Bad Cop

I have this friend, D, whom I completely respect and admire. We were at D's house over the weekend for a little bit of sadness and a little bit of fun. The sadness was because we were on the mainland for my Grandfather's funeral, and the fun was because we hit Splashdown Park Waterslides directly after. How was I to know that planning to take your kids to the waterslides directly after a funeral is considered irreverant and bad form? I suppose when asked to join the family at the wake after that I could have refrained from telling everyone that we were going to the waterslides instead, but that just wouldn't be me.

So anyways, back to D. She's just this totally awesome, sunshiney gal with a constant smile and positive nature. And she rocks at Mommying. The thing that struck me was that her boy sassed her just the tiniest bit and she said, "No. Uh-uh. We don't talk to each other like that. Go to your room please." And without arguing or continuing the sass, he walked. Straight to his room. Like, she didn't even have to yell at him or start counting or turn colours or anything. He had a little time-out, came back and apologized, then life continued on as normal. Easy Peasy Mac and Cheesy.

When we see parenting we respect and admire it does one of two things. It either makes us try to emulate it, or it makes our shortcomings glaring. And my shortcomings were glaring at me today. No, wait, it was just my sass-a-frass son. Glaring, giving me the "karate arms" threat, telling me no when the expected answer was clearly yes, and just being generally unpleasant. There was one incident after another, one time-out after another, one too many rude comments directed in my direction. The final straw was when Superdaddy and I sat him down to talk to him and after explicitly explaining that if the rude behaviour continued that he would be staying home instead of going to our friends' house for a bonfire he tried to subtlely smack his fist into his palm like he was continuing to threaten us and then raised his middle finger in his cupped hand, which he recently learned was NAUGHTY. YOU DELIBERATELY DISOBEYED ME, SIMBA. I kept him home. Everyone else left. I missed the bonfire and the food and the friends and the bikeride I was going to have on the way because I was not taking that naughty little boy out for some fun tonight.

And then a funny thing happened.

After about half an hour of hysterical crying and threatening and then crying some more, he rested in my arms. I talked to him again about how his rudeness was hurting my feelings. I offered him some dinner and he was polite about it and ate it. He cleared his plate and mine without being asked. We read some books together on the couch and he snuggled in close. We went up to the library, me running and him on his bike, and returned our overdue books. All evening I could see him doing things to emulate me. If I stooped to pet Max, he did the same directly after. If I went for a glass of water, he was suddenly thirsty.

I don't think my first-born is ever lacking from attention, but I do think tonight was good for us. I think it was good that he is reminded that if we make a threat we will follow through. More importantly I think he realized that even though his behaviour can be naughty he's still a pretty good guy and it turns out that Mom really likes to be around him. He missed out on some stuff tonight. I didn't let him watch a movie, there were no yummy snacks, and he went to bed early. Not enough to make his life miserable but enough for him to recognize business. Because I did mean business. But I love that guy. Even when I miss out on roasted marshmallows.

To Make a Short Story Long

This one is going to meander a bit, but worry not, we'll get there.

So a while ago now a good friend of ours, M, got a new kitten. Skyler, who is afraid of all things living, was absolutely terrified of this sweet little creature whom we shall call Baking Powder. We sat on the couch for a while with Baking Powder sitting calmly beside us and I soothed Skyler and assured her over and over for about ten minutes that Baking Powder was just a kitten and would never hurt her, that he was kind and sweet and cute just like OUR little baby Talia.

And then Baking Powder pounced on her hand and bit her.

Proving once again that I am, in fact, a liar.

Last weekend we went back to M's house for dinner and Skyler comes running and screaming from the back of the yard. "What happened, honey?" "Mommy, some random cat bit my hand!" We were sitting around the fire later and Baking Powder came slinking under the chair I was sitting in with Skyler in my lap. Skyler started getting all squealy and worried and I asked her what the problem was. "Mommy, it actually wasn't some random cat bit my hand, it was Baking Powder."

