedish Chef cheering, there’s positive change, and I’m cautiously hopeful of more.

It’s not all forward momentum, though. I heard the boys screaming at each other last week. When I went to investigate, I found Drake on his top bunk yelling, and Guppy wailing on the floor.

“What happened?” I asked.

“GUPPY WANTED THE FIREMAN. I COULDN’T FIND IT. I THREW BEAR.”

Translation: Guppy asked Drake for the fireman toy. Drake couldn’t find it. Guppy started to cry, which irritated Drake, who threw a teddy bear at him in anger, which made Guppy cry more.

I quickly located the fireman, admonished Drake for making things worse, and they both quieted down.

On a recent night I was making dinner, while the boys played on the back porch. I glanced out and noticed Drake throwing something into the back yard. I opened the porch door, and saw a pile of hair. Drake had decided he and Guppy needed haircuts, so he’d used his scissors. The results, while not terrible, were definitely choppy, and will need to be fixed by a professional.

That still leaves me one hopeful step ahead, though. I’m going to relish this as long as I’m able. And hey, maybe the next event will be a hopeful one too. Or at least amusing, if it’s not.

The article “Birds in Hand” from the March issue of Gourmet intrigued me. Roast two chickens at once, it said, to produce a chicken dinner for four, then use the leftovers for three more meals. Something about this kind of one-stop all-week shopping appeals to the thrifty housewife in me, so I decided to give it a go.

What I didn’t know, though, was that I’d be seeing those chickens for quite some time. My sons, 5yo Drake and 3yo Guppy, are picky, though improving, eaters. So the meals for four sometimes stretched out to lunches and leftovers, as the boys sometimes opted for PBJs, cereal, and other kid-friendly dinner substitutes.

I began with Roast Chicken with Pan Gravy and served Panfried Smashed Potatoes on the side.

I used the leftover roast chicken to make Cheesy Chicken and Mushroom Lasagne. The kids wouldn’t touch it, but G and I devoured it.

Next up were Chicken Gyros with Cucumber Salsa and Tsatsiki. Again the kids were suspicious of such a multi-layered meal, but I thought it was delicious.

With still more roast chicken to use, I made the Chicken Tostadas again. Drake pronounced them, “Spicy, but awesome!” And if you know what kind of eating struggles we’ve had with him, you’ll know I just about broke down and cried.

But I still had leftover chicken and tomato sauce. So I put that over tortilla chips, covered it with cheese, topped it with the leftover iceberg lettuce and radishes for Chicken Nachos, recipe adapted from Cooks Illustrated.

Still not done, I took a last serving of the chicken nachos, heated them up in the cast iron skillet, added in two eggs, and had a Mexican chicken scramble.

After all this, I still had Leftover Roast Chicken Stock to make. I threw in two carcasses and the odds and ends in my veggie bin, then made a Leek and Pea Risotto. The recipe called for calamari. I tried trout instead. Bad call. Better to have skipped the protein entirely.

Then I was done, right? Alas, no. I still had a cup of Pan Gravy from the first recipe. So I heated up a bag of frozen fries, topped them with Wisconsin cheese curds, melted them in the oven, then covered them in gravy to make Poutine, a staple of Canadian diners.

That, my friends, was finally the end of the two roast chickens. Thirteen days. Eight different recipes, nine if you count making the stock. Everything but the trout was good, some things were great. But it was an enormous undertaking, and continually reusing all the food was tiring. It’s not an experience I’ll be repeating anytime soon.

Next up, I think, lots of small, simple, meals that I’ll try to make both veggie based and kid to friendly. Yeah, those aren’t mutually incompatible, are they? I can but try.

Our family recently returned from a trip to Miami FL with my parents and sisters’ families. It was 5yo Drake and 3yo Guppy’s first trip to that state. The hotel property we stayed at had a giant pool area, with a zero-depth entry, giant slide and a little jacuzzi pool.

Our first day at the pool, Drake wanted to go down the slide. It was high, curved, and encased in rock. We couldn’t see the top from the bottom, and vice versa. I went with him, because the pool it ended in was 4′, over Drake’s head, and he doesn’t yet swim. We went down it the first couple times together. The next couple times I met him at the bottom and swam him to the shallow water. Then he ran up the stairs calling, “Let’s go down together again, Mom!”

I walked up the steps to the top of the slide. He was gone. A mom in front of me said, “He should wait till he hears the signal beep to go down.” I can’t remember if I even heard the last of her sentence as I turned to race down the steps, and dive into the pool where Drake was struggling under the slide. There wasn’t a lifeguard; it was swim at your own risk. Or that of your impulsive 5yo, in our case. The handful of other parents around the pool were just realizing something was wrong as I dove in and pushed him up and out of the water. He had swallowed some, but not aspirated it, and might have been more angry than scared. He screamed for a long time, as the other parents stopped by to offer sympathy and make sure he was OK. Drake eventually stopped screaming and we went down a few more times, always being very clear that he wait for me at the top or make sure I was waiting at the bottom, plus not rush down the slide too soon after the kid in front of him.

