Parents, having trouble with whining kids? Arguing kids? Sibling rivalries? Good news. Today the solution occurred to me: Abandonment. No, you won't get away with it, but guess what? The kids cannot possibly join you in the jail cell. You will even have bars and guards keeping them away!
Kristi's in Chicago, Maggie's at camp in the N.C. mountains, Sadie's on a roadtrip with grandparents, and a friend took Audrey to spend last night.
For the first time since we moved, our new house became a bachelor pad.
Lucky me, the VH1 Classic channel was broadcasting full-length concerts of Rush and Iron Maiden yesterday evening -- both filmed in Rio de Janiero!
With no one else around, I could listen to the concerts at a suitable volume.
Kristi's in Chicago, Maggie's at camp in the N.C. mountains, Sadie's on a roadtrip with grandparents, and a friend took Audrey to spend last night.
For the first time since we moved, our new house became a bachelor pad.
Lucky me, the VH1 Classic channel was broadcasting full-length concerts of Rush and Iron Maiden yesterday evening -- both filmed in Rio de Janiero!
With no one else around, I could listen to the concerts at a suitable volume.
Sadie, age 3, was sitting in the shallow water of the bathtub. Sadie likes to pick up bugs and other small creatures, but apparently she had visited Ripley's Aquarium recently and had seen the terrarium of poison dart frogs -- or something.
We all heard: "AIIGGHH! There's a frog! There's a frog!"
Her sister Audrey (age 7) and I ran into the bathroom. A cute, little, green tree frog was perched at the far end of the white tub. Sadie had her back against the faucet at the other end and was staring at the frog.
Audrey bent over the tub and started trying to catch it.
Sadie: "DON'T! IT'S POISONOUS! IT'S POISONOUS!"
Me and Audrey: "No no, it's not poisonous...."
Sadie: "IT'S POISONOUS! IT'S POISONOUS! It'll bite! Audrey, it'll bite!"
Audrey continued to try to capture the frog, who was flitting between the edge of the tub and a little steel basket on suction cups about an inch above the tub's rim.
Me and Audrey: "Sadie ... this kind isn't poisonous... look at me Sadie... Sadie, look at me... this kind's not poisonous."
Sadie calmed down a bit -- I think she started to believe us.
Audrey was still trying to catch the frog, who now jumped into the water and started zipping around the perimeter of the tub with a marvelous ease and swiftness, an effortless motion of legs for a quick glide through the dirty water only a 3-year-old can provide.
The little green frog went behind Sadie's back and continued its loop back to the far end of the tub. Sadie seemed more worried about Audrey's attempts to capture the frog. I don't know if she had even noticed that the little green daredevil had gone behind her back.
Finally, Audrey captured the frog, but only with one hand.
As she turned toward the bathroom door, the frog wiggled free and began hopping down the hallway toward Audrey and Sadie's bedroom.
Then Audrey used two hands, cupped the frog from the hallway floor, and took it outside. She wanted to put it in a bucket so she could show Mommy.
When she saw through a window that Mommy was inside, Audrey started yelling about the frog through the glass. Then she brought it back into the house. This time, the frog remained in Audrey's hands.
Eventually, the frog was released outdoors, and I began to wonder, and worry about, how the heck that thing had slipped into the house.
We were watching the end of "The Count of Monte Cristo" on the ABC Family channel as we waited for "The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe" to begin.
I had forgotten how violent "Count" is. At the end, Jim Caviezel's character thrusts a sword through Guy Pearce's character, who then falls to the ground, impaled.
Sadie, 3, saw this, but she had a rather enlightened response.
"That's not good," she said. "God said we can't do that."
1. When the car breaks down on the side of a highway, it's a moment for expanding the kids' vocabulary.
2. Technological advances have made home-schooling easier. For example, most basic cable plans include access to PBS Kids, The History Channel, The Discovery Channel, and The Golf Channel.
3. Courses include Advanced Topics in Popular Culture, which is easy to teach when Dad is driving and really wants to listen to The Flaming Lips on the minivan's sound system.
4. A visit to the grocer’s produce section is an educational field trip, therefore tax-deductible.
5. Home-schooling encourages practical understandings of subjects like agriculture, botany, chemistry, and cultural heritage, especially when Dad breaks out the home-brewing kit.
- Colin Foote Burch
(c) copyright 2009 Colin Foote Burch
Maggie, 8, watched most of Star Wars for the first time last night, but she was too tired to finish the movie, so she went to bed.
As I type this, she is watching the movie, again, from the beginning, with her sisters, Audrey, 6, and Sadie, almost 3 — although in fairness to this father, my wife and I believe the latter will fall asleep shortly.
I read the opening to Audrey — the scroll of words across the stars — so she could follow the basic story line. And I watched the beginning with them. I was explaining that the Storm Troopers were not androids or robots, but people in armor, and that they were bad guys.
Maggie, 8: “They’re not bad guys, they just believe different things.”
Audrey, 6: “The good guys believe in God.”
Wow! We’ll talk through this later.
-Colin Foote Burch
Check out:
Star Wars and Philosophy (Popular Culture and Philosophy)
Christian Wisdom of the Jedi Masters
Sadie, our third-child surprise, the one we almost named Merlot due to her likely inspiration, will turn three years old next month.
Her birthday is on Bastille Day. There's significance in that. I'm sure of it. I just haven't figured it out yet.
Sadie has two older sisters, ages 6 and 8, neither of which were nearly named after a red wine.
My wife and I learned gobs from our first two. Every developmental stage has its normal traits, like the tantrums of the "terrible twos" and potty training.
On the other hand, each child is different. We identified attention-deficit disorder in our oldest daughter when she was 6 years old. We suspected a degree of anxiety in our middle child when she was 4 years old.
In both cases, we sought professional help. We looked into conventional medical approaches to these problems as well as emerging remedies like neurofeedback, which has been the subject of mainstream medical research in Germany. My wife and I believe that our love for our children must be guided by critical minds that insist on multiple sources of information for anything we consider. While it is impossible to know everything, our approach removes some of the variables in decision-making -- and it has been fruitful. With our intentional involvement at home and the help of a licensed doctor, the oldest daughter can maintain focused attention for much longer, and the middle daughter is less anxious in her daily life.
But there remains the simple fact -- even as we begin our third run through the preschool years -- that we have so much to learn. Researchers say that the human brain develops dramatically during the first five years of life -- so much so, that my wife and I feel the burden of properly navigating Sadie's third and fourth years. How do you do it perfectly? When no one has ever done it perfectly?
Well, there is some good news for us.
Well, first, we've done made it through the preschool years twice already. And if you have done so, you ought to pat yourself on the back.
Second, we know where to look for good information. We have culled the good authors, books and Web sites from the mediocre and the bad.
Third, we know how to love Sadie. We make direct eye contact with her. We hug her and kiss her all the time (probably not difficult for most parents, yet extremely important at this stage of development). We spend time with her, even when it is difficult to peel ourselves away from our computers.
Sadie has been on her own learning curve. We don't let her do whatever she wants -- especially when what she wants to do involves wet toilet paper --never mind her persistence and fits. Surviving these episodes requires a level of patience and endurance that my wife and I do not possess naturally, and I'm sure many American parents feel the same way.
Yet in the end, all the little struggles are worth it. We see the outcomes of our preschool-year efforts in the 8-year-old and the 6-year-old.
I cannot wait for the next year with the little girl we almost named Merlot. I want to help that little brain develop to its full potential.
-Colin Foote Burch
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