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The Terrible Threes

Don’t let anyone tell you there is such a thing as the Terrible Twos.  They might be trying, but only compared to the Ones in which the child is still delightfully lacking in willpower.  During the Twos, the child is discovering himself and what he is capable of doing and discovering that he has boundaries.  It is this sudden discovery of boundaries that, I imagine, causes most of the headaches.  This is still nothing compared to the Threes.

The Boy turned three in January this year and almost immediately Mommy and I noticed a marked change in his behavior.  His willpower seems to have increased exponentially and he is contentious on almost every issue. We have been told that he is testing his boundaries.  Yup, they’re still there.  Except he tests them on a regular basis as if expecting for them to suddenly vanish.  We seem to battle over everything now and I can not afford to lose even an inch.  No quarter given!  Especially not after he ate that penny a few weeks ago.  That is a story for another time.

Dinner seems to be the focal point each evening in the trials of the Three. The Boy, like so many other members of my family, does not do well when he hasn’t eaten in a while.  He gets cranky and even mild conflict can set him off on a rampage.  Couple this with the fact that he’s just been told he has to come inside to eat, and he’s going to eat the same thing as Mommy and Daddy and you have a nightly recipe for tantrums. Dinner becomes willpower warfare.

Go sit at the table please.
No. I don’t want to sit at the table.
Please sit at the table now.
No. I don’t want to eat.
Time Out for not doing what I say.[HYSTERICAL CRYING]
Time Out is over. Please go sit at the table.
[SITS AT TABLE AND CONTORTS FACE INTO A VISAGE WORTHY OF A GARGOYLE]
Take a bite please
I don’t want to eat that.
You have to eat and this is what we’re having tonight.
I don’t like it.
You haven’t even tried it yet.
How about 3 bites.
How about all the bites.
You have to feed me.
You are a big boy and can feed yourself.  Scoop a bite and eat it please.
Humph.
[DADDY LOADS A SPOON] There is a bite for you. Pick it up and eat it.
[PUTS BITE IN MOUTH] Whether or not he likes it is irrelevant.

From this point it could go a number of ways.  He could finish his plate.  This is probably the most rare circumstance.  He could reach a point that Mommy or I feel is acceptable and be excused from the table.  This happens sporadically and without pattern.  Most of the time he is given an ultimatum.  No Story and no Milk before bed if you don’t eat your dinner.  Sometimes we set a timer on the microwave giving him a countdown clock.  This usually has the effect of turning him into a screaming mess, but it gets our point across.  If you do not eat within a reasonable amount of time, you lose later privileges.

It sounds good in theory, but the problem is that The Boy doesn’t ever seem to learn the lessons we are teaching.  We are very careful not to backslide or to cave even once, because that would set a dangerous precedent and make gaining back the ground all the more difficult.  Yet he still pushes the same issues over and over.

We’ve been told we’re doing the right thing.  Yippee for us.  All I know is that I’m ready for Four and whatever change that brings.  Hopefully it will be for the better.

2013
03/16
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This was a triumph…

I like to play video games.  Specifically computer games.  I have been playing PC games since “Commander Keen.”  I still have most of the CDs to the games I’ve purchased over the years and a few of them would require me to build a custom PC as they are so old that they would not function on current technology. I have walked the halls of castle Wolfenstein, barrel-rolled through the tunnels of Descent, and spent a virtual millennia being the Mayor of SimCities.  I have been Gordon Freeman, Commander Sheppard, and the Dark Jedi Revan.  I have flown to the far reaches of space in Wing Commander, Freespace, and Tie Fighter.  I know what it means to be eaten by a Grue.

Ever since The Boy was born I have found there to be much less time to devote to gaming.  It isn’t just a lack of time, but many of the games I enjoy are much too intense for a two year old’s little brain.  The last thing I need is for him to witness a Team Fortress 2 match where characters are exploding all over the screen. So no TF2 while The Boy is awake and headphones on while he is asleep.