Within the hour I was taking a break and my mom was watching Drake and Guppy play on the steps of the jacuzzi pool. Guppy threw a ball in the water. Drake lunged after it, unaware that the water was over his head. My mom waded in to fish him out. Drowning #2 averted.

About this time we’d had enough and returned to our room. Drake and Guppy still had some energy to burn, so were racing around the space, which had a sliding glass door to the patio. G. Grod said “Stop running,” just as Drake ran full-speed into the glass window. Screaming. More screaming. A little more screaming, and some frozen peas on the huge goose egg that erupted on his forehead, and was so bruised that it eventually leaked internally down his face, giving him two black eyes.

My sister Sydney came to babysit then, and took good care of the injured daredevil. G. Grod and I beat a hasty exit for a noisy, but by comparison positively relaxing dinner out. No further disasters ensued. Apparently Drake just needed to get them all out of his system on the first day.

My husband G. Grod, 5yo son Drake, 3yo son Guppy, and I just returned from a week in Miami with my family. We had a good time, and did a lot of fun things. But it was very different from my expectations beforehand.

Here’s what I thought I would do on vacation:

What I actually did:

So, mostly good. As usual, G. and I wished for even more downtime grown-up time. Lessons learned: Boys need to learn to swim. Be more even more careful about sunscreen. And adjust expectations and pack lighter for things like books and movies.

I purchased Christie Mellor’s Three-Martini Family Vacation in advance of our first full-on family trip. I haven’t yet read her previous one, The Three-Martini Playdate, though many of my parent friends have recommended it. I found this a funny, refreshing, if sometimes guilt-inducing, tonic to the current culture of over-parenting. I read it in the car to and from the beach in lieu of entertaining my kids in the backseat. I presumed, correctly, they could manage a 30 to 60 minute drive.

Trust me, there is never going to be the “perfect time” to go on a vacation, and if you wait for the ideal moment, you will be old and gray, and too finicky to want to travel anywhere you can’t have your shredded wheat and regular “programs.” Do not wait. Go now.

Traveling with children in tow can be challenging, but so can traveling with anybody who doesn’t want to do exactly what you want to do exactly when you want to do it. It’s annoying, but there you are. You could put a rucksack over your shoulder and abscond in the dead of night, leaving your broken-hearted family to pick up the shattered remnants of their lives without their mommy or daddy, or you could give it a try, and discover that “traveling” and “with children” don’t have to be mutually exclusive.

A few of her key points:

Teach your kids manners, self sufficiency and to be considerate of others as soon as they’re able. You, they, and others will all appreciate it in the long run.

Avoid places full of children, as they tend to be noisy, active, intrusive, and lack the manners mentioned above.

Three-martini parenting isn’t about ignoring your kids. It’s about finding balance between grownup time and kid time. Play with and attend to your kids. Within reason.

As much as possible, eschew social pressure. Remember the best vacations can be simple, cheap and even local.

This is a book one shouldn’t judge till one’s read it. It’s supposed to be humorous and tongue-in-cheek–one of its points is to lighten up. Consider it as a girlfriend’s take-it-or-leave-it advice. Mellor doesn’t pretend or claim to be an expert. She’s just another parent in the trenches, who’s been there and done that.

We bought our house a little over four years ago from a couple with two little kids, about eight and five. We noticed the five-foot chain link fence around the yard, and the padlocks they left for them and thought, huh.

Drake was just over a year old, and I wondered if I’d eventually need to lock him into the yard. Sure enough, last summer he made several breaks for freedom, a few times enticing little brother Guppy down the block. We brought out the padlocks. They screamed. They wailed. But they stayed in the yard.

During a recent thaw, Drake and friends were playing outside, then Drake entered the house from the front door, not the back, and barefoot.

“Weren’t you in the back?” I asked.

He shrugged. “I took off my boots, threw them over the fence, then climbed over.”

I looked out and saw his boots on the ground in front of the fence. So much for security and padlocks. I think he’s picked up a few things at circus school. I can only hope Guppy, who is a solid citizen with a low center of gravity, will remain earthbound a little while longer, and not follow his brother over the fence.

People who talk in movie theaters irritate me. The exception: kids in movies for kids. They talk, and it delights me. I can only hope they’ll unlearn that behavior by the time they’re seeing movies for old people, like me.

5yo Drake and I went to see Bolt at the Riverview Theater with friends. The kids, 5, 4, and 2, were entranced by the show. There were lots of “Dog!” and “Wow!” comments. The story was easy to follow, had cute characters like pigeons and a hamster, and Bolt was endearing, though I found his eyes a little too creepily realistic looking. I like my cartoons to look cartoon-y, thanks.