We went to the lake yesterday afternoon and pulled up to the house just past dinner time, hungry and tired but content. As we pulled into the driveway we saw the neighbourhood Mama Deer with her two little fawns grazing on our front lawn, but paid them no mind because we see them so often. We opened the van door and saw our neighbour's dog, Otis, come running down the street to greet us. He comes over quite a bit because Marcus is really into throwing a ball for him, so again, nothing unusual. However, as wee Otis got closer he saw the fawns and I swear a smile spread across his little doggy face. Otis loves to chase. He chases our cats all the time (but not in a way that bothers us--in a sweet 'I'd never know what to do if I caught up with them' kind of way). So he started to chase the fawns that bolted between the van and the house. But Mama Deer did not bolt. Instead she started to clobber Otis with both of her front hooves and remarkably with her back hooves as well. I stood frozen at the sliding door of the van and the kids both watched with mouths agape in horror. I took a step towards them like I was going to assuage the ire of the deer but David uttered, "Don't. You. Dare." Otis finally freed himself from the barrage of kicks and ran squealing and yelping up the road. I hoped the deer would then take off but she didn't. She started looking around the yard like maybe Otis had some little doggy friends that she could clobber, since she was in a clobbering kind of mood. I quietly got back into the van and closed the door behind me. Marcus started whimpering, "I'm scared. How are we going to get back to the house?" We assured the kids that they needn't be scared of deer and that the deer was just protecting her fawns (of course, I am a known liar). But when I finally mustered up the courage to open the van door, I was scared too. I had a bottle of shampoo in my hand so I threw it at the deer hoping she'd go on down the street but she didn't; she blinked at it and looked at me expectantly. I carried Skyler quickly to the house and went back for Marcus, not willing to put them on the ground to walk. David brought Talia in quickly.

Otis went to the vet and it turns out he is okay. At first his owners thought he was a goner; he just lay on their porch and closed his eyes and whimpered. But, no broken bones, no internal injuries, he's going to be fine.

Later that evening we're sitting on the couch looking out the window and watching the offending Mama Deer munching on some apples our across-the-street neighbour left out for her. Marcus says, "Uhm Mom, you know, I have a phobia now." "Oh? Of what?" "Of deer." Skyler looks up excitedly, "OH! I have a phobie TOO!" "Really? Of what?" Fully expecting her to have a new deer phobia too.

"I have a phobia of M's cats!"

Reciprocity

I'm getting tired of the unreasonable demands. Or maybe it's the pure unreasonableness of the demands that is tiring me; either way, it's taxing.

I'm sitting on the front lawn watching Talia play and Skyler and Marcus are taking turns coming up to me and demanding that I get up immediately to find a toy, get a snack, replenish a cup of milk, or dance like a monkey on a string. I am up and down and up and down and up and down and I start feeling like maybe I'd be better off staying on my feet. If I were to embrace indentured servitude, that is.

But I have a better idea.

I decided that from now on for every time-killing and irrelevant demand made to me by the kids, I would make a similar demand on them. A demand that would actually save me some time in some way. For example, Marcus comes up with a random plastic toy watch and asks me to put it on him. I survey the room and say, "Marcus, I will put that watch on you if you pick up those cups that Talia pulled out of the drawer." He wins, I win, we both win.

When David heard of the reciprocity agreement he was ecstatic. "Skyler, I'll read you a book if you go get me a beer." He walked around grinning and exclaiming, "I like this new rule. This is a great rule!" Marcus glared in my direction.

The reciprocity idea actually came to me as I was cleaning the house the other day with two little turkeys underfoot demanding constant service. I needed them out of my hair so I could tidy up before dinner and now without cable that takes some creative solutions. But I realized if every time they came up to me I gave them a chore they would sooner or later stop coming up to me. By the time they clued in to the ruse they had picked up every toy in the living room and had washed the front window as well. After that they kept their distance. I knew then that I was onto something good.