Since gaming is such a big part of my life it was inevitable that The Boy would pick up on it eventually.  It began innocently enough with a casual game called Peggle.  I don’t remember the specific order of events, but I ended up using it as a digital pacifier.  He was enthralled. He also decided that it should be called “Boom.” Eventually any time I sat down to the computer for any reason, he asked to play “Boom.”  I got tired of Peggle pretty quickly, but alas, The Boy would not be deterred. Then, last Christmas, I got Portal 2 by Valve Software.

I have been a huge fan of Valve Software ever since the first Half-Life game. Their games always have a very high level of polish and Portal 2 is no exception. Unlike every other First-Person-Shooter, the Portal gun does not shoot bullets, but instead fires traversable holes.  The levels are all puzzle based, with the player trying to find the best way to reach the exit using only portals and a few other objects provided in the levels. There is no gore, no swearing and no death. Well at least not visible, recognizable death.  So outside of the normal screen based reservations, I felt it safe for The Boy to experience.

He LOVES it. His favorite part is the big red button in each level. As soon as Chell, the main character, exits the elevator The Boy is already telling me to find the big button.

TB: “We hafta find the big button.”
Me: “Yes. We have to find the button, but we have to get a box first.”
TB: “Yes. Let’s getta box. Where da box go?”
Me: “I don’t know. We have to find it.”
TB: “OOOOHHH yes! We hafta getta box.”
The box is acquired.
TB: “We hafta find the big button.”
The big button appears on screen.
TB: “OOOOOHHH! There’s a big button!”

At the end of every stage there is an elevator that takes you to the next level.  Valve uses this, a bit more often than I’d like, to break the action and load the next level.  The Boy is not fazed.

TB: “Time to get in a alligator.”
Me: “It’s an elevator not an alligator.”
TB: “It’s a vator not alligator.”
Me: “Right.”
TB: “Vator not alligator.”
Me: “Right. Elevator.”
TB: “It’s loading.”
Me: “Yes still loading.”
TB: “We hafta find a big button!”
Me: “We will find the big button.”

I like sharing it with him.  It doesn’t matter that he doesn’t understand the witty dialogue, the subtext or even how the portals work.  He enjoys the game on his level, I get to enjoy it on mine and The Mommy gets to enjoy some alone time.

Next up will be to play through the original Portal and teach The Boy Jonathan Coulton’s epic epilogue song.  Then we’ll have some cake. No lie.

2012
03/05
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Actual conversation with the boy.

The following conversation occurred while putting the boy to bed.  He was drinking his milk and looking up at me
The Boy: Ewww.
Me: What’s Ewww?
The Boy: A bug in the sky.
Me: Where’s a bug in the sky?
The Boy: There’s a spider outside.
Me: You saw a spider outside?
The Boy: There’s a firetruck outside.
Me: There’s a firetruck outside?
The  Boy: Sooo I should drink a milk.
Goes back to drinking his milk.

2012
03/01
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The Best Ever Car

The Boy likes cars.  He especially likes race cars.  He has almost 30 Fisher Price Wheelies cars with two ramp play-sets and Zig the big rig.  They litter the floor like a used auto lot and turn up in the strangest places: behind the toilet, in the dishwasher, in the litter box (was thoroughly sanitized afterwards) in the bed somehow right after you’ve changed the sheets.  We even got him a play-mat from Ikea on which there are roads where he can drive his plethora of vehicles.  The Mommy even carries one or two with her everywhere she and The Boy go because he likes to drive them on everything and it keeps him quiet when quiet is required.

One of his favorite movies is Pixar’s Cars.  He watches it at least once a week.  He’s got several versions of Lightning McQueen to drive.  One of them even drives itself after being shaken.  He even had a Cars themed birthday party with a 3D cake shaped like Lightning McQueen and 6 mini-Mater cupcake cakes all hand decorated by my Wife and Sister.

So when I say, “The Boy likes cars,” you have some idea of what we’re dealing with.

I have mentioned before that I am into Lego.  Huge understatement. The Boy does enjoy the brick, not as much as I would like, but especially likes when he can, surprise, drive them around.  He’s not much of a builder yet, but he certainly has a good time pushing various creations of mine across the floor.  He has several fully realized Duplo vehicles like a dump truck, a garbage truck and a farm tractor but sometimes I will build him a Duplo train, which is fun because it weaves all across the floor, or any manner of stacked bricks on the wheel bases.  One night we had a great time ramming them through walls of loosely stacked bricks so they would collapse.  I would barely get 2 or 3 stacked up before he would attempt to knock them over.  That went on for an hour.

