I think I shouted that more times this season than should really be allowed in a normal person’s life. My 8 year old son is always ready. He doesn’t play baseball for “fun,” remember. But still I shout it anyway because he is too old for me to shout how cute he looks in his baseball costumeuniform.
He was forced to take the past week off from playing baseball when he sprained his thumb. Not in a baseball game, but a rather unfortunate neighborhood Dodge Ball injury. He was so excited to get back in time to play the last game of the season. A game that would determine the first place winner in the 8U division.
Ironically enough they were playing the same team they beat in the first tournament and lost to in the second tournament.
It was about 9000 degrees out. (Yes, fellow Texas dwellers, there is no reason to point out to me that it will get hotter than this in the summer. I understand that. But still, it was HOT today.)
A fact which really has no bearing on the game. I just wanted to throw it out there so you could fully appreciate how much I was sweating. Also, look how cute he is.
It was a great game. For a couple innings it looked like we might not win. Then, the bottom of the final inning my son on first, two outs, the next boy up brought him home for the win. There was much cheering.
Saturday is the closing ceremonies. They will be getting their first place trophies. Baseball is officially over for everyone but my oldest son.
I have no idea what I am going to do with all my free time. Other than lounge by the pool. And sweat while I count to seven over and over again.
I know this isn’t going to make me popular, but I am going to say it anyway.
As a nation we sit around, yes sit, and complain that our children are growing lazy and fat. We wonder why. Could it be that we have placed so many rules and restrictions on their physical activities that it is no longer fun? If you have to strap on protective gear to ride your bike three houses down the street, are you going to ride your bike?
Want to ride your scooter? Strap on the elbow and knee pads along with your helmet. Who cares if you can no longer properly bend your limbs. That just means you won’t go as fast. That is safer. You probably won’t ride very often if you are uncomfortable, so that will exponentially decrease your risks of being injured.
I know the best outdoor activity. Just go sit in the yard. Not the front yard though, a pedophile might drive by and decide to kidnap you. Better make it the back yard. In the shade. Bring your DS outside so you have something to do.
Sadly this isn’t that far from the truth.
I have heard parents chastise their children for running outside. Running outside. Where are you supposed to run? Inside on a treadmill in a controlled environment?
Sure, you might fall. You might get scraped up. You might even break something. And while that would completely stink, it happens. One of my sons broke his nose mowing the lawn. Maybe face masks should be required when using a push mower.
I was talking yesterday to a good friend of mine about this very subject and how we have pathologized childhood.
We try to take away every single risk. We try to protect them from every single thing. But at what cost?
What happened to having a balanced approach to life, weighing risks and acting accordingly?
Similarly, the judgement that parents, mostly mothers, feel entitled to heft onto one another astounds me. I get so annoyed when I hear mothers justifying their actions, as if I am entitled to an explanation. If you feel it is safe to leave your child in the car and run into the 7-11 for a soda, good for you. I don’t need to hear about the big window through which you could see your car the entire time, or how it only takes one minute, or that you are packing a machine gun to cut anyone down who dare to comes near your car. I don’t care.
Or if you are the parent who thinks it is safer to get all the kids out of the car and make them stand next to the gas pump while you pump gas, wearing protective helmets and sunscreen, I say good for you too. Just don’t tell me that in order to be a good mother I need to also.
How I parent is not an indictment of your parenting. Nor is how you all parent an indictment of mine.
I wish more people would remember that.
We should get it printed on t-shirts.
This is why I have pointedly not discussed the helmet rules at our house, or the perceived non-sunscreen wearing. Though I do have to wonder if all children are expected to be ghostly white nowadays. Is this the new standard of negligent parenting? Tan children?
Maybe if I made them stay inside and play video games more…
Who doesn’t love ice cream? Who wouldn’t want to win FREE ice cream? WHO? I ask.
What about an ice cream party for your entire neighborhood? Wouldn’t you like to win that? Especially if you live somewhere with no neighbors and you could just eat it all yourself! Wait, was that selfish? Uh, forget I said that.
And since not everyone can win an ice cream party, I also have coupons for a free 1.5 quart for ten lucky people. Those you don’t have to share with any neighbors.
Click here to find out how to enter. Especially if you live in my neighborhood.
In other growing up too fast news, I had to scold Miles for kissing a little girl in the neighborhood who didn’t want to be kissed. When I told him that there was no more kissing allowed he collapsed on the kitchen floor, in obvious pain, crying, “But I want to kiss Ava. I looooooove her.” I never thought I would have to have to utter these words to my four year old, “No unwanted physical contact!”
I am not sure what I love more about the video… what he screams when he sees the camera. Or that he is shaping up to be quite a little stalker.
The tiny princess bike might met an unfortunate end. I think someone, who isn’t me, ran it over in the driveway. The tire is all bent and flat.
So late Saturday night I found myself at the store buying two new bicycles. One for my daughter who needed a larger bike so she could keep up with her friends without pedaling her legs five times for every one of theirs. When your knees are hitting your handle bars it is time.
I brought her home a purple and pink bike and also got her a basket for the front that has the Disney Princesses on it. She is able to conveniently keep her cigarettes and handgun in there.