Caring for Five

Lately I've been taking care of some extra kidlets for a friend of mine who got a few weeks of work. It was a no-brainer for me--she has taken care of my children so many times I couldn't even begin to count. So let's not dispute the "why". Let's, instead, discuss the how. The how is far more entertaining.

So my friend, let's call her J, has two kids. With my three, that makes FIVE. I'm doing the math to emphasize the large amount of children that are in my barely capable care. J, I'm sorry, but it's true. At the best of times I'd barely call myself inept. J has a little girl that is almost three and a little guy that is ten months old. They are fabulous kids and have been so well-behaved around here it's silly.

What's pretty funny is how I'VE been behaving through all this. Because although all the kids seem to be very content and have been smiling and playing all day (even MY kids have been behaving), I have been in a constant state of panic the entire time. Panic. I'm lying on the blanket on the front yard surrounded by happy and smiling children and in my heart I am panicking.

Because I have to pee. Or because somebody has asked me for a snack. And I can't even begin to wrap my head around how I can do anything besides sit on the blanket and look after the babies. I actually felt at around 2pm today that I had to pee, looked at my watch and thought, "Meh, J will be here in an hour, I guess I'll just wait." When the kids need a snack I bring one of the babies in the house and leave my five-year-old in charge of the other one. Yes, that's right, my five-year-old. But I leave the front door wide open so I'll be able to hear him if he starts panicking.

Today I had the kids all out front and I had J's baby on my hip inside while I frantically prepared him a bottle and poured frozen blueberries into a bowl for everybody, and the doorbell rang. I do my inside jobs like I'm playing Beat the Clock because although I will leave my five-year-old in charge of my baby, I won't do it for more than thirty seconds. So every thirty seconds I race to the front window and make sure that my baby is still on the blanket, that nobody is sitting on her, and that Random Marcus isn't balancing her on his handlebars. I didn't rush downstairs to answer the door because I honestly thought it was just Marcus messing around and I knew I wasn't going to be able to work up the energy to ask him to stop so I just ignored it.

When I made it to the front door thirty seconds later, there was an actual person there. A lady who had come to our door mistakenly, but it made me survey the scene that she had just encountered. Several unattended, somewhat dirty children out front. The entire contents of my diaper bag strewn about the blanket (because I change the diapers outside when we're outside). Me coming to the door with yet another dirty child on my hip, and then the rest of the kids swarming the bowl of blueberries like I had neglected to actually feed this unfortunate little group of ragamuffins. She realized right away she had the wrong house. And she backed away slowly.

It's not technically hard to look after this many children. It's just rather impossible to do it without a sense of humour.

Your Kid is a Liar

Well, maybe not your kid. But my kid is. And it’s completely unintentional but seriously, kids are liars. Bold-faced, unabashed liars. As a teacher I feel it’s my duty to share this with you because it is extremely important that you take everything your kid says with a grain of salt. Because your kid is a liar.

Case in point: Marcus had t-ball the other night. I wasn’t able to make it because I was sick so David took the kids. David must not have noticed that Marcus came home with a ball that didn’t belong to him. This is the conversation that took place between Marcus and I:

Marcus (on stairs): Look mom, the coach gave me a ball!

Me (in kitchen): What do you mean? Why did he give you a ball?

Marcus: I dunno, he just gave it to me. I don’t know why.

Me: Did the other kids get a ball too?

Marcus: I don’t know, I got a ball though.

Me: Well what did he say when he gave it to you?

Marcus: He said, “Here Marcus. This is for you.” Then he gave it to me. See, it says Marcus on it.

Me: Oh. That doesn’t say Marcus honey, that says Marlins. Do you think that maybe
you thought that ball said Marcus and you thought it was yours?

Marcus: It says Marlins? Are you sure? It doesn’t say Marcus?

Me: Look honey, it starts with Mar, just like your name, but look at these letters. Do you have these letters in your name? Did your coach actually GIVE you the ball, or did you just see it on the ground and thought it had your name one it?