I told you all of that to tell you this.  A few months ago I put together a crude fire truck out of his Duplo.  When I say crude I mean only a two-year old could really conceptualize that this blocky mass could in any way be construed as a vehicle much less a fire truck.  It was red and yellow and had wheels, similarities end. The Boy thought it was great though and drove it around for a while before being distracted by some shiny thing or other and moving on.  Amazingly the “fire truck” has remained assembled.  It had made its way up to The Boy’s bedroom and he would occasionally play with it in the crib after naps when it was left within his reach.  Today when we went to get him after nap he had the “fire truck” in his hands and said, “This is the best ever car!”  He may not really believe that or even understand what he is saying, but that was pretty special for a few moments.  The “fire truck” that I built for him months ago surpassed all the other modes of transportation as the Best Ever.

High fives for me.

2012
01/28
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Self-correction

I wish I hadn’t waited so long to write again. Stuff happens. The Boy is well. He’s 22 months, healthy, growing and talking up a storm. He can hold a conversation with you and understand what it is you are conversing about. He is able to identify, by name. pretty much every picture in his picture books. He can say “obnoxious” and say it obnoxiously. He can already correctly pronounce words with l’s and r’s, something other kids have problems with until they are six. His ability to mimic is frightening. You only have to say something one time for him to repeat it perfectly complete with whatever gesture you made. He is the most linguistically advanced child of any we’ve met in his age group.

The Boy’s dialectic accomplishments are a double-edged sword. We have found ourselves dealing with “terrible two” behavior a little earlier than we expected. He learned the word “no” several months ago and until recently any time you asked him anything, he would respond with no. He says “ok” for yes, so we’ve at least been able to identify when he really wants something, but for the most part we are replied to in the negative. This had not stopped us from being good parents and making him do it, whatever it is, anyway.  We have recently wondered if we are being a bit too harsh on him when we tell him to stop doing something as a strange behavior has started to emerge.

A while back he was playing with some Duplo (baby Lego for those not in the know). I had made a “car” for him, little more than 4 or 5 bricks on a wheel brick base.  He was driving it around and it came apart, which they are designed to do.  He started crying and then “fussing” at himself for breaking it.

“Stop it!  Stop it! Breaked it! Stop it!”

Clearly he felt he had done something “bad” enough to warrant a punishment.  We didn’t really know quite what to do since what he had done wasn’t really anything bad at all.  We eventually went over to console him and calm down the hysteria.

Since then, when he’s doing something he knows is wrong and we start to get stern, he immediately follows up with “Stop it!”

We have also been using Time-Out as a method for punishment.  It is only moderately effective as he is able to entertain himself without the aid of toys or tv fairly well.  Regardless, he knows when he’s done something bad or is going to do something bad as he prefaces it with “Time Out?”

Our evening routine has added picking up our toys before going up to bed.  A large part of that is picking up all the Wheelies off the floor and putting them in the bucket.  We’ll say, “Pickup your cars and put them in the bucket please.” To which he responds by running away, playing with something else and then saying, “Time-Out?”  So then he goes to Time-Out.

He understands what is going on.  He knows when he’s doing something wrong.  We’re just not sure how to make him actually do the right thing instead of the wrong thing.  Parenting is confusing.

