THE GOOD
My 4 year old had a screamer because I said "no" to one of her demands. As I was sitting on the couch waiting for the storm to pass I see my neighbor bookin' down the sidewalk and then up my front steps. He is a young single guy that I have chatted with a few times. Nice guy. Loves my dog. He came running because he heard the screams and thought my daughter was hurt. To the uninitiated her screamers do sound like she is being tortured on the rack. He was coming to help. See, there are good, kind, caring folks in the world. One of them happens to live next door to me.
THE BAD
Last night, as I was putting the kids to bed, the doorbell rang. I ran downstairs to find two teenager boys dressed in white shirts, ties and dress pants on my doorstep. They even had on nice shoes. These boys were spit shined.
Yes?
Ma'am, could we have a moment of your time?
No, I am putting my kids to bed.
We just want to share our love of Our Lord, Jesus Christ and Our Church with you.
Thank you very much but I love MY church and am not interested. Good luck to you. Good night.
But Our Lord and Our Church....
Good Night.
I turned and walked back upstairs. They were still talking to me when I got up there. Through the screen door. What part of "No Thank You" do you think they didn't understand?
THE UGLY
In an effort to manage my control issues I try to stay out of the kitchen when the children cook. My 8 and 4 year old wanted to make brownies as a welcome-home present for their oldest sister. Staying out of the kitchen was the hardest thing I have done in a long time. I did have to intervene once as they were well on their way to eating all of the white sugar in the house. But other then that I gritted my teeth, tried not to yell and did some meditation.
Baking is part math, part chemistry. My son brought each measuring cup in to me for approval. His sister helped crack the eggs and stir. I put the pan into the oven. The brownies are surprising good.
My kitchen will never be the same. Ugly doesn't even begin to describe it.
8 comments:
did we get any pictures of the brownies the mess or the kids?
LOL i havent let my kids cook yet , apart from juice stirring because I dont want to deal witht he mess. when do you let them start? i mean things like toast, how old is old enought to learn toasters and microwaves and stuff?
(ps) I had to pick just one more site because I have no time today to read alll the blogs I love, and I needed a shower before heading off to the city, I picked your blog, Thanks for updating LOL LOL just in time too!
Cooking with kids..I could write a book.
They can start cooking, with close supervise between 6-8 years, depending on the child. Toast being one of the easiest. As they get older they can cook scrambled eggs and quesadillas on the stove top. Baking can happen as soon as they can read, but I always handle to oven.
In our house, when you turn 13, you are responsible for planning and cooking one meal for the entire family each week. A rite of passage.
If you cook, you are responsible for cleaning up. With the younger ones this requires a lot of help from me. The teenagers do a great job without my help...most of the time.
A great cookbook for younger kids is Molly Katzen's Pretend Soup.
It sounds to me like all of the above were good! You have a great neighbor, you walked away from annoying proselytizeres, and you gave up kitchen control. Even ugly can be good sometimes, right?
Holy cow, those evangelist boys have quite the territory. They were at my house a few weeks ago!
maybe you can give a brownie to cute, nice neighbor guy. He sounds cool, if a bit naive about tantrums.
Lisa
I used to get really annoyed at the JWs, but then I had one explain to me that if they DON'T go door to door witnessing, then God might not include them when he selects who gets to inherit the earth at rapture.
It made me feel so sorry for them that now I always accept their pamphlets and hear them out for a couple minutes. I've even learned a few things! It helped to relax me once I realized they weren't trying to actually convert me and they didn't want money.
When I was a little girl I remember my (devout Catholic) grama would make them lemonaide, invite them into the backyard and then get into a full blown debate. It was awesome! But I guess the fear of losing out on God's inheritance kept them coming back.
UGHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!! I can't stand it when my kids want to "help" in the kitchen. I know I need to let them, though, so I grit my teeth and grin and bear it.
oH I love the Mormons! Bring em on!
We also include cooking as an important part of our kids contribution to home.
Someone once told me that everytime you say, "I should write a book" you should write down the topic matter and then start THAT book. She did just that and is now a prolific author.
Genius isn't it?? So get started on that cooking book!
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