Marcus: Hmm. Maybe my coach didn’t give it to me.

You see, with less than three minutes of interrogation I got to the root of it. I didn’t even have to torture him. I should work for CSIS. The thing is, Marcus wasn’t intentionally lying. For whatever reason, he thought his coach had given him a ball with his name on it. He believed that his coach had given him that ball for keeps. He created this scenario in his mind in which his coach gave him a ball.

So if your child comes home from school with some whack-a-doodle story about some hijinks that occurred in class, take a minute to do some investigative parenting. There could be more to the story.

On Loyalty

First of all, I’d just like to say, I don’t care how important the hockey game is, it is just not okay to wake a sleeping baby. I don’t understand how you can become so emotionally invested in a game on tv that you would hoot loud enough to wake a sleeping, TEETHING, possibly SICK with LYME DISEASE baby. Come on!

Ahem.

Skyler has this little blue bear that she loves. His name is BearBear. She’s had him forever, and I don’t know where she got him but he has been her best friend for a long time now. About a month ago we were driving in the van and out of nowhere she says, “Mom, you know, BearBear is mine friend.” It’s true, he is her friend. When she is worried or sad she seeks him out and hugs him hard. She sleeps with him every night.

Then one day Skyler went to Save-On-Foods with Daddy and there was a bear just like BearBear, only larger, and pink. She lost her damn mind over that bear, looked up at Daddy while hugging the bear and said in the most adorable voice she could muster, “He’s so fluffy I’m going to die!” Don’t give her too much credit on the cute scale here—that was a direct quote from the movie Despicable Me. She’s cute, but not THAT cute. So of course Daddy bought her the bear, which I am fine with. The more the merrier, right? But Daddy had a different idea. He thought it would be okay if Baby Bear Pink REPLACED BearBear. As in, “Skyler, you can only bring one bear to bed with you.” I’m all, “WHAT?!”

Wait, I should also let you know that there is not just one BearBear, although Skyler didn’t know it at that point. We have two, well three really, BearBears. They’re in rotation. Rather, two of them are in rotation but we had to pull the third because his outfit could be removed but the other two had outfits that couldn’t be and we were worried she’d figure out the ruse. When I realized how much she loved BearBear I bought a couple more on Ebay so that we’d never have to search for BearBear in the middle of the night, or break her heart if she
lost him. Because it is IMPORTANT to me that she LOVES BearBear. And LOVE means something. TO. ME.

Obviously that is one flaw in the Baby Bear Pink idea. But what really got to me is how she was completely willing to abandon BearBear, her confidante, her security, her soulmate, her FRIEND for some random pink bear. I was sad that suddenly it seemed as though the only person that was really worried about BearBear was me. Yes, I’ll admit it, I love that bear. That bear has kept my daughter emotionally safe for years. I love that bear.

I was worried for nothing though. Because now that the novelty of Baby Bear Pink has worn off, she is often forgotten. Skyler still sleeps with BearBear. AND Baby Bear Pink, and some random pink hamster. And anybody else she can fit in her tiny little arms. But always BearBear. And last night when I snuck into her room to kiss her goodnight, Baby Bear Pink was on the floor. And BearBear? Nestled safely in her arms. That’s my girl.

The Cute Kid Debacle

Debacle is a great word. This is probably not an ACTUAL debacle, more of one of those little non-events that make my life somewhat interesting and slightly humourous.

I heard on the radio of this contest of cute kids in which you could win a brand new car. Check it: a BRAND NEW CAR. Do I actually need a brand new car? No. Could I even fit my entire family into the car they were offering? Again, no. But I DO have cute kids, and I DO love to win things, so I figured I had this in the bag and should enter immediately. Without delay. So I sped home, whipped the kids out of their carseats and powered up the old internet. I chose some adorable pictures of my children and entered the contest.