2011
10/15
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Sleepytime Menagere

I’ve been putting The Boy to bed recently.  This, of course, comes at the end of the bedtime cycle and is not nearly as traumatic.  Mommy told me that she sometimes had trouble getting The Boy to focus and drink his bedtime bottle. I wasn’t having that problem as I help him practice his animal noises and that seems to keep him distracted from wanting to get down or read a book or call the cat.
So here’s what we’ve been working on:
Monkey – oo oo ah ah
Elephant – lip trumpet
Tiger – rawr
Horse – neigh neigh
Cow – moooo
Chicken – bock bock
Pig – clearing throat
Duck – quack
Donkey – ee aw
Bird – twee
Mouse – quee
Kitty – (was) mee. (Now) meeow
Puppy – woof woof
Wolf – awoooooo
Squirrel – tongue click
Owl – who
Lion (same as tiger)
Bear (same as lion)
Frog – rib
Wookie – throat trill
Gorilla – (growling) uh uh (with accompanying chest pounding)

We are still having some issues with the gorilla. The Boy got the grunting down pretty fast but he’s a little confused on the chest pounding.  He seems to think that since I pounded my chest, he should pound my chest too. So he balls up his tiny fist and reaches out for me to lean in close where he then flails his fist against my chest.  I was so confused the first time he tried to hit me, and even though I’ve even showed him using his own hands how to beat on his own chest, he still insists on hitting mine.

Oh well, he’ll get it eventually.

2011
06/14
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My Copilot

I usually write about me and my experiences with The Boy.  Today, however, will be about the other person who has made all of this possible, The Boy’s Mommy.

Mommy is pretty special. How special you ask? Not only does she deal with The Boy every day, with the feeding, the dressing, the playing and the changing of poopy diapers, but she also takes care of the house, with the keeping it clean and the cooking and the laundry. She also holds down a part-time work from home job.

Mommy is a Search Engine Evaluator. It’s her job to make sure that what you type into google and other search engines brings up relevant results. She spends 3-4 hours a day evaluating queries usually during the time The Boy is napping. It’s not a glamorous job, but it affords her the ability to work from home or anywhere she has an internet connection. Mommy decided shortly after The Boy was born that she no longer wanted to work outside of the home. I was fine with this decision as I feel it’s important for The Boy to have as much parental contact as possible. Plus, I’m not a huge fan of the idea of someone else raising my kid in a daycare. If you have to use daycare I don’t think less of you. You have to do what you have to do. We would put the boy in if we had to, but thanks to Mommy we don’t, and for that I am grateful.

Mommy is like any good mommy in that she worries a lot.  She worries if The Boy is going to hurt himself.  She worries if he is getting enough to eat and if he’s growing at a normal rate.  She worries that he may not be getting enough quality time or that he’s not hitting development milestones on time.  She worries he might get stung by a bee or get shot out of a cannon (courtesy of Daddy).  I would be worried if she didn’t worry about any of those things, so I am grateful to her for that.

I am not the best husband, though she will defend me out in public.  I even missed the simple solution of getting her a Mother’s day card.  I spent hours and hours trying to figure out what I could do that was meaningful and wouldn’t cost more than we have to spend which essentially amounts to it being free.  My brain just doesn’t go to “card” though.   Sorry babe.  I’ll remember the card next year.

So my gift to her are these words, posted on the intertubes for all to see, so that all may know how much I love her and appreciate her herculean efforts at raising our son, The Boy, who is, at the moment, running around his Great Grandmother’s house wearing no clothes, with his arms over his head, cackling like a maniac.

Gotta go. He’s chasing the cat and I’m supposed to be watching him as the other part of my Mother’s day gift. I might need my cannon.

Love you babe. Happy Mother’s day!

2011
05/08
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Shaggy Dog

The Boy needs a haircut.  It will not be his first, but he hasn’t had one since the first, so… yeah. It’s time.  It’s not like his hair is in his face or he’s tripping on it or people are accusing him of looking like a hippie (other than me).  He is just turning into a little mop-head.  His hair looks, at the moment,  like a cross between Bieber hair (before Bieber got his hair cut) and 1968 Beatles mops.  I’m not saying he needs to be shaved bald like me, but I don’t want him looking like a hobo either.

So what’s the holdup? Why have we continually allowed him to look like a cast member of Hair?  It’s not that we haven’t tried.  You see, The Boy is a wiggler.  He is incapable of sitting still for longer than three seconds.  He is a perpetual motion machine.  If we could somehow harness his raw energy and bottle it we’d make a fortune.  The only time he isn’t spinning in 15 different directions is when he’s asleep, and I’ve already talked about how that works out. So we can’t cut his hair while he’s asleep, because it’ll wake him up and that’s the last thing that we want.