Not sure how many more years (months?) the Princesses will be cool. She already told me that she wished I had bought her the Hannah Montana bike. No. Just no. I do have some standards, however much the line may blow in the breeze with inconsistency.
I brought Miles home this bike:
Isn’t it cute and free of licensed characters?
Wait, what is that the box says?
No brakes?
Surely that is not what Huffy means. It must mean something else. Right?
Why on earth would there be a bike with no brakes? How would you stop? How would you STOP, Huffy?
Of course I did not read the box before I bought the bike. I got home took the bike pieces out of the box and saw a huge sticker on the bike frame that said NO BRAKES. Even then I was in denial, thinking that it meant I had to INSTALL the brakes. Brakes that would surely be contained IN THE BOX.
Uh, no. I got out the instruction manual where I read that this bike does not have brakes. And it should be used with CAUTION. You think??? Maybe the box should say this bike is for children you don’t like: just add steep hills and traffic…
I stuck it back into the box while Miles cried that he could just stop by dragging his feet. But I thought that sounded a little dangerous, what with all the broken glass, hypodermic needles, and cobras littering the street. (No, I will never let it die. It makes me laugh too much.) There may have been swearing. Some of it by me.
I assured him that we would go back to the store first thing Sunday morning, right after breakfast.
7:00am Sunday morning I hear his bedroom door fling open. He comes running down the hall, down the stairs, before shouting, “I want my breakfast right now!”
We brought home a new bike. The Gravel Blaster.
This one has brakes.
Over at Work It, Mom! I have a recipe up for Banana Bread Pudding. Not bananabread pudding. Banana (pause) bread (pause) pudding. Or perhaps bread pudding with bananas.
Whatever you want to call it. It is delicious and you should go make it for your family. Then you will have a nice snack while you watch Backtalk.
Have you watched the latest Backtalk episodes?
We had new episodes this past month on the topics of:
Breastfeeding (Yes, apparently it is still controversial at times which completely boggles my mind.)
Body image (An area I still struggle with, though obviously not enough to actually WORK OUT and do something about it.)
Blogging about your teens (I am walking this line as are Kelly and Lindsay. Oh the stories I could share but chose not to. It kind of makes me wish I had never taught my children to read.)
(It was just as much fun as I thought it would be)
My eldest son found out yesterday that he made the summer baseball team that he tried out for last week. HURRRRRAAYYYYYYY!!!
His excitement is tempered only by the fact that he must cut his hair. The coach told the kids that everyone on the team will have short hair, no long haired hippies. Helllllooooo, Texas, you crazy, crazy state.
(I probably should wash my car someday, though I think the dirt might be what is holding the car together.)
He also needs some new baseball pants. I brought him to the store and he did not like the pants, for reasons that are completely inconsistent and irrational to everyone but him. After “discussing” said pants in the store, where the store owner agreed with me that the pants fit just fine and are in fact the pants the entire team will be wearing as their uniform, we left empty handed.
There was lots of eye rolling.
Mostly from me.
Because if they aren’t going to let you have long hair, do you honestly think they are going to let you wear whatever kind of pants you feel like? Huh? You don’t know? I do and the answer is NO.
(Today Miles is sporting his swim goggles, life vest, and suitcase filled with stuffed animals. He is ready for anything. Luckily this balances out the teenage angst in the house.)
Now we are home and he is glaring at me, in the way that only teenagers are capable. Clearly it is all my fault that the pants do not fit him in the way that he imagines they should fit. Which, for the record, it would seem he imagines CLOWN PANTS. I told him that Manny Ramirez probably has his pants custom made, and no, we will not be doing that.
Poor child, he is so deprived.
Or else retarded from all those years of riding his bike without a helmet through a mine field of cobras, broken glass, hypodermic needles and used condoms.
Last night Miles asked his 10 yr old brother to teach him how to ride a bike.
Miles climbed on the seat with instructions to “just keep pedalling.”
His brother ran behind him and pushed the bike as fast as he could…
And then he JUST. LET. GO. Much like people who teach kids to swim by tossing them into the pool, it was either ride the bike or crash.
I held my breath.
And watched him ride down the street, coming toward me. Getting closer and closer.
“Did you teach him how to stop?” I yelled.
“No, I kind of thought he would fall before he would need to know how to stop!”
He rode the (princess) bike up and down the street in front of our house as it got darker and darker outside. Everyone* in our family came outside to see him ride and cheer him on. Eventually the street lights came on we went into the house.
On the way up the front steps Miles grabbed his brother’s arm, “Thanks for teaching me to ride a bike!”
“You’re welcome.”
The sweetness** was too much for me to bear and I was forced to eat them.
*******
* Okay, not everyone. My daughter was incredibly angry and vocal with her anger that her younger brother dared to learn to ride a bike at 4 years old when she was not able to do so until she was almost six.
Since her cries of “Push him down and make him stop,” were not heeded by us she did the next best thing which was to stand on the edge where the driveway meets the street and scream on the top of her lungs like she was being dragged behind the bike instead of merely watching it drive by her.
** This morning when Rob left for work he discovered that someone had scratched the entire side of his car, probably with the handle of one of their bikes or scooters when they rode too close to the car. That was not so sweet.