The plot is a mash up of Toy Story and The Truman Show. Bolt thinks he’s a superdog, but he only plays one on television. When he is accidentally released into the real world, he has to learn to deal with not being super. Along the way, though, he also learns how to be a real dog, which he finds is not a bad trade off.

I doubt the movie would have been so enjoyable with older kids, and it most certainly wouldn’t have been on its own–everything is good, few things are great. But watching it with kids, and experiencing their wonder, along with real-butter popcorn and movie candy, was a delight.

Ironic parallel: Rhino the hamster spends most of his time in a plastic ball. 70’s pop culture mavens may remember one of John Travolta’s, the voice of Bolt, early movies, The Boy in the Plastic Bubble.

5yo Drake and 3yo Guppy’s 8th-grade babysitter had one of the lead roles in her middle school’s production of West Side Story. Drake’s love of music runs deep, and he’s become enamored of musicals (Sound of Music) and music from Musicals (Mamma Mia! and “What a Piece of Work is Man” from Hair) so I thought I’d give it a shot.

It went well. Drake enjoyed the music, didn’t seem troubled that he couldn’t follow the story (a good thing in my book), and we sat behind the orchestra, so he got to see that as well. I gave him the option of leaving at intermission, but he wanted to stay. The kids in the play did a great job, and Drake sat through his first full-length musical. (Less winning were the grandparents behind me who talked at normal volume throughout and had to wrangle an 18mo toddler. But their other grandkid was in the play, and this was middle school, not the Guthrie, so I didn’t ask them to keep it down.)

Soon after, I saw a flyer for another local middle school’s production of Harry Allard and James Marshall’s Miss Nelson is Missing. Buoyed by my previous success, I thought it would be good for Drake and Guppy. The play itself would have been about an hour, which is what I expected. Alas, in the admirable spirit of including everybody who wants to participate, there were musical numbers between EVERY scene, so the show lasted two hours. At the end of the play, the last of its run, there were speeches, and thank yous. And more speeches. And more thanks yous. Finally I grabbed my kids and tried to make an exit.

Guppy was not on board with this plan. “I DON’T WANT TO LEAVE!” he screamed as I carried him out of the auditorium. He continued to scream, plus hit me, as we made our way through the school and outside. I put him down, he threw himself to the ground screaming and kicking. By this time the play was finally over. Playgoers streamed around us. I put him on his feet and dragged him resolutely to the car. He continued to cry and scream, and refused to get in his car seat. Mothers in the parking lot gave me sympathetic looks. Elderly people gave me dirty looks. Drake screamed because Guppy was screaming. I waited a few minutes, then wrestled Guppy into his seat. He screamed all the way home, where I handed him to G. Grod and said, “He needs a diaper. And he’s been crying for 30 minutes. I’m going to lie down.”

G got him quieted within minutes, so my frayed nerves and I could take a nap. But not before I swore off middle school musicals for a while.

This Saturday past, my husband G. Grod was at a democratic convention to support a candidate for city council. It would take most of the day, so 5yo Drake and 3yo Guppy and I would be on our own.

We were basically just lounging about in our pajamas, until Guppy wandered in waving an empty gummy-bear vitamin bottle. One that had been at least 3/4 full that morning.

I grilled both of them. Denial, denial. So I called my dad, a retired doctor, to confirm what I thought I had to do:

Make ‘em barf.

Guppy seemed the likeliest suspect, so I corralled him and stuck my finger down his throat. Voila. Gummy-smelling barf. I had to do this several times, and then take a break, during which time he tried to hide from me. I tracked him down and did a second round to be safe.

In the meantime, I realized that neither boy could be trusted, and even if Drake hadn’t ingested the vitamins I might as well be fair to Guppy and possibly use this as a teaching moment. So he had his turn in the bathroom. Surprise; he barfed up a substance remarkably similar to Guppy’s.

I was very matter of fact, quiet and firm during all of this. Amazingly, neither of them bit me. They were screaming, crying, running. Kind of like Jurassic Park, where I was the velociraptor. After, though, I calmed them down, explained why too many vitamins were bad, and why they had to get them out of their stomachs. They didn’t seem to hold a grudge.

I, on the other hand, now know better than to buy candy-like vitamins for my kids. Both are lousy eaters. Drake would subsist on yogurt, bread and sugar if I let him. So the multivitamins were recommended by their pediatrician, and serving to fill in some of the gaping holes in their diet. Now, though, they’re on their own. Scurvy and rickets, here we come.

Phillip Becht, of Minneapolis’ Modern Cafe, at the City Pages, on three types of food:

1. Work eats
2. Kid eats
3. Family eats

His simple approach reminds me of Mark Bittman’s Mimimalist recipes.

I wish my kids ate a lot of broccoli. They do like the gingerbread spice cake and pizza sauce that I hide pureed broccoli in, though. Heh.