My mother apparently cut my hair while I slept when I was a baby.  I slept through anything.  According to legend, the neighbor had a dog that was outside my window and the dog barked all day and all night.  Thusly, I learned to sleep like the dead.  Not so with The Boy, and so cutting his hair while he’s asleep is not a valid option.

Also, I don’t know if you’re aware, but scissors are sharp.  So a scissors and whirling dervish combination is less than optimal.  We tried trimmers once, but he kept whipping his head around to see what the buzzing thing we were getting near him was.  We ended up being so afraid we were going to clip him that we just called off the haircut.

We have recently found that his activity slows like that of a yogi when he watches TV.  More specifically, Shaun the Sheep.  He will sit in my lap reclining against my chest and watch his daily half-hour’s worth of TV in complete stillness.  OK not “complete,” but he’s pretty still for about 10 minutes before he starts to get fidgety.  We don’t let him watch a lot of TV.  We figure it’s a pretty bad habit to start, especially since both The Wife and I (to a lesser degree) are addicts.  He loves to read books (bee?) and we prefer to encourage that.  Plus, even if it’s not true, there’s still the nagging rumor that Babies + TV = Autism.  See this post.

So today I did a trial run of sorts and clipped his finger and toe talons while he sat in my lap watching the three allotted Shaun shorts (three per half hour episode).   It actually worked out really well.  It almost seemed as if cutting his nails was as equally interesting as the show.  He didn’t fidget, fight or pull away.  I deemed the exercise a success and granted a foray into hair cutting.

I will of course post the results of the haircut when we build up enough courage to attempt it.  Don’t expect pictures.

2011
03/27
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The Fett

I’m going to let my geek hang out a bit and share with you a couple of my obsessions.  I have had these for a very long time and despite many attempts on others’ parts to mock or shame me, I resolutely continue to cling them like a baby monkey on its mother.

I love LEGO.  Note that the usage is correct.  Sheep is the plural of sheep. LEGO is the plural of LEGO.  I did spend a great many years calling them Legos, but have seen the error of my ways.  Beginning when I was 5 or 6, upon receiving my first Classic System Space set, I embarked upon a lifelong addiction love affair with those plastic bricks.  My wife doesn’t really understand, but she is kind enough and accepting enough to allow my neurosis to continue.  I really don’t think she could stop it if she wanted to.  It would be like trying to stop a mile-long freight train.  So the collection grows annually. Mostly at birthday and Christmas, but from time to time I will pick up sets that are on a special sale.

I also love Star Wars, but to a lesser degree now than I did a few years ago.  I was not fortunate enough in my youth to have any of the Star Wars toys.  I was given a choice between my many interests and LEGO typically won out.  That did not stop me from watching all three movies every weekend once we got copies of them on VHS.  Nor did it stop me from standing up and cheering in the theater when I heard about the theatrical re-issue of the original trilogy in 1997.   I have a life-sized cardboard stand-up of Darth Vader.   I have a 30 inch vinyl decal of Vader’s helmet on the back window of my car.  I own and regularly listen to the complete soundtracks as composed by John Williams.  As to the lesser degree I mentioned earlier, I fell out of “the faith” when Episodes I, II, and III hit the screens.  I won’t go into detail here. Many others have ripped those movies apart, and rightly so.  Suffice to say I saw each of them once and then promptly disavowed of their existence.  When I discuss Star Wars I am only ever talking about Episodes IV, V, and VI.

Imagine my delight, though, when in 1999 LEGO and Lucas Arts partnered together to bring the world the greatest licensing deal ever.  They were going to make official Star Wars LEGO sets.  Glee!  The first run of sets wasn’t fantastic, but there was promise and I eagerly snatched up what I could where I could.

So I have told you all of that to tell you this.  I have a LEGO Boba Fett mini-figure magnet on my fridge.
http://www.bricklink.com/catalogItemPic.asp?G=852552
He’s the one on the left.  I have the other two also.  They came as a set.  Yes, that is a LEGO Slave Leia.  Yes, I think it’s hysterical.  Why is this important?  Why would you care what is on my fridge?  You care because The Boy cares.

