My kid and notes from Year 3.6
September 19, 2018
Halfway to four
How did we survive 3 and a half years? Whew. What a journey this has been. I like JB a whole lot and there are a lot of days I don’t enjoy zir company so very much because it’s so frustrating just getting shoes on zir feet every morning why does this have to be an argument every single morning –
but I guess we’ll keep zir.
Hands on your belly!
Kitchen safety is harder to teach to an antsy 3 year old than I expected. I want JB to help and to encourage that zest for helping but also don’t want zir to catch on fire or slice off a finger, so instead of saying “Don’t touch X” which never ever ever EVER works, we do “hands on your belly!”
When we’re standing next to the stove together, giving zir wandering hands a docking station of BELLY! is the only thing that prevents zir from dipping hands into boiling water to fish out that one floating dumping, or stirring the pasta prematurely, or grabbing the pot handle and upending its contents all over both of us.
The no-thank-you corner
We are extremely lucky that JB has, thus far, been a hearty eater who is willing to try anything once, even if it looks suspicious. If, after trying something, ze really doesn’t like it, ze doesn’t have to eat more unless it’s a healthy dish. When it comes to individual components of a dish, like raw onions, JB is allowed to opt out by NOT by whining or fussing. Ze is allowed to place undesired food in the corner of zir plate.
Very few foods end up in that corner these days, except green onions and non-caramelized onions. Like I said, we’re very lucky.
New lessons and skills
See previous months for zir current responsibilities.
We have finally established a pattern of behavior for dropping off at school, picking up after school, and for the period from before dinner to bedtime. We used to have an easy routine where we’d show up and ze would launch into activities, we’d show up in the evening and ze would launch zirself at us, and then the lead up to bedtime was fun and messy and easy. It hasn’t been easy for months because ze has gotten cranky and temperamental. I finally clearly laid out a set of expectations, three per event, and enforced it for two weeks. It has made life SO much easier. It doesn’t mean the threenager isn’t crabby at all but it means not every single thing is a fight from brush your teeth! to eat your breakfast! to pick your socks! to put them on! to put your shoes on! Lots of days still feel like an endless fight but in reality it’s more of an average of one outburst per activity period rather than an endless meltdown from waking up through leaving for school. That stuff just grinds away at your sanity.
There was absolutely some bribery involved. That is, ze can earn a sticker or ONE candy per period (pick up or drop off or dinner period) when ze has done all the jobs without whining, fussing, or being rude. But we don’t always pay out because ze doesn’t necessarily need the payout more than a couple days in a row for the behaviors to take hold.
Precious Moments
Everyone wants to be Teacher
JB: Daddy, I am teacher! Excuse me, Denny (former teacher’s name)? Are you sick? Ok, go home! The vitamins are at home and you have to go upstairs and then go downstairs and then go in the bedroom and then you need to get in the car!
Me: My car is in my bedroom?
JB: If you need anything you ask teacher Jenny, ok?
Me: Ok, can you help me find my car?
I probably should have saved thumb war for later
Me: Please stop poking my toes with your toes. Or are you trying to declare toe war???
JB: YES! Fight fight fight! Toe fight!
Someone wants a baby sibling and it’s not me
JB: My elephant lovey wants to sit wif you today in your office
Me: Ok
JB: No but I have to hold him because my baby is crying. Eees ok baby, ees ok. It’s a tiny little baby and it needs to go in my belly. It’s ok baby, it’s ok.
Me: It needs to go in your belly? Why?
JB: No, YOUR belly. *Stuffs under my shirt* Be careful! Don’t let her fall out, she will be saaaad. It’s called a little baby baby.
We haven’t explained marriage very well
JB: I’m married!!
PiC: Please don’t get married too early.
JB: I have a ring so I’m married!
PiC: Being married is about more than just a ring
JB: But Mommy has a ring and she’s married so I have a ring and I’m married!
PiC: But who is mommy married to?
JB: Me!
Hand me downs are love
JB: Can I open this?
Me: No, that’s for New Baby.
JB: Why?
Me: Because it’s friendly to bring a brand new baby a little gift.
JB: I would like to give him my pajamas because I’m getting too big for my pajamas please.
Me: He’s just a bitty baby, ok?
JB: But I like babies
Hand on belly, so good! Love these, as always.
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Cooking with a 3.5 year old sounds terrifying!
Glad to hear you have some good routines working!
With THIS 3.5 year old IS terrifying. It’s possible others aren’t.
Hang in there. Our son was tough at that age too. It was much easier once he goes to school full time.
It’s good that it’s so up and down we don’t COMPLETELY lose hope in any given month.
Lovely stuff! You should download your beautiful posts about motherhood and kidhood into Word & print them out, so someday your (and he) will have a kind of narrative scrapbook about his time in his life.
I should!
Chin up! It gets easier!! Honest. Cooking with your 3.5 year old says to me your a good mommy… have faith and just do your best. And remember, your only human.