This contest lets the viewers vote on the cutest kids, rating each child out of 10. When voting began you could actually see the score of the child and where they stood in the ratings. I raised an eyebrow at this. I worked it though with facebook status updates, such as:

Sarah Davidson Hey! Somebody is voting my kids DOWN! I don't think I like this contest!

Followed by:

Sarah Davidson I suspect that some of the leaders are probably voting others down.

And then:

Sarah Davidson Okay so now I am feeling bad for the people whose kids are on the last page so I'm giving them all 10s because how mean is it to say somebody's kid is only a 2.5?! They could get stuck with that label for life! They'll start dating 4s even though they're really 7s and could possibly be dating 8s. It's just not right.

At this point I decided to email the guy in the promotions department to mention this alarming fact. We do NOT want 7s dating 4s if they can get 8s. Right?

12/02/2011

To c___@radio.astral.com

From:	SuperMommy
Sent:	February 12, 2011 2:05:52 PM
To:	C__@radio.astral.com

Okay so I entered my kids in your cute baby contest thinking, why not, it's time those little ingrates started earning their keep. I am shamelessly exploiting my kids trying to win a new car. And I don't even need a new car. I'm told these are the types of hobbies housewives should have. Seemed like a good idea at the time. My kids are usually pretty cute when they're not driving me completely insane at the market or even better, in the bank. They're good kids. We like them.
So I've come to realize this voting thing is kind of mean but more importantly, could be really damaging! I am feeling bad for the people whose kids are on the last page so I'm giving them all 10s because how mean is it to say somebody's kid is only a 2.5?! They could get stuck with that label for life! They'll start dating 4s even though they're really 7s and could possibly be dating 8s. It's just not right. So anyways, I hope when you guys choose a winner you choose a 2.5 because I bet you last night's leftovers that some of those 7s are going around voting down all the babies that are uber-cute. So even if their KIDS are 7s the PARENTS are 2s and should just be ashamed.

Regards,

SuperMommy

It’s funny how the anonymity of the internet allows you to be cheeky to people you’ve never met. After that email they did change the contest so you couldn’t see the scores but the photos were still arranged by popularity. My status update:

Sarah Davidson It used to show their scores but they changed it. Now you can tell when you hit "browse" as it takes you to the first page. Mine have no chance though because every time a kid gets on that front page they get assaulted with low votes. It's really sad!

Could I stop there? Have we met? Of course I couldn’t. Not without a little more sass. Back to the old emailer:

To c___@radio.astral.com

From:	SuperMommy
Sent:	February 13, 2011 7:17:45 AM
To: c___@radio.astral.com

Don't know if you got the first one but that's okay as I often carry out one-sided conversations. I like that you took off the ratings and the rating order although I think you've underestimated the mental capacity of your rabid car-coveting mothers. Have you never watched Toddlers and Tiaras? These ladies are not your average Isn't-My-Kid-Adorable cut of mommy. They know that when you hit browse those kids are lined up nice and neat in order of votes and they assault the leaders with a barrage of low votes. Cutthroat. I've never seen such a thing.

Have a nice day!

SuperMommy

I can tell you whose kids AREN’T going to win this contest! :)

Anyhow, I did actually get a reply, which surprised the pants off me!

To Sarah Davidson

From:	McWilliam, Crosby
Sent:	February 13, 2011 8:35:09 AM
To:	SuperMommy

Hi Supermommy,

Thanks for your emails. We appreciate your observations and as you noticed removed the viewer on the ratings in order to protect the kids. We're working on another way of displaying the photos alphabetically in the hopes that there's no perception of who's in first, but it might take a day or so to make that active if our web people can do it at all...

Thanks again for writing.

Crosby McWilliam

Promotions Director

Virgin Radio

I find it equally interesting when you write someone with cheek and sass and they respond to you like you are a regular sane and reasonable person. He must deal with crazies all the time. I look forward to seeing if their web people are able to alphabetize.