One night while eating his dinner in his high chair in the kitchen, The Boy pointed in the general direction of the fridge.   Not knowing at exactly what he was pointing since his little arm kind of waves around a bit, I started to point to various items on the fridge myself.  I eventually ended up with LEGO Boba Fett.  That caught his attention.  I removed it from the fridge and held it in front of The Boy.  This greatly interested him.  So I explained who the character was.
“Boba Fett,” I said and waved it in front of The Boy’s face while deftly avoiding his banana covered fingers.   I repeated it a few more times and then returned Boba to his place on the fridge.  It didn’t take The Boy 5 minutes to figure out how to say “Boba?”  I must say, the first time I heard it I think I cried a little from pride.

That was last week.  This week The Boy has decided that he won’t eat unless he has a look at “Boba?” every other bite.  I still won’t let his sticky fingers touch it though.  Some decorum must be preserved.  “Boba?” once or twice was cute, however 15 times in a row makes it lose some magic. It gets him to eat, though, so what are ya gonna do?

I think I just need to teach The Boy something else.

2011
03/09
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The Un-sleepening

The Boy does not like to go to sleep.  He never has and most likely never will.  He has gotten better over the past few months and has surprised us recently with sleeping all the way through the night.  For the most part he just fights his way into slumber every time he hits the mattress.

I do like sleep. I like it a lot. I do have trouble making myself go to bed, though.  Maybe The Boy gets that from me.  It’s not like he’s ever awake when it’s time for me to go to bed and can see me resist and stall and putter around so I’m not sure how he picked up that behavior.

His first couple of months home from the hospital were pretty brutal on everyone involved, especially his Mom.  He would wake up every two hours or so to eat and then not go back to sleep.  He would only sleep if he was swaddled tight enough to cut off circulation in any other creature.  Also he had to be held by his head and his rump and bounced endlessly.  We also figured out early on that he slept best in his bouncer seat with the vibration turned on.  So. Many. Batteries.

Around 4 months old he surprised us by sleeping through the night.  As new parents, when we woke we had a moment of terror, but after a quick check discovered he was, in fact, not dead.  Then at month 5 he decided sleeping through the night wasn’t cool or hip or whatever the kids are calling it these days.  He went back to waking up every couple of hours to feed.  This was not a welcome change.  We endured sleepless nights for 4 more months before we finally manned up and let him cry it out one evening.   Within three nights he was back to sleeping almost all the way through the night.  He would wake up about 5am have a bite and head back off to sleep and then wake up again at 8ish.  Mostly acceptable.

Daytime naps are something altogether different.  I don’t usually have to deal with those as I am at work, but I do hear about them every day.  “Your child wouldn’t nap today.”   Why is he “my” child when he doesn’t sleep.  As if ownership can be changed at any point. Sheesh.

So The Boy doesn’t like to go to sleep.  Some babies can be driven to sleep.  I was one of those babies.  In fact that was one of the many tools in my parents’ arsenal.  They would put me in the car, drive around the block 3 times and, as if by magic, I would be asleep.  This does not work for The Boy.   At least not at sub-interstate feeds.  He used to fall asleep once we hit 70 mph.  He also used to be reclined in a rear facing “bucket” seat.  Once he turned one year old, we switched to the “big boy” seat that faces forward.  Well now there’s just so much to look at that he may not ever sleep in the car ever again.

We took a trip to Great-Grandmother’s house which is about an hour and a half away.  It was late evening so the sky was dark, but there was a fair amount of light from cars and highway lighting.   We expected him to fall asleep.  He always fell asleep on this trip before, but this was the first time facing forward.   He kept himself awake the entire time.  As we were making  the last few turns I glanced back and the poor little kid had his head resting on the side of the car seat, his eyes wide and staring like he had seen some  kind of war atrocity.  He had worked himself into a sweat and his hair was plastered to his head and his jammies were soaked.  He never cried though.  He just didn’t want to miss anything I guess.

Maybe the next kid will be a sleeper.  I can dream.

2011
02/19
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